Nothing to put you in the holiday spirit like a little snow!

We're having a little snow. Nothing major, less than 6" of accumulation, but it does look all pretty and Christmassy, especially to those of us who do not (heh) have to go out and drive to work in it. (Hey, there has to be an occasional upside to months of unemployment!) Sadly, the R.C. did have to go out and drive in it, to her temp job. We all hope she made the perilous three-mile journey without incident.

I do have bits and pieces of holiday shopping to complete, and a package or two to ship. For those reasons, I hope the weather is better tomorrow. (After all, I have a temp gig of my own that begins on the 17th and runs through the end of the year. Gotta be done by next Monday!)

To do me credit, I'm almost done with the shopping portion of my preparations. I haven't started the shipping portion yet, though, and the pile of cards sitting across the room reminds me that I haven't finished those yet, either.

How can someone unemployed be so busy they haven't had a chance to get these things done? It's hard to say, but between the hour or so a day I spend on the job sites, the hour or so I spend emailing/phoning with Bernie & Her (I swear I'm going to start charging them for the time one of these days....), spending at least an hour getting ready for each interview plus an hour in the interviews and the hour or so of drive time for each of them--well, the days are just packed. Being unemployed is, some days, almost a full-time job in itself.

I'm going to do better today, though. I'm going to sit right down and finish up my cards this morning. (Unless Bernie emails to confirm that he wants me to finish up that website project after all....)

Lots of news happening these days. Americans split on mortgage bailout says one headline. Big surprise there. People who knew they couldn't pay for a house were enticed into taking on mortgages that virtually guaranteed they'd be in trouble in five years and now everyone's acting all surprised that the housing industry is headed toward disaster and hundreds of thousands of people are headed toward financial ruin. Even someone as financially stupid as me saw this one coming, so why are the national press and our so-called leaders acting shocked and surprised?

I'm pro-bailout, myself, not because I think the people or the lending institutions deserve to be bailed out of a problem they knowingly contributed to, but because I don't want a recession.

And Ask.com is adding a feature that lets people delete their search results from the search engine servers? I like the move toward insuring privacy.

The writer's strike continues apace in the world of television. I'm rooting for the writers, of course. They produce the material and are entitled to fair compensations for it. Having been chiseled out of payments for video and dvd sales, I think it's fair that they now be paid for the new internet streaming-produced revenue.

Unbelievably, some people are still debating whether or not water-boarding is torture. Me? I say you grab someone off the street, smuggle them to a foreign country, and lock them up secretly for years? That's a crime even before you start terrorizing and torturing them.

In 2006, Vice-President Cheney defended water-boarding.

Asked on a radio programme whether "a dunk in water is a no-brainer if it can save lives?" he replied: "Well, it's a no-brainer for me, but for a while there I was criticised as being the vice-president for torture. We don't torture."

On the other hand, Senator and Republican presidential candidate John McCain, who was tortured by the North Vietnamese as a prisoner of war, has said that water-boarding is torture: "It no different than holding a pistol to his head and firing a blank."

Yes. It's torture and everyone knows it, including Cheney.

Bush & Buddies certainly are leaving a nasty, nasty situation for whoever next occupies the White House, aren't they? They've wrecked us both domestically and internationally now. I wonder if they have any other big plans for their last year in power?

Excuse me now. I have to go try and recapture my holiday spirit so I can finish my cards.