The faucet is now ON

This fall, November 1 was the day the faucet turned on. October was gorgeous, with day after day of sunshine. Beginning November 1, and for the foreseeable, we're looking at rain and then more rain. Now, I'm not a huge fan of rain, and after two years in the valley I still can't get used to monsoon season, but I'm even less of a fan of cold, and in my book 50 degrees is not cold, so I'm not going to complain too much.

Willow has been back in business for three days now, and she's steadily improving and losing the 'tude. The left-side shenanigans of a few weeks ago have now shifted entirely to the right side (traveling haunches-in, or leg yielding wildly out of the circle). Whenever a problem I'm having with a horse flip-flops like that, I count it as progress. And tonight I discovered that, as usual, most of the problem is actually my fault. I realized that as soon as Willow started to travel crooked, I pitched forward ever so slightly. So I focused on sitting back and driving with my seat, and was able to straighten Willow out almost instantly. She's really sensitive, and apparently even the slightest feeling of me leaning forward really confuses her. One more mystery solved.

If you haven't voted early, make sure you get out and vote tomorrow! Willow gets tomorrow night off while I watch election results. Whichever way things go, history will be made.

Obama's speech

I'm back from attending a MoveOn.org party at a local market, where we watched Obama's nomination acceptance speech. There was a competing party at the community center, so the get-together I attended was just a handful of people, but we were boisterous and patriotic. Two people brought their dogs, and one lady bought her pet rat, which perched on her shoulder the whole time. It was a fun group.

My dog Sam's lameness turns out to be a strained ligament, so yay, no surgery required. The vet says it may take six weeks to fully heal, and I'm to limit Sam's activity in the meantime. Sam is a German shorthair, so the vet's orders are fairly amusing.

Portland loves Obama too

Barack back in Eugene!

Barack Obama visited Eugene again yesterday, and this time he speechified on the quad, so a lot more people could get in. Unfortunately, I didn't know about this visit until Thursday, and I had fun dental surgery scheduled for Friday morning. Too late to cancel! Between the very sore mouth and the Darvocet, standing around for a few hours just wasn't gonna happen. But it looks like he got an awesome turnout again!

My mouth was feeling a lot better today, but the dentist warned me not to exert myself overly for a couple days lest I start bleeding again (yuck), so I lunged and did work in hand with Willow. Normally my three sounds to communicate with her while lungeing are cluck, trill, and kiss, and I couldn't do any of those with my mouth in its current state. Oh well. She still worked hard for me.

Ask John Yoo

Do you need someone to write you a legal opinion to justify your questionable, illicit, barbaric, or just plain reprehensible actions? Problem solved!

Ask John Yoo!

Yes, We Can

More on Obama

Here's a video somebody took on the soccer field. I actually had a much better view of the senator than this person did, but at least this gives you an idea of the size of the crowd and our enthusiasm!

Obama in Eugene

Barack Obama spoke at Mac Court in Eugene this evening at 9 p.m. I got in line at 5 p.m. There were already two insanely long lines wrapping around both sides of the arena and on down past the track and field center.

I made friends with a nice lady named Joyce. I had also brought along a book to read, but Joyce and I passed the time chatting. We were lucky to get an evening with no rain. At 7 p.m. the doors opened and the line started moving slowly. We were four or five blocks from the entrance, and there was another line, just as long as ours, off in the other direction. But everyone was hopeful we'd get in. There were at least as many people in line behind us as in front of us.

The line kept moving, and we were a block and a half from the entrance. I called a friend whom I knew had gotten in and asked, how many seats are still open? Maybe 10%, he said. Uh oh. About ten minutes later volunteers came by and told us the arena was full. BUT . . . Obama would make a brief appearance on the soccer field behind the arena before the rally. Off we trooped to the soccer field!

Can you see the hope?

No one had a clue where the senator would appear, so Joyce and I just chose a spot randomly. We were in the middle of a crowd and couldn't see much of anything. People started to cheer, and we could hear Obama speaking. Suddenly I realized he was right in front of us!

I know that looks like a smear, but I swear, that's Obama. He spoke for about five minutes, then shook as many hands as he could, and off to the rally he went. As we were walking back to the car, we could hear Mac Court rocking and rolling. Oh well, at least I can honestly say I got to hear him speak in person.