Another Friday, another drive up to LMU to rescue my college freshman from a weekend on campus. It’s a beautiful campus, but the town is smaller than our high school. It would have been cruel to leave Tommy up there for a three day weekend. Besides, he is actually starting to make friends during the week, so the weekend of forced interaction with peers is slightly less urgent now. I don’t love driving. In my fantasy world I have a driver and I get to spend my time in the car reading books, working on lists and writing. My real life is far less glamorous.

I got away later than I intended because I had to make a last minute supply drop at the high school for the 10th grader. “I need a bun sized hair net by 3 pm.” Eventually, Evan and I headed out of town. Well, we went the wrong way and ended up at East Town Mall, THEN we headed out of Knoxville. Have I mentioned that I am completely directionally impaired? Oh. Sorry. We traveled along happily until we came to an abrupt standstill on the Interstate that lasted about 20 minutes after which traffic resumed normal behaviors. I guess it was just some sort of pretend you live in Atlanta social experiment or something. As everyone resumed normal speeds and spaces between cars, it was clear than the 20 minute interruption had disturbed some of the other drivers. Right before my eyes, the cars around me became animated Wacky Races contestants. Cars drove in the grassy median and the paved emergency lane. Motorcycles weaved so closely between cars you could have touched them with your hand. Someone pulled the Speed Buggy lift the body of your car up and over another car move. The aggressive driving was so absurd I thought we were being filmed for a B-movie.

I thought things would get easier when I got on the long, straight drive that is Hwy 63. I was wrong. The cartoon cars just added trailers with boats and Jet Skis. Instead of the usual smell of the tobacco fields to add atmosphere, the road was absolutely covered with the remains of skunks. I don’t know if there was an escape at some local skunk breeder’s farm or if that rural road is the direct path for skunk migration, but I have never seen such Pepe Le Carnage. Each furry spot on the road radiated a smell that covered a quarter of a mile. My passenger began a campaign of complaint. “Poo smell. Smell poo. Where poo? Yucky poo.” It didn’t help that the mermaid cartoon ended as we were traveling down skunk road. “Tv all done. No more car. I done. No car!”

On one of the rare stretches of road when the speed limit is actually above 45, I peeked over a hill to see a trooper’s car blocking the road in front of me. Everyone morphed from cartoon into real human beings as we pulled over and watched a helicopter land in the road. An ambulance rushed to the chopper. Everyone silently watched. Well, everyone except the one animated weasel from Roger Rabbit. Maybe it was a hyena from The Lion King. That one moron tried to drive in the grassy median to get past the helicopter. Several of us got out of our cars and gave that driver the evil eye, but it took a trucker’s horn beep alerting the nearby troopers to get the reckless driver to stop and wait for the emergency scene to get out of the road. As quickly as it landed, the Lifestar helicopter was in the air and on its’ urgent journey and the road was clear for drivers. The rest of the trip was calmer as all the drivers on the road thought about the family of the person in the helicopter. I briefly imagined myself on the gurney in the chopper with a medic holding a giggling Evan. Evan would throw goldfish crackers at my head while yelling, “Go faster.”

By the time I got to LMU I felt drained. I looked forward to the ride home with Tommy beside me doing his running commentary routine. Instead, 18-y-o Tommy hopped in the backseat to watch cartoon rats with his 3-y-o brother. I turned on the radio’s comedy channel to try and stay awake. I snickered at Patton Oswalt the stand-up while the boys laughed at Patton as Remy. I think Patton Oswalt is the only reason I made it home safe and sane.

I will NOT question Sarah Palin’s feminism. Feminism is about the freedom to be who you want to be and not be limited by someone else’s inability to accept that women are not a lesser gender. I do not care if people talk about how beautiful she is. Complaining about a politician’s appearance is as silly as complaining about them being too charismatic. I don’t care if she has some relatives with problems. I will not participate in paranoid conspiracy theories. I do take issue with anyone who thinks that women will automatically vote for another woman. The only thing that matters is that I disagree with Sarah Palin’s politics. I think her policies are an environmental and ecological disaster. I think that her outspoken anti-choice stance is extremely dangerous, not just for abortion rights, but for the right to prevent pregnancy. I think her stance against marriage rights for all people is wrong. Teaching creationism and abstinence only sex education in schools is backward.

I am sick to death of otherwise sane people cackling like the Graeae about people instead of policies. Post after post about someone’s pantsuit or someone else’s haircut is a distraction we don’t need. You don’t know what I’m talking about? How about this - I don’t like the way Michelle claps as though she’s afraid a fingernail will break. It is as insincere looking as the beauty queen parade wave. Does that matter? No! Do I think everything Obama wants to do is possible? No. Ten years to free ourselves of our addiction to foreign oil? Not going to happen. Instead of laughing about the impossibility of that, I know that we have to keep moving in the direction to make it happen. I believe that the erosion of civil rights, the disappearing middle class and the increasing us against them attitude is bad for America. I believe that a hot-tempered, older version of George Bush will do less for this country than an intelligent, well-spoken, idealistic, young dreamer.

Now, stop calling anyone who disagrees with you made-up names and start acting like we are all on the same team. We all want what is best and no matter who is elected, we have to work together to do the right thing. This planet is too small to do otherwise. Somebody make an online election advent calendar and let’s look forward November sixth. November fifth is officially the “accept what we have and make it work” day.

No class method - Roadside sofas
Drive to North Knoxville. Find a road with several sofas littering the roadsides. Put your sofa with its’ peers. Drive away. I’m not sure why people do this or how they get away with this big time littering, but it is clearly a popular practice.

College student method - Bonfire
It doesn’t matter if it’s one sofa or a dozen sofas, you set those suckers on fire and sit around watching them burn. I’m surprised college students aren’t regularly hospitalized for inhaling what must be toxic sofa fumes. I’m equally perplexed as to how poor college students regularly have multiple sofas to burn. Perhaps they collect the roadside sofas to fuel their bonfires.

Environmentally incorrect method - Put with trash
Disassemble bottom and arms of sofa to rediscover all the small toys that have been missing for months and years. Call trash service to request a large item pickup. Put sofa at your curb with a six-pack of unopened sodas for the trash collectors who have to deal with your heavy, stinky sofa.

Future “How to” posts will list options for getting rid of the evil cat that peed all over the sofa and alternative seating choices for a living room with no sofa.

Yesterday, the dogs did their someone’s out front bark (casual woofs), followed by their someone’s in our yard bark (the barking equivalent of a car alarm) and I got excited with them. Someone in the yard might mean the UPS driver is cautiously maneuvering his way through the mine field that is our front yard. The children all get excited when the mail comes and fight over who will retrieve it from the mailman. I know that the mailman only brings bad things. Good stuff comes in boxes from package delivery services. I was sorely disappointed that it was just a pamphlet pusher. Our neighborhood has an unusually high number of people home in the daytime and lacks a cut-through that would encourage high speed cars, so the pamphlet people love to visit us. Our pamphlet people come in all varieties. Some of them want you to buy something. Others want you to sign a clipboard. There are even some who want you to join their club. The conversations are all pretty much the same.

Pamphleteer: “Hello! My name is ___ and I’d like to give you this pamphlet about ___.”
Me: “No thank you.”
Pamphleteer: “It’s okay, once won’t hurt.”
Me: “Sorry, we’re paperless.”
Pamphleteer: “I just have to hand out seven in the next hour and my wish will come true.”
Me: “No. I don’t think so.”
Pamphleteer: “I haven’t eaten for three days and . . . ”
Me: “DOUG!”
Pamphleteer: “I’m working my way through school and . . . ”
Me: “Doug, the pamphlet person won’t go away!”
Pamphleteer: “I get paid by the pamphlet and . . . ”
Doug: “Name drop whoever we know that uses the same pamphlet.”
Me: “Our good friend ___ has already given us one of these.”
Pamphleteer: “Oh, good. Have a nice day.”

I like it better when Doug answers the door.

BlogHer is coming to Nashville this October to learn that not only is Tennessee the blogging state, but East Tennessee is THE blogging capital. East Tennessee blogging women and women who just need a nudge to go from blog reading to blog writing need to register today. Yes, it would be nice if everyone would put my name in the space for referrer when registering. If you do, it helps me get to Nashville. Maybe I can get myself there faster than Doug can get me there. Even if I’m not there, I still want you to be there. Show BlogHer our southern hospitality and the strong women who make this state wonderful. Gather together on October 16th and share a pitcher of sweet tea.

Dad: “Let’s plan this week’s menu democratically.”
Amy: “What’s that mean?”
Me: “It means we fight amongst ourselves.”

Monday is Doug and I’s anniversary. We’ll probably celebrate by giving each other a kiss on the cheek as we pass each other on the staircase. We see each other several times a day when Doug comes up from his dungeon to get a fresh pot of coffee and I walk down to move laundry from the washing machine to the dryer. Otherwise, it’s all Skype and Twitter. Twitter people get queasy if someone tweets about adult activities during office hours, but we could probably get away with some racey Skype interaction. Just in case we have 3- 13 minutes alone and uninterrupted by urgent phone calls, I washed Doug’s favorite marital aids today. “Wait, my leg went numb. Maybe if I bend like this.” “Ow, you’re cutting off my circulation.” “Okay, maybe if I lean here I could, ouch - I’m getting a cramp like this.” “Here, try putting this here and that there.” “Oh, yes. That feels so much better.”

The pillows are clean and fluffy for propping up middle aged body parts. In seemingly unrelated news, Doug thinks he’s going to go for a run every night.

My brother makes me laugh.