What I've Done, and What I Ought to Do

Ow! Pepper!

Pepper!

Darn it, Pepper!
(She was much less visible than in the first shot here.)

Done:

• Went to church, barely on time, too late to serve at Mass. This was just as well, because last night I stubbed my toes badly on a wooden bookcase, tripping over a certain black dog in the dark. Limping up the aisle with candle in hand probably wouldn't be a good idea. I may have a broken toe or two, but since I can't afford a doctor I'll never know whether this is the case.
• Did a sinkful of dishes. One down, one to go.
• Took a much-needed nap.
• Sat on a bench at the dog park with an acquaintance there, a journalism student, as the dogs tried to work out what to do if they couldn't follow me around the track. They managed to have fun anyway. My new friend, who broke a toe recently herself, said that all they can do for broken toes is wrap them, and maybe have you wear a special boot.
  
• Bought groceries (and first aid tape) and made dinner.
  
• Returned a friend's phone call.
  
• Made minor progress on my unread mail.
• Admonished Cayenne for stepping on my toes. Yes, those toes.
  
• Spent an hour or two editing a version of last night's entry, and submitted it to Huffington Post's Off the Bus pages.
• Fussed around with a few more avatars so I could submit a choice of headshots to HuffPo.
• Experimented with templates and template widths on my test blog and on the Musings from Mâvarin archive blog. Musings now uses the Minima Stretch template, which makes the posting area wide enough to accommodate much larger photos than you see on the Outpost. I've tried to widen the template I use here, but the code is harder to parse than Minima and I haven't been able to make it work properly so far.
• Did another load of dishes. My mistake: two down, one to go.
  

Need to Do:

• More dishes, and clean up the kitchen generally.
• Open the Peachtree Accounting software I bought in 2005 and familiarize myself with it before tomorrow afternoon. Why? I finally have a job interview!
• Catch up with my Twitter feed (okay, so that's more of a question of what I want to do).
• Clear out more email.
• Design more buttons on request, and print out. That can probably wait until tomorrow.
  
• Soak my feet and wash my hair.
• Get some sleep!
  

Karen

A Blue-Green Oasis in McCain's Own Red State

This is essentially the rough draft of an entry I'll be submitting to The Huffington Post. That version, if it happens, will probably be shorter, and with only one photo. Okay, let's give this a shot!

Both of Tucson's Congress members are Democrats.

When John and I came to Arizona in 1986, it didn't take us long to get the lay of the land, geographically and culturally. Phoenix, where John's sister lived, was a huge megalopolis, its desert mostly obliterated in favor of car dealerships, shopping malls, golf courses and swimming pools. Tucson, although growing, was a much more manageable size, and you could see desert plants such as saguaros and prickly pears even in the heart of the city. (I'm sorry to say this is less true now, 22 years later.) Phoenix gave off a vibe of being formal and well-to-do. Tucson was informal and scrappy. Phoenix was full of Republicans (Barry Goldwater, Evan Mecham, John McCain), and Tucson full of Democrats (Mo Udall, Dennis DeConcini, Tom Volgy). So naturally, we moved to Tucson.

Making Obama buttons I designed for the local campaign office.

But aside from voting, the occasional blog entry and the odd contribution, I didn't really get involved in politics until this year, somewhere around the time of the two conventions. A volunteer called and asked me to help with canvassing and phone banking, but I refused on the grounds of severe discomfort due to shyness. The volunteer then suggested that I might do office work for the local Obama campaign, primarily data entry. Was I familiar with Excel spreadsheets? Heck yeah! I was, after all, a recently-unemployed staff accountant.

So I came in the next day and the next, recording the results of phone calls to Democrats in Arizona and New Mexico. There was no Obama campaign office per se, but much of the activity at the Pima County Democratic Headquarters was centered on the presidential race. One day I sat with several older women, one of whom joked we were "old white women for Obama." The next day the office had a hot-selling button with that very slogan. That's when I offered to take my laptop home and start designing Obama buttons. "Middle Class for Obama," "Book Lovers for Obama" and (my favorite) "Barkers for Barack Obama," featuring my dogs' pictures, were among the initial designs. The line has expanded considerably since then in response to people's requests. Another volunteer named Barb is in charge of the button production. Each of us loaned a buttonmaker to the campaign, but she orders the parts, creates some of the designs and keeps an eye on what sells.

As I've worked on buttons or data entry, I've heard the volunteers' end of lots of phone conversations, and the occasional discussion in between calls. Much of the effort has been directed toward getting out the vote in New Mexico, considered much more of a swing state than Arizona. Arizona, after all, is John McCain's constituency as senator. Heck, I've voted for him myself a few times. (Never again!) One day, someone expressed her annoyance about the emphasis on our neighboring state. "New Mexico only has three electoral votes," she said.

"How many does Arizona have?" I asked.

"Ten."

At one point I was told that Arizona itself had become a swing state, but I've seen little evidence of this. Even here in Tucson, pressures are brought to bear on behalf of the Republican ticket. One day I heard a rumor that a local Catholic church allowed an independent group to add a flier to its Sunday bulletin, promising damnation for anyone who votes for Barack Obama or Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords. I've found no evidence online that this actually happened, but I would not be surprised if it did. Similar problems cropped up here in 2006.

As we get down to the end of the campaign, though, and more and more states come into play for the Democrats, things seem to be picking up here. Governor Janet Napolitano was in Tucson on Saturday, hosting a breakfast event for Obama. Next weekend, Robert Reich and Gabrielle Giffords will be hosting another event. Tucson's other member of the House of Representatives, Congressman Raúl M. Grijalva, has been campaigning for Obama since the end of January, and loaning out his own campaign headquarters for debate parties and other Obama volunteering and events.

A local church hosts an anti-war rally.

On Friday night, October 17th, Grijalva hosted an event involving the "Obama tour bus." I decided to take some of my buttons, drive down there and check it out. Somehow I expected a traditional rally, with people standing outside carrying signs. But it wasn't like that at all. I did, however, see something like that on the way over. Outside one of the more socially active churches in town, about a dozen people were holding up anti-war signs at a major intersection along Speedway Boulevard. (Sorry the photo isn't better; it was around sunset and at a distance.)

Friendly volunteers from the Obama tour bus

The Obama-Grijalva event was a more sedate affair. Outside a converted house off Fourth Avenue, there was a white bus bearing Obama logos and such. Tables were set up in the yard, and volunteers sold T-shirts and signs and buttons and stickers. I left to find an ATM, and came back with cash for a T-shirt.

Wine and mini-chimis for the Grijalva campaign.

Inside the building, people were milling around, drinking white wine and chatting, and eventually eating a spread of Mexican finger foods. Mr. Grijalva himself said hello to me and I responded, but by the time I worked up the nerve to say anything more he was off talking to his campaign manager (or someone).

Congressman Raul Grijalva

Eventually I approached the Congressman properly, explaining that although I'm not in his district I've been hearing good things about him for years. He seemed genuinely pleased. I then asked to take a photo, explaining it was for my blog. At first he asked what a blog was, but it turned out he was putting me on. He asked whether my blog was "left wing," and I said I wrote about a lot of things, not just politics.

"But politically, is it left wing?"

Slightly nonplussed by the terminology, I said that I had pro-Obama and Giffords stuff on my sidebar, and offered to add him to it. (I prefer to think of myself as "Democrat" or "moderately liberal.") I went on to say that I was hoping to submit my first article to Huffington Post soon. He approved.

The truck in front of my car represented the opposition.

When I got back in my car and turned on the headlights, they illuminated a "NOBAMA" and a McCain sticker on the truck in front of me. Ah, well. Can't win 'em all.

Karen

P.S. Another HuffPoster reported on the Napolitano appearance. Her entry is here.

Just for fun

Round Robin: A Tucson Ramble

My local gas station, Hanson's Good To Go, Oct 12th.

This week's Round Robin Photo Challenge: Photograph Your Home Town comes to us from Marie of Photographs and Memories. I've done quite a few photo essays about Tucson over the past four and a half years, covering downtown landmarks, bridges, parks, the desert, sunsets, etc. (I'm not going to bother with most of the links; there are too many of them. But you may want to click on the Tucson tag on the sidebar and scroll back a few screens.) For this one, I decided to go with "ordinary" places in Tucson: businesses I drive past and other street scenes. All of these shots were taken this month, and most of them in the past 24 hours. Here we go! Click on each photo to see larger versions, in some cases much larger.

Hanson's again, Oct 18th, showing Wilmot businesses

Let's start with two views of the gas station nearest my house (more or less). Hanson's isn't a franchise of one of the major oil companies, and its gas is usually almost but not quite the lowest in town. I like the prices, the architecture, the convenience, the service and the individuality of the place and try to give it all my business. Notice that regular unleaded went down from 3.06 to 2.89 in less than a week. That helps!

A Sun Tran bus picks up at Reid Park on Country Club Road.

Part of the side of that same bus.

The local bus service is called Sun Tran. I don't like to ride buses myself (less autonomy, more delays and motion sickness), but several of my friends ride them all the time. Some of the buses, including the one shown above, have colorful and interesting artwork on every side.

I've never been to Home Plate, but I assume it's a sports bar and grill. There is also a bar on Craycroft near the Davis-Monthan Air Force Base entry gate called 3rd Base Bar. I like the clever names, and the fact that these two business names are related. John points out that third base is "the last stop before home."

A unique Tucson business bites the dust.

Late this afternoon I drove downtown for an Obama Bus Tour event. On the way down Speedway, I noticed that Greasy Tony's has closed and the building is for sale. Although I never ate there, that seems a shame to me. It was a non-chain business and a student hangout sort of place, and it was around long before we got here in 1986. But I suppose its time was up.

The Obama bus outside REA Media on 9th St.

The Obama tour bus was at a meet and greet and canvassing event, just across the railroad track from the rail station I photographed for a Round Robin spread earlier this year. Tucson's other congressman beside my own Gabrielle Giffords, Raul Grijalva, was on hand to lead the charge. Grijalva, a well-liked and respected figure in Tucson politics, has spearheaded numerous pro-Obama efforts this year. I'll be writing more about that after I've had some sleep.

The Coronado Hotel at the end of 9th St.

At the end of the block, in fact the end of the street, was this picturesque and historic little hotel. Around the corner from it was the same dead end where I turned the car around on a previous Round Robin photo shoot ramble, and where I later walked around on that January day, trying to find a way back across the railroad tracks. I retraced that same route in the car tonight, trying to get to the Wells Fargo bank across from the Main Library downtown. You see, I needed cash for an Obama T-shirt.

Now let's go see everyone else's impressions of their home towns.

Linking List

Marie - Posted!
Photographs & Memories
http://photographsmemoriestoo.blogspot.com

Gattina - Posted!
Keyhole Pictures
http://gattina-keyholepictures.blogspot.com

Monica
Family Affair Photography
http://familyaffairphotography.blogspot.com

Karen - Posted!
Outpost Mâvarin
http://outmavarin.blogspot.com

Wammy - Posted!
The Ellis Family Cincinnati
http://theellisfamilycincinnati.blogspot.com

Martha - Posted!
Menagerie
http://meandering-martha.blogspot.com

Jill - Posted!
South Bay Soliloquy
http://southbaysoliloquy.blogspot.com

Cheryl
Life of a College Student
http://erinminusguidedogs.blogspot.com

Jama Hameed - Posted!
Sweet Memories
http://mummyjam.blogspot.com

Connie - Posted!
Far Side Of Fifty
http://farsideoffiftyphotos.blogspot.com

Carly - Posted!
Ellipsis
http://ellipsissuddenlycarly.blogspot.com

Kat
In My Dreams I Can Fly
http://inmydreamssfk.blogspot.com

Teena - Posted!
It's All About Me!
http://purple4mee.blogspot.com

Ellen B - Posted!
The Happy Wonderer
http://happywonderer.wordpress.com

And of course, you can also, you know, play along! See the Round Robin blog for details.

Karen

My Dogs Are Not Poseurs

For Feline & Furball Friday, I thought I'd try for a couple quick posed shots. Only my dogs don't cooperate very well with such things!

They only did this for the dog biscuits.

I messed up the exposure on the first two shots, but found the result interesting. For this one, I darkened it up and used a "dark marker" effect.

A noise across the alleyway!

One more try, this time with the camera set properly. A second later, they were at the fence, barking back at the dog across the alleyway.

Check out (sometimes)photoblog every Friday for links to dogs and cats in the camera lens.

Karen

Weekend Assignment #238: What a Rip Off!

I've decided to follow Carly's lead, and combine the new Weekend Assignment post with the previous week's results. Please let me know if you have any objection to this. First we'll cover the new topic, and then we'll double back to review your responses to last week's entry.

Weekend Assignment #238: As you can see from the entry below this one, I found out on Thursday morning that someone ripped me off by plagiarizing a poem of mine all over the Web. Tell us of a time you've been ripped off - that is, stolen from or cheated in some way.

Extra Credit: Is there anything you do differently now because of what happened?

Seeing my best poem garbled and reposted under someone else's name is a minor annoyance compared to a few memorable ripoffs of yesteryear. When I lived in Columbus, Ohio in the early 1980s, I had a Honda moped that was stolen. It was chained to the side of the house, and we were home at the time, but neither we nor Jenny Dog noticed anything until the following morning.

The register I had to empty for a robber - twice

A year later I was held up at gunpoint at work - twice. I was managing a location of Buzzard's Nest Records (albeit without a manager's title) for $4.00 an hour when a guy came into the store on a Saturday afternoon. I was alone. He said to give me all the money, "and don't look at me like you want to get to know me." All I can tell you about his appearance was he was white and wore a stocking cap. I gave him all the money in the register, and then lied about whether there was other money on the premises, thus preventing him from getting the money in the Central Ticket Office outlet operation or the petty cash in the back room. That bit of dangerous loyalty wasn't good enough for my boss, George. He claimed that the guy must have cased the store (unlikely, since he didn't know about the ticket money). George also ranted that there was a standing rule (never, ever mentioned to me until that night) that if you couldn't get to the desk in the back room with the extra cash, you were supposed to "skim" the twenties and hide them in the bottom drawer of the cabinet under the register. Needless to say, I was not pleased with my boss's compassion that night for his distressed employee, who had put her life on the line to save him from losing even more money to the robber.

A week later, again on Saturday afternoon, the same store was robbed again. This time there were two of us working due to shift overlap, but it made no difference. All I can tell you about him was that he was black and wore a stocking cap. Oh, and one more thing: he knew about the "skim the twenties and put them in a drawer" trick, and made me hand them over. Again I lied about whether there was any money in the back room, and again the ticket money was not discovered. The guy then ordered us into the back room and ran out the front.

As far as I know, neither robber was ever caught. A detective did bring around mug shots one day to try to get the first guy identified, but none of the photos matched my memory. Whoever the detective thought it was, it wasn't.

Since arriving in Tucson, I've had a few things stolen. Someone broke into our van in 1987 or so, and stole me Canon AE-1 and a pair of John's slippers. And about seven years ago I came outside one morning and discovered the ignition was missing from my 1987 Chrysler New Yorker, which formerly belonged to me mom. Some would-be thief or joy rider had tried to use a screwdriver in place of a key but had not actually managed to drive the car away. So I guess it doesn't quite count as a rip off.

I don't think any of these experiences has changed the way I look at the world, except maybe to be just a smidge more careful. I still prefer to assume other people are honest and reasonable unless reason or evidence suggests otherwise.

Your turn! Tell us of a time someone else tried to cheat you or steal from you. Write it up in your blog along with a link back here, and leave a link to your entry in the comments below. I'll be back in a week with a roundup of your responses.

Speaking of which...

For Weekend Assignment #237: Spending Spree, I asked you to pretend you were obligated to spend a $10,000 inheritance in just a week or two, as asked how you'd spend it. Let us count the ways:

Julie said...

Like Karen, though, I'd probably spend it on travel. And not just to England, to part of Europe as well. There are three of us, so the money won't go as far as her trip with John would. Still, we would like return to England at some point. We visited in 2001 (pictures here, in a part of the site that desperately needs revamping) and had a wonderful time. Chris was just eleven or so at the time, which was a little young to appreciate a few things. This time we would like to get a car and drive around the countryside and stop in Scotland to see the Holy Grail castle among other things. Since this is a frivolous expenditure, we'd pay any extra fee to the rental companies so he could take a turn behind the wheel. I still don't know if they'd let him, since he's under 21, but we'd certainly try.

Tall Paul said...

Who needs a week? I head on over the Yamaha Dealer and put down the ten grand on a Star Midnight Warrior. Hey! The rules never said I couldn't put the money towards anything that cost over $10,000!

(He also has a detailed Plan B.)

Jama said in comments...

This is going to be easy to spend for me, just grab a few laptops, plasma tv, DSLR, and some home furnishings. :)

Martha said in comments...

I was going to write about it but it's not long enough to post a whole entry about - I'd get a face lift! (I'd probably be too scared in real life to do it, but since this is fantasizing...)if there was anything left over I'd buy a new clothes.
Can't remember the last time I bought something for myself that wasn't a necessity ::sigh::

Florinda said...

Hmm, I could use some new bookcases. I never seem to have enough space for all my books, since I keep getting more of them. But I'm not talking about the IKEA build-'em-yourself kind of bookcases. I'd like some real furniture, the kind that comes on a delivery truck and gets set up in your house for you.

Mike said...

I'm not going to go into specific brands or anything, but most of the things I'd buy would be electronic gadgets. Or toys, if you like. First, I'd buy a laptop. I may have mentioned that before. I don't know what kind exactly, but with 10 grand to spend I can buy whatever I want. Then, I'd buy a new camera. Did I tell you ours broke?

Kiva said...

I would love to take my husband and my dog on a train trip around the U.S. in a private railroad car. We could stop any where, explore the area, and then get picked up by the next train to somewhere. Can you imagine the great pictures that I could take and what fun we'd have?

Carly said...

I can't do much about changing my priorities at this point, so I think I will find some things that will aid me in my life. Not necessities, but practical all the same. For example; I love to cook, so I would love to purchase a new set of cookware, and some new food processors. Also, I have never owned a really nice set of China, so I would buy me some dishes and flatware in a pretty pattern for all those gourmet meals I like to make! With what's left over, I will pick up some new clothes, like the ones I found this past week at my favorite store, Old Navy.

APOOO said...

With everything going on around us…sometimes we need to dream, hope, smile, smell the roses…even when it is not the weekend…who says we can’t do this little exercise on any day.

(APOOO did not actually answer the question, but passed it on to her own readers, along with an interesting bling photo.)

That's it for now. Don't forget to post your ripoff stories, and I'll see you back here in a week!

Karen

Laughing, Spinning Changing Lies

I just received an email helpfully pointing me at several websites on which strangers have reposted all or part of my poem "...And All Ye Need To Know" a.k.a. Pilate's Answer. Here is what I wrote to the first of the websites:

The poem at the following link is the middle two thirds of my poem And All Ye Need To Know, which I first wrote circa 1974 and posted on one of my blogs on March 28, 2005, the same day my poem was broadcast on the Tucson community radio station KXCI.

My posting:
http://journals.aol.com/mavarin/MusingsfromMavarin/entries/2005/03/28/radio-radio-right-now/1658

The plagiarized one:
http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/an-ear-between-two-whispered-words-published/

and

www.poemhunter.com/best-poems/wilfred-john/an-ear-between-two-whispered-words-published/

Notice that the one on your site chooses a title that doesn't quite appear in the truncated poem, and that the shortened opening stanza doesn't match the meter of the rest of the poem (or make much sense). The plagiarist also posted an even more garbled version on another site, one that makes so little sense that I wonder whether English is a second language to him or her.

Please remove this stolen work from your site. I have been advised that this "Wilfred John" has plagiarized many other works. You really should look into that.

Regards,
Karen Funk Blocher

The "even more garbled version" of the poem is here:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/3899534/WILFRED-JOHNS-SELECTED-POETRY

Scroll down, a lot, and you find a version that almost reduces the poem to word salad, rearranging individual lines in ways that don't make sense.

Can I prove that it's my poem? With a little time and effort, I can probably come up with a typed copy from high school (1974 or 1975) or my Syracuse University days (1975-1979). The last modified date on my current computer is in 2004, but I can probably find an older copy on my iMac, my first laptop or an old CD or floppy. Beyond that, I can explain in detail what the poem is about. I doubt that "Wilfred John" can.

The email I received lists more illicit repostings of my poem by Wilfred John:

http://my.opera.com/poetry%20in%20motion/blog/2008/03/07/her-tears-they-fell-unnoticed

http://www.completeclassics.com/p/m/poem.asp?poem=10366861&poet=351043&num=45&total=1359

and one by "Samuel L Jack": http://www.poetry.com/dotnet/P7820473/999/1/display.aspx

Does Jack = John? Are there more copies floating around? And if I look for a copy of my poem The Burial, about the death of Jenny Dog, will I find that too? How am I to root out all this theft of my work?

And how can I possibly go to sleep right now, after staying up all night reading about the Presidential debate?

Here is the complete poem. You will notice that it's very long by modern standards, 44 lines. This makes it ineligible for most poetry contests, which explains why the plagiarist(s) did not post it in full:

Pilate’s Answer:

“...And All Ye Need to Know”

by Karen Funk Blocher

And when they thought they needed him

For all men's grand and trivial schemes,

They hunted, leaving women home

To watch him dancing at their doors.

The men would sometimes find him, too:

An ear between two whispered words,

A hand in dying, dancing flames,

An eye that blinked in time with stars.

Soon or late, they thought they spied

An ancient foot between two growls,

And grabbing by a withered toe

They dragged him to the stadium.

In the center was a stage,

That they from every angle might

Survey and study ageless flesh:

Now young, now old, forever strange.

And one by one they came to coax,

To scream, negotiate, threaten, bribe...

While he stood smiling, mocking all,

His mouth forever smiling, shut.

And much would some of them endure

Just to glimpse his shadowed face.

They sat on nails. They cut off ears.

They starved alone among the rats.

Then many, failing, came outside

To claim that they had heard his voice,

And used his name to justify

Their good, and bad, and mad ideas.

Others, quiet in their chairs

Would paint him 'til their hands were dust,

In somber blues, in burning reds,

In glorious fluorescent tones.

A child, a sphinx, a laurel crown,

A junkie, shepherd, quiet pond

They saw in him, and in his hand

A flower, pitchfork, candle, sword.

Each night the thwarted pilgrims left,

Some early, others staying 'til

Their eyelids pressed on reddened eyes

And legs could scarcely stagger off.

And finally, when all had gone,

Truth left the stage, invading dreams

And laughing, spinning changing lies

For men to follow, blindly grateful.

Update: Julie pointed me at an anti-plagiarism site, http://www.plagiarismtoday.com/. Using something called Copyscape, I discovered that I posted an earlier edit of the poem to a Madeleine L'Engle fan community (Bonastra) in 1997:

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis/8838/aug2/msg00045.html

This explains why the plagiarist chose 1997 as a copyright date.

The poemhunter site is apparently feeding the poem to an ecard generator as well:

http://completeclassics.com/ecard/1/prepare.asp?poem=10366861

My original correspondent has emailed me back with further info on the plagiarist. The guy is in India, and claims his niece has been reposting his favorite poems under his name. He promised to remove any that weren't his own work (which is all of them), but obviously he has not. My contact notes that even his comments to other people's poems are plagiarized.

I tried to contact scribd.com and got a mailer daemon. I also tried to contact completeclassics.com. That didn't work either. Poetry.com is a scam site to begin with, and doesn't provide an email address on its contact page.

Gee, this is frustrating! But I checked a few of my other poems out, and they apparently haven't been copied. I don't know whether that's due to the age and obscurity of the 1997 posting versus my more recent ones, or an indication that of all the poems I've ever written and posted online, only one was worth ripping off.

Karen

Confessions of a Newly-Addicted "Political Junkie"

One of my most recent button designs

The term "political junkie" has been around for a while now. There's a guy over at NPR, Ken Rudin, who is commonly called "the Political Junkie," as if there were only one such person; but really it's a fairly common condition, especially in the autumn of 2008. It certainly applies to me these days, and to John, and to lots of other people.

Now, I freely admit that I have kind of an addictive personality anyway, a distinct tendency to obsess over one enthusiasm or another for months or years at a time before being seduced by the next one. Over the past 42 years or so I've had all-consuming interests in the Monkees, the Batman tv series, the Beatles, Star Trek, Doctor Who, Quantum Leap, my own novels-in-progress, and...well, I'm probably forgetting at least one more. But this latest addiction, to reading and watching and discussing the day's Presidential Election news, is a little different from the rest. For one thing, it's sucking up all my waking hours at a time when I have more time than usual to give to it - eight hours more, plus commute. For another, it's an addiction that's hitting thousands of Americans at the same time, if not millions.

Why is this? I think there are a number of factors involved:

1. This particular election is really, really important. With the economy tanking, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan dragging on and a huge public resentment building toward what the Bush administration has done to this country and the world, voters are aware that we need to elect someone who is capable of improving the situation. The course of future history over the next four years is in our hands, and we don't want to screw it up.

2. This election is personal. We're the ones who will suffer if we elect the wrong person. Maybe other people will suffer too, but for each of us there's an immediacy that wasn't there before. What about my job, my house, my health insurance, my 401(k)? These questions are more obviously and closely connected to who is elected than they've been in decades.

3. This election is historic. Unless something extraordinary happens in the next couple of weeks, we're about to elect this country's first African American President. He's already defeated a viable female presidential candidate in the primaries, and faces a Republican ticket that includes the country's second female vice presidential nominee. And all this is happening against a backdrop of the biggest economic upheaval in nearly 80 years.

4. This election is dramatic. Just look at the cast of characters, and the twists and turns in the ever-changing plot. We've got the guy with the funny name and unusual background, who defies all attempts at stereotyping with his level-headed, analytical unflappability, coupled with a sort of pragmatic idealism. We've got the old war hero, once respected by nearly everyone, but now a tragic victim of his hubris and other fatal flaws. There's the trusted mentor/sidekick, generally steady but occasionally good for a laugh. And there's the ingenue, a perky source of sexual interest and comic relief but with a dark streak of meanness and corruption that nearly outweighs her general cluelessness. We watch them all every day as they confront each other's endless accusations, revelations, prevarications and obfuscations, helped or hindered by a cast of thousands from political pundits to Joe the Plumber.

5. This election is information-rich. I probably read at least 30 screens full of brief tweets on Twitter today, 95% of them political, 75% of them containing links I followed to read dozens of news and commentary postings on everything from economic theory to the difference between ACORN's troubles and actual attempts at voter fraud. On top of that I'm getting a few dozen political emails a day. I'm almost glad I'm unemployed at the moment, because I'd never keep up otherwise.

Doctor Who was never this all-consuming. Then again, Doctor Who was never this crucial to the real-life future of the human race.

Karen