Friday, March 27, 2009

links of the day

I know, I know, I have been the worst blogger. It's hard because my main motivation in starting a blog was to write about my experience training & running a marathon. Now that it's over, I've lost a lot of motivation to continue blogging. I can't even seem to finish blogging about the marathon itself! And then my other motivation was the election...and then that ended and didn't have quite the finish I was hoping for. But I'll try to catch up...

I was reading through the news today & came across 2 realllly good article about Obama's poor performance with the presidency so far. I have tried to really give him a chance, but I just don't believe he is leading this country the right way. I do give him props for opening the White House up more to technology - the online town hall was a cool idea, even if he didn't really tell us anything new through it.

Anyway, I find this article on CNN really revealing. Because now I know it's not just me that feels this way. There are so many good quotes in this article that I won't regurgitate here, you just need to read it yourself.

And here is another good article and guess what the title is? "On Spending and the Deficit, McCain was Right." My favorite part:

The point was that Obama was promising so many things that to pay for them he would eventually have to raise taxes on people making far less than $250,000. Look out, McCain warned -- someday he'll come after you.

And now that's where we appear to be headed. At some point, Obama will likely have to bow to those in his party who say he must raise taxes if he wants to pay for health care and other expensive initiatives.

Yeah, I can't WAIT til my already meager salary gets even more taxed by the govt. Yippee.

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

link of the day

Check out Jon Stewart...yes you read that right...Jon Stewart ripping Obama's plan to make veterans use private health insurance. It is so worth it, just for his last 3 sentences. Check it out.

Tuesday, March 17, 2009

quote of the day

"My colleagues and I are sending a letter to [AIG CEO Edward] Liddy informing him that he can go right ahead and tell the employees that are scheduled to get bonuses that they should voluntarily return them," Sen. Charles Schumer said on the Senate floor. "Because if they don't, we plan to tax virtually all of [the money] ... so it is returned to its rightful owners, the taxpayers."

via CNN

Does anyone else get the feeling that our leaders have no real clue what they're doing?

"we plan to tax...so it is returned to its rightful owners, the taxpayers"

So let me get this straight. First, the govt taxes you and me. Then, they give the money away to these AIG execs. Then, they threaten to tax the money, which in essence is already tax money. So they want to tax the taxes and give the money back to...its rightful owners? Except that it's actually going back to the government. And you and I won't see a cent of it returned to us. And to put the frosting on the cake...who's bright idea was it in the first place to give them a loan? And now they want to tax the loan?

Someone please explain to Sen. Schumer how ridiculous this is.

Monday, March 16, 2009

oops

Totally forgot to register for the Peachtree Road Race. Oops! Darnit. I guess I could try the paper lottery next Sun...but what are the odds of me getting one of the last 10,000 spots when the first 45,000 were gone in 7 hours?

Anyone else missing out? Or got their spot?

Friday, March 13, 2009

Tuesday, March 10, 2009

jefferson, washington, and chuck norris

Our President & Congress desperately need a history lesson from Thomas Jefferson & George Washington...and Chuck Norris.

To contract new debts is not the way to pay old ones.
George Washington, letter to James Welch, Apr. 7, 1799

To preserve [the] independence [of the people,] we must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt. We must make our election between economy and liberty, or profusion and servitude. If we run into such debts as that we must be taxed in our meat and in our drink, in our necessaries and our comforts, in our labors and our amusements, for our callings and our creeds, as the people of England are, our people, like them, must come to labor sixteen hours in the twenty-four, give the earnings of fifteen of these to the government for their debts and daily expenses, and the sixteenth being insufficient to afford us bread, we must live, as they now do, on oatmeal and potatoes, have no time to think, no means of calling the mismanagers to account, but be glad to obtain subsistence by hiring ourselves to rivet their chains on the necks of our fellow-sufferers.
Thomas Jefferson to Samuel Kercheval, 1816. ME 15:39

All of this courtesy of Chuck Norris, who has compiled a great many quotes from our founding fathers in this article: I may run for president of Texas. A good, quick read if you're up for it! Maybe Chuck Norris will join the ranks for Jefferson & Washington as a great President some day, hehe.

And props to Ryan for pointing these out to me and issuing a challenge to us all - write letters/emails to the President and your elected officials and ask them what they think of what our founding fathers said!

Friday, March 6, 2009

disney marathon: miles 8-10

So the first stop after Epcot after the highway running was the Ticket & Transportation Center. That was a fun area to run through because it was kind of unexpected. I forgot it was there. But we ran under the monorail station where there were tons of fans cheering us on! And gotta love the cast members with their mickey gloves on! It was also very cool running through completely empty parking lots. What a sight!

And how convenient...the course ran right by our hotel, The Contemporary between miles 9 & 10. I was really really really excited as I saw the Contemporary come into view. I was going to see all my fans together for the first time on the course. Here's Holly & Shane with signs ready:
Right before I saw them, we all went running under a bridge of sorts, and as I came through the end, I could see everyone. I started waving, and tried to yell "hey!" But no one was paying attention!!! Maybe you can see me waving frantically on the left side...


I literally was right in front of them before they saw me. I guess I was a little early. Like I said, those first 8 miles went by so fast! Luckily they caught me and took this lovely progression of pictures below.





Unfortunately there were wall to wall cone barriers between us so I couldn't get any high fives or hugs in. But no worries, there were still 16.2 miles ahead! And the Magic Kingdom was less than a hop, skip & a jump from here.