esrosedotblog

LONGBEACH

I went to Long Beach yesterday and spent the day with Randy. I had a great getaway time. I left at 5 and got there at 7AM in time for lengthy tour of Randy's new condo--a hit!--breakfast at The Garden and then we walked: to the refurbished downtown with a rehabbed mall area that even has its own WalMart and Albertsons SuperMarket; thence to The Pike; a totally new rehab area built on the site of the old Amusement Park. This section is contiguous with the Convention Center and the northern beach where the Aquarium and the Queen Mary development are located. It is a great place to walk and people watch and the fountain at the Aquarium is back in business. It was being refurbished last time I was there

Then we walked the length of the beach south to Belmont Shores; quite a hike, but necessary for me to get my beach-fix. Lunch at Chucks Coffee Shop (Locally World Famous and Home of the Weasel--we havn't figured either of those out and forgot to ask Tom who hangs there); where you can get the best turkey burger you would ever want if you wanted one; we did. Thence onward back north via Broadway and a return to Randy's place. We arrived at 2 PM. So take two hours out for eating and pee stops and we basically walked at a sorta-brisk pace about four hours continuous. Nice.

Nap, hookup with Tom and dinner at Ambrosia which is a semi Greek Restaurant nearby. Great evening, early bed and headed back to PS at 6AM this morning. Got here 745. Whirlwind and wonderful. Thanks Randy.

ON THE LINKS

Tom Schaller hits it hard again today in Daily Kos; link to the upper right. See Active tense, passive approach by Tom Schaller: Posted Sun Apr 11th, 2004 at 11:55:55 EDT. Part One: I am not as concerned about whether Rice was telling the truth or not as whether SHE THOUGHT she was telling the truth! Over and over, the bushies seem to be in a daze of denial. They continue to say the same things and reassert even disproven concepts. Zomboid.

In the second part, Schaller touches on the news we have been having all week (I have seen it five or six times in non-political media) about how many days bush has vacated this year either in Crawford or camp david. Here we have an interview from a golf cart. Not unknown for a President but perhaps a bit laid back for a week in which we have lost two cities in I-rak and added a good percentage to the list of the dead who he doesn't like to mention too too much.

There was also a disturbing opinion piece in the LATimes today (again link to the upper right) about bush' christian-driven 'crusade'. This was written by some Hoover Institute guys who do not even seem bothered by the scarey born-again mode. Junior figures that since all the terrorism is 'anti-christian' so should be the anti-terrorism. He is acting on god's will. Wait a minute! Hold on. And they say this right out? I figured it but not that it was a given creed. We were even treated to his morning bible readings and how they guide his comments in the day.

Let's see. What else is bothering me? In the same Kos as cited above, keep scrollin'. See: Iraq revisited by DemFromCT Sun Apr 11th, 2004 at 14:21:27 EDT. I thought that Bremer was the one guy who might be plodding along in the right direction much of the time; and now, it seems that everyone is backing away from his decision to close down the Shiite newspaper and go after the radical sheik (get it? radical chic? Not funny at all in the context, huh?).

In a lighter, more serious humorous vein, I am amused to see how Andrew Sullivan continues to stand on his head turning dark to light and failure into success; gold from lead with his little alchemistry kit. If you want to see the wand at work go to the link upper right; but I warn you. He will send you running with the twists and turns. Andrew is all right on the gay stuff and some of his rants about the fallible left; but he sure has his head up his ass these days about Iraq and the bush league guys.