#VOTE DAMMIT! No excuses. Here’s how to find your polling place.

If you are a registered voter in the United States, you have no excuse NOT to vote.

The midterm elections are much more important than the presidential elections. The midterms determine local politics, the stuff that affects you on a day-to-day basis. If you’re unhappy with what is or isn’t being done, don’t blame Obama. Blame your local elected officials. The president isn’t king. There’s only so much he can do on his own.

Are you out of work? Are you underpaid? Are you barely able to make ends meet? Republicans are giving away the store to corporate interests, leaving us to foot the bill.

Remember this scene from Rosanne?

That scene could have been written yesterday, but it was two decades ago! Republicans are still shoveling the same crap. Tax breaks to lure companies who provide low wage jobs to families who then still have to rely on food stamps.

What the hell??

We can’t keep letting the GOP sell America to the lowest bidder! We can’t let congress give religious extremists the right to bastardize the constitution to suit their needs!

Please. Vote. Vote as if your life depended on it. If not for yourself, do it for the future of your children, your family, your country.

Thanks to the folks at Word Press, here is a voter information tool to help you find your poling place on Tuesday, November 4th.

WTF! No… seriously, W – T – F?

When I created ADignorantium I set a few guidelines for myself. Two of the most important are, I don’t bully and I don’t use language that I’d be embarrassed to let a grandmother read. Don’t get me wrong. I do plenty of cussing at home. Some of my favorite words have only four letters. Lately though, it’s been difficult to maintain the latter. The political climate has devolved into a childish temper tantrum, and I am pissed!

I am so friggin pissed I could spit nails!

I never truly understood that expression until those unbelievably shortsighted tea party republicans decided to put the screws to the United States. I can’t even put thoughts into words, I’m so angry. This is not how America works! We don’t allow a few extremists to shut down the entire government  Do we?

Instead of passing a clean appropriations bill, house republicans attached an ACA rider that doomed it to fail. The unrelated provisions guaranteed the bill would not pass the senate. All they had to do was pass a continuing resolution (CR) that was clean of extraneous nonsense, but they are blinded by their hatred of anything Obama.

Truth be told, I’m not exactly thrilled with every bit of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), but it’s a good start. It’s a step in the right direction. When you’re not happy with something, you don’t fix it by killing it. And before you throw “corporate exemptions” at me, those exemptions were concessions to republicans. If you want to get rid of the exemptions, you write a bill, separate from the appropriations bill, and send it to the senate. But that’s not what they want. They want to undo the healthcare law. After trying and failing to repeal the ACA forty two times, they try this stunt!?

Now the government is shut down. National parks, museums, and landmarks are closed to the public. Millions are now without work.

• Don’t they understand that a government shutdown affects more than government employees?
• Don’t they know that everyday Americans like hotel staff, bartenders, waiters, and store clerks depend on tourism to make a living?
• Do they even care that their stubbornness will have a negative effect on the economy?

There is no doubt in my mind that this bullisht is racially motivated. I wasn’t sure at first. I just chalked it up to politics as usual. But after six years of stubborn resistance, there can be no other explanation.

So now I owe some very good friends an apology for all those late night conversations about “race in America” in which I was so certain that things had improved since my father’s generation. Apparently, I was wrong. I was wrong and it sickens me. I am so f*king ashamed of my own country. MY OWN COUNTRY!

I’d like to think we’ll remember. I want to believe we will carry this rage with us to the voting booth. I know I will. But America has a short memory span. We are more worried about Miley, Kim, and Kanye than we are about what our local politicians are up to. More Americans know the names of the Real Housewives than who their representatives are.

So why am I surprised when this isht happens?

~end rant~

Thanks to all for bearing with me. We now return to our regularly scheduled blog.

I must have been a serial killer in a past life. It’s the only possible explanation. :\

Murphy’s Law, as it relates to medical issues, seems to apply even more so on weekends, when most hospitals run with minimal staff.

A new kidney stone joined the party on Friday evening. Thankfully the pain isn’t that excruciating “death would be better” misery that often accompany these things. If it was, I’d have to spend a weekend in a hospital room attached to a morphine drip waiting for Monday. Surgeons generally don’t work on the weekends.

These painful little gifts from hell show up frequently enough that I’ve become a pro at recognizing their calling cards; lower back and flank pain followed by endless trips to the restroom, where I can be heard screeching out a passable Robert Plant impersonation.

I drink an average of two to three liters of water each day. That’s significantly more than before my right kidney declared war a few years ago. Unfortunately, hydration only tells half the story. There are other factors that determine your propensity for kidney stones. Though technically not hereditary, if your father had kidney stones, chances are you will too.

Due to my history of kidney trouble, this will probably not be my last tango with these microscopic menaces. So I’ll keep drinking water, eating a low sodium diet, and wondering what the hell it was I did in a past life that Karma deemed it necessary to torture me so.