WUI (Writing under the influence)

First, my wife's car's brakes started making too much noise for her comfort so I went home after lunch to fix them. Because MPVs have a defect whereby front rotors don't cool uniformly, which leads to warping and requires machining the rotors once a year or so, I decided to do it myself. Machining of both rotors is about $50 plus new pads are $20. Much better than what I paid my mechanic the last time.

In any case, when I came home I found a message from somebody names Jill from the Oregonian working on a story "analyzing" the political landscape in Forest Grove. She got my name from our local paper, I think, because she referred to my many letters to the editor. She didn't even know I ran for the city council 4 years ago. I told her I thought the city is probably close to 50-50 split between Democrats and Republicans (including so leaning independents) with a slight advantage going to the left last and possibly this election cycle because of the war. Of course, I told her that if my wish came true and Pacific University disappeared tomorrow this would be a solidly republican town. Other things we discussed was the obsolescence of libraries and their use as a means to indoctrinate children after public schools are done indoctrinating them.

I made sure I mentioned a few of my neighbors who are so extreme they voted for Kucinich 4 years ago and of course will vote for Obama only because Kucinich is out trying to defend his congressional seat. Lastly, I told her that as a faithful follower of all Rush Limbaugh's orders I'm participating in the Operation Chaos.

Than, a couple hours later, two people from the Obama campaign -- who opened its headquarters just a few days ago in Forest Grove -- came by to ask me to vote for Obama. And this is the most fun part. They came because they knew I was a registered Democrat. But when I told them why, their smiles turned into disbelieve that we actually do exist. I told them I would do anything (legal) to deny Obama the presidency. They were polite (I guess that is the 'change' part of the Obama campaign for as long as he thinks he has a chance) so the conversation ended without any shouting.

This is going to be a very interesting few months.