Where have all the pretty flowers gone?

Yesterday's Florida GOP Primary gave us a front-runner, and cost us a terrorizing shmuck. The Florida Dems also held a meaningless beauty contest that absolutely no one should listen to the Clintons handicap. And John Edwards is finally out of gas after running steadily in third-ish place for nearly 5 years. Just wait for all the over-the-top analysis to completely miss the point. Which is - you gotta win something to actually have a shot at winning something. Hope you keep things in proper perspective today. Rock on.

Our first effort just off the sidewalk - more snowlump than snowman.

Our first effort just off the sidewalk - more snowlump than snowman.
Originally uploaded by emaggie

Seattle woke up to a few paltry, fluffy inches of the white stuff this morning. Which meant that daycare and just about every school in the State pulled the cord early. So we got Maya out in the mid-30s beauty and made our inaugual snowman at our new house. As you'll see in the following series, my snowman engineering was fatally blinded by my enthusiasm for overstatement. It was fun, nonetheless. And after naptime we'll maybe try to resurrect the snowy beast. Enjoy.

Ah, those impermanent yet remarkable first steps on a snowy deck.

Ah, those impermanent yet remarkable first steps on a snowy deck.
Originally uploaded by emaggie

Ball #1 - Our doomed, massive snowman begins.

Ball #1 - Our doomed, massive snowman begins.
Originally uploaded by emaggie

Ball #2 - Maya helps to sow the seeds of failure.

Ball #2 - Maya helps to sow the seeds of failure.
Originally uploaded by emaggie

Ball #3 - Notice how Daddy chose to make the bottom ball the smallest.

Ball #3 - Notice how Daddy chose to make the bottom ball the smallest.
Originally uploaded by emaggie

The failure's complete. Time for lunch and loads of yuks.

The failure's complete. Time for lunch and loads of yuks.
Originally uploaded by emaggie

"I'm exiting the race to hang more with my smokin' hot wife. Oh and that whole re-election thing, too."

The political world just got a bundle less fun to snark about. Dennis Kucinich dropped out of the Presidential race. He's instead facing a tough re-election race for his House seat back in Ohio. I met him in New Hampshire in '04, wandering around a mixer at Dartmouth essentially looking for anyone to chat up. He was charming. Adorable. Funny. Small. I believe he is entirely driven by the right impulses and means what he says. He deserves to be re-elected from his home district. He thereby gets my Gold Medal endorsement. Vote for him, Cleveland.

Hope your own representation is also solid gold today. Rock on.

A very overdue haircut begins...

A very overdue haircut begins...
Originally uploaded by emaggie

Maya's hard-to-love fake smile.

Maya's hard-to-love fake smile.
Originally uploaded by emaggie

Mission accomplished.

"One question for you, Wolf - can I please shift to the lectern between these two just to get some camera time?"

What if you cut interest rates 3/4ths of a percent and even the financial markets said..."waah?" Well, that's what we'll be seeing in the next few days. The fact that the major American markets could still dump billions of value on a day following such an announcement is the canary in the coal mine. I'm no economist. Although I did get a "B" in a pair of econ courses nearly two decades ago. So allow me to offer one pithy comment. Check your gut. It knows you, maybe you don't know it. This flux is all gut. Let's hope we've got the right tonic to settle things down in the coming months.

I should riff fully on the Democratic Debate in South Carolina last night, but I'm still playing catch up during naptime with our TiVo. But since everyone's throwing bombs, I'll offer my own. Hillary fights far dirtier (and smarter) than anyone in this race. My rationale is that I briefly combed votes doing opposition research bunk for Howard Dean's campaign in the last Presidential cycle. The sort of stuff Hillary's offering as broadcasted contrasts with Barack Obama is part and parcel of the ammunition I was told to look for - parse the voting record by bill names, look at some comparative markers (voting members with 100% ratings from various agents), categorize by funding vehicle (which Federal/State department), and look for the punchline. I warn everyone who takes my advice with a grain of salt that these tactics tarnish us all. Obama's people surely do the same research. I just honestly believe they're not playing it as cynical nor are they so willing to cross check this early in the period, so to speak, as the HillaryBorg. Do with that what you will.

Hope your own skates are sharpened and you don't swallow that wad of chew in your cheek before intermission. Rock on.

Just when you thought the World was all flowery and fabulous...

We're in a fun, scary, astonishing period with regard to Maya. Full-on potty training. Maya gets the concept and we get the signs of whenever she's, um, ready to go. Up 'til now, she's been hit or miss. Increasingly hit, but ya' know how it goes. Her part-time daycare helps tremendously because of the regimented approach of making all the kids line up like a bunch of beerdrinkers during halftime at Lambeau Field. But since we've not done this before, a minor success is heralded like a major victory. Kinda like how the Bushies run the Country. Regardless, yesterday was a watershed event. Pun intended.

After picking Maya up from daycare, we were prepping for naptime when she gave me the wink-wink nudge-nudge that she had some bizness at hand. Bear in mind, we have a rather unusually-designed three-story house and we were on the top floor. So we got situated, Maya did her business (hooray!), we flushed, and headed down to the lowest level to Maya's room for a quick congratulatory call to Sarah before a few naptime stories. Fast forward a few blissful minutes and...I see water dripping down the doorframe of Maya's room. We all have those moments when we launch into Superhero mode. This was one of mine. By the time I got upstairs I'd realized that the toilet had clogged. A steady stream of water had formed a river that was doing what rivers do - run downhill. Holy. Ironic. Crap.

We're cleaned up. At least physically. Maya didn't miss a beat while I threw every towel in the neighborhood into the fray. So now I'm looking for a plumber to tell us wassup with that particular possessed head (I've seen the signs in the past). And maybe getting this story out there will somehow ease the lingering trauma. So if you've got a toilet in your house, I strongly recommend that you tell it how much you appreciate what it does. I don't expect I'll look at my own the same way for the foreseeable future.

Hope downhill runs for you apply to skiing today. Rock on.

Was that snow or Gawd's frozen happy tears falling in Green Bay?

It was a hugely satisfying weekend for the Green Bay Packers and fans like me the world over. The Pack spotted the Seattle Seahawks two touchdowns in the first 4 minutes. Believe me or not, but I wasn't all that worried. And then they bore down and found gold under the accumulating snow. You could run off a full roster of great performances from that team. No disrespect meant to the Seahawks. The Packers were on fire amidst the swirling storm. Just. Plain. Loved it.

And then the Dallas Cowboys got punked by the New York Giants. Never overlook a team that's won 9 of 10 games on the road - the Giants are dream-killers. I suspect next week at Lambeau will be a true test. Yet, seeing all the swirling humiliation around Texas Stadium just made the weekend all that more sweet. To be fair, I've been to one game in Dallas while we lived there back in the med school era. A college roommate of mine from Milwaukee (who was also at Lambeau Saturday) came to visit and scored tix for a Packers-Cowboys game through a family connection. I was shocked that the Cowboys fans couldn't have been nicer, even before the Pack stunk it up on their turf yet again. So my view of the Cowboys had been somewhat softened by experience. Until this Season. Seeing "Lover Boy" Romo go down in flames again brought back that good ol' cynical tang. Yummy.

Speaking of Romo, the NYPost offered the most original insult yesterday by hiring a Jessica Simpson impersonator to wander around the stadium. Karma tossed in a snarky joke with the fact that she's apparently from a Seattle suburb. And then Terrell Owens poured extra laughing gas on the gag and lit a roman candle by getting all teary-eyed after the game in defending his QB's choice of bye-week nookie getaways. Somewhere right now, Roger Clemens is probably even cracking up as he hunkers down with his lawyers.

Hope your own impersonators have nothing to work with today. Rock on.

Will you just please look at that form!

Will you just please look at that form!
Originally uploaded by emaggie

(insert utterly adorable "Go Pack Go!" reference without jinxing anything)

(insert utterly adorable "Go Pack Go!" reference without jinking anything)
Originally uploaded by emaggie

Throw another handful of brats on the grill, America!

The Green Bay Packers play the Seattle Seahawks tomorrow. (As if) you didn't already know. Big game. Lotsa fun. As goes the bizness of not-much-actual-newsiness around such events, I nonetheless commend both the generally lame Seattle Post-Intelligencer for a delightful profile of Mike Holmgren and the always-obsessed Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel with a fun puff piece detailing the so-called "leaders" on the Pack's especially young and talented squad. For those that know me, Eric Torkelson will always be my favorite Packer - who else ever did an autograph session at the Medford True Value Hardware store, for the love of cripes? But my now-less marginal awareness of the below pictured uber-leader, Rob Davis, is the most delicious surprise of the day. Favre will always be the brightest silver ever mined for this Torkelson lover. And I have a strict bronze medal list of beloved Packers - John Anderson, Lynn Dickey, Ed West, Paul Coffman, and Sterling Sharpe. Rob Davis is now officially added to that elite roster. Go Pack Go!



Hope y'all cover the spread while spreadin' the compliments around all weekend. Rock on.

And Fred Thompson will stop a staged armed-robbery with his trusty .45 and blow the smoke off the barrel as a tear wells up in his eye.

Boy, was I wrong. Hillary apparently nailed it with women voters by showing her human side. Unlike almost every single living American spouting off yesterday about what was bound to happen in New Hampshire, I'll actually apologize. I'll never be wrong again. Promise. We should all expect the next rush to judgment will come from the same punditocracy describing Obama's demise. I should take a break from commenting and just read a few books about other things and/or begin prepping brats for this weekend's NFL Playoff game between the Packers and Seahawks. But, well...I'll just pop off briefly to keep the chops up. Barack Obama will raise cash in the next four weeks like a junkie Trump. Hillary Clinton will get back on the inevitability train, taking the occasional heart-to-heart Sanka break. John Edwards will labor on and still no one will notice. Bill Richardson will pour three fingers of single-malt and light a phattie. Dennis Kucinich will keep the Viggo Mortensen vote, lose those few thousand hippie-veggie-oil biodiesel votes. My Republic Party picks for New Hampshire were pretty close, so I'll stand pat - John McCain faces many laps worth of hurdles but pulls it out. Mitt Romney will flop all over the place like a wounded marlin. Mike Huckabee will add the surviving cast of "Hee Haw" to his celebrity cavalcade. Ron Paul will soon be riding the bus with Mike Gravel. Duncan Hunter will still be in the closet. And we'll hear about it until this fascinating election actually ain't so much anymore.

Hope your endorsements all come from the exotic dancer unions today. Rock on.

Message to the messengers: "Message matters"

This is the 1,100th post over the 3-year history of and the Family Buick. I started out wanting to feature our soon-to-arrive daughter, Maya, after past half-starts with political shtick (including Try the Kool Aid while working for Howard Dean's campaign in '04). But for those that check in occasionally, you know all too well that herein I veer into the realm of political shtick more often than not. Today's a big day for people cut from similar cloth. New Hampshire is burning white hot. Results will come in a handful of hours. The turnout appears to be huge. But I want to get out front (again) with a few resonant moments from the last 24 hours and what I entirely believe they will mean in the days and weeks ahead.

1) Hillary's tearful moment yesterday was human. Every voter in the room was surely touched. But this was her "Howard Dean in Iowa" moment. She will be mercilessly taken to ludicrous task by the merciless crowd. Fair? No. Damaging? Undeniably so.
2) Bill Clinton is an institution. However, he's gone fully off the reservation in the last handful of events. When he called Obama's campaign a "fairy tale" he just coined his latest "that depends on what the definition of 'is' is" moment.

Hang onto your hats - tonite's going to be a hoot. Hope your own change is jangling today. Rock on.

Wanna bet?

It's go time. Everyone in the political universe and their central-casting retarded cousin and/or loving wife is currently in New Hampshire, prepped and over-caffeinated before tomorrow's Primary. So I'm going to offer a hopefully tasty rhetorical biscotti to munch on while considering anyone else's at-least-as-plausible prediction. With a challenge. I'll bet all comers One Canadian Dollar to offer up their own full breakdown. The closest by points (over or under) to each individual pick, then totalled for a final score wins the Loonie. I accept PayPal. Or general kudos. Game on.

The Democrat Party
Barack Obama - 46%
Hillary Clinton - 29%
John Edwards - 16%
Bill Richardson - 7%
Dennis Kucinich - 2%

The Republic Party
John McCain - 36%
Mitt Romney - 28%
Ron Paul - 18%
Rudy Guiliani - 9%
Mike Huckabee - 7%
Random morons - 2%

You can tell what I'm feeling. Hope y'all have the popcorn ready for tomorrow's feature. Rock on.

All she was missing was an "AAAARRRGH!"

Well howdy-doo - Barack Obama brought forth the "change" he's been promising the first night out of the gate. Namely, he changed the arc of the race last night in Iowa. Hillary's already throwing bombs - called him a "false hope" while probably sporting a raging hangover in Nashua this morning. Obama's victory speech last night was, in contrast, masterful. For those that look for the nuance in such theatre, watch how Barack moves in contrast to the camera, paying attention throughout to the audience. He's the most talented politcian I've ever seen (sorry, Bill). Hillary's tough as nails and is correct when she claims to have been tested through controversy. But everyone in the attentive world knows that the fact that she lost by 9 percent is major. I predict plenty of blood on the floor over the weekend. For those of us that love this sort of tangle, it's primerib time.

Oh, and if Mike Huckabee wins the nomination, I'll buy the world a Coke. I still say you're nuts if you don't see John McCain pulling down that role.

Hope your own balloons drop as planned today. Rock on.