Quote Of The Day Via Lucille Ball:

I have an everyday religion that works for me. Love yourself first, and everything else falls into line. You've really got to love yourself to get anything done in this world.

Wittiest Should Win.

(American Apparel. Duh.)

The Door Screams I Hate You, Hate You Hanging Around My Blue Jeans

...the one and only William Parry. Too freaking cute.

Yes:

Cold cans of soda from pretzal carts.

Air drying my hair.

Eating at Founding Farmers. Yum.

Virginia.

Filene Center at the Wolf Trap.

J.Crew catalog themed after my favorite book.

And why someday I want to have kids.

Trader Joe's: esp. banana chips and fresh salsa

No:

Home hunting with no credit history or viable income. And other people's carpet stains.

I have no idea how this happens

All my maps have been overthrown

Happenstance has changed my plans

So many times my heart has been outgrown

- Wilco, You Are My Face

Sorry To Bore You, But I'm Gonna Talk About Health Care Now.

Why we need it, in a nutshell:

1. My aunt is a psychiatric researcher at the University of San Diego. A lot of her patients are schizophrenic. A lot of her patients can't work, because they are schizophrenic. Thus, they don't have the money for treatment. They don't have treatment, they do crazy things like...shoot people.

2. To supplement the cost of caring for patients without health care coverage, hospitals routinely charge patients with health care for expensive tests they don't really need.

3. The public option is pivotal.

This is the only way insurance companies would feel enough competitive heat to drive down their prices. And this reform should be all about competition.

I also think it would force innovation. Always a good thing.

4. By denying the poor and minority groups access to health care, our country reinforces inescapable and tired socioeconomic stratas and racism.

...It's obvious something about our health care system has to change.

If there is legitimate conservative input, I can respect that.

But so far there's no focus on solutions. Only ruining the high everyone is still on from Obama's election:

"If we're able to stop Obama on this, it will be his Waterloo. It will break him."

- Jim DeMint, Republican Senator from South Carolina

Go read Paul Krugman.

And watch Jon Stewart. Who, though I'm not supposed to think this, is the journalist right now.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Bill Kristol Extended Interview
http://www.thedailyshow.com/
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Joke of the Day

July 25, 2009

Congratulations!

Phil + Taryn, deserve all the happiness in the world.

Nationals Baseball Game.

...just another thing to love here.

Andrew Wyeth/Edward Hopper Moments.

Summer in the City.

So my roommate Hanna and I ventured out to the farmer's market in Eastern Market on Saturday morning and it was just about the best thing ever: sunflower bouquets, piles of peaches, sliced cucumber, homemade salsa, hommus, blueberry pancakes, melon, fresh squeezed lemonade, cheese, chocolate banana nut bread, huge blackberries...

Hanna took amazing pictures to document the trip, so soon I hope I can go into more detail about why I've decided to buy only from farmer's markets from now on.

...I'm loving this city more and more.

Also this weekend:

Dive bars.

National Museum of the American Indian.

Maybe it's growing up in Oklahoma with the curriculum of the Oklahoma school system, but I've always been completely and utterly disinterested in Native American history. Like, bore me to death bad.

But this museum was incredible: the architecture is stunning, the value system hits home, there was an exhibit on reservation skateboarding (which pulled on my love for California skateboard culture, Lords of Dogtown and the Z-Boys) and the cafeteria is insanely good, featuring amazing, unique food from all the different tribal regions.

National Portrait Gallery.

National Gallery of Art.

Smithsonian American Art Museum.

(...Okay, so I like art).

King Street.

In Virginia. We walked down to the water and had the best ice cream ever.

Wait, Robert McNamara died!? Watch The Fog of War. Seriously haunting stuff.

My parents are back from Greece. Jealous.

Meg is taking art classes at Anderson Ranch in Snowmass, CO for a month. Just a little background as to why Meg is amazing: we were lucky enough to grow up in Snowmass and we'd always take hikes over to beautiful Anderson Ranch and "oooh and aaah" about how cool it would be to go there someday. And then she goes and wins a fellowship there.

But most impressive: Casey survived a week on her own with our grandparents!

Jay-Z's Death of Autotune is exactly why I never tamper with the ring on my cellphone.

And Common's What a World is for BAMF moments walking down city streets.

I finally finished John Kennedy Toole's A Confederacy of Dunces.

"Claude is dumb. Okay. I'll grant you that. Claude is all the time worrying me about them communiss. Okay. Maybe he don't know nothing about politics. But I ain't worried about politics. I'm worried about dying halfway decent. Claude can be kind to a person, and that's more than you can do with all your politics and all your graduating smart. For everything nice I ever done for you, I just get kicked around. I want to be treated nice by somebody before I die. You learnt everything, Ignatius, except how to be a human being."

Probably the best, most creative capacity for writing and wordplay I've ever experienced.

But while every write-up praises its comedy, I found it really depressing and therefore hard to get through. But I always found Don Quixote to be extremely depressing too, so I guess it's fitting.

Though the end was totally worth it.

I get to work with this girl. Cool beyond belief.

She posted the lyrics to Animal Collective's Summertime Clothes and right now, I feel like nothing could describe my life more perfectly: that East Coast lack of summer air conditioning forces you to fall into restless sleep on top of your sheets when you've got so much on your mind.

and i want to walk around with you

it doesn't really matter i'll go where you feel

hunt for the breeze, get a midnight meal

I love where I work.

So THIS is what me and my amazing coworkers put on this week.

A ton of work, a major success: Nancy Pelosi dresses to a T,  Joel Madden is a tool, John Oliver is hilarious, Clinton in a power tie, Van Jones is the future...

Please also enjoy this Wonkette blog post, as it was my job to sit in that press room and wait for Maureen Dowd to not show up.

But my favorite part of this entire conference week was hanging out at the Senate office buildings on Thursday:

I got to discuss the ACES Bill with my ultimate idol, Claire McCaskill, for a full twenty minutes.

Okay, actually it was more like my Missouri-born coworker Brett, Power Shift guru Ethan and new friend Daniel earnestly discussed the bill with her while I tried to contain my joy and keep myself from hugging her/sputtering out how much I admired her blue-dog-democrat-ways every four seconds.

As Daniel put it, "Kate, you just sat there smiling!"

(He was also forgetting the fact that moments earlier he had freaked out about Chuck Shumer saying "hi" to him in the hallway. And our joint freak out after seeing Sonia Sotomayor limp out of a Senator's office, followed by a mob of cameras).

But seriously, listening to these three incredibly intelligent young men and the insanely well-spoken, smart Claire respectfully argue their points (a stronger climate bill vs. the reality of representing Missouri) was fascinating and will go down as one of the highlights of my life. Politics at its best.

The fact that one of her legislative assistants gossiped to me about Tom Coburn's involvement in the recent Ensign scandal (OMG stop claiming the moral highground!) was just icing on the cake.

Also, we launched this amazing campaign.

Paired with video (for which I had to be a stand-in while they set up the lighting...)

Anyway, full week. I'm still on cloud nine. 

The Apex of Patriotism: 4th of July in DC

Generally one of my favorite holidays due to sparklers and pie making contests...

4th of July weekend here was awesome.

Roman candles on a corner of U-Street.

Going to the MJ tribute party dressed in little boy pajamas.

Waiting on a curb with a mob of tourists outside the White House to watch Obama wave from the tinted glass of an intimidating SUV motorcade.

Sprawling out to watch the fireworks over the capital.

Roof top parties are the best parties.

And a good dance mix makes a party.

I saw Up in 3D and Away We Go, both really really good movies. Pixar and John Krasinski never cease to amaze me. Niether do Venus, Serena and Federer.

I love it when Wilco CD releases converge with summertime. Perfection.

Major, huge week ahead: Bill Clinton, John Oliver, Van Jones, Nancy Pelosi and Kathleen Sebelius are all speaking at our conference on Wednesday!

I am especially excited for Sebelius, my homegirl from a conservative state. 

...speaking of conservative states: It is literally killing me that Sally Kerns is allowed to be rep'n Oklahoma. I mean, Ellen couldn't even help her.

Top that off with Inhofe refusing to meet with Sotomayer.

Seriously. Why is my favorite state deliberately moving backward?

Some good Opinion pieces:

"40 Years Later, Still Second-Class Americans."

"The Republican Party will never revive itself until its sanctimonious pantheon — Sanford, Gingrich, Limbaugh, Palin, Ensign, Vitter and hypocrites yet to be exposed — stop being two-faced."

"Invent, Invent, Invent."

Scottie Dogs.

My favorite president is FDR.

He's kinda my go-to guy as to why I consider myself a government loving Democrat.

So it's fitting that my favorite, favorite monument is the FDR memorial, which is essentially its own park affronting the Potomac. 

To put this into context, every monument I've seen in DC has been architecturally stunning, restrained instead of cheesy and incredibly moving. Plus I'm a sucker for being moved by these types of things.

But his quotes are as epic as his presidency. Especially relevant in an economic downturn. And made all the more awesome carved into stone and surrounded by waterfalls.

"Franklin's illness gave him strength and courage he had not had before. He had to think out the fundamentals of living and learn the greatest of all lessons - infinite patience and never-ending persistence."

- Eleanor Roosevelt.

"I was 32 when I started cooking, up until then I just ate."

So on the plane ride to DC I read Julia Child's "My Life in France."

Though her kitchen pioneering hay days were before my time, I became so spellbound and attached: her fearlessness, her beautiful marriage to Paul Child and the amazing adventures they embarked on together for both of their careers, the way she embraced life and didn't sweat the small stuff, her love of learning...

Well, today I went to the Museum of American History which boasts such iconic Americana items like the red slippers worn by Judy Garland in Wizard of Oz, Lincoln's sobering black top hat, an Alabama sit-in counter, etc.

...but my personal favorite was Julia's Kitchen (!!!!!!), fully intact and on display for all to peek inside. 

I distinctly remember falling in love with food and cooking sophomore year, when I lived in an apartment with Kelly. We'd both come home from class and watch Giada; and honestly my life's never been the same. 

Because whether it's Giada or Julia or Anthony Bourdain or Mario Batali, they're striking at the best and purest parts of life: travel, culture, family, friends, simplicity, time, patience, persistence, catharsis, quality...

Anyway, it felt like my Julia Child phase has come full circle.

And now this: