Day: November 4, 2008

Life

Charting Dangerous Territory

Karen

There are election posts all over the blog-o-sphere today …

I’m afraid mine won’t be the exception. I’m so sorry, but I need to get this off my chest. This journal is something I would like my children to read someday – I want them to know how I felt about sensitive issues and why I did some of the things I did. But because this post is likely to piss off some people and I have no desire to get into a heated debate with anyone because this is how I feel, and what I’m thinking right now, I’m shutting comments off. Thank you for understanding.

I have to be honest. Since the hubbub of the election theatrics campaigns began, I’ve been reading more and more blog opinions, very strong opinions at times, about our country’s politics in general and our presidential candidates specifically.

And most of them have (eventually) pissed me off to no end.

And I’m not one to usually get too upset over what I read on blogs because come on, we all have opinions. It’s our right to have our own opinions, at least, the last time I checked we still have that right, that may change in the near future, but we’ll cross that bridge if we’re forced to.

And even though we might have been reading certain bloggers for any number of months/years and feel like we KNOW them, we don’t really. You and I both know that a lot of times what is written on our blogs is an exaggeration, or a condensed/diluted version, of real life due to the ever elusive attempt to entertain and/or make people laugh so they will love us and want to keep coming back. So you know, whatever man. Tit for tat. You take everything you read on blogs with a grain of salt; at least you should and I certainly do.

I’ve lambasted written before about how we ought not to judge bloggers simply because someone has picked one candidate over the other. After all, speaking for myself, I’m a Republican, to a point. I don’t necessarily agree with everything the Republicans stand for, but overall, they advocate less government and I’m 100% for that, so I typically vote Republican. Now whether that conjures up an automatic image of me in your mind, so be it. I am who I am, no one can take that away from me, and I will certainly not apologize for that.

But wow. Enough with the condescending I’m-better-than-you-are and what-I-think-is-how-you-should-live attitudes. It’s a huge turn-off. I respect bloggers who present a well thought out argument as opposed to those that nitpick appearances or lifestyles and ignore what’s really important – what they want to do with our country.

Continue reading “Charting Dangerous Territory” →

General

Vote for the Right Change

Karen

vote_republican1

Please exercise your free will. Please vote for less taxes, less spending, less government, more personal responsibility.

Remember the 700 billion dollar bailout? Whose to blame? The government! Do we REALLY want MORE government mucking up our lives?! Making our decisions for us? Deciding how to best spend OUR money?? Do we not have brains? Can we not make up our own minds without the government holding our hand? Have we been reduced to this?

We’ve worked hard, shed tears and blood for our great country. Do we really WANT a socialist society? You really want to hand your hard-earned cash over to a sector of society who chooses not to work as hard as you? How will handing them free money/benefits/food/homes/clothes motivate them to want to do better? To make something more of their lives? You think they will want to get out, get a job and make their situations better if we keep handing them things for free? Seriously? Sure, it’s nice to help people, it’s also nice to help people get back on their feet, not support them!

Please vote. Please vote for change. Please vote for the right change.

Thank you.

I’m Write From Karen, and I approve this message. 🙂

NaNoWriMo

Racing Heart – First Excerpt

Karen

Racing Heart

I’ll be posting excerpts from my 2008 National Novel Writing Month project, Racing Heart, every Tuesday in November. I have comments turned off, not because I don’t want your feedback, but because I can’t afford to think too much about what I’m doing at this point – I hope you understand. 🙂

I’ve stumbled onto a secret – getting away from my house is key to being productive. I’ve been spending most of my time at the university library. Not only is it comfortable and quiet, I can’t access the Internet without a username and password and I’m not going to take the time to obtain a guest pass because quite frankly? IT’S REFRESHING. And because I’m not being distracted by the ‘net, I’m getting a whole lot more done.

This week will be hectic, writing wise. We’re leaving to go camping Thursday afternoon, so I’ll have to write in the mornings and pack for our trip in the afternoon. Yes of course I plan on writing Thursday morning, I’m on a roll. *smile* I’ll also get up early at the campground and use their recreation area to do my writing.

I’m nothing if not flexible.

How is your project coming along?

Please remember, this is straight from my rough draft – I’ve done virtually no editing. 🙂

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Prologue

“Crash on turn two.”

Even though Julie had been braced for such a call, all the muscles in her arms tensed up.

“Roger.” She replied through the headset in her helmet.

She glanced at the traffic in her rearview mirror. A long line of cars were right on her rear bumper. She was still in the lead, but how long would it last?

“Stay high, stay high!” the female voice barked at her.

“How bad?” Julie said through clenched teeth.

“A blown tire, debris everywhere and he’s having trouble keeping the car from spinning out.”

Julie glanced again in her rear view mirror, Kent’s car was so close behind her, she could see his eyes behind his visor.

“Three car pile up! Watch your speed. Caution is out.”

Julie eased up on the accelerator and watched the needle plunge to 150 mph. “Who crashed?”

“Drive low!” the voice barked.

Julie, trusting her crew chief, immediately went low. Though she had slowed down, she was still going nearly 80 miles an hour. She narrowed her eyes at the sight of the huge wall of smoke ahead of her. She knew from past experience that it was best to just plow ahead. If she slowed down too much, the cars behind her would hit her.

“Talk to me,” Julie growled into her headset. She had entered the cloud and her visibility had been reduced to zero.

“Hang tight, hang tight,” her crew chief yelled.

Julie’s hands tightened even more on the steering wheel. Her palms adhered to the hot, sticky steering wheel cover.

“Oh Jesus,” said the voice.

Julie’s heart tripped and she focused all of her energy into looking past the smoke. She could just make out two shadowy shapes in her peripheral. She jerked her head to gauge their distance and swerved sharply to the right.

She felt, rather than saw, the shape whiz past her.

Julie immediately dismissed the first obstacle and concentrated on the second. It was far below her and didn’t pose any immediate threat. She issued a soft sigh of relief and eased her car further up the track.

“Wow, that was …” before she could squeeze the last part of her sentence out, her body was thrown to the left and her shoulder smashed into the safety cage. Before she could process what had happened, her car was suddenly spinning wildly out of control.

“Straighten out and go high,” the strained voice sounded in her ear.

Julie reacted instinctively. Her eyes remained wide open and began to water. She didn’t dare take the time to blink. She knew too many drivers who had been in serious crashes simply because they had blinked one too many times.

“Cars right on your tail, speed up,” her crew chief instructed.

Julie again simply reacted to the voice. She pressed on the accelerator and the car shot forward. The back of her head bumped against the headrest.

The race car jerked free of the smoke. Julie blinked in rapid succession and in the split second it took her to regain her focus and breathe, the front of her car smashed headlong into the wall.

Julie had a faint recollection of someone saying something in her headset before she blacked out.