Bush and Loons (No, like the duck....)

I hadn't planned on staying up until 1 am, but this is important.

Today I went kayaking for two and a half hours on a lake where the loudest sound in some spots was the drip of water falling from the paddle back into its lake.

There were three loons, a beaver dam, and thousands and thousands of trees.

I plan on bringing all of you who want, someday, up to the Adirondacks. They're a deep part of me, and so beautiful.

That is why I am pissed about what Bush's administration plans to do to the Endangered Species Act (thanks to Orion for the link):

Giving Americans access to endangered animals, officials said, would feed the gigantic U.S. demand for live animals, skins, parts and trophies, and generate profits that would allow poor nations to pay for conservation of the remaining animals and their habitat.

I can't hold these ideas in my mind at one time; it's pure doublethink.

And, as someone suggested in Orion's journal, the official comment time for this runs out on October 17th. You still have three days!

Let EVERYONE know what you think:

Write the Office of the Federal Environmental Executive.

Write the Environmental Protection Agency.

Get contact information for your local office of the Endangered Species Act and write them.

Email:
task_force@ofee.gov
public-access@epa.gov

Write lots of people. Get upset.
We can decide to screw up our species ourselves, but they're fucking with the fate of other species here. Let them know that they have no idea what the hell they're doing, and make them want to stop doing it.

( Read what I wrote. Use it as a template. Copy it, I don't care...just let them know that what they're doing is wrong. )

Squeee!!

So, my family is hosting a Finnish exchange student, Heidi, from late October until late January.

She came over to the house here for the first time this evening. She's very quiet and didn't really seem to have many interests.

We had a nice dinner, which means 'the pork chops were excellent and no one really talked.'

And then on the way back down, I saw her pocketbook was covered in buttons (the kind you get at renfaires or conventions). I asked if I could take a look:

"Can ET borrow your cellphone?" in Finnish has lots of umlauts.

There were other buttons, too, one about The Princess Bride. This looked promising. So I ask, "do you like the movie?" and she says, "yes," and starts talking about fantasy films, and LotR, and tells me that the Peter Jackson people are going to do The Hobbit next! (Earis, do you know anything about this?) I start bouncing up and down with joy, and my mom looks at me like I've turned into a different person, and as we walk out to the car--I was on driving-Heidi-home duty--she goes, "do you read fanfic?"

We have a conversation about slash, yaoi, and Elijah Wood all the way home. She's never seen The Dark Crystal--I was trying to use David Bowie as an example of a famous star people might do real person slash with, and she didn't know who he was, so I get to show it to her. I said, "all you need to know for now is he's a rock star in leather pants" and she grinned at me.

Oh, this is going to be fun. And she's coming to the Mawr for Lantern Night.

Also found a store today that sells little else but tea and tea accessories (anyone want tea?) and learned to play chess.