It's so wonderful to hear about the good things the CIA is doing for us. They have always been so open and honest, so trustworthy. And efficient! The agency epitomizes efficiency. Now, in its latest missive, we are told that Al-Qaeda still aims to use weapons of mass destruction against the U.S. How reassuring it is to know that the top intelligence agency in the world is still keeping tabs on that dastardly group.

I guess my only question to the CIA is, uh, isn't it YOUR JOB to make sure Al-Qaeda doesn't succeed? And perhaps a little more stealth is in order. That's what we pay you those big bucks for. Quit pestering us with your cheesy threats and do your bloody job.

And speaking of blood, my husband, Uncle PC, had a little bout with skin cancer on his nose and had surgery for it a couple weeks ago, called Moh's surgery. He's doing fine, they cleared the margins of cancer and grafted some tissue from his ear area, without making him hideous. But he does have a fascinating small, round, black scabby thing on his nose which is supposed to clear up....after 2-3 months. He usually keeps a little bandage over it, for meeting clients and whatnot, but I get to see him au natural. Frankly, I love looking at the scab, I've never seen anything so ugly, so multi-textured, so...UGLY. It's worse than what I imagined a chancre would look like. I want to touch it, but we can't until tomorrow.

It's the little things that keep life lively. Even the CIA, with its dour doom & gloom, can't douse that.

Why most of us are poor, except for the really really rich

All of the pieces of the puzzle are slowly coming together as I read bits and pieces here and there attempting to explain why we are all poor now. The simplistic (and incorrect) answer is that too many people bought houses that they could not afford. So, dang it, they deserve to be strung up and crucified; therefore they should be happy to be alive and scraping cheese off the sidewalk for their evening meal. But why do the rest of us have to suffer for their failings, we bought a sensible mortgage and are making proper payments.

O.K., this is where is gets confusing. And deliberately so. If you keep the real explanation as complicated as possible, and muddle peoples' minds with elaborate nonsensical banking terms, their brains will explode in confusion and they will keep chattering about those dang people who bought houses that they could not afford.

Basically, what happened was banks started making up ways to use our money to get more money from really really rich people. They starting bundling mortgages in groups and issuing "insurance" policies to speculators (the really really rich people) who would pay a small premium. Basically, the speculators were betting that the mortgages would fail. The banks wanted more and more mortgages for bundling so they could keep getting those small premiums, so they didn't care about buyer qualifications. The banks thought the really really rich people were suckers and kept stashing all those small premiums in their pockets. Meanwhile the speculators hired experts who determined that there was no way the real estate market could sustain all those mortgages and predicted the bubble would burst. When all the mortgages started failing, the banks had to divvy up MILLIONS to pay the speculators, who then became really, really, REALLY rich people. The banks basically stole our money to pay off a make-believe debt (and then got bailed out by us AGAIN through the government!!), a debt that provided nothing to us, the banks' investors.

I had to stop now, because I can sense eyes glazing over. That's the beauty of this whole business. No one understands it. The banks were bookies. Sea Biscuit in the fifth. All perfectly sanctioned by the government.

O.K., you can go back to American Idol, now. I think I'll do the Daily Jumble, myself.

Snippets

Happy New Year! Everyone is nattering about what to call the last decade. There's a big push for "the Naughts", however I've never heard a soul actually use the term. I wager that the years 2000-2009 will simply be referred as the O's. As in Oh Sh*t. As in the aggregate IQ of most of the members of the last administration. As in the expression on all our faces on 9/11. As in the $ amount in our bank accounts. As in the wondrous day of Prez O's inauguration. Despite the fact that he's becoming a Bush with better window dresssing, 1/20/09 was truly a magical day.

So, let's hear it for the O's!!! And move on to something new, please.

I lived for 12-1/2 wonderful years in Seattle. As a homeowner, I've been relegated to turn eastward, to the City that Shan't Be Named (and, no, it's not Bellevue), also fondly known as the Outer Limits, or OL, for its affordability. Drat those million dollar homes in Seattle--and whoever is foreclosing on all of them. No one's buying them that I can see.

However, my husband and I head to Seattle every chance we get for sun (hush, don't spread the word). We went there yesterday to visit University Village, which is practically its own city now. The last time I was there, back in 1991 or so, it consisted only of a grocery store and some sort of pub/restaurant. I played on a company softball team and that was our apres-game spot.

My first visit to the U-Village was during the blizzard of 1990. I was stranded at work in Kirkland, with no bus in sight for hours, and started walking home. Home was on 85th in Seattle. I was fearless, and never one to sit around waiting. I made it to 520 and a car filled with wonderful Montessori teachers stopped to give me a ride across the bridge. They couldn't take me as far as 85th, but dropped me off at the University Village. I had been living in Seattle for 6 months and might as well have been on the moon, but I asked them for general directions (go right until you hit Aurora, or something) and headed on my way. Luckily I was dressed warmly, with added warmth from the heat of my indignation. How dare they not have buses running, what's with this stupid town that shuts down in snow? And what's with all this fake politeness, anyway--I had moved here from Pennsylvania, that has a veritable phalanx of snowplows at the ready, and Philadelphia, which is not known for politeness of any sort, but at least it's real--I had plenty of time to ruminate and boy did I ever. I scoffed at every hapless soul I saw waiting at a bus stop. Loser!

I finally made it home, stamped off the snow and became a person again. A person who had a neat adventure during the blizzard of 1990.