Tuesday evening roundup and ramble

Call it OWS or OWES, but it's not the Tea Party of the left.http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif

I am not an ideologue. There are conservatives whom I respect tremendously, and Anne Applebaum is one. Which is why I'm very disappointed with her column on OWS. The whole argument that OWS is remotely anti-democratic or detrimental to democracy, specifically because the protests occur in nations equipped with democratic institutions to address grievances, misses the point: people feel that those institutions are not working for them, that they've been coopted by special interests. They want their democratic institutions to work for them.

Believe me when I say that domestic violence is never funny. But this is not domestic violence, so I have no problem finding it f*ing hilarious.

Yes, it is ostentation in matters of food that infuriates people.

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I am blessed to have health insurance, an awesome doctor, and health center within my office building. I leveraged all three today, and though the rest of this ramble concerns solely the third, I just wanted to count my blessings.

I was at the health center, filling out paperwork, when the center coordinator complimented my shoes. I thanked her, told her they were from a thrift shop; she said I could do that because I have small feet; I said, hardly. One thing led to another, and I started telling her that I was now in the market for synthetic shoes, and that I was struggling terribly, because they were so ugly and so expensive. At the same time. We talked a bit more about shoes, and I went in to get my shot.

When I came out, she asked me if I were, perchance, vegan. One of the nurses joined the conversation, said she had recently become a vegetarian but couldn't imagine giving up dairy. I told her I was the same way for a while, but I started feeling much better almost immediately after making the change, and wouldn't want to go back. So they asked me questions, asked me for recipes. I told them about how I recently spent the weekend with eight other people, and no one noticed, much less complained, about the three vegan dinners in a row. If it's done right, you don't notice what's missing. Anyway, I promised to send them recipes, and I hope they find what works for them. I'm glad people are interested, curious.