Saving the Planet

My favorite thing of the weekend was The Pussycat Dolls pole dancing for the environment. Check out page 6 of your Calendar section. Check out the guys in the audience. Oh yeah, they're thinking, "I've got to get me one of those energy saving lightbulbs." Or, "You know what, right after this I am going run home and unplug my phone charger." Seriously, whatever it takes to get people to think about the environment even a little is good. Shakira shaking her booty probably brought the temperature up a few more notches. Whatever works.

My least favorite thing this weekend was the news that over 200 innocent people were killed by a suicide bomber outside of Baghdad. It was not even on the front page of the paper today. It was somewhere in the middle of the first section. Hmmmm. Where do you think it would be if over 200 people were killed at the Malibu farmers market?

For the past couple of months I have been receiving a frightening catalogue with the unfortunate moniker, "Time For Me". This is aimed at women of a certain age who have already raised their kids and are thinking of retiring from their jobs and now have "time for me!" First of all, didn't you WANT to have those children? Isn't that what you dreamed about more than anything? So, technically, that WAS your time. You wanted it and you got it. And now that time is over and it is not time for YOU, it's time for somebody else...Perhaps somebody less fortunate than you? Ever think of that, you selfish pig!? No, I'm telling you, this catalogue makes me crazy. I have two issues in front of me. On one cover a woman is sitting alone in a canoe, dangling her feet in the water and laughing hysterically. On the other cover a woman in full make-up is holding a golf club pretty much up against her crotch and she is about to play MINIATURE GOLF. Do these women not have anything better to do with their time? Okay, you raised your kids. Good work. Now maybe it's time to do something for humanity? Could you give back just a little? Must you go to Europe...Again? Okay, I might be judging them a little too harshly. Maybe right before miniature golf this happy woman went down to a shelter and brought some clothes and worked with the kids and after miniature golf she's going to a woman's prison and helping them with their reading and writing. But I just have a feeling the woman in the canoe is not going to do that. I think she's about to have a nervous breakdown. I think I hate this catalogue.

Some of you probably listen to the same radio stations that I do. Today I heard something that made me pull over and collect myself because I could not believe our beloved Potus actually said this. (And my son told me Michael Moore used this cut in Sicko.) Bush was in a sort of town hall meeting and a woman stood up (it was radio but I had the feeling...) And the women told him that she had to hold down three jobs to support her family. And our President said, without hesitation, "Three jobs! That is so American. How wonderful is that!" And some of the audience applauded. This guy actually thought it was wonderful that this poor woman had three jobs. Wonderful. Never occured to him that maybe, if she was in a union and had benefits and proper wages, she might be able to actually be home and spend time with her family instead of working 24 hours a day. Maybe even have time to go to her fabulous summer home in Kennebunkport and sail around on her mini yacht and have cocktails on the beach and ain't life just so grand when you have three fabulous jobs to look forward to. Oh hoorah America. Now, hey, I love America. I am one of the lucky ones. (I do not blame America for my cancer.) But something is wrong when so many Americans have to work their butts off just to scrape by. Something is wrong when there seems to be less and less of a middle class. Rich, poor. Not much in between.

But I'm really not that angry. And I'm not auditioning for the Huffington Post. Actually, I have my second chemo on Thursday and I am supposed to be relaxed and calm and maybe if I toss all catalogues and just watch The Pussycat Dolls on YouTube I could be in a good place by Thursday...It's worth a try...