Who I am…
I am a lawyer, former mother of teenagers, and a quixotic seeker after and champion of factual truth.
I make the best damn brownies you have ever had that are not regulated by the federal government.
I love movies, Broadway, and intelligent conversation.
I think in song lyrics and movie and television quotes.
I believe in the use of proper spelling, punctuation, and grammar even in text messages. I am willing to debate the use of the Oxford comma, if you know what the Oxford comma is. It also makes me very happy if people use the subjunctive mood when appropriate.
I have been told I intimidate people. I am really just a fluffy-centered teddy bear. Really.
- It's all my fault. No, really. The views expressed in this blog are mine and mine alone and in no way whatsoever represent the views of anyone else, including any past, present, or future employer.
- Follow The Wild Winds of Fortune on WordPress.com
Wild Winds of Fortune Feed
Search this blog
Archives
December 2025 S M T W T F S 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 
Words to live by ….
“He has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?” Micah 6:8.
“Pray for the dead, fight like hell for the living.” Mary Harris (“Mother Jones”).
“Don’t boo. Vote.” Barack Obama.
“Man’s capacity for justice makes democracy possible, but man’s inclination to injustice makes democracy necessary.” Reinhold Niebuhr.
“No one ever thinks of themselves as one of Them. We’re always one of Us. It’s Them that do the bad things.” Sir Terry Pratchett.
“Damning facts are still facts.” Steven C. Holtzman.
“If you don’t stick to your values when they’re tested, they’re not values — they’re hobbies.” Jon Stewart.
“Darkness never sustains, even though it sometimes seems it will.” Doctor Who.
“Writing is a form of mischief.” Stephen Sondheim.
“An idea is not responsible for the people who believe it.” Don Marquis.
“If you can see your path laid out in front of you step by step, you know it’s not your path. Your own path you make with every step you take. That’s why it’s your path.” Joseph Campbell.
“Truth is our strongest ally, our biggest weapon, and our best defense.” Me.
“Reality has a well-known liberal bias.” Stephen Colbert.
“The opposite of war isn’t peace, it’s creation.” Jonathan Larson.
“We live through times when hate and fear seem stronger.
We rise and fall, and light from dying embers
Remembrances that hope and love last longer.
And love is love is love is love is love is love is love is love;
Cannot be killed or swept aside.”
Lin-Manuel Miranda.“If I can’t dance, I don’t want to be part of your revolution.” Emma Goldman.
“No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.” Samuel Beckett.
“I believe that the God who made (among other things) light, and space, and number, and time, and the spiral curve of Fibonacci numbers, must be acknowledged to understand more than I do about why there’s pain in the world.” Teresa Neilsen Hayden.
“No, it’s not fair. You’re in the wrong universe for fair.” John Scalzi.
“Liberals got women the right to vote. Liberals got African-Americans the right to vote. Liberals created Social Security and lifted millions of elderly people out of poverty. Liberals ended segregation. Liberals passed the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act. Liberals created Medicare. Liberals passed the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act. So when you try to hurl that label at my feet, ‘Liberal,’ as if it were something to be ashamed of, something dirty, something to run away from, it won’t work, because I will pick up that label and I will wear it as a badge of honor.” Lawrence O’Donnell
“So keep fightin’ for freedom and justice, beloveds, but don’t you forget to have fun doin’ it. Lord, let your laughter ring forth. Be outrageous, ridicule the fraidy-cats, rejoice in all the oddities that freedom can produce. And when you get through kickin’ ass and celebratin’ the sheer joy of a good fight, be sure to tell those who come after how much fun it was.” Molly Ivins.
- Art Beadwork Blogging Books Culture (popular and otherwise) Family Feminism Food God faith and theology Health History Justice KIds Kids in all their glory Miscellany Music My life and times nothing special Personal Relationships Politics Science SCOTUS Social Issues Sports The Internet and its perils The World Travel (real or imaginary) Who I am Work! Writing
Tags
- abortion
- Antarctica
- anti-vaxxers
- architecture
- Art
- baseball
- blogging
- Books
- Broadway!
- Capital punishment
- chinchilla races
- computer
- elections
- Everybody talks about the weather
- Feminism
- first
- first-world problems
- Florida
- football
- Gamergate
- Geeks! Geeks! Geeks!
- Get your red hot links here!
- GMOs
- God faith and theology
- Gratitude
- guns
- hehehe
- hehehehe
- History
- LGBT rights and issues
- life
- life sucks sometimes
- Look what I made!
- mental health
- Mindfulness
- Mom
- Moooom!!!!!
- movies
- Music
- My friends are the coolest people
- NASA
- neil-gaiman
- news
- notes to self
- People worth listening to
- poetry
- Politics
- privacy
- Profundities
- Railfan
- really cool things
- recipes
- Reprehensible people
- Space
- technology
- television
- The Interminable Job Search
- The Not-So-Little Drummer Boy
- The NSLDB
- The Red-Headed Menace strikes again
- The Rocket Scientist. the field season
- the search for truth
- The Voice
- The wonderful Penwiper
- things I believe
- torture
- Tragedy
- Trivia
- Unions
- Voting
- What did I do now?
- What I like
- writing
- you have *got* to be freaking kidding me
-
Join 303 other subscribers
Contact info:
Email me at wwf@lithic.net
Category Archives: Social Issues
Vaccine idiocy: it’s a first world problem, unfortunately.
I can tell the measles epidemic has hit the big time: politicians are weighing in on the issue of vaccination. Rand Paul says that parents should be able to choose, and that he knows many cases of children who have … Continue reading
Where is Sam Vimes when you need him?
A friend of mine on Facebook stated after the Staten Island grand jury refused to indict the officer in the Eric Garner case that she was taking a break from the news to reread Terry Pratchett’s Night Watch. She said … Continue reading
QOTD, for those in Silicon Valley
Santa Clara County Supervisor Joe Simitian, talking about the lack of affordable housing in Mountain View: “Next time we have a big earthquake, the safest place is to be in Tracy, because as far as I know, every cop, firefighter … Continue reading
Safety.
The other day I saw a Rachel Maddow piece about Kaci Hickox, the nurse in Maine who has defied orders to stay sequestered in her house. Hickox has been tested for Ebola, does not have Ebola, has shown no signs … Continue reading
“Social Justice Warrior” has a really lovely ring to it.
I’ve been meaning to write a GamerGate post. Everyone else has, pretty much. I’m busy with other things (such as deciding if I have enough of an idea to try NaNoWriMo this year — I may need to settle for … Continue reading
Just a reminder: this year marks the Fiftieth Anniversary of the Berkeley Free Speech movement. It was a movement that could only take place in an environment free from social media, from a job market where potential graduates have to … Continue reading
Where do the rest of us fit in?
I was listening last night to the TED Radio Hour on NPR, and the subject was technology. There were pieces about how current technology — including social media — could be used to magnify the impact of terrorist attacks, the … Continue reading
I think the vehemence of the prior post was caused by several arguments I have had today with people who insist labor unions are the worst thing that ever happened to this country, that cops are overpaid, and that public … Continue reading
A manifesto, of sorts.
I will not use any service that purports to replace a regulated service in any city where said service refuses to abide by existing regulations. No Uber or Lyft in cities where they do not follow the same regs as … Continue reading
Intersectionality.
In a post following the protests in Ferguson, I talked about my friend’s rules for shopping as an African-American male. I finally began to emotionally (rather than intellectually) relate to his experience when I began mapping them onto the “rules” … Continue reading
Owning my privilege.
C., a friend whom I knew from church, is someone I would want my kids to be like. He attended an Ivy League school, dresses conservatively, and holds down a very nice job at a tech company. He is also … Continue reading
When heroes fall.
I call it the Frank Lloyd Wright axiom: sometimes geniuses are horrible human beings. Most of the time, I can separate the person from their creation: I can look at the Robie House and admire its beauty. The fact that … Continue reading
Just go ahead and die, already.
[Note: please feel free to send this to anybody you think might benefit by it.] Society hates people like me. Or, more accurately, a sizable minority is afraid of people like me. Last week, USA Today ran a series about … Continue reading
Saving for what?
A couple of weeks ago, I went to the last movie showing at the Century 21 theater in San Jose. The Century 21, which dates from 1964, was a wonderful place to see movies: one of the last widescreen theaters … Continue reading
As a follow-up to “We’re being held hostage. At gunpoint.” I would like to pass along a couple of links from the New York Times about “impulsive suicide.” Making the means of suicide more difficult to get to reduces these. … Continue reading
The Wild Winds of Fortune 