/rant mode: ON/

Item:  Would somebody please tell me why the hell Jeb Bush would "disagree" with the Pope about the existence of climate change?  I can see why Jeb doesn't want anything done to fight climate change--he might make less money, which of course would be a tragedy--but why would anyone "disagree" that climate change is happening?  Maybe Jeb should check in with some real scientists.  Like, say, the Pope, who has a degree in chemistry and worked as a chemist before becoming a priest.

Item:  Global warming aside, can anybody offer some suggestions about how in the bloody hell we're going to feed, clothe, house, educate and employ 11 billion people using just this planet?

Item: I'm 46 years old and I do hereby promise you that I will never, ever wax nostalgic (at least, not in public) about how great things were in the "good old days" or when I was a kid.  People who do that seem not to realize that the "good old days" weren't good for everybody.  They were good for rich white people.  Nobody else had civil rights, access to good education, high-paying jobs or the ability to get ahead. Go on, ask an elderly black man about how great things were in the 1950s when he was legally prevented from using the same water fountain as you in most of the Southern states.  Go on.  I dare you.

Item: This high school in Idaho has officially banned its cheerleaders from wearing their uniforms without leggings or sweat pants, allegedly because the short skirts exposed their butts on stairs and while sitting.  I, personally, have never before seen a cheerleader skirt that didn't also have some kind of bloomer stitched into it, but that aside, has it maybe occurred to the school that the cheerleaders' skirts ought to be a little bit longer?!  You know, a couple of inches more fabric between her butt and the outside world?  Seems like this one can be blamed on the school, not the students.

Item: John Boehner is resigning from Congress.  So the next time you want to laugh at some guy with an orange face who just can't seem to stop embarrassing himself in public, you'll just have to find yourself a puppet or something.

Item: A flight was delayed because a pet tarantula escaped from its enclosure in the cargo bay.  Look, I'm all for exotic pets, but in a world where an eighteen-month-old baby can be removed from an airplane for being on the no-fly list, I just don't think anything that has a number of legs divisible by eight should get a pass.  And while it may be true that not all terrorists are spiders, it is also true that the vast majority of spiders are terrorists.  The price of liberty is eternal vigilance.

Item: Presidential candidate and general asshole Mike Huckabee apparently has it in for rainbow-colored Doritos.  Evidently your choice of snack is now a political statement.  So if you're a Republican, you might want to stick to Cheetos.  Not only are they crunchier, they will turn your fingers orange.  You know, like John Boehner's.

That's about it for today.  I started a new job this week, and one of the things I'm going to have to do, a lot, is speak a little Spanish.  Luckily, I already speak that language, but I'm a little rusty.  I forget stupid words like "building" and "boat."  But looky here what just came in the mail:

 
I think these will help.  It's awesome to live with a librarian.

/rant mode: OFF/