09 October 2008

I GUESS I WASN'T JOKING AFTER ALL

Here it is, possibly the single most important vote that some senators and representatives are going to make in their whole careers and...

THANK GOD, OREGON'S CHILDRENS' WOODEN TOY ARROW INDUSTRY IS SAVED! THE PUERTO RICAN RUM INDUSTRY WILL THRIVE TO DISTILL ANOTHER DAY.

Earmarks. Of course there were earmarks on the economic bailout / rescue bill.

JUST HOW SHAMELESS ARE THESE PEOPLE?

That wasn't really a question.

Mark Twain said: "America has no distinctly criminal class, excepting maybe Congress." It is as true today as it was in Twain's time.

I'm at Bouchercon in Baltimore. It's the huge annual mystery readers and writers confab and is as fun, and at times useful, as ever. Large amounts of booze are being drunk - some of it probably Puerto Rican rum at that. Plenty of both inebriated and sober talk about writing and publishing is in the wind. Some people are sneaking around the hotel corridors. Awards are being given out. Books are being signed. It's like any convention anywhere, I suppose. For us writers, who spend our days sitting alone in front of computer screens or pads of paper - I even know one who still uses manual typewriters - it's a welcome and necessary reminder that we are part of a community, an industry and that no matter if we write about serial killers or cats solving crimes, we share a common cause and bond. I like it.

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