What is this Even

Today, I have been down to the park for a picnic with my family. While there, I repeatedly jogged to and from the nearest Pokéstop, because we couldn’t see any place closer where we could have our picnic. We clocked where the other spot in the park was and will probably aim to picnic there in future, but for this time… we were where we were.

But jogging. Whut.

And then, THEN. I’d been toying with getting out on my bike and trying to figure out the logistics of taking lots of crap with me. Well dur Raesie, you’ve got a backpack or three, use one of those. I’d been walking around the last couple of days with my messenger bag and wondering why my back was hurting so much. HMMMMMMMMMMMMM. Having said that,  it’s not like I intended to get… *shudders* active, so I didn’t really think about the best way to do the thing.

But bringing a bike into the equation, one REALLY has to think about that. And so I did! And I got lucky, in that my crammed full crap cupboard had not one, not two, but three backpacks in it. The third didn’t have anything in it, which made it perfect for the test run. I shoved my purse in, the tag end of a few drinks, and my knitting, and made my way down to the river. Mmm, riparian entertainments. *giggles* But really, I’ve ridden a bike once in the past… blargh, 20+ years, and that was last year; this was a bit of a rough trip. But I think that if I keep up with it, it’ll get easier (and give me more time to sit my ass by the river and the Pokéstop <__<).

Really though, no idea how much longer this sort of drive to be out and about and doing the thing is going to last… probably until I catch ’em all, and who knows how long that will take.

There are many things that I prefer about the UK over the US, but the shorter political cycle is *definitely* a part of it. We’re in a rather gross patch of continued cycle right now due to Brexit fallout and people trying to take advantage of it. We have a new Prime Minister and leader of the Conservative party (gag, Thatcher Junior), and the Labour party is currently tearing itself apart, again, to try and overthrow a leader that the actual voters like, but the Parliamentary Labour Party despise. Really. They gave us a Miliband, we gave them a Corbyn — they should be grovelling thanks at being pulled back to the left by someone who actually gives a fuck about things (besides his allotment and manhole covers).

Having said that, the run-up to Brexit was like, two months, tops. The year before when we were voting for our MPs, it was the ‘standard’ month cycle. I teased my fellow Brits on behalf of my fellow Americans, who have been dealing with the political cycle… heck, almost since the last freaking election. I kind of wonder how they survive it, how *I* survived it, and then I remember that I didn’t watch television for six years.

I actually watch some TV now, and the bits of it that make it across the pond make me just want to throw my hands up in the air and say fuck it. All the candidates that I know of are fucking terrible; that includes the Greens and Libertarians. And I couldn’t even comfortably vote third party this time around. I did in 2000 and learned my ‘lesson’, though I did vote third party in 2012 because I felt confident it was going to be okay (and it was).

But this time? I’ll be honest, I am not particularly a fan of Hilary. I wouldn’t assign all the scandals that the right are trying to pin on her, but there was definitely some stuff before she was First Lady that I consider questionable, and as a former government intelligence employee, I really, *REALLY* was not okay with the whole handling of her classified emails. It’s been cleared (even if Wikileaks is trying to trot it out now, sigh!), so I’m not going to worry my pretty little head about it. I *AM* going to worry my ass off about the possibility of Trump taking control of the US; he’s failed at pretty much everything else he’s done, and I would like to see the land of my birth *not* go down the shitter. My dear friend Pollychrome has written some good posts in this vein, so check them out if you want some good brain fodder.

Having said that, as much as I feel voting third party for President is not the right thing to do this election, I still respect the choice of my friends going third party. None of them are Bernie Bros, trying to find a way to avoid Hilary out of spite. They are intelligent people who are making their decisions based on their own research and opinions, and I can’t begrudge them that. I do think they are right too — that we need to break the two party system into bits. I’m just not brave enough to risk it this time around.

Anyways, dord.

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