Shaken, not stirred.

Well, I was SUPPOSED to be at a wine tasting today, which included a martini tasting. However...uh huh, nope, I did NOT pick up the tickets I won and I was NOT milling about at Greystone Mansion this afternoon. My younger son, who tips the scales at the ripe old age of 20, had made some previous plans. This in and of itself isn't that big a problem. I won these tickets from a radio station and asked three friends to come with me. All three said, in essence, "sorry, busy".

So I figured okay, that's fine, it's me and the hubster. It'll take three busses, as my carless state continues for awhile yet, but what else have I got to do on a Saturday, right?

However, with the sudden realization that my younger son would NOT be home and my older one would be alone for something in the vicinity of 6 or so hours, the pretty color print that says "Congratulations!" and "your tickets are at will-call" remains on the rather cluttered occasional table next the my desk.

My older son has some issues, one of them health related. He's on medication for it and it's reared it's ugly head exactly ONCE in the past five years, but that's one time too many, it's not advisable to be alone if one can avoid it. So the wine went untasted, at least by me. As did the martinis. Although the martini tasting was billed as being sponsored by Grey Goose. This is VODKA. I do not drink VODKA martinis and I, quite frankly, resent the current trend that labels all martinis as being made with vodka and forces me to order a "Bombay Martini" because I happen to like my drinks served in their original and unaltered recipes. I think it not only sounds silly but is redundant to saunter up to a bar and order a "gin martini". To avoid this (as well as to avoid being served Beefeater, which is swill) I order Bombay. This adds two bucks to the price of the martini, btw, as it's now a "called" drink as opposed to a "well" drink. I understand the call part, I have "called" for a particular brand. I have no idea why the house rotgut is called "well".

Anyway, I amused myself by going through the closet. BAD move. I have two garbage bags full of very nice evening wear that I can no longer comfortably sit for any length of time in. I intend to get some under bed boxes and some cedar thingies and take the clothing out of the trash bags and slide it under the bed, as it's now imperative I go back to Weight Watchers. Hope does spring eternal.

A couple of business type suits also found their way into their temporary home in the Glad bags, which really depressed the hell out of me, as I actually wore them about two years ago. This was before I a) became firmly and, apparently, irrevocably ensconced in a job with the main requirement of sitting on my rather sizable butt 9 hours a day and b) ate my way through the loss of my husband's job and, as the night follows the day, my home. Sometimes I ache for that place, it's really not so much the house as the fact that my family had owned it for 30 odd years and we didn't have enough time to get everything out. I have a decent enough apt now, a bit small for the four of us but the neighborhood is pretty fair and we still are playing host the the previously blogged ducks. I miss the damnedest things though. I miss pulling into my own driveway and leaving the car there. And oh my GOD how I miss my washer and dryer. However...

I did keep my sapphire blue evening suit in the closet though. I tried it on and it buttons after a fashion. I bought this suit from Bloomingdale's several years ago, mostly to spite my step-mother-in-law. After my husband's mother died my father-in-law and his wife (okay, give the devil her due, they'd been married for something like 30 years) beat a path to the old family Church for a wedding. As my MIL was now passed on my FIL was, at least to the Catholic Church, now a widower and free to marry.

Did I mention I married into a large family of Italians?

Well, anyway, we received an invitation to this ceremony, which was being held a couple of weeks after Christmas. This enabled my "new" MIL to piggyback her wedding and subsequent reception at their home onto my FIL's birthday, thus saving considerable bucks. Especially considering her four step-children (all well grown with adult or close to it children of their own) were all given their tasks...One for the cake, one for the photographer. We got decor, but I digress.

Well, anyway, about two weeks before Christmas I got a call from her asking what size pants she should buy my sons because she wanted them to be properly dressed at this shindig. I pointed out that, as I was scavenging through the dumpsters out back of the local Big Lots I had managed to snag some very serviceable three piece suits but if she thought that would be overdressed....and NO, this was BEFORE the big financial debacle, there are three men live in my house and they ALL own suits.

Having expressed obvious and very vocal surprise that my husband and sons owned suits she then told me what she thought I should wear. The outfit she suggested WAS a knockout, it was designed for me by a friend who does that sort of thing and it's pretty cool. However, once she told me it would be "appropriate" and she expected to see me in it I realized it would be a cold day in hell before I wore it, at least to THAT wedding (I later wore it to my niece's). So, in a fit of pique, I returned from a marathon shopping trip with THE SUIT in a bag. Damn, it was beautiful. Sapphire blue double breasted velvet jacket with sapphire blue satin slacks. It gave me no small amount of smug pleasure when that suit was WAY more "appropriate" for a mid-January evening event than the ruby red silk floor length skirt and top combo would have been.

The pantsuit was a little too big. Not baggy big, but I was EXTREMELY comfortable in it. I tried it on today. I CAN get it buttoned and still breathe. And, unlike some of my other evening suits, I can get my arms down with some effort. I tried another one on and, after carefully greasing my arms and working them all the way down into the long sleeves I discovered I looked something like Burgess Meredith playing "The Penguin." I wasn't able to get my arms all the way down to my sides and there was absolutly NO way I could bend them at the elbow. There I stood, with my arms looking as if they were in black splints, my hands sort of flapping for no real reason. The blue, while snug, COULD probably be worn as long as I remain standing. I don't think sitting is yet an option, those Swarovski buttons would most definitely do no small amount of damage when they came loose, especially considering the catapult like force and speed with which they would most certainly launch themselves towards back of some unsuspecting theater patron.

I left it on it's hangar though, as a reminder that I once wore it comfortably and now I can't, in spite of the fact that it looks now as if it came from Beverly Hills Tent and Awning. And tonight I cooked like a real person, I cleaned and cut vegetables, blanched and shocked them, mixed then with brown rice and garbanzo beans with a homemade vinaigrette and served it with boneless, skinless chicken breasts, which were marinated in Pesto and were NOT as good as I thought they would be, pesto in a grill pan just didn't seem to work. But the whole thing made me feel MUCH better about A) the blue suit; B) the Guinness Book of World Records size muffin top currently sitting right above the waistband of my favorite jeans and C) the slice of lemon tart I had with a cup of tea about an hour ago.

Some Enchanted Evening...

I have a birthday coming up. This, in and of itself, isn't that big of a deal. The deal is that I WANT it to be a big deal, and it never is. After all these years you would think I would outgrow this, but still, I keep expecting the gesture. You know, coming home from work and finding a chocolate cake with candles. Or coming home and having your family usher you into the two bedroom unit downstairs that has the hardwood floors and the new kitchen cabinets and a real front door with a screen that you can open on stuffy nights onto a little lawn with flower beds with the happy news "Happy Birthday! I rented this for us!"

Ain't gonna happen.

Know WHY?

The hubster and I have the same birthday.

I used to think this would be the occasion for a HUGE blowout. Instead, it's more like having a birthday on Christmas Day. Through the years we've tried alternating, sharing and, eventually, just sort of ignoring the entire thing all together. My husband occasionally sends me a free e card, the kids say "Happy Birthday Mom, sorry we're so broke" and that, as they say, is pretty much that. The year I turned 50 I didn't even get the e-card. I thought 50 was a BIG DEAL. People kept telling me about the great fun they had on this landmark occasion. Other people, I think, have more fun than I do. It's times like this I miss my mother, who always got me a birthday gift and didn't make me feel guilty about wanting attention. She made me feel guilty about pleanty of things, but NOT my birthday. This, btw, is a result of 12 years of parochial schooling and NOT nastiness on the part of any one person. Or three. A Catholic education can be a terrifying thing at times.

Well, this year the opening of the big musical show that's currently on tour is on my birthday. This is one of the opening nights we line up four hours in advance for in hopes of snagging free unclaimed tickets and this is "South Pacific" which I've been DYING to see. So my boys and I will, in all probability, be lined up downtown waiting for the freebies. The hubster was invited but is declining, as he usually does. He attends (of his own free will) no musicals written by people who aren't Sondheim and he attends no plays not authored by Shakespeare or Noel Coward. Although, now that I think of it, I think he went to a Tom Stoppard play once. I dragged him to see "Pippin". He didn't like it. I dragged him to see "Applause". He didn't like that much either, having seen Lauren Bacall do it in London and I'm not sure but if Bacall hadn't been in London with it he probably wouldn't have gone to that either. OH wait! He does love "A Chorus Line".

Me? I LOVE Rodgers and Hart. Rodgers and Hammerstein. Jerome Kern, George Gershwin. Lerner and Loewe, is there ANYTHING more perfectly crafted than "My Fair Lady"? Okay, so George Bernard Show had a little something to do with it, the book at any rate. I like Stephen Schwartz and really enjoyed "Wicked". LOVED "Mary Poppins". "Dreamgirls". I love "On the Town" and "Wonderful Town" and "Guys and Dolls" and "Damn Yankees" and "Brigadoon" and "Anything Goes". We all ended up, for some convoluted reason, seeing "RENT" on one of it's tours. I was astonished to find I LOVED it. The hubster spend the entire show with his arms folded across his chest. I'm not sure he realizes how uncomfortable this makes us.

I still don't know why I want the people I care for to get the sort of pleasure I get from these things. My sons love them and happily go, but I would just LOVE to spend my birthday at opening night of South Pacific, all FOUR of us, and have everyone say "WOW, I'm really glad I saw that." But no. Three of us will see "South Pacific" and one of us will play pub trivia. I suppose that's okay, everyone to his own pleasure.

However, this week-end, to assuage my ever morose anticipation of the years piling up and attaching themselves to my fanny, I'm going to take another run at the "Queen of Sheba" cake. I'm pretty sure the egg whites were folded with too much vigor the last time, AND we didn't tilt the pan so the batter clung to the sides and gave the cake something to climb, probably because the slightly over-beaten egg whites that were folded in with such energy gave us a cake batter that was more like brownie batter.

It sure as hell tasted good though.

Mary, Mary, quite contrary...

About, oh, maybe six, seven years ago here in California, we had a governor, name of Gray Davis. Gray ran on a platform that was, basically, it's too damn expensive to live here. He was right. He'd been in state politics for a long time, he was ABSOLUTELY, POSITIVELY RIGHT.

Well, Gray got himself elected and he promptly paid back the voters by cutting the outrageous price of car registration. Which lasted for, oh, about 18 months, at which point the State ran out of money.

California runs out of money all the time, trust me. Every year there's a big news deal about how no one's going to get paid because the budget hasn't been signed because the state's out of money and they're trying to balance the budget. Which, btw, they never do. So someone stops the clocks up in Sacramento and we all pretend it's still Friday night and the midnight deadline for the budget hasn't really passed and it really ISN'T a week from last Tuesday now. The legislature gets bored, they figure out a lousy budget, the governor bitches and signes the damn thing anyway. This is how it works here.

So, Davis discovers the state is out of money and begrudgingly (at least according to him) raises auto registration fees back where they were. So in California it now cost us $648.50 to register a 1987 Yugo. Add an extra $25 if you wanted a personalized plate. Well, to make an already long blog less long, there was a recall. Of the Governor, not the Yugo. I'm not going to say the auto registration fees were the sole reason but they're the only reason anyone remembers now. We love our cars.

The recall was a special election with a ballot that made the State of Florida butterfly ballot of 2000 look like a masterwork of clarity. If you were opposed to the recall, vote for Gray Davis for Governor and NO on the recall. If you were in favor of the recall, vote for one of the following 400 candidates for Governor, a list that included, in no particular order, Gary Coleman, Arianna Huffington, Mary Carey and Arnold Schwarzenegger who, at one point in this process, during a debate, threatened to kill Ms. Huffington. California, of course, elected him as he could pretty much do whatever he wanted to Arianna as long as he lowered auto registration fees, pretty much the sole selling point of his campaign.

Mary Carey, however, made no small amount of sense. Ms. Carey, if you don't remember, is a star of the adult screen. She makes no secret of this. It's a legal business, at least here. She works for her money, earns her money, and pays taxes on her money and, frankly, is more qualified to hold the office of Governor of the State of California than the shimmering star of the auction world currently running for that august office.

Ms. Carey had an idea for boosting the state revenue without raising car registration fees. Just leave the damn bars open 24 hours. Currently, last call in California is 2am. The bar re-opens at 6am, closed for a grand total of four hours. That's FOUR hours of revenue, taxes, increased fees for liquor licenses and, let's face it, it's not like closing the bars for a grand total of FOUR hours in the middle of the night discourages ANYTHING. Have you ever known anyone with a drinking problem who suddenly stopped drinking because the state made the bars close? Me either.

Well, Arnold's leaving for home and it's time to interview some new candidates. Like Meg Whitman. God only knows why ANYONE wants this job, I wouldn't have it on a bet. But Meg not only wants it, she's paying a LOT of money to let us know just how badly she wants it, and why she wants it.

Now Meg was the CEO of eBay. Meg has more money than, well, than Schwarzenegger probably. She's a dyed blond with a Fantastic Sam's bob, blue pop eyes, a business wardrobe I think she GOT from an eBay auction and blindingly white teeth. She looks directly into the camera and tells us that she ran eBay and she wants to run California. She wants to call out the National Guard to protect our borders from all those illegals who run across the I-5 at Camp Pendleton dragging poor, pigtailed little girls along behind them like helium balloons.



She ALSO is extremely mad at a guy named Steve Poizner. Steve, it seems, has the audacity to run against HER! Steve must be stopped. Because Steve, well, I guess Steve was a non-paying bidder or something. She also mad at Jerry Brown, who is running against her. Except Jerry Brown is a Democrat and Meg's a Republican and, since we haven't even had a PRIMARY yet, she's kind of jumping the gun on that one if nothing else.

And here's my favorite Meg Whitman quote: "I oppose Barbara Boxer". That's all. Um Meg? You might want to re-list your candidacy because maybe you MEANT to run for the SENATE but you're actually running for Governor. Barbara Boxer is a SENATOR. A U.S. Senator, not even a state senator. Meg? You're NOT RUNNING AGAINST HER. You probably won't run into her in Sacramento. I don't think she'll be at your Christmas or Hanukkah party. I'm thinking she probably doesn't like you much either, for what that's worth. Meg? Do yourself a favor. Go on eBay and put a bid in for someones used Poli Sci book, it'll do you a world of good.


So, in a nutshell, here's Meg, who "opposed Barbara Boxer" for no discernible reason.


And Mary Carey, who, like Franklin Delano Roosevelt, at least knows there's money to be had in the liquor industry:

I'm thinking of starting a write in movement.

"Chicks and Ducks and Geese..."

Last Friday, while walking home from work, my next door neighbor was entertaining some ducks. Yes, ducks. There were two of them, she was standing in her open front door talking to a woman and the woman's child and we all looked at the ducks.

They are rather docile ducks and I assumed they had some sort of business at my neighbor's house, visiting, bad choice of pet, something like that. In fact, I thought "geez, if you're looking for a watch-bird you should have got yourself a goose." Geese are the most territorial bird on earth, and the nastiest. They bite. Hard. When I had my house the people on the corner kept a goose. A big, pretty, goose, you know, like you think Mother Goose must have looked? Great for still pictures. Not so great in action. We could hear that thing honking a block away.

The ducks, however, seemed to be non-plussed at the activity. I stopped for half a minute and then went on my way. A few hours later, my son and I set out looking for dinner, after waiting for two hours for someone else to do something and discovering that other residents of my domain will sit with their stomachs growling rather than take action towards putting a meal together. No, there was NOTHING in the kitchen edible, I had been sick and hadn't shopped for two weeks.

So down the stairs to the front and a turn towards Trader Joe's we go. And there, on the parkway, are the ducks. They appear to be tired and settling down for the night. They'd chosen a spot close to the driveway where the street dips and there's always at least four inches of water pooled at the curb. My son and I stop dead, as if we've never seen ducks before. Well, outside of Disneyland I'm not sure we had now that I think of it. I look around and see that the people who live in the apartment directly beneath us are hanging over the back of their couch in the front window, watching the ducks. We, apparently, lack for entertainment here in the urban village.

Our best guess is that they've wandered over from the lake and decided to take up residence here. Yes, we have a lake. It exists as a repository for errant balls from Lakeside (LAKEside, get it? ) Country Club and as a great big recreational area for the people who have bought 10 million dollar homes with modest fronts on the street and lavish backs with yards that slope down to the lake. They have private little docks where they keep their private little paddle boats. Years ago the lake was visible to all and sundry but, as the years have gone by, new owners have added to their homes so that there is only enough room between the houses for dense hedges, thus blocking all lake views from those of us who occupy the dreaded RENTAL side of town and would not, actually be paying for our lake views. We manage to see it every Halloween however, because half of Southern California buses in to trick or treat in that particular neighborhood and we can see through the open front doors right out the picture windows to the back. So there.



The ducks remain. The block supplies them with bread. They periodically get up and cross the street, usually when someone, or something is walking down the street they don't care for. They don't seem to care for poodles, btw. They never run, they never fly. They saunter. Cars come down the street and they stand and watch them. The cars stop. The freaking STREET SWEEPER stopped for them this morning. You would think NONE of us had ever seen a duck before.

We're all keeping our cats in. Our cats are getting fat and lazy but we defer to the presence of the ducks. The thought has crossed my mind that they are a sign, Farmville has crossed from the Internet to reality and this is a gift gone terribly awry. "Cindy has given you a duck in Farmville. Do you want to accept?"

I'm still not sure why the ducks have chosen to leave their cushy life on the rich people's private lake to take up with those of us who have already been foreclosed, but then I don't even know how to tell if they're male or female ducks.

I just know we have ducks. And for some reason, our little block has slowed to a summertime crawl because of them. In a while I will probably wonder if I should call Animal Control or the Audubon Society and get them back where they belong. But then, I'm not where I belong either. And the ducks make me feel a little better about that.

Elisabeth, the tribe has spoken.

Okay, I've needed to say this for quite some time now.

Elisabeth Hasselbeck makes me sick.

Every time that twit opens her mouth Alice Paul rolls over. She's Sarah Palin. Without the brains.

So, having basically announced yesterday that ESPN's Erin Andrews, currently on Dancing With The Stars, was not the victim in her stalking case but the protagonist, decided to cry big crocodile tears on "The View" and say that she was very sad she hurt Ms. Andrew's feelings and called her up to apologize. And then apologized on the air for good measure. Sitting next to Barbara Walters who, I imagine, probably punched her out backstage for her complete and utter ignorance.

I also have a gut feeling that Ms. Hasselbeck would NOT have felt such tearful remorse if the television viewing audience had not, for the most part, called her a pig for those uncalled for and unnecessary remarks.

If you haven't heard, Ms. Andrews was the victim of a peeping tom, a sicko who stalked her, drilled holes in hotel room walls and watched her in the shower, among other things. The stalker now rots in a jail somewhere. The system DOES work every now and then.

Ms. Hasselbeck announced that the stalker should have just waited a few months and watched Ms. Andrews performing on "Dancing With The Stars" and saved himself some jail time, thus implying that Ms. Andrews and her dancing costumes brought the stalker on herself.

Ms. Hasselbeck, if you're not aware of her (and how lucky you ARE if you're not) has achieved her lofty position of political pundit and psychologist by LOSING "Survivor", btw. I know this because she was on back when I actually watched that show.

Here, for your entertainment, is Elisabeth Hasselbeck stranded in the Australian Outback:

Yes, I'm sure this is all in the line of duty and part of the performance.

Here, btw, is Erin Andrews from "Dancing With The Stars", along with her hunka hunka burnin' love partner, Max.

Okay, today's episode of "Sesame Street" is brought to us by the letter "H". As in H YPOCRITE.

And yes, it may by the oldest cliche in the book, but one picture (or, in this case, two) IS worth....

Just because they make them in your size...

No, I didn't make the Floating Island, not that anyone asked, or cares. I got a hellish sinus infection instead, which has plodded on for a week now, although the end IS in sight. Thanks to the moron Union of which I am a member we have virtually no viable health insurance and a trip to the doctor for antibiotics was out of the question. Armed with Sudafed, Saline, Afrin and the kitchen faucet (increase your water intake when you have a head cold, btw, it works) I attacked the thing with all the resources available to me. This morning I realized that headway has most definitely been made, I am on the mend.

This pleases my family for a number of reasons. First, I'm cooking dinner again. Even I was starting to get sick of Boston Market. Sunday's pork tenderloin was pretty much inhaled. I don't know if it was even good. What it was, was something without a million mgs of sodium and it was hot out of the kitchen, not lukewarm in a tin foil pan.

Second, I imagine I am sleeping more quietly now, which should please my husband, my children in the next room, the neighbors next door and the landlord who lives in the next town over, all of whom could hear me and my clogged sinus snoring. At one point I actually woke myself up. Why is it, no one admits they snore? I mean, what's wrong with it, anyway? Okay, so it sounds a lot like your backed up kitchen drain when the Draino finally works, but other than that, what's the social stigma?

I'm still a bit tired around the edges though, which may be why I'm hypersensitive about the idiots I have encountered on the Internet over the last several years. Now, I'm not saying everyone online is an idiot, in fact, I am blessed to have met about a dozen people I count as friends via my computer, three of whom I wouldn't part with for the world and have made the Internet experience well worth the aggravation.

But then, there are these others. The Internet has become the last bastion for scoundrels. No, I take that back. They're not scoundrels. They're hypersensitive, paranoid fools who use message boards to say stuff they wouldn't dare say in public. I mentioned the Liberace museum in Las Vegas on a chat thread and now I'm being vilified as hating gays. ALL gays. Huh? Isn't the Liberace museum in Las Vegas anymore? It was when I went there, and, btw, if you've never been I recommend it. Fascinating...that man had HUGE hands. You should see the size of the rings. So now I guess I hate an entire group of people and now I can't go see Neil Patrick Harris perform in anything which is a shame because I really like him. It's amazing how he managed to build a career AFTER Doogie Howser. Oh wait, no, I hate him, some guy said so, on the Internet. Or maybe it was a woman, I'm not sure. And where does this put me with regard to Rachael Maddow and the Ellen Show? I mean, if I hate these people...

There's a Disneyland board that routinely bans people for, well, yeah, I'm not exactly sure. Scary place, that. Little news and a LOT of people starting prayer chains for people who didn't ask for them. Some poor, friendly soul posts something like "oh, what I DAY I had today, seemed like everything went wrong and Target was OUT of Tide" and someone starts a prayer chain. Someone else offers them a cup of coffee and a freshly baked muffin. OVER THE INTERNET, PEOPLE! There ARE no muffins. Well, there may be muffins in her kitchen, but that doesn't really help the poor sap six states to the east of her who has just been told there are muffins.

But back to the gay thing. Now, I don't hate gays, I'm a live and let live sort of person. I don't really care WHAT you do as long as you don't do it to me. And if you're a guy and you're trying to do it to me, you're probably not gay, you're just trying to get into an easier softball division.

However, jumping up and down and screaming you don't hate homosexuals is sort of like announcing you don't beat your dog. People believe what they want to believe. End of story. I'm reminded of someone I used to work with though. This woman was, well, let's just call her a meddler and say I don't really miss her. Anyway, she, like so many of us (yes, including myself) had an ass the size of Cleveland. She would eat half a box of Cheerio-s for breakfast (with whole milk) and then get all teary and say she couldn't lose weight, it was glands or big bones or something. I would occasionally go to lunch with her. Now I may look like Jabba the hut at times but I try and do the decent thing for myself when I deal with food. So there I am, with my salad bar and my chicken and there she is with a double bacon cheeseburger and a side of extra mayo. No, I'm NOT exaggerating, I swear on my mother's grave. Hell, you want the cheeseburger, eat the damn cheeseburger. But then don't cry, literally, about how miserable you are because you've got a fat ass.

You have a fat ass because you're eating double bacon cheeseburgers with extra mayo, you twit! Well, anyway, she would start PMSing and she would find someone and start crying. And she maintained that every time she went to a restaurant everyone looked at her to see what the fat broad was eating. And I remember saying "No one's looking at you. I've been to lunch with you. No one is looking at what you eat, no one cares."

Nope, she was convinced the the entire world was watching her eat. Because she was fat. When the truth is, people were looking at her because she was wearing white crop pants with red flowers all over them, a matching red t-shirt, thumb rings and Birkenstocks.

THIS is the same self hypersensitivity that the person on line has. I'm guessing that the person is gay and therefore sees homophobia behind every door, in every drawer and in every word. Mention Liberace and you must be homophobic. Lord only knows what would happen if I said I've been known to eat in West Hollywood. "I'm gay, and you're all looking at me because I'm gay." Um, no, we're all looking at you because you're having a paranoiac fit in public. Because, until you started screaming at me that I hated gays, I didn't know you were gay (I'm not sure you are, actually, I'm guessing). More importantly, I don't especially care. Because we were discussing President Obama when this meltdown took place.

Sort of like the co-worker who saw disapproval and malice in every person she passed, this person sees hatred and mistrust wherever he or she goes.

Now I'm not really sure the Internet is responsible for this buffoon. But it does give him or her a soapbox. Because if they went out in public they'd be laughed off their soapbox but in hiding behind a screen name and a cartoon character avatar it makes him or her feel righteous, sort of a modern day Joan of Arc.

Complete, I have a hunch, with the voices.