So I'm fashionably bald

I was wearing a T-shirt that said "Ban Republican Marriage" while watching the results with Democrats Abroad at a brewery here. The t-shirt gathered a lot of attention, and several reporters interviewed me, including some from CBC radio, The Vancouver Sun and The Tyee, a local daily online magazine, whose reporter called me "fashionably bald."

Pretty close prediction

It's 1:40 p.m. ET (10:40 PT). I spent the afternoon and evening at a bar with a bunch of Americans and Canadians watching election results. (Luis was working as an extra in "Farewell Atlantis," a movie about the end of the world. I spent the night celebrating the beginning of a new world.)
Anyway, I must say that my prediction was pretty close.
I had North Carolina as a toss-up, and at this time it is leaning toward Obama. The other toss-up I listed was Florida, which was very close but has been called for Obama.
The Times now lists Montana as leaning McCain (I guess McCain), Missouri as light red (I had McCain) and Indiana as light blue (Oops! I had that for McCain.)
So I missed North Carolina and Indiana if they go as they seem to be leaning now. Not bad that I missed just two -- two of the states that are still aren't a solid color 1:40 PT.

Time for some campaigning

As you know, we've been doing some work as extras in movies.
This is Luis' first role in a political cartoon. Pay close attention to the end of the cartoon when the song refers to getting voters to the voting booth in this cartoon.
OK, well, anyone can make this cartoon at JibJab.

Electoral Map

I've been following the election from afar. It's very exciting. A bunch of us will go to a bar on Tuesday to watch the election results together. I've never been into Monday night football, as much as it is fun to watch football players in those tight uniforms. But I'll be glued to the TV for Tuesday's night election results.

As for the electoral map, here are my guesses on the toss-up states.

Missouri is a toss-up state. I've lived there. Though Obama has made a hard push there, I believe it's still a red state; McCain gets the show-me state.

Indiana might be turning blue, but it's not there yet. I give that state to McCain, too.

Ohio and Pennsylvania have been hard-hit by the bad economy. I believe they're going to go for Obama.

I've left two as toss-ups at this point. I've lived in North Carolina, and I have a feeling it's going to be a very close race. Florida will be a very, very close race, too. If I had to pick at this point, I'd give North Carolina to McCain and Florida to Obama.

I'll also note that I'm uncertain about Nevada, Colorado and Virginia being in the Obama-leaning side, but I left them that way.

Here's my prediction as of Sunday night.

Obama from 311 to 353 electoral votes

McCain from 185 to 227 electoral votes

Here's my electoral map projection.

You can make your own electoral map.

poor Karen Hughes

I was doing some work on my computer while watching CNN on my Media Center PC.
This quote caught my attention: "What Barack Obama is benefiting from as well in this discussion is a wholesale rejection of George Bush."
CNN then showed the face of Karen Hughes, W's former press secretary, who looked as if she was about to cry. Check out the pic of her below left. I think there's a lot of Republican faces that look like that right now.

My first Canadian drug purchase

I mentioned how prescription drugs are cheaper here. Well, I made my first purchase for Synthroid, which is a thyroid medication.
In the States, I had private health insurance through Tribune Corp. I would pay a $25 co-pay for a 30 day supply for the name-brand Synthroid.
On Wednesday, I just paid U.S. $24.83 for a 300-day supply.
That extra zero is correct -- three hundred days. I got 10 times the supply for the same price -- without prescription drug coverage, as I won't meet my deductible this year.
I said to the pharmacist it was my first drug purchase here, and I told him what I paid in the United States.
He was baffled. "Who's making all that money?" he said.
And that's a lot of money.
About a third of that cost was a fee. I imagine a fee to the pharmacist -- not a lot of money out of $25.
That means the drug company was getting about $16 for this -- and making a profit or they wouldn't sell the drug here.
So when I spent my $250 co-pay for a 300-day supply, plus my insurance company's money, that's a nice windfall for the drug companies.
So if the presidential candidates want to fix healthcare, maybe they should see how Canada keeps its drug prices low.

Origins of Thanksgiving (in the United States and Canada)

Both the American and Canadian Thanksgiving celebrate the end of the harvest, but they are very different holidays: Americans are forced to spend the holiday with in-laws, whereas Canadians can celebrate it with whomever they dam well please.
Otherwise, they're the same because the United States stole Thanksgiving from Canada, as you'll see later.
Each year, citizens of both countries have Thanksgiving to thank the Lord for three things:

• Getting fatter and fatter each year
• The fact that Ice Capades hasn't made its way north
• The fact that a lot of ice separates Canada from Sarah Palin

The U.S. holiday is modeled after a feast in Plymouth in 1621. Naturally, the people in southern states didn't like anything from northern states. But northerners encouraged southerners to go along, saying they could even e-mail talkline@butterball.com with any questions about cooking turkeys. Southerners complained that the Internet hadn't yet been invented, as Al Gore hadn't been born yet. But soon southerners had no choice about the holiday, as Northerners dominated the federal government and forced the holiday upon southerners.
In 1863, Pres. Abraham Lincoln said that to unite the country, Americans would have to end slavery, kill turkeys and watch football. That year, on Oct. 3, he proclaimed a national day of thanksgiving to be celebrated on Thursday, November 26. Subsequent presidents also chose the last Thursday in November.
President Franklin D. Roosevelt, however, wanted to boost the economy with more holiday shopping. So in 1942, he declared Thanksgiving the fourth Thursday. Of course, the fourth Thursday is usually the last, which led Roosevelt to coin the word "Duh!"
But Roosevelt apparently planned ahead, as 1944 had five Thursdays, so Americans got an extra seven days of Christmas shopping that year. (The next November with five Thursdays is 2012.)
In the following decades, people began to move around the country and decided that getting stranded in an airport was preferable to spending time with in-laws. So Thanksgiving became a day to thank airlines for long delays and cancellations.
In Canada, Thanksgiving goes back to 1578. To take a break, Martin Frobisher, an Englishman who explored Canada's northeast coast, went to Boston Market to buy a turkey and to tax Americans for their tea. Realizing he had arrived 195 years too soon to protest the tea party, he went back to Newfoundland to celebrate his safe arrival in the New World by killing a turkey.Canadians loved the celebration so much that they quickly made it a national holiday 301 years later.
Canada's first Thanksgiving in 1578 preceded America's first celebration by 43 years, yet Canada's holiday only fell a couple of weeks before the American one.So as not to appear to have stolen the idea from the United States, Parliament, in 1957, moved the holiday even earlier, to the second Monday in October. Another reason for the move: Most of Canada is buried in snow by November, therefore:

• It's too cold and difficult to get out of the igloos to hunt down a turkey
• Many Canadians got sick of ordering in Domino's Pizza for Thanksgiving
• The pizza deliverymen complained the igloos had no doors to knock on

Oh, and the harvest ends a bit earlier in Canada, as the country is further north. So that was yet another reason to celebrate the end of harvest in early October.
So at the end of harvest, Canadians and Americans stuff themselves with turkey and top if off with a healthy dose of fruit in the form of pumpkin pie.

This posting comes at the request of Caryn, my most loyal commenter. Ahem, people, you can comment on my posts. Thanks to those who let me know my musings are actually being read.

The factual information, if you can distinguish it from the jokes, comes from the Encyclopedia Britannica entry on Thanksgiving, thanks to the awesome online resources available from the Vancouver Public Library.

debate

We have the time for our TV show. Check out www.richandluis.com.

How rude that the debate is scheduled on my birthday. But I have a broadcast journalism class to attend tonight, anyway, so it's not as if we would be celebrating my b'day tonight. Then when I come home, we're going to watch the debate, which I'm recording. Tomorrow, we're going to go out for dinner for my birthday. A CNN story says more states have gone toward Obama.

On Monday, we had a great Canadian Thanksgiving. I'll update you more when I get the pics.

the election and more

I've become sort of obsessed with the U.S. election. I'm regularly checking the electoral vote map. It really is an exciting race.
The latest changes to The New York Times electoral map:

• New Hampshire, which was a toss-up, is now leaning toward Obama
• North Carolina, where I once lived and has long been a red state, is now a toss-up state
• Oregon, which was leaning Obama (light blue) is now solid Blue, with a new poll showing Obama surpasses McCain in that state even with the margin of error
  

That brings Obama to 196 solid blue states (Obama well in the lead) and 68 light blue (close but Obama is in the lead), for a total of 264 electoral votes, with 270 needed to win.

My absentee ballot was supposed to arrive last week, but it hasn't gotten here yet. If it doesn't arrive on time, I'm catching a flight and voting in person. I WILL NOT miss voting in this historic election. Well, OK, I can't really fly there as I'll be swamped with my freelance work at the time.
I'm sure it's going to arrive this week. The mail here is just really slow. One thing I really appreciate about the United States government is that the mail is really fast.
As for our place, it's really coming together with all the furniture we bought. Soon I'll take some video and post it so you can see the layout.

a few trips in the works

I'm coming back to NY for Thanksgiving. I'll be traveling all day Nov. 22 and on my return Dec. 3. So I'm available in between to see my family and friends. I can't wait to see everyone.
I would love to plan my trip ahead so I don't find myself heading back home and missing visits with anyone.
I don't know if I'm more excited about booking the trip or finding out the news that a certain politician abused her power. No, of course, I'm more excited about this trip -- and another one.
Luis and I are going to Colombia. We just booked the trip. Not that we can afford it. But, hey, how often would we have enough time to visit Colombia for a month. Luis hasn't been there for eight years. So this is going to be an awesome trip. I can't wait to meet his family. And he can't wait to see them once again.