We had a surprisingly activity-packed weekend. Not that we actually did a lot, really, but it felt like it on Saturday.

With Mama and Papa, we went to the local protest against California's Prop 8, organized by Join the Impact. We also met most of our friends there, since civil rights are something we're all proponents of. The protest was pleasant, though the mic system was not quite adequate for the crowd, so I spent a lot of time cooing over Ben, Alisha's youngest, or talking to Alisha and Amy, while we all enjoyed the sun. David took pictures, naturally, the best of which you can see here:

Prop H8 Protest

And then we all went to lunch, which was fun (though may I say that Bittercreek was a little stingy with its tzatziki sauce on the pita David and I shared).

In the evening, after walking home via Boise State's library, we went bowling, something we always enjoy, but don't do nearly often enough. We were going to meet our friend Ed, but he stood us up, having thought that we were meeting Sunday evening, instead. So he missed my rather nifty game of 145, and the two less nifty games that followed of 86 and 89. Seriously, when you haven't been bowling in awhile, your hand starts to hurt! In fact, David would claim that more than just your hand hurts, since he woke up Sunday morning with a sore backside, but I maintain it was because of the walking, something we haven't done nearly enough of since moving back. Life is just so hard, isn't it?

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Like many people, this has been an emotional week and it's been difficult to write a post until now. I'm sure everyone's nearly stuffed full of the postmortem analysis, but I still want to write about the election results.

The good. Obama won in an electoral landslide and his tide of dreams swept clean many Congressional seats, which promises hope that the US can pull out of the dark ages of the last eight years. Or maybe the dark ages have been going on much longer. Thomas Friedman pointed out that the American Civil War began in Virginia 174 years ago and, in many ways, ended there on Tuesday. Overstated, but inspiring. Notably for the record turnout, especially among minorities.

The bad. Idaho politics didn't shake the narrow-minded conservatism that bogs down political life here, except in two cases. 1) Voters from four districts that form the core of Boise (including the district in which I live) enabled a sweep for their democratic state legislators. 2) Idaho will be sending one democrat to the House in Washington. He's a true "Idaho democrat," which means he'd be a republican in almost any other state, but still, Idahoans did actually elect a democrat.

The ugly. California, Florida and Arizona approved anti-marriage ballot measures, which undermines the concept of marriage (and the legal protection it provides) by limiting who can and can't be married. According to exit polls (which Nate Silver tells me to distrust) the bulk of racial minorities voted for these hateful measures. If so, it is baffling how, in one day, progress can be made for racial minorities and those same minorities can simultaneously beat up on another minority. But, by far, the ugliest result on Tuesday was the Arkansas' anti-child ballot measure, which hurt orphans by reducing the number of loving homes to which they could otherwise belong.

In the end, maybe Benjamin Franklin said it best, "Democracy is two wolves and one sheep deciding on what to have for dinner."

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Last night, we broke with habit and watched some TV, mostly two episodes of House on cable. The first thing I have to say is: really? (...A long tirade about commercials omitted....) While I tried to mute and ignore the ads, I did watch one for McCain-Palin. Maybe it was morbid curiosity. Not surprisingly, it was negative and included statements, which I have read on factcheck.org to be false. But, the negativity I found especially unpleasant. So, out of curiosity, this morning I looked online for an Obama ad and this is the first one that plays on his website:

Naturally I find it more palatable because I agree with many more of his policy stances, but I also really just really liked the positiveness of the messages. A message in this ad of which I'm particularly fond: "I don't want a nation just for me. I want a nation for everybody."

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For quite some time David and I have discussed making what we write on here more overtly political. Sometimes we think we shouldn't, because while I'm all about breaking down an open door, as the Italians say, I also don't want to make anyone feel uncomfortable or unwelcome. But then something comes to light, like Wal-Mart's latest shenanigans (thank you, Taylor), and I decide that since such things make me extremely uncomfortable, being overtly political is not just okay, but required.

So take the plunge with us and read the article. Just lovely, isn't it?

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