It’s not that I dislike LJ quiz thingies. It’s that I feel compelled to make them into valid XHTML.

Why the hell to I schedule appointments for first thing in the morning on a Saturday during tax season!?

I am nearly finished with my taxes. I got most of my income figures today. Tomorrow: Correlate with bank account, double-checking, then see if I missed stuff. If not, do the actual tax forms. Sad when that’s the easy part, eh?

Thinking about socialism, I realized that my beliefs can be summed up easily: Socialism must be a social force. It can’t be legislated without the full will of the people. Keeping that will afterward, too, means that it has to work in the best interests of that society, too, or it will fail.

A society is more likely to be in tune with its laws if the regions the laws govern are small. A country as vast as the United States is currently is legally top-heavy: It has many distinct regions with distinct cultures. No law fits all of them easily. What few pass the muster are little more than the Bill of Rights. Even within my state, there’s enough regional difference to cause strife. The uneven population base leans money toward the majority’s benefit, often to the detriment of those on the other side of the mountains, where the issues are different and none of the services the money has funded are available.

As a society, the US is amazingly rich. I think some socialism is the Right Thing, if only because things like malnutrition and most disease can be solved 100%. There’s no reason for any member of our society to be excluded. We can bring the base-line up. I don’t think all industry must be private — quite the opposite — but that human rights can be an ever increasing thing, not some ancient minimum that can never be altered.

Imagine if, today, in all grocery stores, the food were priced much as it is today. Except at the bottom of the shelves in the front are bags of beans, rice, oats … maybe even flour. Basics. Free. Just take some — there’s plenty, after all. It’s not glamourous, but one need not die of starvation even if completely without money. There is no qualifying, no need for tracking, and it’s basic enough and the value low enough that hoarding should be rare, and treated as the social disease it is, not as a high crime.

The ingenious may decide to save their cash and eat only basics. It may spur small-time industry and company start-ups, because one can always put food on the table while trying a new venture. Imagine being relatively poor, and saving the money your family spends on food. That goes a long way toward funding a new invention, a new business, or can just ease a financial tight spot. There would be no barrier to, tomorrow, simply not paying for food for a while while you get back on your feet, or found a way to be financially independent in the future. You won’t get rich just by eating beans and rice, but you may become independent.

Other things, the things that naturally form monopolies, particularly utilities, make perfect things to socialise. Power plants have little room to compete, and given a free market, will tend to play winner-take-all. Phone and internet service I am somewhat dubious of being socialised, because a driving force to improve is needed. With the right attitude, it too could be socialised.

I was given a calendar page saying:

Do what you want to do. . .

but want to do what you are doing.

Be what you want to be . . .

but want to be what you are.

P.S. I kissed her. It was nice.

Dawn’s leaving in an hour or less. I’m sad.

This image made me think of Gennie.

I woke up sad and lonely. I have been up very late entering data for taxes. I saw this morning that Carrie took me off her friends list. Ah, well. I can imagine not wanting everything your ex posts showing up when you didn’t exactly ask for it. I cried a little bit anyway.

I sent my bills yesterday, so today at work is dealing with the little administrivial stuff. I worked at the Christian Center this morning, though, which is surprisingly fun since Mary (who I worked with at the theater) is there.

Carrie called this afternoon as I was walking back. I miss her. She’s doing okay, but send your love, eh?

Many thanks to doni_dyke01 for the new user-pic.

Gnome 2.10 is pretty spiffy. The Panel is finally getting some needed TLC, though it's still far from being a Dock. There's a checkbox for "lock to panel" now, instead of the cumbersome lock and unlock menu entries for applets. There's still no usable session manager interface, though, so that's one thing that hurts badly.

I just audited 1/3 of my books for 2004. There’s six inches of powdery snow where greening grass was yesterday. Town is utterly silent in a blanket of snow at 1 am. It’s a bit magical. Goodnight.

fun with Google Maps.

I saw this and have been giggling for the last five minutes.

Dawn and I watched Kiki’s Delivery Service. Miyazaki bats five for five in my book now. There’s such delicacy and grace hidden in there. I’m not used to seeing that expressed.