I really dislike how crazy this whole Black Friday shopping thing has gotten. It's the dark side of humanity: stampeding hordes at midnight because they can save $50 on a new tv.
I know people who "do" Black Friday. They do get fantastic deals on clothes, toys, and other things so that they can give their children a happy Christmas morning without breaking the bank. My scorn is not for them.
Heck, I've done Black Friday a few times myself. 6When I have, it's been years when I had a pretty good idea of what I wanted to get for everyone on my shopping list, and I was able to finish all or most of my holiday shopping.
After listening to the horror stories from some friends who work retail full-time, I just couldn't do it this year. The whole "stores open at 6am! no, 4am! no, midnight! no, 8-fricken-pm-on-Thanksgiving-Day" is ridiculous. So I decided to participate in the Buy Nothing Day "boycott" of the big-box stores. How did I do?
Well, I wound up spending $80. Not exactly "Nothing". But I tried to be conscientious in my spending, I think I made some pretty reasonable purchasing choices.
-$15 to hire a Personal Minion (aka one of my Girl Scouts) for 3 hrs of helping me put away garden stuff, put up my outdoor Christmas decorations, and gather some firewood and kindling from all the downed limbs in the woods.
-$44 at the Orange Big Box hardware store to rent a multi-position ladder to hang things up high in my stairwell.
-$18 at my local, independent, family-owned hardware store for joint compound and a spreader. Because what everyone wants to do on a holiday weekend is fix drywall. But I have the ladder, so might as well fix the dinged walls that have been driving me nuts for 7 years.
-And finally, $3 on a soda and Powerball ticket. Totally unnecessary purchase, other than the fact that I needed to break a $20 so I could pay my Minion.
Tomorrow is Small Business Saturday. Seems like a good excuse for me to go get frou-frou coffee, a giant cupcake, and some handmade truffles at the local patisserie!
Hiking exploits, experimental cooking, general nerdery, and cat pictures.
Seriously. Do not call me Katy.
Friday, November 23, 2012
Tuesday, November 6, 2012
In Which We Prove That Every Vote Really DOES Count
Here are some facts and figures to chew on, followed by a rant.
New Hampshire has one of the largest parliamentary bodies (read: legislature) in the English-speaking world. The NH General Court is made up of the Senate, with 24 members, and the House, with 400 members. No, I did not add a 0 by accident. That's right - Four. Hundred.
NH population according to the 2010 US Census is 1,318,194. That gives us 1 Representative for every 3295 residents.
Out of the 1.3 million NH residents, 21.2% are under the age of 18 and therefore unable to vote. So the voting population is (at most) 1,038,736. As of January 2012, there are 791,249 registered voters in NH. Which drops our Rep-to-resident ratio all the way down to 1/1978.
In the 2008 Presidential election, NH voter turnout was 72.5% (kicking the national turnout rate of 61%, I might add). Assuming a similar turnout this year, that puts us at 573,656 ballots cast in NH. Which now drops the ratio to 1 Representative per every 1434 voters. How few people it now takes to swing the election one way or another.
My presidential vote may be a drop in the ocean, but my vote for State Representative is more like a drop in a shot glass. Although, I should say my votes. I actually have 8 votes for State Rep. My district is my town, and based on our town population, we get 8 Representatives. It's not broken down by area any further, so I currently have a ballot with 16 names from which to choose.
I understand not breaking the district down further to assign each Representative a specific area. I'm not crazy about it, I think it makes it much harder for me to understand who my elected Representatives are and who they stand for, but I do understand. I don't really understand why NH needs 400 Representatives, but that's coming from someone who grew up in a similarly small state that manages to get by with merely 151 Representatives.
What I do not understand is why, on Election Eve, I can find so little information on any of my 16 choices. I very much dislike voting "blind" - I want to have at least read up on a candidate or an issue before I make my choice. At this point in my life, I do not vote a party-line ticket. However, I feel like that is what I am going to have to do tomorrow if I want to vote for Representatives at all.
No candidate websites with their policy statements. Barely half of them answered the questionnaire sent out by the Town Patch online newspaper - and that had more questions about their hometowns, families, and education than it did about their ideas for government.
I am incredibly frustrated that I feel completely incapable of making an informed decision. And I'm wondering, if getting elected doesn't actually seem to require any campaigning beyond having a voter decide they like the way your name looks on paper, then maybe I should run for State Representative. I mean, throw up a cheap, static, 1-page website and I'd already be miles ahead of my competition....
On second thought, never mind. A wee bit of research shows that NH Reps and Senators get paid a whopping $200 per biennium. And I didn't drop a 0 this time either.
New Hampshire has one of the largest parliamentary bodies (read: legislature) in the English-speaking world. The NH General Court is made up of the Senate, with 24 members, and the House, with 400 members. No, I did not add a 0 by accident. That's right - Four. Hundred.
NH population according to the 2010 US Census is 1,318,194. That gives us 1 Representative for every 3295 residents.
Out of the 1.3 million NH residents, 21.2% are under the age of 18 and therefore unable to vote. So the voting population is (at most) 1,038,736. As of January 2012, there are 791,249 registered voters in NH. Which drops our Rep-to-resident ratio all the way down to 1/1978.
In the 2008 Presidential election, NH voter turnout was 72.5% (kicking the national turnout rate of 61%, I might add). Assuming a similar turnout this year, that puts us at 573,656 ballots cast in NH. Which now drops the ratio to 1 Representative per every 1434 voters. How few people it now takes to swing the election one way or another.
My presidential vote may be a drop in the ocean, but my vote for State Representative is more like a drop in a shot glass. Although, I should say my votes. I actually have 8 votes for State Rep. My district is my town, and based on our town population, we get 8 Representatives. It's not broken down by area any further, so I currently have a ballot with 16 names from which to choose.
I understand not breaking the district down further to assign each Representative a specific area. I'm not crazy about it, I think it makes it much harder for me to understand who my elected Representatives are and who they stand for, but I do understand. I don't really understand why NH needs 400 Representatives, but that's coming from someone who grew up in a similarly small state that manages to get by with merely 151 Representatives.
What I do not understand is why, on Election Eve, I can find so little information on any of my 16 choices. I very much dislike voting "blind" - I want to have at least read up on a candidate or an issue before I make my choice. At this point in my life, I do not vote a party-line ticket. However, I feel like that is what I am going to have to do tomorrow if I want to vote for Representatives at all.
No candidate websites with their policy statements. Barely half of them answered the questionnaire sent out by the Town Patch online newspaper - and that had more questions about their hometowns, families, and education than it did about their ideas for government.
I am incredibly frustrated that I feel completely incapable of making an informed decision. And I'm wondering, if getting elected doesn't actually seem to require any campaigning beyond having a voter decide they like the way your name looks on paper, then maybe I should run for State Representative. I mean, throw up a cheap, static, 1-page website and I'd already be miles ahead of my competition....
On second thought, never mind. A wee bit of research shows that NH Reps and Senators get paid a whopping $200 per biennium. And I didn't drop a 0 this time either.
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