US History, Government, and Political Philosophy 101

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US History, Government, and Political Philosophy 101

I have about a half-dozen posts in various stages of completion and they all have one thing in common: each of them has a lengthy diatribe about US history and politics. This is because many of my readers are either overseas (and thus would not have studied US history and governmental structure as thoroughly as used to be taught here) or don’t seem to have paid attention in school (not uncommon). Since about half of the things that set me off these days come down to “Cthulhu’s Tendrils, have they not read the Constitution? It’s four freaking pages!” or “…seriously, do they not bother to use Google to check out the crap they’re being fed?” I’ve decided to make a reference series that gives a good overview of American history from ancient times to the modern era with an emphasis on how our government actually works as opposed to how people wish it would work or believe it works.

 

So, let’s get started, shall we?

 

Roughly 10,000 years ago, the first immigrants arrived via a peninsula that connected Asia and Alaska in what is now the Bering Strait. These immigrants moved southward until their descendants pretty much covered most of North and South America. These people gave rise to the various American empires: the Incas, the Mayans, the Aztecs, the Sioux, the Ute, the Anasazi, the Cherokee, the Choctaw, the Cree, the Seminole, the Algonquians, and the Iroquois among them. The different tribes traded and warred over territory throughout their history and just generally lived their lives with the Atlantic and Pacific keeping them from knowing anything about the interconnected continents of Asia, Europe, and Africa. Only the aborigines in Australia were more isolated than the American empires. During the early 1000s, Leif Erikson, son of Erik the Red, was the first European to set foot in North America. Nearly five centuries later, Christopher Columbus would land in North America during his voyage to find a shorter (and less heavily taxed) route to India, thus opening North and South America (as well as the islands in the Atlantic and Caribbean) up to European exploration and settlement.

 

Skipping ahead a bit, in time, Great Britain came to be the most predominant colonial force in North America. France and Spain, yes, had their colonies but Great Britain had much greater influence in North America. The colonists living in the original thirteen colonies considered themselves to be British subjects. Indeed, many of the colonies had governors who had been appointed by the Crown. However, these colonies also — by and large — had locally elected government officials and councils. Great Britain was at some distance and the colonists had a level of autonomy from the English Parliament and the Crown and self-rule that wasn’t found outside of the British isles. Though there had been rumblings of breaking away, for the most part, people in the British North American colonies were content with their situation. Some of our Founding Fathers, namely George Washington, proudly fought for the British during the Seven Years’ War (what we call the French and Indian War when referring to the parts that took place in North America). However, once the French and Indian War was over, relations between British North America and Great Britain took a decided turn south.

 

The Revolutionary Era in North America began in 1763 when, following the conclusion of the French and Indian War, the British government decided that the North American colonists needed to contribute more towards helping to maintain the Empire, the British government levied direct taxes on the colonies. To say that this upset many of the North American colonists is like saying that the Great Wall of China is long. It wasn’t the taxes, the items taxed, or the amount of the tax itself that bothered the colonists so much. It was the fact that the colonists had no elected representation in the English Parliament and thus, no vote on taxation and other matters that might impact their interests. It was a facet of English law and custom that those who were taxed deserved some voice in the government. So, the colonists felt that their rights as Englishmen were being trampled upon. The taxes that so vexed the colonists were the Sugar Act, the Stamp Act (1765), the Currency Act, and the Quartering Acts.

 

Benjamin Franklin spoke before Parliament (he had been sent to London to try to settle matters between the local populace and the Penn heirs over who had control of Pennsylvania) and convinced them to drop the taxes in 1766. However, Parliament passed the Declaratory Act which stated that they did have the power to make laws for the colonies in all cases.

 

The next year, 1767, Parliament passed the Townshend Acts which taxed things like paper, tea, and glass. Again, the colonists were enraged because these taxes were levied without them having a voice in Parliament. Protests grew more common and, on March 5, 1770, the protests resulted in five colonists being killed by British forces in Boston (the Boston Massacre). Parliament withdrew the taxes in the Townshend Acts on everything except tea later in 1770 in response to the protests and to the boycotting of British goods. Benjamin Franklin continued to advocate an accommodationist stance between Britain and the colonies until the publications of letters between the governor of Massachusetts, Thomas Hutchinson, and Andrew Oliver, the lieutenant-governor, that called for the abridging of colonial rights and the direct pay (by Parliament) of the officials in order to free them from the local councils (who had been the ones paying the officials, thus granting the locals some measure of control over them). After being humiliated by the British Solicitor-General in front of the Privy Council, Benjamin Franklin returned to Pennsylvania in 1775 and became an effective voice for revolution.

 

The Intolerable Acts (the Massachusetts Government Act, the Administration of Justice Act, the Boston Port Act, and the Quartering Act of 1774) were passed in 1774 and revolutionary fervor hit a fever pitch. With a fell swoop, the English Parliament had restructured the Massachusetts government to take power away from the local councils and restricted town meetings. Crimes committed by British soldiers would be tried only back in London, not locally. The Boston Harbor was closed until Britain had been compensated for the losses during the Boston Tea Party. And finally, British troops could be quartered in any colonists’ homes without permission of the owner. There was also the Quebec Act of 1774 which placed Quebec’s border at the Ohio River, cutting off colonial claims to that territory but, by the time it was passed, the colonists had already begun forming their own shadow governments and training their own militias in secret. The first shots of the revolution were fired at Lexington and Concord in April 1775 and by July 1776, patriots (those who advocated for revolution) had control of all thirteen of the American colonies and had driven out the British governors. New state constitutions were written and the colonies united under the provisional Continental Congress as the American Revolution kicked into high gear.

 

The American Revolution could be a series in and of itself and this is a good stopping place for now. Check back tomorrow for an explanation of the Declaration of Independence — another document a lot of people haven’t bothered to read for all that it’s fairly short. The Declaration of Independence is very important in understanding both why the colonists rebelled and broke away from Britain and in understanding the philosophies and political thinking that influenced the later American government and still has deep meaning for Americans to this day over two centuries after it and the Constitution were written.

 

— G.K.

Note on References: Anything that wasn’t drawn from memory came from Wikipedia’s entry on the American Revolution. Yes, people, G.K. paid attention in school and can actually remember almost all of this.

Gay Marriage, Church and State, and the First Amendment

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Gay Marriage, Church and State, and the First Amendment

Gay Marriage and LGBT rights have been a big thing in the news over here in the States for the past few months. I mentioned some of my thoughts in L’affaire Eich a while back and most people who know me have a general idea of what my thoughts are but I do still manage to surprise them by one thing (though, really, it shouldn’t be so surprising — it’s just my adherence to it even when it’s not to my advantage that throws people).

 

In my mind, there is no sentence more important in all of history than this one:

 

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

 

Emphasis mine.

 

That right there, folks, is the most important sentence in all of history. It’s the most amazing sentence ever written. It’s a sentence that, in one fell swoop, severely limits the power of a new-born government and places power directly in the hands of the people. It’s the sentence that makes “consent of the governed” actually work. Yes, yes, the Second Amendment is very important and I’ll always defend it. But without the First Amendment, the Second would be pointless because there’d be nothing to protect.

 

The First Amendment protects a lot of things: freedom to assemble, freedom of association, freedom of religion, freedom from being religious, freedom to speak your mind, freedom to argue and debate, freedom to protest, freedom to lobby the government, freedom to advertise, freedom to advocate for the overthrow of the government.

 

Notice I said “protects” and not “promises” or “grants.” All rights in the Bill of Rights are negative rights (something I’ll touch on in detail in a later post). No one is “given” anything — the assumption is that the people already have these rights and the government is told to keep its grubby paws off them even if they think they’re meddling “for our own good” or “for the children” or whatever the catchphrase du jour is this week.

 

The First Amendment also explicitly forbids Congress from granting favor or disfavor to any particular sect or religion. There’s no official religion in the United States even though some colonies were founded as charters of a specific church or movement. When it comes to religious beliefs and practices, Congress (and via the Fourteenth Amendment, the States) cannot interfere except in a very narrow range of circumstances such as parents refusing emergency medical services for their child if a third party contacted them, human sacrifice, slavery via contract, and things of that nature (granted, I’m not a lawyer so if I’m wrong, let me know). Congress cannot pass a law that would force a religious institution to support something against its fundamental beliefs — such as forcing the Amish or Quakers to speak out in support of a war, forcing the Catholic church to fund abortions, forcing an Islamic group to speak out in favor of strip bars, or forcing a Jewish synagogue to sell its members on the health benefits of bacon.[1]

 

The flip-side of this is that no religion or sect can force its members to vote in a certain manner, to refrain from certain beliefs or behaviors by force of law, or to support certain policies or candidates in political matters. A church can beseech. It can plead. It can remark upon. But it cannot force its members to action in the political sphere. Yes, a church can refuse to perform blessings or rites upon members who violate the church’s teachings or beliefs but it can’t call up the local sheriff and have him arrest a member for being a Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, Socialist, Anarchist, or anything like that. It can’t take a member to court for being in favor of a tax increase, gay marriage, or voting against the Reverend’s daughter on the local school board.[2]

 

There is a legal separation of church and state that acts to protect both and this is a Good Thing. The church can, just as any other group, try to convince its members to live a certain way or to vote a certain way but it can’t force them to do so or punish them for not doing so by force of law. The state can’t tell the church that it has to perform certain rites or that it has to favor certain political policies. The church can’t baptize Caesar and Caesar can’t rule over the church. That’s a good thing because every single time we’ve mingled the two, it’s gone badly. Just look at the corruption in the Catholic Church during the era when the Pope ruled as a temporal king and claimed political dominion over all sovereigns. Look at the corruption that led to deaths in Salem, Massachusetts when all the minister had to do was point and say “witch.” Look at the way that Catholics, Quakers, Baptists, and Jews were disenfranchised in the UK and forced to pay taxes to support the Anglican church or be jailed for refusal to go against their conscience. Look at how Protestants were disenfranchised in France and Spain. Look at how Christians and Jews are treated in the Middle East (outside of Israel) today. Look at how anyone of faith is treated in China today. Letting the government enforce religious orthodoxy is a terrible idea because not a single human alive is perfect. Letting religious orthodoxy control the government is a terrible idea because religions are run by humans who aren’t perfect. Yes, yes, when Jesus returns, He’ll set up a perfect kingdom. Jesus is a special exception to the whole “terrible human” thing. As soon as you can find someone alive who is as perfect in every way as Jesus is, let me know and that person will have my vote. Until then, I’m going to function under the “power corrupts” adage and try to keep Caesar chained and unbaptized and keep religion from ascending Caesar’s seat.

 

Why? Because separation of Church and State is one of the only things that makes the whole American Experiment work. Without it, we’re just another England or France. Without it, we’re not America anymore. Which is why I favor stripping all religions and sects of the power to perform legal marriages and going with a system like the current one in France. Currently, in France, if you want to get married (and have it be legal), you go to the Mayor’s office and apply for a marriage license. You have to post banns for a certain amount of time to give anyone who knows a legitimate legal reason why the marriage shouldn’t happen a chance to raise an objection. Then, you go before the Mayor who reads off the laws concerning marriage, you sign on the dotted line, and bam. You’re married. If you’re religious, you can then go to the church/temple/synagogue of your choice and have a matrimonial ceremony in line with your faith. The minister can’t make the marriage legal to the French government and the French government can’t tell the minister who they have to marry or who they are forbidden from marrying in their faith.

 

“Oh, but then you’re trampling on our rights!” I hear some cry. “You’re forcing us to think gay marriage is okay if you make it legal. Next people will marry their brothers and sisters and dogs and cars…” Yeah, no. Every place has laws regarding consanguinity for public health reasons. People too closely related who petition for legal marriage are refused because of the likelihood of their offspring having recessive birth defects come up and tainting the entire gene pool in a region. However, these laws don’t come with fines or jail times (otherwise there are entire communities in Appalachia who would be in trouble). The government just refuses to grant a license to them. Same thing with animals or inanimate objects — if they can’t express consent in human terms that anyone who speaks the common tongue can understand, they can’t sign the certificate. And, fun fact: it’s actually not illegal to marry your pet in some places yet no one seems to do so in those areas. It’s not that it’s permissible — just not forbidden. So, refusing to ask the government to use the power of law to enforce your religious definition of marriage will not lead to the downfall of the civic order. And, there are several religions where same sex marriage is permitted as a rite and refusal to grant legal status to those couples constitutes an infringement of their First Amendment rights — so long as ministers are allowed to perform legally sanctified marriages. Remove the ministers’ power to do so and let the local government decide and you’ve removed the danger there.

 

You’ve also removed the government’s ability to come into your church and tell you what to teach if you do that. Right now, a lot of conservatives in the US are all aflutter that the government is allowing lawsuits to compel people to perform services for gay marriages when gay marriage is against their beliefs. There are rumors that the government might even force ministers to bless such unions by the threat of withdrawing their power to perform marriages at all. Many conservatives fear that soon they’ll be legally compelled to support a lifestyle they find to be sinful.[3] The first step to removing the ability for the government to have the first say in your religion is to divest ministers of the power to perform legally binding marriages. Many conservatives (my mother among them) will scoff at this and have a Wall of Text from the Bible about how this tramples her rights or some other such nonsense. It doesn’t. It actually protects her church from the government. Don’t believe me?

 

Well, it worked in France.

 

France is, compared to the US at least, a pretty liberal country. Not quite so liberal as the Netherlands but still pretty liberal. Just recently, gay marriage became legal in France and gay couples can now go before the Mayor and be married legally. That’s equality in France. However, the LGBT lobby in France wanted to compel churches (particularly the Catholic church) to bless such unions by performing the Sacrament of Matrimony and by letting gay couples partake of the Eucharist (which means that the couple would be “in communion” with the church instead of violating its teachings on sexual purity by living an unrepentant homosexual life). The case didn’t get very far at all. From what I understand (and again, I welcome correction if this is wrong), the LGBT group got into the courtroom and the judge looked at them like they’d dribbled on their shirts before informing them that the French government had no power to force a religious institution to perform any rite or support any belief beyond “you can’t murder people or take their stuff” and that if the LGBT group wanted the Roman Catholic Church to perform same-sex Matrimonial Rites, they needed to take it up with the Church because the government didn’t have the authority and didn’t want the authority to tell any religion what it had to do or teach. The case was dismissed and though I’ve heard rumblings of it going before the EU High Court, I have a feeling that even as batcrap-crazy as they can be, the EU court will rule against it on the same grounds.

 

Separation of church and state means just that: the two are separate and neither can compel, by force, the other to do a damned thing it doesn’t want to do. Even if it’s “for equality” or “for the children” or “because it’ll hurt my feelings if this doesn’t happen.” You’re not compelled to go to a specific church, believe specific things, or perform specific religious duties — you can always go find or start a religion or church that is exactly what you want it to be. Hell, L. Ron Hubbard did this and I’ve seen plenty of Protestant churches spring up over some dispute about which SEC team to support in the NFL semi-finals or because someone ate a bad piece of fish and had a revelation (I swear, it does seem to me that Protestants make things up as they go along). But, no one can force a church to do anything that church doesn’t want to do. If your feelings are hurt: go somewhere else.

 

“But I want to be Catholic/Orthodox/part of the Southern Baptist group/Muslim/Orthodox Jewish/whatever and they say I’m violating their beliefs by being gay.” Guess what? You are. Part of belonging to a religious faith means living by its teachings even when it’s not easy or convenient. I’m Eastern Orthodox. That means that if I want to keep calling myself Orthodox, I have to get up on Sundays (even when I just want to laze about in bed) and go to Liturgy. I have to refrain from having wild orgies. I can’t visit a psychic. I can’t sit around and say that God doesn’t exist. I even sometimes have to fast and spend time praying. I can’t say that the Patriarch of Antioch and All the East is stupid (well, I can, but it’s not really a good policy). I can’t demand to go up to the altar because I’m a woman and that’s a man’s place. I can’t demand to be made a priest (though I could become a monk if I wanted). I can’t have a boyfriend move in and sleep with me — I have to get married to him first.[4] Those are some of the rules of being Orthodox and I knew them when I converted. If I find them that onerous, I’m free to leave and find another faith. I’m not free to demand that an institution that’s been around for 2000+ years change its views just for me. If the place you go to worship says that you’re violating their beliefs, then you can either suck it up and try to live according to their teachings or you can leave and find some other place. If someone refuses to perform a non-vital[5] service for you because of their own religious beliefs, then you can suck it up and find someone else. You can’t force an institution or individual to change their beliefs for you any more than they can force you to change yours for them.

 

That’s separation of church and state. Don’t like it when it works out against you? Then gather an army and go conquer some territory and form your own damned nation and see how it works out for you.

 

For now, that’s enough for this entry. There will be future entries in this vein given my fanatical adherence to the First Amendment and all its ramifications but, for now, I think I’ve probably pissed everyone off enough. 🙂

 

— G.K.

[1]Yes, this also touches on the birth control debate centered around the Hobby Lobby case and Obamacare. I will go into more detail on this in a future entry because this entry is long enough and needs no more meandering.

 

[2]A religious institution can refuse to perform sacraments for people who violate its teachings but it cannot call upon the law or the courts to enforce its teachings. It can, however, call the police if it catches someone breaking the law (such as someone breaking into a church to steal money or commit vandalism) and it can sue someone who has violated a contract with it (such as suing a contractor who was supposed to fix the roof and did not do so).

 

[3]And, seeing the backlash against Eich and photographers and caterers who refuse to perform services for gay marriages, conservatives actually do have some reason to fear that their lives will be made impossible if they donate to a cause against gay marriage or if they themselves refuse non-vital services to gay couples. In America, believing that someone is doing something sinful and not wanting to support that shouldn’t ever lead to a witch hunt against that person or group. The KKK should be free to believe blacks are inferior. The Catholic church should be free to believe that abortion is murder. The Baptist church should be free to believe that homosexuality is sinful. This is one area where the LGBT groups have gone too far in trying to force everyone to wholeheartedly support them and is fodder for a future entry.

 

[4]Having a live-in boyfriend/girlfriend for a “trial before marriage” is against the Church’s teachings. However, suppose I were sick or injured and needed someone to stay with me around the clock to help take care of me. If my boyfriend were the only one who could do that (say I couldn’t afford to hire a nurse and had no family nearby who could help me in such a manner), then he could stay in my home and sleep separately from me and the church, while not being a-okay with it, wouldn’t consider it sinful as long as we resisted the temptation to engage in hanky-panky without a wedding first. Or if my boyfriend was having work done on his house that necessitated he vacate the premises for a few days (like fumigation or major construction), again, he could crash at my place but not in my bed.

 

[5]Non-vital means just that — not required to live. Having a particular photographer work your wedding isn’t a matter of life and death. Having a particular caterer work your wedding isn’t a matter of life and death. Having a particular privately-owned building or hall host your wedding or reception isn’t a matter of life or death. However, an ER doctor or an EMT/paramedic cannot refuse to perform life-saving services on someone who is gay. A surgeon who finds out mid-surgery that the patient is transsexual can’t refuse to continue treatment. A Catholic doctor who is working as an OBGYN cannot refuse to perform an abortion for an ectopic pregnancy (a pregnancy where the fetus implants somewhere that is not the uterus. Such pregnancies can almost never result in a live birth and can almost always kill the mother if they are allowed to proceed by rupturing the Fallopian tube and paving the way for internal bleeding) if the woman comes to him in an urgent situation (such as when the pregnancy is about to result in a rupture of the Fallopian tube which can be fatal). A Muslim nurse cannot refuse to change a Jewish patient’s bandages. A Jewish ER doctor cannot refuse to treat a skinhead who’s been in a car wreck. When it’s a matter of life and death (and not just butthurt feelings), doctors and nurses and medical personnel can be forced to save the lives of those who do things they believe are sinful. Likewise, people in official positions like judges, police, firemen, and lawyers can be forced to protect or serve people who do things or believe things they find abhorrent (but are not illegal). That is something that all people who choose to go into those professions are taught and warned about early on. Most doctors will try to find a way to practice medicine that isn’t in conflict with their faith but, if it comes down to saving someone’s life, they can be compelled to perform the service even if they believe it is sinful or if they hate the person and everything that person stands for.

Misadventures in Computing

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Misadventures in Computing

…or why I vanished for like two weeks.

 

First of all, let it be said: I am a horrible blogger. I do have plans to remedy that but I gave up making promises long ago because no sooner do I make one than I break it. So, no promises but a solid hope that I’m going to get better about keeping this place updated. That said, here’s why I completely vanished from the Intarwebz for a while.

 

1) Moving is hard, yo — A while back, I pretty much decided it was time to move back to Mississippi. There were various reasons for this but the main one had to do with wanting to see my family and spend time with them more than once a year (if I was lucky). So, since around the beginning of May, I’ve been making plans to move. This took up an extraordinary amount of my time and energy. So, the little time and energy I had left over went into my writing instead of my hanging out on Twitter or blogging. Then, near the middle of June, the actual move itself took up all of my time and energy (and money). Now that I’m settled in, though, things should be smoother from here on out.

 

2) Writing is energy and time consuming — I have discovered that I can either write, watch TV, play games, or hang out on the Intarwebz but not all of them. So, I no longer play games outside of some strictly controlled scheduled game time. I do watch TV but only after I’ve hit a certain writing goal for the day. I don’t hang out on the Intarwebz as much because I spend most of my non-writing time working on the Internet and because the Internet is like one big field full of distractions for me. I can go and intend to hang out on Twitter for an hour and then find myself digging through various arcana on Wikipedia six hours later.

 

3) Sometimes, I think my computer wants to kill me — This is the main reason I vanished recently. Now, I’m the kind of person who generally knows how to avoid getting viruses and whatnot on my computer. I have up-to-date virus scanners and spyware searchers continually on the lookout for things that I don’t want on my computer. I have set up my cookie folders so that it’s hard for me to be tracked by websites who don’t explicitly ask my permission or who I don’t want tracking me. GeoIP places hate my guts because I do randomly send them information that screws up their carefully gathered intel on me.

 

However, like every person on this Earth, I have fits of weakness where I’m so certain I know what I’m doing that I do something incredibly stupid. Such as disable my anti-virus because it keeps bugging me whenever my Curse client updates itself and then proceed to hit a Trojan-laden email from a USPS-cloned phishing site that installs a rootkit and a virus to my Master Boot Record. I nuke and rewrite the MBR thinking that would solve the problem but instead got a computer that blue-screened on Winload. So, I did what anyone would do. Bought a recovery image, tossed it on a USB drive (that subsequently died), and tried to recover without a reinstall. Two days with about three hours’ sleep into that, I got a recovery tool that would let me do a full disc back-up, copied everything I could to a 1 TB external drive, nuked my hard drives, struggled over which to load the new OS on (one had over 10k bad journaling warnings which means it’s dead, Jim), found a site that would let me get a digital download purchase for Win7 (because my eyes bleed at the thought of Win 8 on a desktop), reinstalled the OS, redownloaded and reinstalled every application I could, rebuilt my iTunes library, redownloaded all my games, updated all of my major applications, and then nuked my external hard drive and did a full image back-up with files of my new computer so that once I install my brand new hard drive, I can copy everything onto it, nuke the Windows on my old (but still working) hard drive, and install ubuntu for dual-booting to see if a switch to Linux is in the cards.

 

On top of that (as if having to buy a new USB thumb drive and a new USB 1 TB external drive to replace the ones that are bricked, plus a new copy of Win7 and the recovery software + the paid upgrades to Photoshop Elements), my Lifeproof case proved to no longer be waterproof (this after I tested it thoroughly in my sink) and my new iPhone 5s I purchased in November is now a very expensive piece of garbage. Apple decided that AppleCare didn’t cover it since the water damage wasn’t “accidental” and Lifeproof told me that it must have been user error and that the extra warranty I’d gotten only covered the case, not the phone. So, I had to get a new iPhone 5s at midnight which meant shelling out more money and getting saddled with a two-year contract. However, I grilled the people at AT&T, recorded them, and had it written (I almost demanded it be written in blood but then I decided to be reasonable) down that they would replace the phone immediately for free if ANYTHING happened to it that wasn’t a deliberate attempt on my part to destroy the phone. So, score one for AT&T and nil for Apple and Lifeproof when it comes to honoring their warranties, I suppose.

 

I managed to get my computer back up and running on July 4th, declaring my independence from sitting here nursing the thing back to health. Of course, that meant I spent most of July 4th going around and resetting my passwords EVERYWHERE but, hey. Them’s the breaks. It also meant that I didn’t get much writing done last week and I’m now playing catch-up there and on a couple of other things. But, at least the worst of it is behind me (knock on wood) and I made valuable friends at the local liquor store since the guys there totally understood what I was talking about when I launched into a spiel about my computer. They even recommended some cocktails that were strong (but not too strong) so I could unwind a bit while not getting so smashed I couldn’t operate the computer.

 

Now I just pray to the Lords of the Bytes that I suffer no more BSoDs and that I be delivered from Trojans and led not into rootkits for like…forever. Or at least a couple of years. I’m not as young as I used to be and pulling multiple all-nighters takes much longer to recover from than it did when I was in college.

 

So, there you have it. My explanation for my vanishing. Here’s to hoping that it all works out in the future and that I’m not as absent from the Intarwebz as I have been.

 

— G.K.

I Love My New Place

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I Love My New Place

As many of you have heard, I moved back to my hometown of Vicksburg, Mississippi. And, honestly — aside from the hassle of getting a new hard drive when one of my other ones crapped out on me (more on that particular misadventure tomorrow) — I’m loving it. It is taking me some time to get used to again — I’ve got to relearn the folkways a bit. I still get surprised by men hurrying to open a door for me or offering to help me with my bags when I’m out shopping. I’m surprised by how sweet everyone can be and how they look at me a bit funny when I seem apologetic for bothering them to ask them where I might find something in a store because my accent says I’m from here but my manner says I’ve been away for a long, long time. I’m also still getting used to the fact that they don’t mind it if I say hello to a toddler in the cart who is cooing and squawking a bit (people in New Jersey tended not to like strangers interacting with their kids much). And, I no longer have to ask “do you have sweet tea?” because the answer is “yes, honey, of course we have sweet tea.”

 

I’m re-adapting to the heat and humidity very quickly. The first few days were tough — I would get headaches and feel nauseated easily. But now, I can sit out on my balcony during the heat of the day (I have a *balcony* and it overlooks a *lake* where there are fish and pelicans and turtles and frogs and at night I can hear the crickets singing and the bullfrogs roaring!) and not be bothered overmuch aside from normal sweating. Air conditioner is standard *everywhere* (for those of you who haven’t visited the South, the temperatures here get to the upper 90s (F)/ mid 30s (C) regularly from April – October and the humidity increases the feel of it so that we have to factor it into the Heat Index which often surges into the 100s (F)/ upper 30s (C)) which means I no longer have to worry about my computer overheating during the day.

 

And my apartment is huge. It’s massive. I have a guest bedroom *and* an office as well as a dining room (just need a table and chairs), a decently sized (for my needs) kitchen, a master bath AND a second full bath (with loo AND shower and sink), and a living room. And also a balcony.

 

Have I mentioned that I have an honest-to-God balcony? One that I can sit on and smoke on even when it’s pouring down rain and I still don’t get wet? One where I can hang some plants? And that it overlooks a freaking *lake* that has fish and frogs and turtles and trees and birds? Because the balcony is my favorite thing here. It’s shady, it doesn’t get a lot of direct sunlight. It’s cool(er) during the day and I have a good breeze. I can get a gas grill and have little cook-outs out there. I have room to invite people to come over and they’ll actually be comfortable. I can get my niece Mini-me to spend the night up here. I get to see my parents whenever I want. I can see my grandmother whenever I want. I can go down and see my niece Mini-me and my nephews whenever. I can swing by and visit with my sister-in-law and her wife.

 

And, good Lord, the people down here are so nice and chatty. Last week, I went to take care of my rent so I wouldn’t have to deal with any late fees. The woman who runs the main office and I just sat there talking about all kinds of different things for about a half hour. I wound up telling her that if she ever needs help with computers or game advice for her son, to just come by my place. A few days ago, I ran into a guy who was friends with my little brother up at the firehouse he used to be part of. We were just standing in line together at the local convenience store/gas station and I thought I recognized him. I run into people who know my family or who I went to school with all the time now. They’re always asking me what I’m up to, where I’ve been, what brought me back home, and if I’ve got any more books out. When I went to Liturgy on Sunday, everyone in the church who had known me years back kept staring at me trying to figure out who I was. When I told them, every last one of them wanted to hear everything I’ve been up to since I left Mississippi back in 2002.

 

It’s weird. I’ve lived in more urban areas ever since I got out of college in 2002. But moving back “home” doesn’t bug me. Yeah, I’ll probably wind up missing running into people who speak accented English. But…this place is home. And my apartment is fucking awesome. My mother picked it out and, even though she and I don’t always understand each other, she picked the right place for me. It’s close enough to town that I don’t burn too much gas when I need to go get groceries but far enough out that it’s quiet and I don’t have to deal with drunks hollering, kids being rowdy, or the police running past at 50 MPH on a residential street. The quiet and the closeness (but not too much closeness) to nature is a real boon to me as a writer. I’ve gotten more work cleared away in the past few weeks than I had in the three months before it!

 

I’ve always been the adventurous kid. Always a bit of the black sheep in the family. I’ve been the geeky nerdy one in a family filled with working-class people, businessmen, and traditionalists. I left Mississippi years ago convinced the only way I’d move back here for very long was to take care of my parents when they got Really Old (they’re not Really Old yet). I hated this place when I was younger because this is where I got teased and tormented for preferring to read and hang out in bookstores (I was on a first-name basis with the ladies at Waldenbooks) or play Dungeons and Dragons or watch Star Trek or Star Wars instead of shopping for clothes and slathering make-up on and gossiping non-stop about boys. This was where I felt like being different meant being damned. But now, now that I’m back here, I’ve found out that my neighbor beneath me is a girl I went to school and church with growing up and she thinks it’s awesome that I write books and have three published. I mention things like having lived in New Jersey or France to explain where I’ve been and people look at me like I just announced I climbed Mount Everest. So many people tell me that they could never imagine going off and living somewhere where they didn’t know anyone or didn’t speak the language but to me, that was easy. I could pack up next year and go and live in Scotland or California or the Moon and not knowing anyone wouldn’t bug me a bit. I’ve never needed a lot of friends or to have people close by — for years I’ve been fairly content to just spend my free time writing and have resented the occasions where I was obligated to go out somewhere and be sociable. I am an introvert by nature and while I don’t dislike people, I prefer them in small doses (for the most part. A few really close friends and relatives who understand that I don’t need to fill every second with small talk and that sometimes I need to just go off and be alone for a few minutes or to sit with them quietly are fine).

 

Still, moving to Mississippi and to the awesome flat my mother found for me has made me feel something that I didn’t think I would really ever feel again. I feel like I’ve come home. Even if, in the long run, I wind up moving off again, this place is and always will be home to me, no matter how rootless an existence I lead.

 

And that doesn’t bother me nearly as much as I once thought it would.

 

— G.K.

*brushes off the dust*

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*brushes off the dust*

Okay. It’s been ages since I updated this place. First things first, I am still alive. The last few months have been hectic because I’ve moved back to Mississippi. I’m working remote for my employer and will be picking up a few local contracts on the side. I’m working to pay off the moving bills and just trying to get settled in to my new digs which, by the way, are awesome. It’s quiet and calm out here where I am and I have plenty of time and energy to write — which is what I’ve been doing. I’m most of the way through The Penitent (should be sending it out for beta reading by the end of summer max). I’ve completed the rough drafts on three short stories (I’m going to do a collection soon). I’ve gotten most of my research and notes done for Realpolitick. I’ve even started working on a series of one-offs for a new quasi-fantasy serial that would work great as a comic (if I could draw more than stick people). I’m also working on rough chapter drafts for Lanar’ya Three and for another novel.

 

Still, I should be updating more. And, now that I’ve kind of got the worst of it all behind me, I am planning to do just that. There’s been a lot going on in the publishing industry and the fantasy/sci-fi community that I want to comment on. But, for now, you’ll just have to put up with this super-short update and bookmark this place to come back and check later for my “pearls of wisdom.”

 

— G.K.

Star Trek vs Doctor Who — America and Britain at Their Best

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Star Trek vs Doctor Who -- America and Britain at Their Best

In order to understand this entry, head over to the Stratosphere Lounge and watch episode 67 starting at the 23:48 mark. Don’t worry, I’ll wait.

 

Done? Good.

 

Bill mentions that Star Trek is all about the frontier and exploring. Everyone has guns because you can’t just trust that the natives will be friendly. The crew of the Enterprise (a ship named after the American strength of commerce and trade) is genial and magnanimous, open to working with anyone peacefully but ready to defend themselves or their ideals against any enemies. Also, anyone can eventually become part of the Enterprise crew. Kirk is a farm boy from Ohio. McCoy is a doctor from Mississippi. Scotty is an engineer from Scotland. They’re normal people in extraordinary circumstances.

 

He also mentions that the Doctor is an aristocrat. He’s a Time Lord from Gallifrey. He’s got the power of a god and is pretty much immortal. His TARDIS is a hidden, magical world tucked away in a perfectly ordinary police call box. It’s done that way because it’s very British. London (and most of the rest of the United Kingdom) had been settled and explored since the classical era — there is no frontier in the American sense. The Doctor takes on companions who could be anyone but no one can become the Doctor. That divide is much like the British divide between commoner and royalty — nothing can breach it.

 

Or so Bill says. I think he’s wrong. Let me explain why before you lynch me.

 

Great Britain and the Northern Enlightenment are what gave birth to the foundational ideas of the United States. The Founding Fathers were all loyal British subjects before they rebelled against a tyrannical Parliament and Crown. They were almost all educated in the traditional British aristocratic manner. George Washington was part of the aristocracy through his family and his service to the King. He was called “His Excellency.” And, only in England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland could a commoner, through uncommon courage and wisdom, be raised up to the aristocracy. Hell, my own distant paternal ancestor Baird was raised up by King William of Scotland1. You didn’t see that happening much in the Mediterranean or Iberian areas of Europe (and yes, I include France and Germany in that). Embracing a commoner and disdaining pure blood and breeding in favor of action is a very Anglo-Saxon-Celtic-Gaelic thing. But the Norsemen and the Gaels recognized that uncommon valor could be found in the most common of men2. So they raised them up an example to the rest of their followers.

 

Britain’s ideals prior to the Great War are very much a part of the American DNA, if you will. Yes, we have diverged from our Islander cousins in the past few generations but we still have more in common with them (and the Canadians, the Aussies, and the Kiwis) than we have with any other country on this planet. And, the Doctor — he’s a bit of a rebel. He has the power of a god but he rarely uses it to force his will on anyone. He does have more in common with Scotty, McCoy, and Spock than he has with Kirk. After all, he has a police call box so that he can be called to help out. He carries a screwdriver to fix things instead of a gun to blast enemies. He has two hearts so he can love all the more deeply. But, at the end of the day, he is willing to fight for what is right — even using a gun or sword (NuWho: Dalek, Bad Wolf, The Parting of the Ways, The Christmas Invasion, The Family of Blood, Journey’s End, The End of Time Part II). He’s willing to lay down his life to save the life of a friend. He could have become the ruler of Gallifrey and all the Time Lords but he turned his back on that to explore time and space. No matter his incarnation, he’s filled with wonder at the cosmos and curiosity to see it all. Yes, sometimes, he’s a bit of a controlling git and manipulates those around him. But he’s a god who wants very desperately to be human. He would give up everything just to live a common life, to marry, have children, grow old, and die. As a matter of fact, he does this in Journey’s End when he convinces the meta-crisis to go off with the one woman the Doctor will always love and live out a human life with her.

 

The Doctor is not just a British superhero — he’s a very American figure. He holds himself to a standard far higher than that which everyone else uses. He refuses to use his power (with the exception of him going a bit mad during The Waters of Mars) to force anyone to do his bidding. Instead, he continually risks his life to save mortals from peril. He continually risks his hearts in taking on companions he knows will leave him for the very kind of life he envies — a life with a house, doors, carpets and things.

 

The Doctor, like the crew of the Enterprise, is the best that both Britain and America have to give to the world. Just look around today. There are only two countries continually turning out movies and TV series with heroes — the US and the UK. Are our heroes the same? No. Are our stories the same? Again, no. But we are much closer to our British cousins than we ever will be to the French, the Germans, the Italians, the Japanese, the Chinese, or any other nation or race on this planet. We have so much in common, so many shared dreams. It is truly a shame whenever an American discounts one of the greatest British television series as being “too British” instead of embracing it as part of his own cultural heritage.

 

Only two peoples on the face of this planet have had the power to subjugate it and dominate it, enslaving the rest of the nations to their will. Those two nations are Britain — who had an empire until they discovered that imperialism took too much energy and gracefully allowed their colonies to go free (as opposed to the French who fought it tooth and nail and dragged an ally into a losing war in Vietnam) — and America, who, right now, could demand that every nation worship her as an Old Testament style god or face wrath, fire, and destruction3.

 

And yet, neither of us has done that.

 

Yes, we might bicker over our trifling differences. Yes, the British are much more socialist and collectivist than Americans — that comes from being crammed together on a tiny island for centuries. But, we are both nations that understand the frontier. We are both nations that dream the big, impossible dreams. And we are both nations that believe that there are true heroes out there. Sometimes it’s an alien Time Lord and sometimes it’s a farm boy from Ohio. But, at the end of the day, they’re both good men which circumstances have forced to become great men. The Doctor belongs to America just as much as Captain Kirk belongs to Britain. They’re both part of our cultural DNA.

 

And I hope to Cthulhu4 we always remember that. The day we turn our back completely on our cousins, our shared history, and our common heritage is the day we will lose a very precious and very vital part of who, and what, we are as Americans.

 

— G.K.

 

1 If I recall correctly, according to my elderly cousin James Beard, our family hails from Lanarkshire in Scotland. Our ancestor, Baird, was raised up by King William of Scotland for killing a boar threatening his royal party.

 

2 The Anglos and Saxons were a bit unique in that, since primacy in war was paramount to their societies (due to the Norse worship), commoners who showed uncommon valor were prized above nobles who failed to show that same valor. American culture has been shaped quite heavily by this meritocratic view.

 

3 Seriously — this is why I get pissy with people who are like “but America is Imperialistic.” No, we’re not. We saw how much trouble this was right after the Spanish-American war. We let the Philippines go without a fight. We continually ask our commonwealths (who are not states) if they want to stay, go, or become states. We have enough firepower and enough nukes that we could go to the UN tomorrow and say “Hey, ya know what? We’re sick of all the bullshit. China, you’re gonna become an open democracy or else you’ll all die. And Russia, seriously, stop with the bullshit or you’re all dead. Europe? You wanna quit that shit or die? By the way, you have three minutes to decide before the missiles are on the way.” *insert Jeopardy theme music here.* “Oh, and all you fuckers in the Middle East hating on Israel? Tell Allah we said ‘hey, shitface’ when you and your people see him in *checks watch* oh, about fifteen seconds.” We could force the rest of the world to bow to us and do whatever we want but we have absolutely no desire to do so. We just want to be left alone. Name me three other nations that have had this power and refused to use it and maybe I’ll hear you out about how imperialistic the United States is.

 

4 I said I wasn’t going to swear to real deities anymore which is why I’m always swearing to ones that don’t exist.

Midnight of Lanar’ya Now Available Through Rooster and Pig!

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Midnight of Lanar'ya Now Available Through Rooster and Pig!

Whoo-hoo! Happy Release Day to me! The second book in the Fall of the Lanarian Empire series is now up on sale at the Rooster and Pig store. It will be available via other retailers soon.

 

You guys have no idea how glad I am to have this monster off my plate. This has to have been the most stubborn book I’ve ever written. The story just did not want me to get it all down but, by the grace of Cthulhu, (I gave up swearing to real deities for Lent, Mom) I finally got it down. It took several rounds and quite a few times I thought Midnight was gonna have me pinned to the mat but I wrestled it into submission.

 

Red wine and dark chocolate may or may not have played a helping hand. The jury is still out on that.

 

My current plans are to finish The Penitent and get it out to my beta readers by the end of May at the latest and then turn my attentions to the third book (and final) in the Fall of the Lanarian Empire series. I may or may not take periodic breaks to either crank out some short stories (I have five almost finished) or work on the treatment for my political-procedural-without-the-ideology Realpolitick which I’m hoping to have done and pitch to Amazon or Netflix as they’re the only players who are really into experimenting with the Internet as an entertainment distribution medium.

 

I also wouldn’t mind finally having a best-seller so that I could quit my day job and write without having to worry about how all those pesky bills are going to get paid. 🙂

 

For now, though, I’m off to finish getting ready for work and then, tonight, I shall celebrate by doing something productive… that may or may not involve fermented grape juice and dark chocolate and classic Doctor Who. Jury’s still out on that.

 

— G.K.

The Best Part of Being an Aunt…

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The Best Part of Being an Aunt...

…is hearing my niece or my nephews say “I love you.”

 

Granted, I live in New Jersey and don’t get down to Mississippi to see them near as much as I’d like to but they love me anyway. I talk to my youngest nephew Jacob whenever I happen to pop on to Battle.net. He’s a gamer like me and we have a lot in common. I’m hoping that he’ll take up programming and go to college for it and eventually work for a gaming company doing something he loves. My nephew Seth and I don’t have as much in common but I do try to figure out what interests we might share so that I can be close to him, too. Thus far, it’s just football (and he’s way more into it than I am) and Southern history that we both like but I’m hoping that, deep down, there’s a history buff underneath the football player who I can connect with.

 

And my niece. My little Mini-me. Nothing can brighten my day like talking to her on the phone and hearing her tell me how much she likes Doctor Who. When her mothers mention that she’s got a smart mouth, I grin ear-to-ear knowing that she got that from me. She looks just like me and she seems to love her ol’ Aunt G.K. When I last visited for Christmas and had a migraine, she just had to follow me into my room when I went to lay down with a cold cloth on my forehead to try to get rid of it. She snuggled up next to me and fell asleep with me. She even said she had a headache, too (though she didn’t. She just wants to be like me, I guess, which is weird but awesome).

 

I don’t have any kids of my own (yet). But I still love hanging out with my nephews and my niece. I love my parents and my sisters but nothing can make me smile as brightly as hearing one of the kids say they love me and that they’re looking forward to seeing me again. Nothing.

 

That’s the most awesome part of being the weird aunt. Because, at the end of the day, no matter how strange I am, those kids think I’m awesome enough to call me “Aunt Kelly.”

 

— G.K.

L’affaire Eich

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L'affaire Eich

In case you’ve been living under a rock, last week, Brendan Eich, the CEO of Mozilla, was pretty much forced to resign his position due to having donated to Prop 8 back in 2008. OKCupid dug up his name from a list of donors and changed their website so that if a person using Firefox visited, they were shown a page suggesting a different browser because Eich was CEO of Mozilla and was blasted as “anti-gay” for his donation.

 

As someone who is totally in favor of gay marriage, I’m with Sarah Hoyt and Andrew Sullivan on this one. It’s disturbing that someone’s private beliefs and personal donations can be used to force them out of a position especially after they’ve committed themselves to inclusiveness and equality in the workplace for LGBTs. The man believed that gay marriage shouldn’t be legally recognized. A lot of people believe that. That doesn’t make them anti-gay or homophobic. It makes them against changing the definition of marriage. Yes, some of them will be bigoted arseholes but most of them are not. A good many might favor civil unions that would have all of the same rights and privileges of marriage but just wouldn’t be called marriage. Others might fear that legalizing gay marriage would force religious institutions to perform weddings that go against their teachings — and, in light of some of the lawsuits against bakers and photographers* who don’t want to offer their services due to religious beliefs, there could be something to that fear.

 

But beyond that, do we really want to live in a world where you can be hounded in the streets, driven out of your job, and harassed for something you believe? If we start granting corporations the right to pressure workers — yes, even executives — to hide their personal beliefs and constantly hold the company line, do we really have freedom of speech anymore? Sure, it’s not the government that’s interfering. It’s just your employer. And, it’s not like we’re in the midst of a recession or anything, right, so there are plenty of jobs to be had, right? And, how does this hounding help the gay marriage cause? Is it going to change anyone’s mind? Is it going to make people more receptive to arguments in favor of gay marriage? Or is it going to cause opponents of gay marriage to become more entrenched, to move to insulate themselves more? Is it going to cause greater division in society by forcing gay marriage opponents to work only for others who share their views, putting themselves in an echo chamber?

 

Would you feel the same way about this issue if it were not gay marriage? Say that Brendan Eich supported keeping pot illegal. But, he promised not to fire anyone who thought pot should be legal, who advocated for legalization, who donated to efforts to make it legal, etc. Would it be right for legalization advocates to hound him out of his job? After all, putting people in jail over what they want to put in their bodies in their own time without endangering others is a far sight worse than simply saying “I don’t think marriage should be redefined.” The first denies people their liberty. The second denies them a tax break.

 

And would you want to be in his position with your own employer? I’m sure that most people work at a place where they may not agree with every single thing their employer believes or supports. Would you want someone fired because they were a creationist (when that belief had nothing to do with their job whatsoever)? Would you want someone fired because they were pro-choice (when that belief had nothing to do with their job)? Pro-life? An atheist? A libertarian? An anarchist? A smoker?** Someone who enjoyed a glass of wine of an evening? Coffee drinkers? Someone who had a copy of Chris Rock’s Bigger and Blacker? Do we really want to open our privately held beliefs to scrutiny by our employers? Would you really want to live in a world where that plays out?

 

This is an argument I have time and time again with a lot of people and this kind of power is why I am a minarchist (rational anarchist). If we grant gay marriage supporters a heckler’s veto like this, then inevitably that power will fall into the hands of someone who is odious. If someone can be forced to step down as CEO over this, then later on, another CEO could be forced to resign for not supporting the Kyoto Treaty (which was deeply flawed) or being a Euro-skeptic or an American isolationist. In a free society like ours, eventually the other side will get into power. So, instead of having to fight, fuss, and live in fear of that (like we’ve had to with the frickin’ abortion issue for forty some-odd years now), how about we all agree that no one should have that kind of power and that we can learn to agree to disagree civilly and that the best way to deal with someone who believes gay marriage shouldn’t be allowed isn’t to hound them over it but to talk to them. To show them that it won’t cause whatever they fear it will cause. To persuade and use reason and our brains instead of bludgeoning them over the head and exiling them to the Outer Darkness for a belief that has jack to do with being a CEO (or a developer, designer, code monkey, artist, editor, etc).

 

— G.K.

 

*Seriously, if a baker or photographer or whatever refuses to serve a gay wedding because of their religious, find another. It’s not like there is a severe shortage of them. Suing them over it is asking the government to tell them that they have to ignore their views for business. No one would object to a gay photographer or baker refusing to service an anti-gay marriage believer’s wedding so why do we think the reverse is okay?

 

**Holiday Inn already does this by refusing to hire smokers. So, I don’t stay at the Holiday Inn or any hotel owned by them. I don’t think that an employer should have the ability to tell their workers what they can and cannot do when they’re not on the clock. So, if Holiday Inn really wants to do this, they should pay their workers 24/7/365 for adhering to their policy. People would scream bloody murder if a place like Wal Mart refused to hire people who ate bacon every morning which has just as much bearing on the ability to work as being a smoker (or non-smoker) does.

I’m Still Around

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I'm Still Around

Just been a bit busy lately is all.

 

So, I got Stolen Lives out the door and it’s doing fairly well. I’m cranking away on The Penitent while working on learning how various world governments work for Realpolitick. I’m also promising myself that soon I will let myself have a few hours to play the new Diablo III expansion so long as I don’t skip going to the YMCA for my daily swim.

 

Yeah, I’m on a health kick. I got sick of having a gimpy ankle and knee that bothered me incessantly (and I’m tired of being a humongous fatass) so I got a membership at the YMCA and I swim for at least 30 minutes every day (and as close to an hour as I can push it). My leg has already gotten a lot better (going up stairs no longer causes me problems and going down them only does when I’m tired). I’m hoping soon to be able to add 15 – 20 minutes of Nordic Ski or elliptical to my work out alternating that with weight lifting every other day. I’m also cutting beef and pork out of my diet and living off vegetables and fish (with the occasional treat for good behavior).

 

I’ve told myself that I’m going to set aside a whole $500 and, if I manage to get down to a healthy weight, I’m going to buy three new pairs of blue jeans and have them embroidered on the legs (and have them hemmed so I don’t have to fold them up to my ankles), two new pairs of black slacks, white dress blouses (because white goes with everything), and some new shirts. I’ll also probably redo my pajamas and all that as well. Maybe a couple of pairs of new Converse trainers (black, creme, and blue or red).

 

Oh, and my Fifth Doctor cosplay outfit. Maybe a sundress, a Sunday dress, and a cocktail dress in case I ever need to wear a dress some place. (I don’t like dresses).

 

So long as I don’t go over my $500 budget. I can sense my mother rolling her eyes at me already. She started with the “new pairs of jeans” and is probably sputtering about no dress shoes in my list (seriously, if people are going to pay that much attention to my shoes, I think it’s them that have the issue, not me). Mom and I have vastly different approaches to fashion: I know I have no fashion sense so I keep it cheap, timeless, and simple. Mom actually likes dressing up and I’d rather be strapped to the rack. Color coordination is something you do for a website skin, not your socks.

 

Anyhow, figured I’d just drop a quick line to let everyone know I am gloriously, happily busy.

 

— G.K.