Blog Sisters:

I've written some personal poems for 4 Alito filibuster holdouts: Byrd, Akaka, Landrieu, Nelson. Here's one of them:

An Open Limerick To Senator Byrd
By Madeleine Begun Kane

Sen. Byrd you're at times quite inspired,
Speaking words that I've often admired.
Now it's time to help muster
A Sam filibuster.
If you don't, all our rights shall expire.

You can find all four of my personal Alito filibuster poems here and the audio podcast version is here.

In a brief departure from political humor, I've written an Ode To Takeout:

Ode To Takeout (Sing To My Favorite Things)
By Madeleine Begun Kane

"Baked meat lasagna and Indian curry.
Sesame noodles. I'm famished! Please hurry!
Buddha's Delight that is fit for a king.
Takeout is one of my favorite things.

Greek beef moussaka and cheese ravioli.
Brocc'li and eggplant, stir fried with aioli..."

This rest of my Ode To Takeout song parody is here.

ScienceBlogs are soooo cool!
Thank you Boing Boing for poiting me there!!!

Mad Kane's post below is a great jumping off point.

This is the most important moment for us, right before the Senate votes.

Judge Alito is not the right man for this time. I've made the case over and over again, including in my daily podcasts. It's the signing statements and his belief that the president is all powerful.

We will lose our privacy, not only personally, but in our daily lives.

Please get involved. There are many ways on my blog. I invite you to stop by.

My latest post comments on Judge Sam Alito's Supreme Court nomination, his integrity or lack thereof, his wife's just pretend tears, and likelihood of a filibuster. It includes five Sam Alito poems in different formats, starting with this one:

If Not Now, Then When?
By Madeleine Begun Kane

Will Senate Dems preserve our rights
And filibuster Sam?
How 'bout it Dems? Let's see you fight
And prove you give a damn.

Cause Democrats must do much more
Than talk and primp and bluster.
It's time for Dems to show some guts
And Sammy filibuster.

The post with all five of my latest Sam Alito poems is here and my podcast version is here.

I'm going to grab "Women" for blogsisters...

Here's what I posted on allied. I don't have any idea who's involved with the 1000tags thing, so I can't endorse it, but it looks like a fun thing to experiment with and right now they're giving out a free tag if you have a blog and post about it. For the BlogSisters tag, I'll choose "women" and we'll see if this blog shows up in any tag cloud, folksonomy, or taxidermy.... ;-)

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I love a secretive wierd thing that comes out of nowhere. Sometimes these side-street jaunts I take full of passion and enthusiasm come back and bite me: you goober, that was dumb to associate yourself with.

1000tags.com is - that we know - the very first project that offers booking and buying tags from a "tag cloud". Or in other words, it is the first commercial tag cloud. That means that it could be the proof of concept demonstrating that folksonomies can be an effective way to advertise.

Yesterday's email included the contract for my volunteer position as Euro-editor for this year's BlogHer. I have a few questions on the details, but esentially, I'll be trying to publish the best blogging from and about Europe to the BlogHer site during the lead up to the conference in San Jose, California, in June. BlogHer focuses on women, of course, but hello, guys, I did ask about what the editorial policy is around including Y chromosomes in my selections. Stand by on that.

In exchange for my hard work (like I couldn't use some of my squandered web hours contributing?) I'll get the mighty muscle of BlogHer promoting my own site, Nerd's Eye View. I've been having something of an identity crisis around the site. Note the remodel! Note the advertising! Note the participation in Performancing discussions on how to monitize your blog. (Bleh. There's that word again. Monitize. Bleh.) I'm not going to sell a billion copies of my book, Baked Insanity, without some marketing, right? If I want to write less "To BLAH, click the BLAH and then, click BLAH" and more stories about noisy elk, I'm gonna have to get my writing in front of more eyeballs. Welcome to the era of shameless self-promotion.

But wait there's more. It's not just about I Me Me My. There's some pretty fine writing out there about European issues that warrants sharing. You may be shocked to learn that I am anti-Americentric thinking. It's true! I engage in my share of Eurobashing, but not more than I engage in my share of Ameribashing. Indulge me while I get up on a soapbox for just a minute and rattle on about how exposure and understanding of other cultures and ideas makes us not just better neighbors, but better people. Eh, you don't need to hear this. You know. I'll step down now.

Anyhow, I could use your help. I'm looking for first rate Euro-bloggers. I have plenty of good ex-pat sites bookmarked. There's no shortage of stories about language lessons or the crazy local phone company or the significance of pork. You get the picture. There's also plenty of primo travel stuff out there, plus, that's a whole 'nother category for BlogHer. That's what I'm NOT looking for.

I'm looking for sites about European issues. I want the Ameriblog and The Daily Kos of Europe. I've got some feeds already, but I'd rather get dupes than miss something, so I'm not going to list them. I'm way a lefty but know thy enemy, yes? I'm also looking for photostreams, podcasts, and any other bloggy stuff that offers quality insight on European issues. I'm primarily looking for work by women - hey, it's BlogHER, not BlogHIM - but I'll certainly look at other stuff. English language only. Of course there's great stuff in all European languages, but I lack the skill to evaluate it. Unless it's visual, then, okay, bring it.

That's more than enough about me and my needs. You and your recommnedations, here, please, in the comments on Nerd's Eye View. Thanks loads for helping me out in this upcoming bloggy adventure.

Note: Cross posted a few places. Sorry for dupes in your RSS readers.

I've posted five new limericks today. Here's the one about Bush and Abramoff:

A Bush Pioneer Who's Named Jack
By Madeleine Begun Kane

A Bush pioneer who's named Jack
Raised for Dubya a huge money stack.
Bush now queries, Jack who?
Though he won't bid adieu
To the dough from that scurrilous hack.

All five of my new limericks are here.
And the audio / podcast version is here.

Please join Medea Benjamin, Angela Davis, Margaret Cho, Dolores Huerta, Kavita Ramdas, Susan Sarandon, and many thousands of others in signing this Code Pink global call for peace!

My latest song parody celebrates Jack Abramoff's plea bargain. Here's how it starts:

Say Goodbye To Tom DeLay -- Song Parody (Sing to "Yesterday")
By Madeleine Begun Kane

Tom DeLay,
He's got troubles. They won't go away.
Jack's pled guilty and he'll have his say.
So say goodbye to Tom DeLay.

Abramoff,
He's pled guilty. Now Tom won't get off.
Yes, they've got him cold, though wingnuts scoff.
Can't wait to hear from Abramoff.

The rest of my Say Goodbye To Tom DeLay song parody is here.

The new year has come in and with it will come many new resolutions for the year. People will promise themselves to lose weight, watch less TV, talk to their kids more, spend more time out in nature, and a host of other good intentions. By May many will already be giving up on their vows and looking towards 2007 for another shot at it.

Why not make every moment an opportunity to renew your commitment to doing what you think is in your best interest? Resolve in each moment to express your love for yourself through behaviors that increase your longterm happiness, health, wealth and peace of mind.

If you are watching something on television and you notice that you aren't feeling good, turn it off. Why do you need to see how it ends? You know the bottom line to the story; the bottom line is, it's a story that doesn't make you feel good. What else do you need to know if you are someone who believes she deserves to feel good all the time?

And you do. Please make this resolve right now. Vow that you will do what it takes so that you feel good in your life. I don't mean pleasure. I mean wellness and satisfaction. Often short-term pleasures, like the excitement and rush of frightening or violent entertainment, actually undermine overall happiness. They upset your nervous system and train your mind to expect negative experiences, among other drawbacks.

I hope this year truly does bring you increased health, wealth, and happiness, but only you can resolve that it will and stick to that resolve, moment by moment.

-- Reposted from The Goodness Blog