Been a Long Time Coming

So it's been, oh, well over a year since I last wrote in this blog. 2007 was crazy. But I'm back baby and thirsty for blood. Well, not really. More like thirsty for cosmopolitans.

Mike and I watched Maxed Out tonight, presumably because we were tired of being cheerful and relaxed. What I thought would be an expose on people's crazy spending habits (which would make me secretly feel better about myself) turned out to be a depressing culmination of financial news stories I have read over the years. People being taken advantage of by greedy lenders instead of people spending $400 on cashmere sweaters and sticking them in the closet, never to be worn.

Don't get me wrong-to some extent the people themselves are at fault for not reading the fine print and signing on the dotted line anyway. But have you ever read the fine print on your own credit card statement? I consider myself pretty responsible and I never have. I've tried, I just can't make sense of it. So, I just make it a point to not carry a balance. Not everyone is this lucky though and I realize that.

So in watching this documentary, I still got the "there but for the grace of God, go I" feeling. Should something horrific happen-someone gets in a car accident, cancer, or a major recession/depression hits-we, too are just one paycheck away from disaster.

I highly recommend this film, one-sided though it may be, if only for the feelings of anger it may stir in you. It led to me to this website (which I will delve into in more detail later) but, more importantly, it led to THIS website:

Call me stupid, crazy, ignorant, whatever but around election time I try to make time to figure out what my elected officials have been doing for the past 4 years and never have time to read through all of the votes. Now I can-I signed up to have my elected officials' votes e-mailed to me via this website. I can even sign up for special interest topics (hello, "Economy"!). I am pretty stoked about this and hope you will be too. If you aren't, get outta my country.