dear king county department of elections

i promise you that no one is trying to commit electoral fraud using my name for this super-boring february election that has all of four boring tax-related propositions on the ballot. i appreciate your intentions, but come on. if, as you say in your “signature mismatch” pamphlet (“your signature is unique as you are!”), you really have two trained election officials evaluating every signature that may appear slightly different than whatever you have on file, couldn’t those two trained minds come together and use, i don’t know, CONTEXT, to determine whether it’s more likely that a natural variation has occurred or whether some sort of conspiracy is at work? maybe it’s just me, but if i were going to risk losing the right to vote for the rest of my life, i would probably choose a) an election with slightly more compelling issues than the extension of existing tax practices within the department of education; b) a voter who actually lived in the city of seattle (where, ostensibly, there are more issues to vote on, closer races, and somewhat ‘larger’ ticket items?); and c) a more devious, more efficient, less obvious plan for my conspiracy than seeking out individual voters whose signatures i can feasibly replicate. presidential, gubernatorial, judicial elections? perhaps. referendums pertaining to drug policy, equal rights, environmental protection? maybe. things that happen in november? possibly. any initiatives proposed by the illustrious tim eyman? sure. these are instances where, if i was crazy, i might find that it was worth my time and effort to orchestrate some sort of grand scheme that skewed the results of the election in favor of my position(s). but by any stretch of the imagination, it wouldn’t be worth the risk to do the same thing for issues along the lines of “should we amend this thingy so that language pertaining to outdated policy is removed or revised?” it just seems way easier, and way more likely, to assume that someone’s signature might have changed since the day they turned 18 and mailed in their voter’s registration. they were young, eager, and trying to present their best handwriting form for such a momentous occasion. it makes more sense to compare current signatures to those provided on more recent ballots, than to check everything against the first signature on record. i really have no idea how my signature in question looked different than it was supposed to, but i can’t imagine that i would have written something that looked suspiciously unlike, say, my signature on the ballot i submitted THREE MONTHS AGO.

give me a break, election officials! i’m young, i have a lifetime of voting ahead of me! and i’m dorky enough to vote in every boring election there is! i send my ballots in three or four weeks before the deadline! you want me to vote! i’m doing exactly what i’m supposed to! you want everyone to do just what i do! you bemoan low voter turnout, especially in off-season elections, especially among young people, so you really shouldn’t be making the voting process more irritating for the few of us who DO vote consistently! now i have anxiety about remembering how my previous signatures looked and making sure i do it the exact same way every time! wouldn’t that make my signature appear more forced, more uneasy, as if someone were trying too hard to make an exact copy instead of being natural? it sure would, based on the understanding of handwriting analysis i’ve gleaned from ‘experts’ on judge shows and crime dramas. so there! i counter your suspicions with socratic methods! all your base are belong to us! etc.

you’d think after seven seasons of the west wing, i’d be more sympathetic to the plight of government workers. and yet, the annoyance of having to photocopy my driver’s license still persists. i know, life is hard when you have too much time on your hands and you sit around coming up with reasons to be indignant. i’m sorry. it’s like the mind of a cavil in the body of a six. okay, now that i’ve made myself out to sound especially unappealing, i’ll stop writing.

Posted by kate under nuclear waste, rabid sputtering | Comments (0)

the perils of including the word “technician” in your job search

clipped from seattle.craigslist.org Mortuary Transport Technician (Kent) Date: 2010-01-21, 11:34AM PST Reply to: job-z3ygf-1563768451@craigslist.org [Errors when replying to ads?] FUNERAL HOME SUPPORT SERVICE NEEDS A COMPASSIONATE INDIVIDUAL POSITIONS AVAILABLE: Mortuary Service Transport Technician; AKA: Removal Technician Job Description: Technicians will be expected to respond to designated hospitals, nursing homes, Medical Examiner/Coroner office or residences to remove bodies of deceased persons in a compassionate and professional manner. The deceased persons are then transported to the location designated by our clients. Experience is helpful, but we are always willing to train the right person. Compensation: $10HR DOE

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the big reveal

I AM GOING TO SOUTH AFRICA. in the spring. to play with adorable meerkats. i wish the neural pathways of fear and excitement were not quite so closely linked, because i keep getting confused and acting afraid when i’m really thrilled. stupid obnoxious frontal lobes. i’ve probably said that before. but there it is, my own personal big reveal. i don’t know if it really merits the title, but it’s likely the only thing about my life that will ever be a surprise to anyone, so there you go.

Posted by kate under nuclear waste | Comments (1)

the problems with intellectual parents…

it’s bad enough that most of my christmas or birthday gifts from my father usually require a cipher of some sort in order to figure out what it is, where it is, and how to get it. sometimes it’s glyphs, sometimes it’s math, sometimes it’s abstract prose. but it’s never ‘happy birthday, kate! love, dad.’ usually, this sort of tactic is restricted to paternal gifts, but sometimes my mother can’t help herself, either.

my dad is notoriously impossible to shop for. usually, he’ll buy himself a bunch of semi-identical plaid shirts from the sale pile at sears, and then have me wrap them and “surprise” him with them at the time of unwrapping. or, he’ll go to the bookstore and make a list of things he wants, but half of them he’ll have already read, and not remembered. so i’ll do as instructed, get the books on the list, only to have him go ‘ohhhh yeah…. i remember this…’ every other time he opens one and looks at the first few pages. but, whatever, it’s our family ritual, he knows he gets what he asks for. anyway.

but gods dammit, it’s one thing to make me work for MY gift, and another thing entirely to make me work to figure out what i’m supposed to get for someone else! this year, my dad said he couldn’t think of anything he wanted, except for me to wrap the obligatory shirts for him. but a moment ago, he told me he’d thought of something! i was so excited. “i wrote it down!” i was even more pleased. then i scanned the dining room table and located a sheet of paper with what appeared to be specific present instructions, only to find… THAT IT WAS A FRACKING HAIKU. an obtuse, esoteric haiku. “you’ll probably know it when you see it,” he said, after i groaned a bit. “it will make the gift that much more meaningful, if you have to discover it on your own, and bring a part of yourself into it!” …or something ridiculous like that. gods fracking dammit. i would really love to know if anyone else in the world has to endure this particular brand of christmas insanity. probably not.

so, i have an exciting adventure at the bookstore to look forward to tomorrow. and the inevitable exciting encounters i’ll have with helpful employees who’ve been watching me wander aimlessly around the store with what appears to be a normal list in my hands. i hope my dad doesn’t cry if “my personal interpretation” of his desired book ends up translating into, oh, i don’t know, a lump of coal.

Posted by kate under nuclear waste | Comments (0)

the plan/razor soundtrack

yes, it’s sort of a random pairing, but i don’t think any of us will care when the end result is more mccreary. amazon says the album will go on sale 02/16/2010.

Posted by kate under BSG, musics | Comments (0)

encoded in my name:

…a penchant for evil space robots with organic underpinnings.

clipped from www.deanjackson.dj Kate Donaldson’s anagram name is TO AND ON DALEKS Now try your name:� ��

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