Tonight, I found myself apportioning 10 raisins a piece for 21 children before questioning whether or not that was in fact the instruction given by Thor’s teacher, who had asked for 10 pieces of each of 10 snacks she had listed on a quest to have fun working with the kids on counting to a hundred.  Brain-tired, I shoved a handful of raisins in my mouth and mulled.  Or chewed.  Whichever.

There was a tradition in the Sophomore year of my high school, for upper-classes to take on girls as Little Sisters.  We, the younger ones, were doled out at random to the older girls.  One of the bonding exercises was for the Big Sister to dress the Little Sister up in hideous nerd gear and parade them around all day.  It just so happened that I was growing out what amounted to be Annie Lennox’s haircut as that day rolled around, and I had clipped my shaggy bangs back from my forehead with a baby clip.  This was prior to the 90s, when baby clips became fashionable, lest you think to yourself, “I’ll bet that looked cute.”

I was standing in the school bathroom with my Big Sister, who was so not into me.  She had two Little Sisters, and had known one of them–the cool one, whose mother didn’t make her wear her skirt at LITERAL TEA LENGTH–from birth, and was just not up to having a dorky hanger-on.  Another Big Sister walked into the bathroom, took one look at me–not even having put on a single bit of nerd gear yet, just me and my baby clip, bare face, and tea-length skirt–and cried, “Oomeegeeeesh!  Her hair is so NERDEEEEEEEE!  OMIGOOOOOOOOOOOD!  AWESOME!!  BWAHAHAHAH!!11!!!!1!!!”  Yes, I could hear the 1s within her exclamation points.

There was this moment when my eyes met my Big Sister’s in the reflection of the mirror, and what I saw was her total revulsion, disappointment, and embarrassment at having to deal with me at all.  We both knew I had shown up looking like that.  She already knew I looked like a dork.  I was just finding out.

It was one of those John Hughes moments, and should have been followed up with Jake Ryan calling to take me to the prom–that’s how meaningful it was.  It was also a defining moment for me.  I smiled at my Big Sister, turned to the other girl and grinned as widely as I could and I said, “I know!  Ohmigod!  I look like such a nerd!  Like, I need a pocket protector, or, like some horn-rimmed glasses!  She’s done it perfectly!”

My Big Sister was visibly relieved, and I think that’s what embarrassed me the most.  I ended up with a beat-up cowboy hat made of straw, and a half-hearted makeup job, and I spent the rest of the day trying not to cry.

The next day, I wore my baby clip again as inoculation against the way I had felt.  That was my way back then.  If something I really liked turned out badly, I tried it again a) just to see if maybe I had played it to the wrong audience and a change of “venue” might help the problem, b) to show the people who made me feel bad that I didn’t give a rat’s rump what they thought, c) to pick at the scab because I was a bit of a masochist.

Thanksgiving, this year, was the first time I had been able to attend one of Thor’s class parties.  It was a Thanksgiving Feast buffet.  I volunteered to bring carrots, enough to serve 5 classes of 1st Graders, plus teachers, plus any parents who were attending.  I thought I was the only person bringing carrots.  I had also been advised that serving dishes would be provided.  So, I showed up with 3 large bags of baby carrots, and a large bag of carrot chips–for variety.  Some other mothers had also provided carrots, so by the time I arrived, my offering was overkill.

I got busy with helping and didn’t pay any attention to my carrots, and didn’t even see them again until I was in the teachers’ breakroom washing the dishes we had used for the buffet.  Another mom–this gorgeous, Charlie’s Angels looking mom, who is incredibly nice, and helpful–came in with my carrots and offered them to the teachers since we’d had overflow.  The teachers–y’all–the teachers sneered.  I was shocked.

I stood there washing my dishes, trying not to make eye contact with Gorgeous Mom, who knew the origin of the veggies, and who had extracted herself from the teachers’ conversation immediately.  That conversation among four, elementary school teachers went like this:

“I can’t believe how lazy some people are.  You don’t have time to even put the food on a tray?”

“Right?!  I would never show up with something that was so obviously from the grocery store.  You can’t make something at home?  You’re that busy?  Huh.”

“Homemade is always the best.  You know some people will just take the stuff they buy at the grocery store and put it on a platter?  That’s so rude.  I wouldn’t even take that to a friend’s party.  What do people think of you if you do that?”

“That you’re lazy!  And you don’t care.  And look–she didn’t even take them out of the bags.”

It went on.  And on.  And on.

I stood there, washing and drying, listening to these women talk about how rude, and tacky, and lazy, and disgusting I was for having brought food to the school, which I had purchased at Kroger, and left in bags so that they could be used as needed and otherwise shared if there were leftovers.  I had purposefully bought more than I thought was absolutely necessary, and I had thought people might like some fresh veg.  Uh…rude, tacky, lazy, and disgusting.

I was fifteen again.  Standing in that bathroom, eyes locked on [redacted]‘s, knowing I had fallen short.  Only, instead of being hurt, I was pissed the feck off.  Who were these harpies?  Seriously?  Rude, tacky, lazy, and disgusting?  No, honey.  Rude is me saying I’ll bring food and then backing out without telling you.  Tacky is only bringing enoug’h for my child’s class and no one else, knowing it is a feast for all the classes.  Lazy is not bothering at all because some other mother will do it.  Disgusting is me spitting on the carrots before sharing them with you.

I seriously considered telling them they were talking about me, but I chose not to.  I was so taken aback, and disbelieving that by the time I had decided what I wanted to say, Gorgeous Mom had steered their conversation to kinder, gentler topics.  It seemed a moot point.  Besides, I could have outed myself, then the likeliest thing would be that they would tell the rest of the teachers that Thor’s Mom was rude, tacky, lazy, disgusting, and uber-confrontational.  For the child’s reputation, I swallowed my bile.

Tonight, I started working on those raisins and had such performance anxiety, I cannot tell you.  My packets weren’t pretty enough.  The Saran Wrap press-n-seal was too sticky.  There was no uniformity.  No aesthetic.  I started to panic.  Would Thor’s teacher think I was rude, tacky, lazy, or disgusting?  Was I even doing it right in the first place?  I had 10 packs of 10 ready to go.  I needed 11 more.  Or was I just supposed to send in 210 raisins by themselves?  Did there have to be 10 even for each child, or should I send one of those big boxes of raisins and let the teacher distribute at will?  OH MY GOD!  BABY CLIPS AND CARROTS!

So, I ate them.

I’ll work on it again tomorrow, after getting some clarification from Thor’s teacher, and having lived down my goofy hair and party tray shame through exhibitionism.

The moral of the story is: Be careful when you mock.  You may be mocking the person standing to your left.

“

Isn’t that crazy?  I know all the gossip-worthy ones, and the ones who are on the few shows I watch, but outside of that…  Listen, I’ve confused Spike Jonze for Spike Lee, and Terrence Malik with Terrence Howard.  That’s unforgivable.  Terrence Malik is a screenwriter and producer.  Terrence Howard is a spokesman for baby wipes.  I also have a really hard time with Guy Pearce and Christian Bale, Leighton Meester and Rachel Bilson, and–okay, ask my husband, I confuse everyone.  I’m excited when I get one right.  Like when Trinity from The Matrix showed up on Chuck and I knew it was Trinity, and didn’t think she was Xena, because yes, I have confused Trinity for Xena.

One gentleman came through and Sheila said, “Lane!  That’s [famous actor]!”

I said, “Who?”

“[Famous Actor]!”

“Don’t know him,” I shrugged.

She helpfully supplied a quick list of hits and I squinted and tilted my head.  He looked sort of familiar, but he was no Johnny Depp, you know?  However, THIS GUY, was Johnny Depp.

Fauxny Depp came in dressed in the distressed fedora and Buddy Holly rims we’re so used to seeing on Johnny, but unlike the swirling cloud of rumor that Johnny accessorizes with a body scarf of stink, Fauxny had no discernible odor at all.  That was my first clue that he was a celebrity lookalike.

Seriously, I thought to myself, “That guy looks a bloody lot like Johnny Depp.  I wonder if that is Johnny Depp.  I’m gonna play it cool.  Hmm.  Doesn’t smell.  That’s not Johnny Depp.  Why would Johnny Depp be at this party and not the one in LA?”  That was my second clue.  The third was when Alex Mazieri introduced himself as…Alex Mazieri.  Can’t fool me.

Glad I played it cool.

The other highlight of my evening was having a Butt Sketch made.

I’ve heard of these before and always avoided them.  I thought they were caricature style sketches of backsides, and the last thing I want to see is my tuckus in the fisheye lense of the caricature artist.  I walked up on the artist, Rhett, as he was sketching the backside of a zaftig woman in a fur.  It was actually lovely and I determined that I should have a portrait made of my own posterior.

Here it is.  As Dana Carvey-as-George Michael might say, “Look at my butt!  The worst thing you can do is try to ignore it.”

If you should ever have a Butt Sketch drawn, do not choose this pose. You will end up feeling like a swaybacked mule. Get comfy.

The front of me looked like this:

Alas, I have no career as a celebrity lookalike in front of me. You know I would.

It was good times all around.

I am not ashamed to tell you that I broke down sobbing, and had to sit in my car for a long time before I could make myself drive away.

We have been extremely fortunate that we have always had a choice in childcare.  We haven’t had to make do with the bare minimum because it was all we could afford, and we haven’t had to rely on unpaid care.  We have been extremely fortunate.

This morning, I am thinking about mothers who are having to leave their babies in the arms of people they aren’t sure they can trust, hoping against hope that the worker is good to their baby, while they go to work to try to earn enough to keep that child in food and diapers.  I am thinking about mothers who don’t have a choice.  I am thinking about mothers who are trusting fate.

When I am Overlord, we will find ways to pay well for three things, and we will find ways to attract the best people for these jobs:  Childcare, education, and elder care.  No mother should have to be afraid to leave her baby.

Any idea how hard it was to leave this little guy with strangers? And he was 9 months old by the time this was taken. <3

Somewhere in my late 20s, I started to appreciate it.  It was nice to be mistaken for younger.  I could get away with more.  In my 30s, when people were telling me I looked to be in my 20s, it was especially nice.  And nicer still when people thought B and I were the same age–y’all know I married a younger man, right?  I am still hearing that I look younger than 41, but I think I have hit the point at which no matter how much younger than my true age I may look, I still look…mature.  The lamb has turned to mutton.  No one is ever going to card me for any reason other than policy, or flattery again.  Not even myopia is going to bring on that second, suspicious look at my ID.

Eh.  No matter.  I was never hoping to be anyone’s MILF anyway.

Speaking of lamb…

Ever since reading this story about waste from a meat processing plant being routed into an area river, I’ve been having a real problem getting meat down.  I’m already a really picky meat eater, with a hair trigger gag reflex, but I find my throat constricting at the thought of pork these days.  When I went grocery shopping today, I couldn’t even bring myself to buy bacon.  I love bacon.  Loved bacon.  Today bacon is making me gag.

I’m not one to harp on about the ethics of meat eating.  You don’t gripe at sharks, or alligators, or lions, or chimpanzees for taking advantage of their place on the food chain, and I think it’s silly to complain that humans shouldn’t eat whatever form of protein is available to them (outside of Swiftian proposals, that is.)  However, between Upton Sinclair and the meat processing industry, I am being driven nearer and nearer to vegetarianism.

I’ll never be a true vegetarian, and I’ll probably get over my mental block against bacon soon (I hope!), but if the pork farmers of America want me to buy their ham, they really need to work harder to make me forget that it once had hooves, ears, and a snout.  I’m gagging again.

Starting with this guy: Theodosius I Magnus

Actually, I’m not sure we’re related to that guy a) because I can’t imagine us having any recognized Saints in the family, b) because I find it really hard to believe anyone can trace a direct line back to the 4th Century, and c) because next in line on the geneology chart is Long Haired Clodius, who, according to Wikipedia, does not appear to be related to Theodosius at all.

Clodius’ disputed offspring, Merovech, is even more unlikely our predecessor.  Wikipedia states:

There is little information about him in the later histories of the Franks. Gregory of Tours only names him once as the father of Childeric I while putting doubt on his descent from Chlodio.^[2] Many admit today that this formulation finds its explanation in a legend reported by Fredegar.

Which puts Childeric I into line, and his son Clovis I, and his son Cloataire I.  Cloataire begat Charibert, and Charibert begat Boggis/Bertrand by a concubine, which is kind of awesome.)  Boggis/Bertrand might have begotten Odo, who did begat Hunald, who begat Waifer, who lost his title and lands.  I’m not sure where the link comes in because sources are conflicting, but Goslin Du Maine pops up under Waifer, and he begat Roricon I, who (possibly?) begat Wolgrin of Agen, who begat Alduin Angouleme, who begat William Taillifer (we’re getting closer to Taylor here.)

William begat William, and then a long line of people named variations of William or John, as the last name evolved from Taillifer to Taylifer, to Taylor, until we get to Rowland Taylor, through whom I appear to be related to William Tyndale by marriage.

Rowland, a reverend, was a particular thorn of protestantism in the side of Mary Tudor, Queen Mary I, eschewing celibacy of the Catholic priesthood (go, Rowland!) and marrying to begat Thomas Taylor and on down.  Mary, being particularly humorless as far as Jeezits and the Trasubstantiation that Rowland also decried went, had him burned at the stake as heretic.

Wikipedia reports these as his last words:

“I say to my wife, and to my children, The Lord gave you unto me, and the Lord hath taken me from you, and you from me: blessed be the name of the Lord! I believe that they are blessed which die in the Lord. God careth for sparrows, and for the hairs of our heads. I have ever found Him more faithful and favorable, than is any father or husband. Trust ye therefore in Him by the means of our dear Savior Christ’s merits: believe, love, fear, and obey Him: pray to Him, for He hath promised to help. Count me not dead, for I shall certainly live, and never die. I go before, and you shall follow after, to our long home.”

Foxe reports these as his last words to his son, Thomas:

“Almighty God bless thee, and give you his Holy Spirit, to be a true servant of Christ, to learn his word, and constantly to stand by his truth all the life long. And my son, see that thou fear God always. Fly from all sin and wicked living. Be virtuous, serve God daily with prayer, and apply thy boke. In anywise see thou be obedient to thy mother, love her, and serve her. Be ruled by her now in thy youth, and follow her good counsel in all things. Beware of lewd company of young men, that fear not God, but followeth their lewd lusts and vain appetites. Flee from whoredom, and hate all filthy lying, remembering that I they father do die in the defense of holy marriage. And another day when God shall bless thee, love and cherish the poor people, and count that thy chief riches to be rich in alms. And when thy mother is waxed old, forsake her not, but provide for her to thy power, and see that she lacks nothing. For so will God bless thee, give thee long life upon earth, and prosperity, which I pray God to grant thee.”

From there until 1774, every one of the male Taylors in my line is named Thomas, John, or William, then we jump to Dempsey, who moved his family to Georgia from North Carolina, being the First Gen son of a William, who moved from Ireland.  Dempsey is listed on the roster of Revolutionary War soldiers from Georgia, which means I could possibly accomplish my lifelong ambition to membership with the DAR.  On my mother’s side, it appears that I could also find no small status with the DAC, but I think that’s considered tacky these days, and one thing a true DAC is not, is tacky.  (This is how you know I could never truly achieve membership.  Like Jessica Simpson, I have too much gas and guffaw much too loudly about it to ever be admitted.)  Dempsey also had some issues with getting land grants (he lost a lottery he entered), and may have died without having had any.  Dennis does not seem to have rectified that situation.

Dempsey begat Dennis, who begat Seaborn (awesome!), who begat Elias, who begat John, who married Velma, who begat Allen, who married Joan, who begat moi.

Whew.

Honestly, I’m not sure how much of this is accurate.  The world is filthy with Taylors, and with all the Johns, Thomases, and Williams in the tree, I could be swinging on someone else’s vine entirely.  Still, it’s pretty nifty to be able to see back the four or five generations I feel are likely.  Even more interesting to find information regarding my mother’s super-secretive family history.

I think what excited her the most was finding out my grandparents’ wedding date.  August 8, 1942.

All the best things happen in August.

A photo of some of Dennis' family. You wacky Duranies will love that one of the Taylor women, pictured here, married a Rhodes, and is listed as R. Taylor Rhodes.

In other opinions:  I saw Bridesmaids.  I laughed.  I enjoyed myself.  I cannot, for the life of me, understand why Melissa McCarthy is up for an Oscar.  Ugly pants, wrist-braces, and gross-out barf takes do not equal great acting.  They equal SNL sketches.  I could stretch and give you a nomination for Wiig, who did a very nice job showing the evolution of emotion and maturity in her character, but McCarthy?  All she did was poop and blurt out inappropriate phrases.

Still other opinions:  I am delighted to read that Samantha Garvey, the homeless teen who made it to the semifinals of the Intel Science Talent Search, has been able to bring about some change in her situation through sheer intellectual talent.  I love seeing a young woman rewarded for being smart, working hard, and looking to education as a way out of poverty.  I love seeing her hard work celebrated.  It is difficult enough to maintain the grades she has made when you know where home is.  I cannot imagine the challenge of doing it while bouncing around between housing, with disabled parents, and the worry of where you’ll be tonight, much less tomorrow.  I love that she has dug in and stayed put intellectually, and I love that she is being lauded for it.  I hope the media latches on to the idea and hunts down further deserving young women and men, and makes news of them and their accomplishments, rather than the current alternative of making news of people who have accomplished nothing more than notoriety.

One more opinion:  The only people who can run for office, are people who can afford to spend months, even years, without working for a living.  People who have no need to earn to provide for themselves, or their families are the only ones who can stay on the campaign trail.  Thus and so, you are never going to get a political candidate who is in touch with Middle America.  Middle America knows that if you disappear from work for weeks at a time, your rent doesn’t get paid, your kids don’t eat, and the bank comes looking for you.  This is what is so frustrating about politicians.

I don’t think I’m an unusually uptight person.  I’m not mellow as the Fall by any means, but I’m pretty happy left to myself.  Left to myself in a Relaxation Room?

B and I went into the room because I was bored and antsy by the fire.  Maybe they should have given me decaf tea?  Anyway, the room is greenhouse styled, with full walls of windows opening out into the courtyard to a beautiful view.  Tiny, flat cushions are situated against the wall, ringing tatami mats for those who relax by stretching.  Above the cushions are headphones.  B and I took seats together, having our pick since we were the only people in the room, and put on our headphones.

The track playing on the headphones was one of a rainstorm, with what sounded like a steady, soaking rain, thunder in the distance, and a zap of lightning now and then.  This should be relaxing, shouldn’t it?  Well, it wasn’t.  You see, where I am from, when rain sounds like that, it means flash flooding.  Flash flooding means the roads are going to be a mess, and that means I am going to have to get up an hour earlier than usual just to get to work on time.  If I’m lucky.

I glanced over at B to see if he was feeling the same pressure to beat traffic, and found him in a peaceful pose.  I did the only thing I could do.  I poked him.

“This rain is giving me stress,” I told him.

“Shh,” he said, and closed his eyes.  He’s used to me.

I tried to leave the Texas of my mind and go to Georgia.  Georgia, my grandparents’ house, is my happy place.  So, going there, I found I could enjoy the rainfall a bit more.  That is, I could enjoy it until I realized that with that kind of rain, I wouldn’t be allowed out on the backporch because it had a metal roof.  Grandma would have the sliding door open and the humidity inside the house would be like living in a rain forest, and she would be chain smoking so that a cloud of Carlton would be smothering me with its full tar oppression.

I looked back over at B.  Peaceful.  Jaw slightly slack.  I poked him again.

“This isn’t working.”  I explained Grandma’s cigarettes and his brow furrowed.

“Shh,” he said.

I sighed.  The track changed so that the soaking rain shifted into a rushing creek.  Then, I gave B a shove and cried, “See?!  Flash flooding!”  And I took off my headphones.

B went back to his happy place, ignoring my inability to relax.  I sat quietly for a few moments, breathing in and out, focusing on the perfect circle in the gate across the way, going to my other happy place where I am holding an infant Thor and feeling his fuzzy head.  Proud that I had managed to relax somewhat, I glanced back over at B and realized he was in perfect posture, even holding Om Fingers.

Om Fingers. Actually called Jnana Mudra.

I was impressed!  So, I poked him.

“You’re doing Om Fingers!”

He sighed at me.  ”Yes.”

I tried.  It wasn’t comfortable.  I said so.  Because he is patient (and used to me), B tried to show me a variation.  Still not comfortable, and I said so.  He suggested I try being quiet.  Patiently.  I shrugged, and as he went back to Om, I closed my eyes and moved my fingers around until I found a satisfying position.  I felt good.  I felt happy.  I felt…dare I say it?  Relaxed.  I waited until I was certain that this was the pose for me, then elbowed him again.

“This is what is comfortable for me.”  I showed him.

He started laughing and gave up on any hope of meditation as long as I was sitting beside him, and suggested we go back into the main lobby and wait by the fire.

And we did.

And it was good.

That's pretty much us. Well, prior to the monkey.

8 years ago, today, I married Bryan.  My lasting impressions of that day are how much we laughed, how fabulous the Whataburger shaped groom’s cake was, and how much I loved every second of it.

See? We were shooting out the door for a drive to Galveston for our honeymoon cruise, and our photographer captured this.

To celebrate, B booked us into Ten Thousand Waves for a couple of days, where we took full advantage of the resort’s offerings and came away limp as noodle people.  We also did a whirlwind tour of Santa Fe and Taos.  Apparently, January is off-season, so a lot of places were closed, but we still managed to find amazing food at a little cafe in Taos, and Blue Corn and El Farol in Santa Fe.  We also ate at the Santa Fe Steamer because Bryan couldn’t pass up the opportunity to eat somewhere that sounded like the punchline of a Family Guy joke–the jokes I made throughout dinner.

I've given up on photos lately, but I did manage to capture us on the road in Santa Fe. 10 years later, still smiling. I think that's a good sign!

It wasn’t my own phone line, mind you, but it was a phone in my bedroom, and I could use it whenever I liked.  Back then, I loved talking on the phone.  Now?  I think I used up all my phone talking in my teen years.  My word.  Jamie, or Karen and I would get on the phone and talk for hours.  In my teen years, my friends and I would start phoning each other at 5am (using the Time & Temperature trick.  You had to have call waiting for this to work, but one person would call Time & Temperature and let that message play out for 60 seconds, and wait for the other one to dial their phone number and beep in on call waiting.  That way, your phone never rang, so you didn’t wake up your parents.  This is not to be confused with the Time & Temperature trick used to make Sister Isabelle believe your mother said you could leave school early.) and talk until we absolutely had to hang up to get to school.  After school, we’d be on the phone again, until a parent was stomping around insisting we hang up.  And, usually around 11pm, we’d use the T&T again, and talk until after midnight.  I cannot tell you the number of times I fell asleep while talking on the phone.

I think this is why I am so tired as an adult.  I talked too much and didn’t sleep enough as a teen.

The other day it hit me that Thor has no access to a telephone.  We don’t have a land line, and it seemed absurd to consider a cell phone for a 6-year-old.  But what would he do in case of an emergency?  Would he be able to use B’s or my cell phone?  You know what’s coming, right?

Thor has a cell phone now.

No, he’s not carrying it to school in his Lightning McQueen backpack.  It’s plugged into its charger on the wall, and that’s where it will stay.  I got him a freebie, pre-set the speed dials for the family numbers, and set parental controls on everything else.  Basically, he has a tiny telephone, on which he loves to talk, and talk, and talk.

He called my mother the other day and I heard him ask, as he was settling down in the middle of my bed for comfort, “Now then, Grandma, I want you to tell me everything you know about bones, and how they are in your body, and how they grow, and how they are in your head.”  It reminded me of calling up Granny and asking things like, “If God is in the sky, but once there was no sky, where did God sit while he was making it?”  Grandparents are good things.

SOPA what, man?

So if you’re anything like me and read a lot of shit on the Internet (particularly when you should be working), you’ve probably already noticed that a good portion of the ‘Net is bringing attention to SOPA and PIPA today. I was confused even after reading the Wiki entries, so Reddit helped explain it a little better.

 

Here’s the thing: as with most bills, there are some things in here that sound pretty good! But the rest of it is entirely too vague. When I was younger I used to think that all the vague stuff would be justly handled by politicians because politicians should be really good people who never manipulate the law to fulfill their own greedy interests. But then I started watching the news, so, that was depressing.

 

These bills are too unclear about their proposed methods and actions. When taken to one extreme, the bill could mean that the US government wants people to stop stealing and monetizing other people’s intellectual property, and that they would be very careful about policing this. When taken to another extreme, the bill could mean that the US government could define IP theft however it (and its $upporter$) sees fit, and essentially shut down any website that so much as hosts a link to said thief’s site, even if it’s  from an unregistered commenter.

 

So, Americans! (Sorry for boring you, non-Americans.) Here’s what you can do to raise your voices (I am borrowing this from my pal Zach because I had no idea what to do, myself):

1) Look up your congressperson or senator, and see if he/she supports or opposes.

 

For SOPA: projects.propublica.org/sopa/
For PIPA: projects.propublica.org/sopa/pipa#roll_call

2) Click the appropriate picture to pull up contact information.

3) Write a handwritten letter describing why you’re unhappy. This is the best way to get their attention.

4) If you don’t have time for that, call their office and politely but firmly express your complaint, specifically mentioning their support for SOPA (house of reps) or PIPA (senate).

 

Let’s avoid the possibility of GWS ever being blocked by some poorly-written over-funded bill. If we want to protect creators from being robbed of their intellectual property, let’s do it the right way and be transparent about our motives. And until that happens, let’s raise hell over these bills so they won’t pass.