Fontana

California always makes me yawn, and the race that was supposed to happen today wasn't any different. To recap:

- it's rained for the past few days in Southern California, so NASCAR postponed the Busch - er, Nationwide Series race 'til today, with a planned start of one hour after the finish of the Winston- er, Nextel - oops, s'cuse me, Sprint Cup race. Which would put it starting, at best, around 8 p.m. EST. (Um...?) Then, of course, the rain continued until this afternoon. The Cup race didn't go green until dinner time, so who knows what's going to happen with the Nationwide race...

- ...because on Lap 21, Casey Mears lost it in a corner, smacking the wall, taking out Dale Jr. (grr......) and bringing out the red flag. Now, more than an hour later, they're finally firing the cars up again, but it's getting cloudy again and it's almost time for me to flip over to the Oscars. I hate California.

So, what can we salvage from today? We got even more evidence that Fontana is a crappy place to hold a race. I've never understood why such a car-crazy culture as Southern California can't sustain a NASCAR race. ESPN.com's Ryan McGee had a nice article this week about California Speedway's woes - bad scheduling (two races a year? Las Vegas a week from now?), bad location. NASCAR ran just a few miles away at the Ontario Motor Speedway back in the 70s, and that track ended up being torn down because of a lot of the same problems Fontana's having now.

Speaking of scheduling, whose bright idea was it to schedule a race in BFE, Calif., on the same day as the Academy Awards??? NASCAR doesn't understand why the celebs who drop in on other races never show up at Fontana. This would be like me scheduling a fundraiser or something the same weekend of the ACC tournament. In the Triangle. And then not understanding why I couldn't sweet talk Dean Smith or Coach K into making a personal appearance. (But Tom Cruise was there today. Okay.)

We also learned some new words, like "weeper" - the term for a seam that lets groundwater seep up onto the track, where Casey Mears or Denny Hamlin can then run over it at 180 m.p.h. and crash into the wall (and into Dale Jr.). I learned a new word, too - "ardilla terrestre." With apologies to Juan Pablo Montoya, that is, in fact, the Spanish term for "gopher." Hey, I don't know every word in my language either. No worries, Juan Pablo.

Yeah, Fox is still awfully proud of that gopher cam. There are few things more excruciating in this life than trying to watch a bunch of TV producers scramble to fill a rain delay. Fox's big brainstorm today was to go around asking drivers what they thought Fox should name the little cartoon gopher in the graphic that accompanies the gopher cam footage. As Jimmie Johnson said, "You guys must be really bored." (I lol'ed, and forgot for a second that I hate Jimmie Johnson.)

The "car of tomorrow" (or today, technically) really sucks. The cars have run 30 laps, have sat in chilly rain for hours and are still overheating. I don't understand the point of that slanty grill design.

It's fashionable for us fans to bash the NASCAR officials, and they deserve it sometines. But I didn't envy them today. They had to decide whether to keep postponing the start time - pissing off fans at the track and watching at home - or put the cars out on a track where water is still weeping up from underground. There's no good call there. But did you see that one safety crew guy jump up on what used to be the hood of Sam Hornish's car when it caught on fire? I hope those guys get paid well. But somehow I doubt it.

This came up on ESPN.com's in-race message board today - we used to call the Cup drivers who moonlighted in the Busch Series "Buschwackers," which has a nice ring to it. (I swear, no sport can match NASCAR for slang.) So, now what do we call them? Nationwidewackers? That makes no sense. How 'bout just "wackers"? It sounds cool. But remember, that's coming from someone who did her undergrad thesis on communication within the NASCAR subculture, so maybe I'm biased toward language that has a little history behind it.

Okay, it's raining in California again. About 60 miles west of the track, the Oscars are getting ready to go green. Next week we've got Las Vegas, a track I also hate. But after that, the schedule gets good, so I'm still pumped.

Praise the Lord and pass the Guinness

Okay, I'm not Irish and I'm not Catholic, so I've never really felt obligated to observe St. Patrick's Day. I guess you could say I was radicalized back in the third grade when my heretofore beloved teacher berated a boy in my class because he forgot to wear green, saying he was only trying to get attention (she cut a shamrock out of green paper and forced him to wear it all day). And then there's the pinching if you don't conform. Yeah, that's really not the way to get me into something.

It only got worse about six years ago, when my friends and I innocently went for dinner and drinks at our usual Friday restaurant, the Celtic Cafe, on -oops!- March 17, only to be turned away because of the hordes of yuppie leprechaun fetishists who only show up there once a year. I actually heard a woman that night bragging about all her Irish relatives, and it was really sad because they were all, like "my great-grandmother's sister's first husband" and such.

As someone whose highly personal religious and cultural traditions are co-opted by the entire city of Winston-Salem every Christmas, I just really don't want to be a part of bandwagonning someone else's holiday.

So I thought this was interesting. U.S. Catholics are a bit conflicted, since St. Patrick's Day falls on the Monday of Holy Week. The issue seems to be that the church doesn't want to celebrate masses for saints during that week. Doesn't seem like a problem to me (isn't more church a good thing?), but like I said, I'm not Catholic, so what do I know?

Some areas are scheduling their St. Patty's parades on the day as normal - party on a Monday, woo-hoo! - and others are backing them up to the Friday before (which is when most people are going to "celebrate" - read: drink - anyhow). It's kind of funny to me that, according to this, the U.S. is the only place where St. Patty's still has any sort of religious emphasis. In Ireland, it's just another day off - one man likened it to Super Bowl Sunday.

One thing I thought was pretty funny, though...

In New York and Boston, with legendary St. Patrick's events planned by the cities' large Irish communities, bishops are taking a hands-off approach, saying the church has no part in planning civic celebrations.

And then, two paragraphs later:

Other public dustups over St. Patrick's Day have erupted in past years, including a protracted fight between gay Irish groups and city leaders in New York and Boston over the right to march in the parades, which the Catholic Church has steadfastly opposed.

But wait...I thought you just said the Church had nothing to do with planning civic events...? You're not full of sh*t, are you, Mr. Bishop Man? Surely not...

And, before we go...My favorite "why I should care about St. Patty's?" excuse came from this guy I knew a few years back. He blew off my whole bastardization of culture argument, saying, "Who cares? It's an excuse to drink." Okay, a) thank you for proving my point, and b) um, excuse to drink? EXCUSE to DRINK??? Why don't you just wear a screaming neon T-shirt that reads "Dude, I am SO not Irish!" for crying out loud? Excuse to drink, sheesh.

Daytona: Delayed Reaction

I've been meaning to do this all week, but things just kept getting in the way (like this "job" thing...whatever...). Last year's race season was a complete wash for me. Seriously, I could probably count on one hand the number of races I watched all the way through. Something about the combination of yawn-worthy competition, Junior lame duck-ness, broadcaster inanity overload and Jimmie Johnson coming back like Jason in the "Friday the 13th" movies made me just want to stab myself in the eye with a lit cigarette.

So - don't ask me why - but I was really pumped to watch the Daytona 500 on Sunday. I'm maybe 95% of the way to accepting that Dale Jr. is now a Hendrick driver, and being okay with that. Even better, Jr. was looking really good in the preseason, winning the Bud Shootout and his Gatorade 150 duel. Besides, it was thte 50th running of the 500 - how could I not watch?

Overall, I wasn't disappointed too badly. Of course I would've liked my guy to win, but I'm cool with a team-best (and Chevy-best) top ten. A few thoughts:

- I mean, it's Fox, so my expectations weren't exactly high to begin with...but I do have a few quibbles about the coverage. The main quibble being that Chris Myers is still allowed within 100 yards of a camera, but I guess I'm just going to have to get past that one. I liked the decade-by-decade retrospective of the 500's history, but I really could have done without Mike Joy's costumes and the over-the-top background music. Yeah, I'm totally sure that the late-70's era NASCAR crowd dressed like that. Right.

- While we're on the subject of Fox's coverage, I also have to give kudos to the panel discussion with past 500-winners, and the group interview with Cale Yarborough and the Allisons. I thought those guys were going to start flinging helmets again there for a second. Absolutely rocked.

- Fox's in-race stuff hasn't changed much. Someone still thinks Darrell Waltrip's little green-flag tagline (which WILL NOT be given press here) is amusing. And the Fox people still lack a certain, er, sense of their place in the world. For instance, they still insist on referring to the "lucky dog rule" as the "free pass," even though everyone involved in NASCAR from the fans to the officials calls it "the lucky dog rule." You know why? Remember who coined the term "lucky dog rule"? The NBC people. So, to recap, a term has permeated the sport's lexicon to the point where even the competition director uses it, but Fox won't do the same because a rival broadcast team came up with it. Same with their new "gopher cam" - great name, great little cartoon of a screaming about-to-be-run-over gopher, but...Didn't ESPN or somebody have an in-ground camera last year? Like I said, I didn't watch a lot of racing , so I can't be sure. Fox isn't exactly reinventing the wheel here, but still, they're all "OOH! Gopher cam! Gopher cam! Give us an Emmy!"

- Whoever planned the pre-race stuff - NASCAR or the speedway staff - did an excellent job rounding up the winners from previous years. I don't know about you guys, but I'd much rather see Richard Petty and Junior Johnson and the others giving the start command, waving the flag, etc., then some B-list celebrity.

- But there's one area where the planners whiffed, big-time. The music. For the pre-race concert, you had Chubby Checker (who killed, btw), Michael McDonald (zzzzzzzzz), Kool and the Gang ("and this year's Daytona 500 will be brought to you from the elevator in your doctor's office") and Brooks&Dunn. Michael McDonald??????????? Okay, even if you buy that whole "music from each decade" thing, wtf is he doing there? Seriously, who put the DJ from my grandmother's nursing home in charge of this thing? When Chubby Checker is the high energy point in your concert, you have serious problems.

- I'm not pissed at Jr's pit moves (or lack thereof) there toward the end. It's all about taking chances - you win some, you lose some. And I'm relatively cool with Ryan Newman. Sure, I'd rather have seen Tony Stewart take the checkers, but at least it wasn't Kyle Busch. Yecch. (The "When will Tony Stewart squash Kyle Busch like a bug?" pool starts here. I'm calling Bristol.)

Okay, I have an issue and I need help. I was supposed to meet my friend Ginger for dinner Sunday, and since she only lives a few blocks from me, I made the drive during the endless stream of late-race cautions. So, I get to her house, we chit-chat, pour our wine, start dinner...and by the time we turn the race on, there's been another wreck. They flash the little graphic telling who was involved in the crash, and I see "Jimmie Johnson."

"Oh, good!" I thought, before I could catch myself. It was a totally involuntary response, I couldn't help it. And I immediately fely guilty. Johnson's a teammate now - I should stop hating him, right?

Except that I can't. I found myself telling Ginger about Johnson's smart-ass "this is for the haters" Victory Lane speech when he won the 500 ("What a punk," she said.), and about pretty much every whiny, horrid, punky thing either he or Chad Knauss has ever done going back to the third grade, and I realized...I have a serious problem. I really need to get over this, but I just can't.

So, should I even try? Or is it okay to still irrationally despise one of my driver's new teammates (I was never wild about Michael Waltrip, after all...)? Look, maybe NASCAR can retroactively turn Richard Petty into a "Sprint Cup Champion," but it's going to take a lot more than a little magic wand action to make me actually like Johnson.

*sigh* On to California...

Way to miss the point, Berkeley!

Okay, if you know me personally, you know that I'm about as anti-war as one can be. If I had my way, our top-of-the-line all-volunteer military would only go into combat as a last resort. It sickens me when politicians who've never gone near a military base except for a photo op use our military as yet another re-election strategy.

But again, if you know me, you know I'm far from anti-military. My step-dad is a decorated Vietnam veteran; two of my grandfathers served in World War II, and I've had family in almost every branch of the armed forces at one point or another. I have the deepest, most profound respect for any person who volunteers to give up control over his or her life to the extent that military personnel do. Not to mention the whole possible-loss-of-life thing.

I don't have a problem reconciling my pacifist tree-huggerness with my respect for the service. Maybe it seems like a contradiction to some people, but not for me. The way I see it, I believe utterly in the freedoms listed in the Constitution, and the military helps protect those freedoms. Simple.

So this pisses me off on a number of levels. Apparently, the good citizens of Berkeley, Calif., don't have the intellectual capacity to balance disapproval of President Bush's war with the necessity of a standing military. That, and I just generally hate it when fellow liberals do crazy sh*t that makes us all look like idiots. Geez, Berkeley - what, are you on John McCain's retainer?

So the city of Berkeley doesn't want Marine recruiters anywhere in town. When they first kicked Marines off the campus of UC Berkeley a few years ago, at least there was a plausible argument. Not a very strong one, granted...But the campus of a school, even a public one, is still kind of a legal grey area. But a whole city? How is that even legal? It reminds me of the old "sundown towns" back in the Jim Crow era. Those weren't kosher, either.

Leaving aside the legality issue...WTF are they thinking??? If you ask me the Feds are perfectly justified in threatening to revoke their funds if the city actually manages to ban the Marines from existence. Why should Berkeley benefit from the protection of the U.S. Government (in all its forms, from bucks to bombs) if the city won't contribute to that protection? It goes back to the basic philosophy of fiduciary trust - all citizens put into the pot, so to speak, in order to build a system that can help us do the things we couldn't do as individuals. Berkeley can't have its cake and eat it, too.

I wish these folks would grow up. I wish they'd climb off their shiny civil disobedience pedestals and get a little real-world dust on their Birkenstocks. I wish they'd learn that waving signs only goes so far, that if you really want to change the world, you organize voting precincts and make phone calls and write your Congressperson. I wish they'd see that the enemy is not that man or woman at the recruiting station, but the corporate-funded fat cat in D.C.

And I'll be honest - the devil on my shoulder wishes, just a little bit, that Berkeley would get hit by a massive natural disaster (no fatalities or anything; just a lot of smashed buildings and stuff), and that when the city council asks the National Guard for help, they're told, "Oh, but I thought we weren't welcome in your city...?" Yeah, I know that's awful, but the little devil on my shoulder doesn't really give a f*** right this minute...

Don't Mess With Bob

Hey, Clare Booth Luce people – what the heck did Eve Ensler ever do to you? Besides get more press, that is. That's gotta burn.

Once again this year, as they've done for a decade now, colleges and community groups all over the U.S. will perform "The Vagina Monologues" to raise money for fighting violence against women. And once again, anti-feminist groups like the aforementioned Clare Booth Luce Policy Institute will do their level best to marginalize the work done through V-Day, the play and pretty much anyone who's ever performed in or attended the play.

The CBL folks have even prepared a handy-dandy PDF brochure with advice to college students on campuses where the VM is being performed. Since I'm a good sport, I checked it out.

And – Whoa.

Where to begin? Okay, according to this, the VM "is [sic] a lie. It [sic] does not empower women with its message that women's identity and image are wrapped up in their sexual organs." Memo to the propagandist: 1) the word "monologues" is plural. Dipshit. 2) You don't get to decide what's empowering to anybody else. Empowerment is kind of an individual thing – that's the point.

But mainly, 3) the VM DO NOT TELL WOMEN WE'RE DEFINED BY OUR ANATOMY. Do I need to repeat this? The play DOES, however, address the unique experiences that women have *because* society has ascribed certain characteristics to our gender. Like that we're our spouses' property. Or that we can be raped as an appropriate tactic of war. Or that our sexuality is perceived as threatening.

Or that the mere anatomical term for our genitalia is "vulgar." Sheesh.

I appeared in a local production of the VM a few years ago. I wasn't really wild about it – my college had performed it at V-Day for years, and I'd never participated; my friend Colleen practically had to beg me to audition. See, I'm not a girly-girl. I'm not into sitting around the campfire singing "Kum Bay Yah" and willing my armpit hair to grow and all that while I contemplate my awesome womanhood.

Which I guess made me a natural to perform "Because He Liked to Look at It." The piece is, to quote the VM narrator, "about a woman who had a good experience with a man." That was the main thing that I liked about it – its story struck me as very male-positive, a much-needed counter-point to the stories of women who'd been abused by men.

It's about a woman not really connected to her sexuality – she has this great line about how loving her "woman-self" was supposed to come only with massive candlelight, Enya music and bubble bath. But it's a man who shows her how beautiful and powerful she is, and I loved that.

Here's what the Luce Institute pamphlet has to say about that wonderful, loving man, Bob: "Bob is featured in 'Because He Liked To Look At It,' the word 'it' referring to a woman's vagina. [Note to self: representative pronouns are bad, 'emkay?] We learn that Bob is ordinary, boring, and unappealing. That is, until the female character discovers his one redeeming quality: a perverted obsession with women's private parts (Ensler 54-55)."

Oh,. HELL'S NAW! You did NOT just call my Bob a pervert! Hey, guys who think pussies are hot – a leading conservative think tank says you're degenerate! Got that? Way to completely misinterpret a moving, dare I say "empowering" experience between consenting adults.

By the way, these are the same people who protest the global V-Day phenomenon because it overshadows the "romance" of Valentine's Day. A romantic vision that, apparently, doesn't include any icky female orgasms. Dude, I am SO glad I'm a liberal!

Look, V-Day's still around for the same reason the VM became a hit in the first place – violence against women, for no other reason than that we're women, still exists. Maybe if the anti-V Day folks spent as much time raising awareness of this fact as they do poo-pooing it, this wouldn't be true.

As for me, the two months I spent working with dozens of other women on this show were…I dunno, what's the word I'm looking for? Oh yeah – empowering. And the Luce people can eat it.

No, not that "it"………gutter-brain! ;)