Pie-rats...

So, sorry, roguishdevil, I'm running around like a maniac these days.

kproche and I headed over to Carlas to work on the decor a little after 2:00pm on Saturday. Met up with markobellydance, Madame and Miss Edie. Spent a few hours getting set up and then ran to Habana Cuba for a bit of dinner.

Things started nearly on schedule (yeah, the show didn't start at 8:00, but most of the audience was sitting in the dining room finishing their dinner, so that was no big deal.

I ran sound while K tended bar. The lineup was great and included Grand Duchess 12 Angelique of Alameda, the lovely I Dalis Houston (Princess Royal and Miss San Jose Gay Pride) Grand Duchess Jen-a of Sacramento, Grand Duchess Sandy Dee of Reno, our own Imperial Crown Princess Ava Grab-Mor, Empress 32 Athena and of course Grand Duke-S Bearina and Grand Duchess Madame Steele.

Not only did the show start at a reasonable hour, it ended at a reasonable hour and made some good money for the IRLM.

Sunday we went back to clean up, hit lunch at Yankee Pier in Santana Row. Besides that? Just did a whole lot of nothing. The pirate show was a lot of work, and needed some serious recovery time.

So can anyone tell me...

...why, in this new "Bush gets his way" world, that some high-ranking GOP house members killed a popular bipartisan compromise Intelligence Reform bill that the President supported?

Are we just looking at some lawmakers who, hoping the extra 2-3 seats will make a difference, are trying to postpone things until the next session to get a bill more to their liking?

Or...

Are we looking at a new era of mono-partisan gridlock where different branches of the Republican party are struggling for supremacy?

While I'm on the strange questions tack, I've got one more.

When did Pat Buchanan start making sense? I'm not going to say he's moved towards the center, or that the center has moved closer to him, and I still don't trust him, but what happened here? Today's Merc included a very interesting editorial he wrote on the Bush Cabinet shake-up.

I don't agree with everything in the editorial, but I also didn't find myself reaching for the Maalox as I read it.

I know, in the next week or two, Buchanan will write something new that will piss me off. On the other hand, the administration's path may have so offended his sense of isolationism and nationalism that it may put him off his culture-war agenda for a long time.