"A SAD STATE", or "Dispach from as close to the convention as I can get without a special pass..."

I walked down by the convention site (remember when it was just "the Garden?"), and I was really sad to see how much of a ghost town it was. I felt i had to visit the area - to see the farse. (If I had still been working at my job, I would not have been agle to go. I would still be sitting at my desk - maybe even now at 10:30pm). It reminded me a lot of how it was during the blackout. Sure there was electricity. But there was something about creating order out of an underlying desire for chaos that was eerily similiar.

The poor delegates. They stuck out in the crowd like a 6th finger on somone's hand; it was perversely creepy. Older men walked around in tweed and slick white hair. The young girls, no doubt the daughters of the delegates, roam the streets of Manhattan in their akward, skinny bodies trying to catch a sneak of P. Diddy while their dads rally for a ban on abortion. The up-and-coming "Future Halliburton CEO's of America" wanna be's that can't be over 22 who walk with a swagger, giggling for girls. There are older women from out of town too, the ones that remind me of my grandmother in Iowa, with perfectly hairsprayed hair, ready to serve me some potato salad, or a fresh pastry.

See, I can pin it, because I know these types. They're the other half of my family - the ones stuck in Iowa.

NOW i know why the Republicans sent their delegates to NY this year.

It is because the kind of people who come from Iowa or Nebraska or Oklahoma who are Bush supporters have one goal in life. And that one goal is to visit New York at least once. My cousin came here a year ago for a choral performance at Carnegie Hall. She was the talk of the town for months. All they can talk about is "what is it like to live/work/play in NY? It must really suck to visit us here in Iowa. Can we come back with you?"

Bush is making their dreams come true. This convention is about blinding people from the truth with a sparkling penny.

The most interesting party of my night was listening to some guy on the subway home, playing a wooden flute and a guitar at the same time.

I couldn't recognize the song, but it was authentic.

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Day 1 out of my job - and I'm liking writing more and more. I've never written so much. It is almost like I can't type fast enough.

Why have I denied myself for so long? WHY??????

I think i need to force my tooshie in somewhere for a writing job. SO, i have no experience. Whatever.

Anyone want to hire a newbie writer?

STORY OF THE DAY: It was going to be the story about a guy who lived for 8 years thinking he had HIV, just to find out recently that he DID NOT. If ever there was an argument for a second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh opinion from a doctor until one is sure that one has whatever disease, this is it.

But I've changed it to this woman who spent her last $2 and won $18 million.

Dreams can come true.

QUESTION OF THE DAY: What is the passion you feel like you're neglecting?