Do Two Negatives Equal A Positive?

Today is April 15th, known as tax day here in the U.S.  I've had my taxes done for a while, in order to apply for FAFSA loans for business school.  Most people know that April 15th is tax day, because, well, most people wait until the last minute to do their taxes.  What many people don't know is that April 15th is also the day Lincoln died.  Not exactly an uplifting piece of trivia, but might as well get all the bad feelings out of the way today and start fresh tomorrow.

The Inauguration Of Barack Obama

Inauguration Day Schedule

Inauguration Day: January 20, 2009

Here I am watching Obama's speech

Today we have a new President, Barack Obama. He was sworn in at 12:05 PM (5 minutes late), just eight minutes after Joe Biden became our new VP. I watched CBS news coverage all morning, and I had the CNN live feed on my laptop from 10:30 - 1:00.

Barack Obama is our 44th President. In case you're living under a rock, today is special because we've just inaugurated our very first African American as the leader of the United States. Obama's campaign was one of hope. He managed to engage a younger generation in politics, and wasn't afraid to use new technologies to do so. His slogan was (still is?) "Yes We Can." He was right.

Today, President Obama's speech urged the American people to be personally responsible. He was also very clear that, while he's hopeful for the future, our country is facing many obstacles and there will be no overnight miracles:

"Today I say to you that the challenges we face are real. They are serious and they are many.

They will not be met easily or in a short span of time. But know this, America - they will be met. On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord.

On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn out dogmas, that for far too long have strangled our politics." Full speech at ABC News >>

Hey everybody, it's a new day!

2009 Desk Calendar By JHill Design

Sara gave me this beautiful desk calandar from JHill Design. It's part of JHill's Places I Have Never Been collection. You should definitely check out the website, because they have some really great designs. You can see my absolute favorites here and here (hint hint). JHill Design is based in Jamaica Plain, MA.

I love my little calendar, but I'm slightly shocked that we're already so far into January! Do you know what happens one week from today?

Election Day USA!

Woo hoo! I finally voted and it was fabulous. It feels good to exercise my rights and help elect our next leader. It was really exciting to see a line of people outside the door. The only other time I've voted in Boston was for the primaries and it wasn't very busy, so I was thrilled to see everybody. Our polling place was pretty efficient and the wait wasn't bad at all. 

I hope you all did your part and cast your vote. Congratulations on moving on; no matter who wins, we'll soon be seeing some sort of change. 

P.S. Who knew "vote" was the same in Spanish? See the second photo above: "vote aqui."

Clean Up After Your Dog

As if this sign wasn't hilarious enough on its own, somebody went ahead and made edits. 

The person who made the speech bubbles was probably standing around waiting for their dog to do their business and thinking exactly what they wrote. 

The smiley faces are mystifying, and luckily they're fading away. 

As for the sign itself: at the bottom it says "$25.00 TO $200.00 FINE." Does anybody else think that's really funny? How do they decide how great or small the fine should be? Does it correlate with the size of the dog? I hope so!

Wholesome Vanity

I love to look at license plates and see where people come from. When we were on our cross country road trip in 2005, I saw license plates from all 50 states (Hawaii was the last one I spotted and it was so exciting)! Because I'm always looking, I occasionally see some cool vanity plates. They give people the opportunity to wow us with their wit and add a personal touch to a government issued plate. Vanity plates were featured on Seinfeld when Kramer was accidentally issued a doctor's plate (read about it here).

New Hampshire is full of them, and this one is a great example. I'm so happy I had my camera with me because usually I just try to jot down the good ones on any scrap of paper I can find. Here are few I have collected:

JELLY -- Vermont
MNHUNT -- Massachusetts
POLAR1 -- Massachusetts
ORGN DNR -- Virginia
NH TUFF -- New Hampshire

I'm not the only person looking for these funny plates. Check out COOLPL8TZ for more!

The Park

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This situation makes me laugh; it really cracks me up! The sign depicts two children playing on a teeter totter (aka, see saw). This is to alert drivers that there is a playground up ahead. As you can see in the photo below, there is no teeter totter in sight (there really is a park though, so they get some credit).

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The sign is so old and outdated that I can't remember the last time I actually saw a teeter totter! I wonder if kids today would even know what this sign means. When I was little it was one of my favorite features of the school playground, but in the last 13 or so years they've totally disappeared. I think teeter totter is now synonymous with law suit. That is just so completely disappointing!

Parking Tickets

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In our area parking tickets are $40 each when you park illegally park in a permit only area. I'm not sure what happened here, but every car on this block was ticketed! The owners are not going to be happy. Honestly, it seems like the meter maid (or butler?) made an error because I've never seen anything like this. How could every available space be taken by people lacking permits?