Running on Fumes

To got my car back to the shop, I drove Your Sister's car to work and back, grabbed my car, drove it to the shop, and -- because Your Sis had a work meeting -- had no way to get home. So I ran. Some of it. I haven't tried an outdoor run this year, and I knew I would be rusty. But the conditions made it much harder than I expected. The air was warm (it was right at 75 degrees yesterday), the wind was very active, and the traffic soot was infesting. I was filthy when I got home about 45 minutes later. It's a little over 4 miles, and I probably ran two miles of that. I felt it most in my lungs. The iPod helped quite a bit. Today, I feel OK. No major leg pain at all.

I'm not having any trouble with the time change, and I relish all this post-work daylight. Thumbs up to the sun. We're cooking out tonight.

I'm still mentally going over the auditions even though I can do nothing about them. I'm curious to see what part will be tossed my way, and I'd bet money it'll be Paris.

Picture of the Day
I changed a panel in the comic. It never looked right to me, and it didn't convey the imagery I wanted, and I felt it was the weakest panel of the three pages. The art ends at the top of the second panel because the I already know the text box reaches that far down.


In the News
The new scandal for the administration comes from the Justice Department. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is facing calls for resignation over the revelation that federal prosecutors were fired for political reasons. The phrase making the rounds is "serving at the pleasure of the president," which means the boss can fire you when he sees fit. And that's not a matter anyone is debating. Also mentioned often is that Clinton fired all the prosecutors when he took office. Again, that's his prerogative. But the fired lawyers say they were canned because they wouldn't push indictments against Democrat congressmen before the November election. Now comes the allegation that a prosecutor was fired because he was investigating Jack Abramoff, the administration-connected lobbyist who starred in his own scandal last year. Now that's stinky. You don't fire lawyers when they start sniffing around your friends. Nixon did that. Congress has also learned that the president was advised to fire all 93 prosecutors after the elections. While that is his right, doing so in the middle of his second term is suspect.

Here's what I think was going on:
1) They wanted to fire those who were close to charging political friends.
2) Firing everybody would hide that.
3) It would also clean the slate for all the failed cases against terror suspects after 9/11. Federal prosecutors have passed on investigations because of flimsy evidence and questionable legal bases. This hasn't made the administration happy.

Gonzales said he won't step down. Adviser Karl Rove may be called by Congress to testify because everyone hates Karl Rove.

This comes in the same week that the Joint Chiefs Chairman declared homosexuality immoral and said it had no place in the military. This can't help the armed forces boost enrollment in the face of depleted and exhausted troops.