I don't mind hard work where there is no definite object of any kind

Tuesday morning at DU and I came into my office to work.  As it may be obvious thus far, little work is being accomplished, but certainly more is getting done here than at home, where I'd certainly already be deep into a Judge Judy episode and still in pajamas.  

On the news this morning - if one can call what we watch in this regard "news" - there were two stories I found worth commenting upon:

(1) People in Boulder are suing a woman who dyed her poodle pink with organic beet juice in the name of animal rights.  (<--is that a misplaced modifier or what?  I mean to say, that the people in Boulder are suing in the name of animal rights because she dyed her poodle pink.  Sheesh.)  She did it to create awareness of breast cancer issues, and others are calling it animal abuse.  It's in court today.  

It probably goes without saying that this is not only ridiculous at every conceivable level, but what's worse is that it made the news.  Someone from News 2 was actually on scene at the courthouse for this, and there were protesters outside the building.  I'm frankly shocked and appalled that this many people can take time out of their lives to defend a dog that is in no way being hurt when W, with his good-ole-boy bonehead politics is running our country with fingers in his ears humming "lalalalalala - I can't hear you" thus creating the shitty economy, $3 a gallon gas prices, and thousands slaughtered daily in the middle east and several countries in Africa.  He touts his policy of reducing our dependency on foreign oil when his entire family holds monetary interests in oil; John McCain has been allowed to become the republican candidate for president (which, ultimately works in the democrats' favor, but still); students graduate high school uneducated; teachers are grossly underpaid; people are starving just around the corner.  These things are worth talking about and holding signs for and signing petitions and hauling people into court.  Pink dogs are not.  Fucking Americans; always right on task with the most mundane and utterly ignorant of the big picture.

(2) Madonna and John Mellencamp were just inducted into the Rock-n-Roll Hall of Fame.  Up to this point, all such inductees were before my generation, so to speak, or at least popular when I was young enough to consider them before my time.  But Madonna?  Good lord, I've gone and gotten old all of a sudden.  There are multiple things wrong with Madonna sharing honors with, say, The Beatles, but I won't go there - namely, I'm alarmed about the fact that these things from my conscious youthful years are now old and although I knew it before, there it was this morning, staring me in the face.  It was particularly striking because I watched Across the Universe last night with my daughter (a very good and interesting film if you can ignore the over-insistence on its Beatles-related quasi-cleverness), and I had to explain to her that ALL of the songs and references in the film were written by or related to the Beatles.  This began, of course, when I could sing along to all of the lyrics in the film, and heard her humming "Dear Prudence" over dinner the night before.  "Wow," she said.  "How many songs did these guys write, anyway?"  Guh.  

So here I am, in my office, still not working.  I've managed to kill 45 minutes of my day and all I have to show for it is some Earl Grey tea and a journal entry.  It could be worse.  Koo koo kachoo.