It’s rare that the United States ‘ government is more liberal than its populace,
but embarrassing as it is, in California that seems to have taken place. San
Francisco city hall and at least two Superior Court judges have decided to
grant same-sex marriage licenses alleging that state law defining marriage
between a man and a woman violated the California Constitution by discriminating
against gays and lesbians. That is absolutely true. Not allowing gays to marry
is discriminatory and it is idiotic. Yet with that said, (I can’t believe I’m
saying this:) I find myself on the same side as Arnold Schwarzenegger who yesterday
wrote a letter to California Attorney General, Bill Lockyer directing him to
put an immediate stop to the granting of marriage licenses to same sex couples.

The fact is, the California constitution is written, approved, and amended by elected representatives. It’s a much more democratic process than on the federal level and it should be up to state representatives rather than individual judges to write state law. As overpundit, points out, illegally granting same sex marriage licenses is from a legal perspective no different than Alabama justice, Roy Moore’s putting up the Ten Commandments monument despite state protests.

(Here comes a huge contradiction) So … while I don’t agree with San Francisco ’s decision to skirt around the law, I give them huge props for doing just that. They (I think knowingly) managed to create the media circus that tells society how to think and how to vote once something gets on the ballot. Unfortunately though, the media has become exponentially more conservative in recent years and I am way curious to see how this whole thing will play out.

I read a few days back that one of the first gay couples to be granted with a marriage license was a couple of 80 year old lesbian activists who had been partners for more than forty years. If nothing else, thank god that have been legally (or quasi-legally) recognized as a married couple.

California and Massachusetts … it’s too bad we’re at opposite ends of the country and too bad we’re so far ahead of the rest of the country. I hope they catch up soon. And I hope that California stops sliding down to conservativism.

Last night Mario and Jessica invited us over for some of Mario’s famous mole (actually his abuelita’s recipe.) It was good to catch up. Laura and I had seen Mario in Queretaro in December, but it had been more than two months since I had seen Jessica and probably more than two years since I had seen her family. I have to give them a hand – Mario and Jessica always have the international crowd at their place: Mario and Laura from Mexico , Jess and I from San Diego, Yuri and Etsuko from Japan, and Juan from Bogota , Colombia . I was in charge of the margaritas and Mario more than came through with the mole, rice, and salad. As soon as he emails me with the recipe (15 ingredients) I’ll put it up on the blog.

I put a translator up on most pages of the site. I’m still stumped on how to translate the forum and I still have to finish up the Mexico part of the travel section, but my goal is to finish by next Friday and then finally email it out to everyone. Usually, I come up with some kinda project like this, it turns out to be nothing like what I had envisioned and I give up. With this website though, the more I do, the more ambitious I get. I really want to make this thing work. I’m stoked that the translator works in six languages … thanks to colonialism that covers quite a few countries and a lot of potential friends/contributors. I want this site to be grassroots (but not hippie) and completely non-corporate. Like what the internet is supposed to be like – free networking around the world and without advertisements.

I’m trying to come up with a logo idea … something having to do with a bear. If anyone has any ideas, leave a comment or email me. I’m going to print out business cards and stickers with the logo and website address and pass them out/ put them up all over the place while traveling. I hope you guys support this and help make it work. My first priority is to get the forum filled up. In the next few days I’ll hopefully be filling it up with ideas, projects, and some of my favorite places I’ve come across on my travels. If anything sparks your interest, please post something so others won’t be timid when they come to the site for the first time.