Today, dear readers, marks the official two-year anniversary of the day Annette and i rolled in to Boise, ID. Two years ago (minus a few hours) we were completing what was largely a white-knuckle drive from Minneapolis to Boise. Wyoming in early spring is not to be taken lightly. Nor is Iowa; a state that i swear i will never willingly set foot in one more time.

My wife, the reason for our being in Idaho, is not here in Idaho at the moment. She’s in Washington DC basically asking for those-with-power to release the earmarked funds already destined for Idaho and several entities at Boise State University.

What? You don’t follow the HHS budget? You didn’t hear that our government stripped the earmarks from the HHS (that’s Health and Human Services) budget… BUT LEFT THE MONEY INTACT! Yes, the earmarks were removed, but the dollars were not touched. What does that mean? Well, first, it’s like food on the floor – it brings out the cockroaches. Earmarks, the pet projects of senators and who know who else, were stripped. But the money was left in the budget… so everybody scrambled for it. Or it went to the pentagon and the DOD. So… there you have it. My wife’s third year funding to continue examining how best to aid older people in Idaho won’t be forthcoming.

But i’m not bitter. No, seriously i’m not. It mean we’ll be packing up and moving again. It means we’ll be leaving Idaho forever.

I’m going to stop here. I’m feeling very angry tonight and i’m no interested in writing anything i might regret. I did that in my late teens-early twenties and i’m not going back.

Except to say this: What does "conservative" really mean? Until recently i didn’t know. I thought a conservative was somebody who voted republican. That’s the same as saying somebody who is hemorrhaging is in need of a band-aid. What "conservative" really means is somebody who is opposed to change in any form. True conservatives resist change on a near cellular level. They are creatures of their milieu i.e. what they were born into is all that there is or should ever be.

I reject this. I deny this. I believe change MUST be part of life. I believe change is a natural (dare i say god-given) fact of life. I believe to resist change is to deny one of the key components of what separates us from the "lower" animals.

In a matter of weeks, or at the outside maybe months, Annette and i will depart Idaho. What our destination will be, at this moment, i’m unsure of.  There are four, maybe five, people i will say good bye to. Two years. 730 days and the best i can do is four, maybe five, people. Is it me? Is it Idaho? I don’t know.

Finally: i believe something Carl Sagan wrote, and later, Jodi Foster said. "I’ve always thought the world was what we make it." Well… i want nothing to do with the world i’ve come to know in idaho. I’d rather bake bread in Tofino BC than be a player in Boise Idaho. I’d rather depart this earth than suffer the adulation of those i’ve come to know here.

One of Milton’s best loved quotes was from Lucifer: "It is better rule in Hell then to serve in Heaven." I think he was correct. The only problem is, for reasons i cannot fully comprehend, what constitutes "Heaven" and what constitutes "Hell" have become blurry. Is it best to be a big fish in a small pond even if that pond is scummy? Or is it better to be a small fish in a big, clear pond?

I don’t know.

Ok. That’st it. I’m pretty drunk. It’s time to sleep… tomorrow i have work to do.

Good night.