When an old man on the bus (who is standing because there are no seats for him) accidentally steps on your foot during the usual flurry of activity that happens at a bus stop and then apologizes… it is not appropriate to retaliate by stepping on his foot and, when he doesn’t notice, to step again, harder, for 5 seconds, glare at him, and sarcastically apologize. It is then even more assholish to lecture him on how, “When people are wearing their expensive clothes and shoes, you don’t step on their feet with your shitty sneakers that you probably got for like $5.” and curse loudly as you get off at the next stop.

If you are a homeless person in filthy, smelly clothes and you are going to come into a Mexican restaurant and steal food from their salsa bar (which has stuff like pickled radishes and carrots), it is not appropriate to push people at the bar aside, reach over their uncovered food so that your sleeves are all over it, and grab multiple handfuls of food with your visibly dirty bare hands… especially if you glare at everyone standing there afterwards as if they were in your way.

It is also not appropriate to force the back doors of a bus to open (by reaching through the gap between the closed doors and pressing the bar) so you can board without paying, particularly if you are again a filthy, smelly, homeless person who will then subject the people there to your stench.

I hate the world and everyone in it. It’s like today is just adding up to be one huge mess after another.
What the hell is wrong with people?

I really should do more with my weekends.
The fact that my laptop can no longer run Photoshop (it starts up but then it’s so slow it’s unusable) doesn’t help.

Maybe it’s time to buy that desktop that I wanted and delegate my laptop to true portable status.

I need to get out more and meet people. I feel like I’m having a lot of trouble with that now that I’m not interacting with large groups of peers 24/7.

Wheee.

I have a $150,000 piece of paper that is so large it will not fit in one of my suitcases and will probably be a carry-on tomorrow instead.

The CS diploma ceremony was the best thing ever. Lightsabers, a robotic bagpiper, and Mark taking my photo when I went up to shake his hand. Also, we all got Rickrolled. Win.

Now we all leave and it’s really, finally over.

It’s still sinking in…

It occurs to me as I write this that tomorrow is likely the last time all of us will be together.

A lot has happened in the past four years. It seems like just yesterday that I was a freshman moving into Mudge and being scared at the big, scary school and all the new people and needing to fit in. Tomorrow all of us are going to walk across the stage and get a piece of paper that says, “You paid us lots of money, congrats.” and then we’ll all go off and get jobs or go to grad school or be bums on the street and pretending we’re pregnant to get money.
Even though I technically left all this last semester, it still seems awfully final this time. Before there was always the possibility of me visiting and everything being just like it used to be… midnight walks home from halfprice with friends, randomly going to Tim’s room for games at random times, having people stop by at any old time for any reason, going to events, being in groups where the most random and socially-unacceptable things could spontaneously happen…
College is so much more than an education, and no matter how many times people said that to me before, it never really sank in until now. Yes, I learned a lot about computer science here, but now somehow that seems far less important than the relationships that I’ve forged here. And now those relationships are going to be strained by distance and life pulling us all different directions. It feels like I’m losing the most important thing that has come out of these past four years.

I’m not really sure what I’m saying, so I suppose I’ll just wish everyone a happy graduation (and hope that it doesn’t rain tomorrow during the main ceremony) and hope that we don’t all lose touch with each other.

http://www.courtinfo.ca.gov/opinions/documents/S147999.PDF

Under these circumstances, we cannot find that retention of the
traditional definition of marriage constitutes a compelling state interest.
Accordingly, we conclude that to the extent the current California statutory
provisions limit marriage to opposite-sex couples, these statutes are
unconstitutional.

Accordingly, in light of the conclusions we reach concerning the constitutional questions brought to us for resolution, we determine that the
language of section 300 limiting the designation of marriage to a union “between a man and a woman” is unconstitutional and must be stricken from the statute, and that the remaining statutory language must be understood as making the designation of marriage available both to opposite-sex and same-sex couples. In addition, because the limitation of marriage to opposite-sex couples imposed by section 308.5 can have no constitutionally permissible effect in light of the constitutional conclusions set forth in this opinion, that provision cannot stand.

Kudos to the California Supreme Court. Makes me glad to be living in a state with sane judges (and mostly sane politicians).

Can’t wait to hear the “Oh noes they’re destroying our families, or so we claim with absolutely no evidence to back up the crap we spew” responses that are sure to follow.

Allowing gay and lesbian couples to marry “will not deprive opposite-sex couples of any rights and will not alter the legal framework of the institution of marriage,” (Chief Justice Ronald George) said.

In addition, he said, the current state law discriminates against same-sex couples on the basis of their sexual orientation – discrimination that the court, for the first time, put in the same legal category as racial or gender bias.

He also noted that state laws and traditions banned interracial marriage until the California Supreme Court, in 1948, became the first court in the nation to overturn such a law. “Even the most familiar and generally accepted of social policies and traditions often mask an unfairness and inequality that frequently is not recognized or appreciated by those not directly harmed,” the chief justice wrote. “

Here’s hoping that either the case isn’t appealed or, failling that, that the US Supreme court refuses it. That court is filled with too many Bushlings right now, and the wrong ruling would set the US back decades as far as equality goes.
Edit: Never mind: The parties cannot appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, Herrera said, as no federal constitutional questions are at issue.

Edit 2: I’ve now had time to read over the “dissenting” opinions (which are actually “concurring and dissenting” opinions) and I can see many of their points. It seems that the dissenters basically reason that, “Since California already has domestic partnership laws that confer the same rights as marriage, at least at the state level, and voters have passed a law that reserves the term ‘marriage’ for a man and a woman, it is not the court’s place to redefine that term, in particular because there are already ‘separate but equal’ institutions in place.”
I actually mostly agree with that statement. However, I still think this is the right ruling, in no small part because people would have twisted a negative ruling to their own benefit, ignoring the very logic that would have led to that decision in the first place (such as using the ruling to argue against any rights for same-sex couples when that was clearly not the court’s intention). In particular, a negative ruling would have set a dangerous precedent for other states that currently do not give any rights to same-sex couples.

I wish the stupid fundies who’ll raise hell about this would give logical, thought-out arguments similar to these dissenting opinions instead of spewing garbage.