As a parent, it's always a disheartening experience when you learn your child may have a drinking problem. However, I wasn't quite expecting that the lesson about the perils of alcohol would have to be discussed with a six year-old.

So maybe one of you can explain why this was the scene that greeted me when I got home from work on Friday (at 2 in the afternoon!).
Based on the mess, I have no doubt that Sookie was involved in this somehow as well. I attempted to ask her, but she was sleeping it off. As for Minnie, thankfully, I can report that she is a very mellow drunk and, when confronted, didn't feel the need to blame all of her problems on any racial or ethnic groups. At least the values of equality and freedom of religion have stuck with her so far, even though the "Just Say No" lesson clearly didn't.

Thank Heaven for Little Girls?

In case you missed it this week, one of the biggest stories to hit the wires was the debut of the "Bratz Bra" - a PADDED bra for the six year old set.

Now, I don't consider myself to be all that conservative, but padded bras for six year olds? Something doesn't seem quite right about that. It's bad enough that Osama and Saddam are more familiar names to the post-9/11 generation (for the record, the little girls being targeted for these bras were in diapers when the planes hit the towers) than Ken and Barbie will ever be, but now our little girls are facing a bigger threat than Al Queda will ever post -- a blow to their body image brought on by the celebrity party-girls and a pressure to grow up way too fast.

I remember how embarrassed I was when my mother announced that it was time for me, at nine, to get my first training bra. At first I thought it was cool that my mom thought I was enough of a woman to take on this rite of passage. Then, Monday rolled around, and I realized that I was the only girl in my class who actually had one on. Since it was the 80s, before the age when first graders were sued for sexual harassment, I endured a lot of snapping until the other girls caught up and we shared the load. My saving grace, however, was that I was damn smart and tuned in to current events. As Gilbert Blythe said to Anne Shirley, "Being smart is more important than being pretty," and I took that to heart. Thanks to my academic success, I was able to build a healthy self-confidence that has carried me farther than looks ever could. My idols were Nancy Reagan, Mary Lou Retton, Sally Ride, and Princess Diana -- smart, beautiful women who possessed significant talents and spoke to the message that little girls could grow up to be anything they wanted -- even princess.

So where did we go so wrong? Why are the granddaughters of the ERA generation not only NOT burning their bras in a quest for equality and solidarity, they're embracing the curse of the boulder (pebble?) holder at a younger age than ever before? Even worse, they're already flirting with the dangers of anorexia (because, you know that the biggest insult that any girl can receive is that she's "fat") and are told that mid-driff shirts and thongs are "nice girl" attire. They're not, but that's the message that these kids are getting. The role-models that I grew up with have been replaced by Paris, Nicole, Mischa, and Lindsay -- walking skeletons whose biggest talents are talking their way into clubs and stealing each others boyfriends. Even our First Lady is a puppet who hides behind her crazy husband and whose greatest success in the last 20 years is to have raised two of the most notorious of the party girl set. Gee, she must be so proud.

Our great feminist sisters are gone, and the strong women who try to rise in their stead are often labeled lesbians by men who are afraid that they're actually making sense. However, there's still hope for the next generation. If we each take the time to tell our little girls -- be they our daughters, sisters, cousins, students, friends or neighbors -- that they are important, that they are athletic, that they are pretty, and that they are valued for who they are, we can still produce a generation of girls who can remain children for just a little longer and whose grandmothers can be truly proud of.

RIP Ann Richards: An idol for smart girls every where who reminded us that "Ginger Rogers did everything Fred Astaire did, except backwards and in high heels," and who seemed to have had both the the self-confidence and father I had been blessed with: "I have always had the feeling I could do anything and my dad told me I could. I was in college before I found out he might be wrong."

Earning the sticker

Some people vote out of civic pride, others vote because it preserves the Democratic process that this country was founded upon. I vote for those reasons in the general elections, but there's there's really only one reason that I vote in the non-Presidential Primary. That's right, kids, it's the sticker that looks like this:

It's Primary Election Day in Maryland, so, as usual, I decided to be a little late for work today just to make sure that my vote was taken care of. I've had friends who have waited until later in the day to vote, waited in line for over an hour, and then have been told that they couldn't because the "polls were closed." Of course they were Democrats and it was the 2004 Presidential Election, but that shouldn't have made a difference right?

Anyway, according to the Maryland Board of Elections and Ginny James' 1995 Government class, it's supposed to be an easy process: Walk up, smile pretty, get a card, toss it in the machine, select your candidates, save your votes, and watch the computer select whoever paid the election officials the most money on your behalf.

All of that would have been a relief. Sadly, this morning didn't go quite that smoothly.

I arrive five minutes before the polls were supposed to have been opened to find my elections officials still trying to piece together the machines. Apparently someone didn't take Networking 101 because the woman behind the table (who I actually never saw again after this point) is trying to jam the networking connection into the USB port. Oh great, I think, let's try to break the machines before we even get this thing off the ground.

Twenty minutes after the polls were opened, the machines are finally up and running. I get to the front of the line and learn that, despite completing all the necessary paperwork with the MVA when I moved a year ago, I'm not registered in the precinct. In fact, according to the election official, I'm not even registered in the STATE. My twin sister -- who moved from Georgia and was only living with me for less than a year before she moved to New York -- is. So, the fact that I've lived in the state for six years and have been registered in the state for six years doesn't really count for anything.

I'm only half-joking when I ask for her ballot.

"Sorry, miss, we can't do that. Frankly, you don't exist."
"Of course I exist. I'm standing right in front of you."
"Well, I can see that, but you're not in the system."

Basically, according to VoteBoy, the State "ate" my registration. I'm seriously tempted to tell him he could Eat Me, but I figure getting ugly with the elections officials isn't about to get me anywhere but a day-trip downtown. Therefore, I opt to play the Sister Suffragette card and tell VoteBoy that my grandmothers taught me from a very young age that women like my great great grandmothers fought hard for my right to vote and that it's a slap in their face that I don't. Therefore, I assure him, there's no way that I would "forget" to change my voting registration or let it lapse because, at the very least, I'm a white Protestant landowner, and even though I didn't have the right "parts" to vote until 1920, I met the other requirements established in 1776.

Desperate to get rid of me and my history-spouting ways, VoteBoy calls the Board of Elections. He calls me a "gal"; I choose to ignore that. NiceVotingLady tells me that VoteBoy is wrong, I'm registered in the State -- just at the old address (even though I filled out the paperwork at the DMV a year ago!). VoteBoy STILL can't find me in the state.

This time, I give in to the urge to push some people out of the way and "do it right the first time." I grab the stylus out of his hand and punch in my last name. Then, because I read the instructions on the screen, I punch "Find in State." Instantly, my name appears.

"Oh, did I not do that?" Um no, buddy, you didn't.

I give him back the stylus and start walking him through the process to get me registered. Really, folks, even a Macaca (a monkey for those of you not following the Senate race in Virginia) could do this as everything you need is right on the screen. Somehow, though, I'm the only one who seems to have passed any sort of reading comprehension test.

We open the screen that covers the provisional ballot. On the screen it says, "use the codes from the chart in Chapter 6 of the Elections Manual."

VoteBoy starts flipping through the elections manual and whining, "I don't see it, I don't see it."

I grab it out of his hand, flip to Chapter 6, read the codes, and go, "I'm a '1'."

"Are you sure?" Hold up, VoteBoy is now asking me if I understand the process? Something doesn't seem right about that. I assure him I'm right, so, he puts in the 1 and punches the button to print out the confirmation page. I sign it and ask for the paper ballot.

"We don't have paper ballots. Use this," VoteBoy says as he tries to hand me a card.
"No, I need a paper ballot."
"No, it's ok, you need this," he says and again tries to hand me the electronic card.

In unrelated news, this is about the time that a second election official appears and goes, "So, William Donald Schaefer just got four votes for Comptroller -- Ted here voted for him, and the machine registered it four times. That's not a problem is it?"

To placate VoteBoy, I wander to the machine (which I know will not work), and slide the card in anyway. Voting Card has already been used, the machine tells me. I head back to the table.
"Seriously guys, I need a paper ballot." I grab the elections manual (again) and start reading out loud, "Paper ballot...Number 2 pencil...pen...pink for Republicans, white for Democrats..."

VoteBoy wanders to the (unwatched!) table where all the supplies are being housed. He opens the envelopes marked, "Provisional Ballots" and goes, "Oh, here they are!"

I get the ballot, and start marking it. Then and only then, does VoteBoy decide to start reading the election manual and again thinks it's a good idea to quiz me on the process. "The ballots are different. Are you sure you have the right one?"

Seriously folks, would I really have gone through all the trouble and not picked up the right ballot? Think about that one will you...

I complete the ballot and say, "Now we're supposed to put this in a sealed envelope," suspecting that there's more to the process because I've only used a pencil so far and the manual mentioned a pen. VoteBoy, who has been looking over my shoulder the whole time, insists that "they" didn't give him any, so he grabs the envelope that the ballots came out of and puts mine inside.

"No, it's supposed to be a sealed envelope," I say.

He starts licking (the envelope, not me, Thank God); I start going through the stuff on the table. I find a second provisional ballot form (the one that needs the pen) and show them to him, "These have a peel-off seal...."

I fill out the form, put my ballot inside, and bring it to the head election judge who has dubbed me "good people" for not ripping anyone's head off and is very interested to know if I'd like to be a judge for our community Christmas parade. I tell him I'd think about it, but my primary concern is being an election judge for the General Election on November 7.

Over an hour after I arrived, I left the school. Since all the electioneers had been in and out of there while I was trying to "get my vote on," they were VERY interested in the final outcome. I filled them in and was walking away when one of them realized the final injury...

...I didn't get my sticker.