Iowa observences

Political ads: I moved south during the 2004 election. It was very strange moving from a swing state to a non-swing state. I had grown so accustomed to political ads I barely noticed them. But moving someplace where every other commercial was not a political ad? Weird.

Well, being in Iowa less than a week before the caucus? Politically overwhelming. I grew up there. I remember caucus season. But what I remember is that the national press always picked the most backwater hick looking farmer to talk to. He was always wearing a seed company hat, like Pioneer, he was usually wearing overalls and possibly a flannel shirt on top of the overalls. And he always had that mumbly Iowa hick accent. Example? He said "eye-wuh" instead of "Eye-oh-wah."

While at my brother's there was no elections. When the TV was on, it was turned to Nickelodeon or Disney. No political ads on Disney--just non-stop High School Musical (1 and 2). But then I went to my mom's house where we watched grown-up television. One commercial after another--political. They would run three or four in a row.

I had seen many of the commercials already--in coverage and discussion of the caucuses. It was really strange to see them without commentary. They were not picked apart for meaning or intention or this or that.

Traffic accidents: I saw my first real-life truck jackknife. I have seen the aftermath of a jackknife but never an actual jackknife. There we are, driving down I-80 and when the cars directly in front of us scatter and a semi is jackkniffing (is that a word) across the interstate. Smoke is coming from the tires, the trailer is wobbling back and forth. We came to a complete stop, the people behind us came to a complete stop, one car went into the ditch, another had its front passenger lights knocked out, and the truck slide all over the place, leaving black smoking tires marks. It didn't take very long, but it happened in a split second and really did seem to be in slow motion. As we sat there for a bit it became apparent that no one was hurt and we moved on. It was also evident that everyone involved was lucky--it could have been much much worse.

*edit: And I'm sick. Naturally. Picked up a cold from one of my nieces. Merry Christmas.