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[This post was originally published on The Living Room Tumblr.]

Me: “You can play for two minutes, then it’s time to get ready for bed.”
Loyette: “How about five minutes?”
Me: “No, two minutes. And if you talk back to me, it might be one minute, or no minutes.”
Loyette: “Daddy, I like two minutes.”

Haley jumps out; will Mitch jump in?

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Haley Barbour won’t run for president. So… will Mitch Daniels? I hope so! Barbour and Daniels are close friends, and they share many of the same establishment, big-money type supporters, so the assumption has been that they wouldn’t both run. Well, the ball’s in your court, Mitch!

As I’ve said before, Daniels articulates a lot of conservatism’s good ideas without a lot of its bulls**t (and without, in this admitted concern troll’s judgment, being a RINO like Huntsman). I certainly don’t agree with him on everything, by any stretch. But, as I wrote in that earlier post, “America needs someone like Mitch Daniels to carry the conservative flag. An honest, sane, grownup representative of true conservative ideas. An election between him and Obama would be a real choice.” It’s even conceivable I might choose to vote for him!

Okay, probably not. I’m left of center, as has been well established. I’m 3-for-3 voting for Democrats for president. But me crossing party lines and voting for Daniels is certainly more likely than if Obama’s opponent is the Generic Republican or the Republican John Kerry or one of the wingnuts. In an Obama-Daniels race, I’d really need to listen closely to what each side is saying, and search my own beliefs to try and figure out who I should support. To make an analogy to that map I linked earlier, I’d enter the race personally shaded light blue instead of dark blue, so to speak.

Run, Mitch, run!

I’m the map, I’m the map, I’m the map

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Larry Sabato has unveiled his initial electoral map for 2012:

LJS2011042101-mapbig

The broad outlines of the projection should surprise no one, and the specifics don’t really matter too much at this early date. For instance, just going by my gut instinct, I might call Florida, Indiana and perhaps North Carolina “Leans R” instead of “Tossup” — but who cares? It’s way too early to project any of the reasonably close states with any level of confidence or precision. As far as I’m concerned, the pink, yellow and sky-blue states might as well all be considered tossups at this point.

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2 years down, 28 to go

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Two years ago today — April 24, 2009 — I officially became a homeowner, as Becky and I closed on our house in Denver.

Five days later, we actually moved in. Here’s a time lapse showing our entire moving day in just over 3 minutes. It shows the day from beginning to end, starting at our old condo in South Denver, then ending here, at our then-new house.

A lot of things look different than they did then, from the paint job to our new couch — to, oh yeah, a new kid! Loyacita was born less than three months after this (and, lo and behold, we’ve now got another girl due in less than three months). Loyette, meanwhile, was 6 months younger in the video than Loyacita is now, which just seems… impossible.

The title of this post, by the way, is a reference to our mortgage, if that escaped anyone. After a decade of insane hyper-mobility, we’ve switched to the opposite extreme, and fully intend to be those weird people who actually pay off their 30-year mortgage, still living in the house. Technically, I guess that would happen on or about May 1, 2039, since our first mortgage payment was due on June 1, 2009.

Anyway, after the jump, some more notes on the video, copied from this old post.

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[This post was originally published on The Living Room Tumblr.]

Easter eggs!