It looks like a thoroughly beautiful Sunday morning as the black edge of the horizon begins to have that glow of sunrise brightening behind it. Objects below my window begin to take shape – the garden fence, the shed, the stone wall. If I lean forward and peer to my left I can see Willie’s grave far below, in the burgeoning dawn. The Angel ornament that made it through all the wild winter weather, is perched proudly atop the marker, like a flag – a talisman – a reminder.

So it’s UConn versus Butler on Monday night for the men. Unless I am mistaken, Alice the Elder appears to have won on the men’s side in a stupendous burst of bracketalogical acumen! I haven’t absolutely checked everyone’s brackets, but unless someone picked UConn to win it all, I Don’t See How Alice the Elder could lose. What a shocker! Almost as shocking as Butler being in the final for the second year in a row. Congrats to the Bulldogs – and congrats to Alice!

Oh, and Better than Tyler Dewdney was … 🙂

On the women’s side the final four get underway tonight, with Stanford versus the Aggies of Texas A&M for the first game, and UConn versus Notre Dame getting underway at 9:30 PM Eastern time – good grief! Poor JBD is going to have to stay awake until the wee hours.

We are honored and surprised that Alice the Elder will be deigning to join us to watch the women play.   In what was an amazing coup, JordanCornblog was able to snag Alice the Elder for an exclusive appearance before the obligatory visit to the Today Show – and of course the trip to Disney World.

It’s difficult to sort out what’s going to happen in the women’s bracket, however, there could be some major shifting around depending on who wins the final (obviously). plrock has all her eggs in the Cardinal basket – whereas UConn is it for quite a few others. On the women’s side, Alice the Elder doesn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell, BTW.

In other news, things in New Hampshire continue to be more depressing and Kurk-crazed than I ever could’ve imagined them to be.

After a great rally on Thursday … with upwards of 5000 people streaming onto the State House lawn to protest the mean-spirited and unnecessary cuts that the House has cobbled together … things have gotten uglier.  The House passed their budget, and the GOP’s Leader there (a 27-year old dude with a Tea-Party-induced hard-on that has lasted more than 4 hours and for which he should seek immediate medical attention) has called out Roman Catholic Bishop John McCormack in language that could only be described as juvenile, impulsive, and amazingly stupid.

We can only hope that the Senate will overturn the destructive budget that the House voted through. Meanwhile, as I read about the vote, I was interested to note that of the representatives in my town, only one (Priscilla Lockwood) voted like a grown-up and said no to the cuts.

I was also kind of surprised to see that one of the more vocal and nasty proponents of the cuts, Tom Keane of Bow, didn’t actually vote on the proposed budget. What’s up with that, Tom? Unwilling to put your money where your mouth is?  Off getting your hair moussed?

Read In the House, a demolition derby the scathing piece by Katy Burns in Today’s Concord Monitor – it’s wonderful!

And so there is something profoundly sad about seeing a group of largely well-heeled, comfortable people – secure enough to work endless hours for a measly 100 bucks a year – not only shredding the safety net of vital services that so many less fortunate people depend on but seeming to take such pleasure in it.

That is what the current leadership in the state Legislature – especially in the House of Representatives – is doing. And doing with a huge amount of smug self-satisfaction. Take Tom Keane, a new Republican rep from Bow. Cuts to mental health programs? Hey, no problem, he airily assured New Hampshire Public Radio’s Elaine Grant.

Those 3,500 or so seriously troubled children who might go without help? Schools would be able to handle the load! Although I do confess to wondering if Keane’s checked with the Bow School Board – of which he is a member – on that grandiose promise.

And adults with grave mental health issues? Why, Keane says, cutting off funding for them will only make the agencies that try to serve them more efficient!

Of course we shouldn’t be surprised. Keane is symptomatic of a House membership which seems to be best personified by Kingston’s Ken Weyler, who (one would think) has been around long enough to know better. Yet the retired airline pilot couldn’t help proclaiming that metal health providers try to create “patients for life.” And that it’s crazy to coddle a mother suffering from postpartum depression once her baby “becomes a little more animated.”

According to NHPR, this is the same guy whose solution for working women who need help in caring for their children, based on his own experiences decades ago, is that mothers should “swap childcare.”

So we are left praying that the Senate will interject some balance, wisdom and humanity into this process.  Will they?