"I grew up in a meatpacking town. My mom died when I was young. My dad was a truck driver."

"He lost his job not too long after my mom died for a while and he got promoted later to dispatcher. My brothers and sisters couldn't go to college, not because they didn't have the capability, they just didn't have the opportunity. And I've lived the American dream, and through hard work and a lot of other help and a loving family and many other things, but when you share that story, I know when people say, 'Hey, you Republicans, you don't know what it's like not to be able to afford gas in your car or pay your health care or worry about college costs or how you're even gonna pay the mortgage,' I said, 'Yeah, I can, because I've walked in your shoes,' and that gives me the chance then to convince them why being a conservative, why joining our team is better, 'cause they just don't stiff arm us right out of the gate."

Which Republican candidate is that? Do you know before looking?

Bob Dylan turns 70.

Thanks for staying alive, Bob!

IN THE COMMENTS: Shouting Thomas said: "Well, shit, Althouse, I was expecting a more expansive Dylan Hullabaloo."

I don't find birthdays and aging that interesting. I write about Dylan all the time, and most of the people here don't even appreciate it. I'm supposed to hold a birthday party? Does Dylan care about birthdays? The word "birthday" appears but twice in all the Dylan songs.  One is in "Desolation Row":

Now Ophelia, she’s ’neath the window
For her I feel so afraid
On her twenty-second birthday
She already is an old maid
To her, death is quite romantic...

That's not about celebrating birthdays. "Birthday" is just there to say the woman is 22. She's old at 22. Being older when younger is a theme in at least 2 Dylan songs that spring instantly to my mind. If they don't spring instantly to your mind, then you probably don't care what they are anyway.

The other Dylan song with the word "birthday" tells us something about what he thinks of birthdays. It's "She Belongs to Me":

She’s got everything she needs
She’s an artist, she don’t look back...
You will start out standing
Proud to steal her anything she sees
You will start out standing
Proud to steal her anything she sees
But you will wind up peeking through her keyhole
Down upon your knees... 
Bow down to her on Sunday
Salute her when her birthday comes...

I don't think Dylan likes getting down on his knees or bowing down, and I think we can infer that he scorns birthday celebrations. That's what I think, and I've been interpreting Dylan songs for 45 years.

At the Cheese Café...

... bask in the glow of warm yellow cheese.

Storefront.

Monroe, Wisconsin.

Tornado.

Audio. From a Fastrip walk-in refrigerator.

ADDED:

"Amazon.com Inc.’s one-day, 99-cent promotion of Lady Gaga’s highly anticipated second studio album..."

"... 'Born This Way,' is resulting in downloading delays on the Internet retailer’s website due to high volume, the company said Monday."

Join the traffic jam: download here.

"I’m Barack Obama, from the Moneygall Obamas."

"And I’ve come home to find the apostrophe that we lost somewhere along the way."