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Greetings, Quotaholics:
Gay
marriage seems to be the topic that will not die.
In several states, including California, court rulings overturned the
ban on gay marriage. Then many states, including California, passed
ballot measures banning gay marriage.
A civil rights suit was filed in California seeking to have the ballot
measure, Proposition 8, overturned. The lawsuit claims that the ban
is discriminatory under the U.S. Constitution.
Last Wednesday the parties came before U.S. District Chief Judge Vaughn
Walker seeking to have the suit dismissed. At that time Judge Walker
asked Charles Cooper, a lawyer for the group that sponsored Proposition
8, to explain how allowing gay couples to wed threatens conventional
unions. Cooper’s reply was that he didn’t know.
According to an article by MSNBC,
"The judge not only refused (to dismiss the case) but signaled
that when the case goes to trial in January, he expects Cooper and his
legal team to present evidence showing that male-female marriages would
be undermined if same-sex marriages were legal."
"The question is relevant to the assertion that Proposition 8 is
constitutionally valid because it furthers the states goal of fostering
‘naturally procreative relationships,’ Walker explained."
"’What is the harm to the procreation purpose you outlined of allowing
same-sex couples to get married?’ Walker asked."
"’My answer is, I don’t know. I don’t know,’ Cooper answered."
"’Walker pressed on, asking again for specific ‘adverse consequences’
that could follow expanding marriage to include same-sex couples. Cooper
cited a study from the Netherlands, where gay marriage is legal, showing
that straight couples were increasingly opting to become domestic partners
instead of getting married."
"’Has that been harmful to children in the Netherlands? What is
the adverse effect?’ Walker asked."
"Cooper said he did not have the facts at hand."
Backers of Proposition 8 point out that the measure garnered 52% of
the votes. But since when are constitutional rights subject to voter
approval? I would hazard a guess that if rights for African Americans
were on the ballot in the 60’s most states would have voted against
them. So does a majority mean anything in this sort of case?
Do you see any harm to traditional marriage by allowing gay marriage?
Cooper cited a study from the Netherlands showing that more couples
are choosing to live together now, but isn’t this true everywhere? Can
this fact be attributed to gay marriage?
I suppose the argument that gay marriage damages "naturally procreative
relationships" assumes that gays would elect to be in one of these
relationships if they aren’t allowed to wed. But that wouldn’t necessarily
be true would it?
Chronically Married,
P.S. There were some formatting problems with the issue last Friday.
These didn’t show up until the issue went through Yahoo so we’re not
sure what the problem was. Hopefully this issue is correct, but
remember the current issue, as well as back issues to March 2008, are
available at our website. The links can be found at the top this
email.
Comment
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Fame has sent a number of celebrities off the deep end, and in the case
of Michael Jackson, to the kiddy pool. – Bill Maher
After Mick Jagger explained that the wrinkles on his face were just
laugh lines – Surely nothing could be that funny? – George Melly
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Business Trip
[Thanks Sied]
On a business trip
to India, a colleague of mine arrived at the airport in Delhi. He
took a taxi to his hotel, where his hospitable Indian host greeted
him.
The cab driver requested the equivalent of eight dollars U.S. for
the fare, which seemed reasonable, so my friend handed him the money.
But the host grabbed the bills and initiated a verbal assault upon
the cabby, calling him a worthless parasite and a disgrace to their
country for trying to over- charge visitors. The host threw half the
amount at the driver and told him never to return. As the taxi sped
off, the host gave the remaining bills to my colleague and asked him
how his trip had been.
“Fine,” the businessman replied, “until you chased the cab away with
my luggage in the trunk.”
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At last I perceive that in revolutions the supreme power rests with
the most abandoned.
In revolutions authority remains with the greatest scoundrels.
The tocsin you hear today is not an alarm but an alert: it sounds the
charge against our enemies. - All from Georges Danton a leading figure
in the early stages of the French Revolution, born on this date in 1759
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Bad
Place Names
[Thanks Tesser]
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Speak right up!
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Fall Travel
This past weekend two geocaching events were scheduled on the same day.
One started at noon and was a picnic and campout. The other was a dinner
and "event cache". The campout, which I do not have a camper
or tent, was an hour’s drive west of me. The other was an hour drive
north of me. But the two events were an hour and a half drive apart.
My plan was to go to the campout event first, do a "meet &
greet", share some snacks & eats, then go to the other one
for dinner and the activities. The first one was in an Indiana state
park; Brookville, IN, to be exact. The other was in a metropark in Germantown,
OH. (Now you can triangulate about where I live.)
It was rainy on the way to Brookville Lake, so the fall colors were
subdued because of the poor lighting. Once in Brookville, fellow geocachers
and I took to the wilds to find some caches. As if on cue, the sun broke
through the clouds as we were at an overlook that had a breath-taking
view of the length of the lake. The hillsides and shoreline lit up as
if someone has plugged the trees into an electrical outlet. It was most
beautimus!
After taking our sweet time looking at the colors, looking for the cache,
looking at the colors, commenting on the colors, looking at the colors,
looking for the cache, finding the cache, looking at the colors, walking
& commenting on the colors some more, we finally returned to the
event site. Of course we had to describe what we witnessed, to the minute
details.
It was time to go to the other event. "See ya laters" were
exchanged and I got into my cachemobile. Do you realize how hard it
is to drive down a lane and a half wide country road with oncoming traffic
AND the surroundings in a blaze of colors? It is danged difficult! I
managed to dodge the idiots coming the other way. (They must have been
looking at the fall foliage, too.)
Why, you may ask, would I be so enamored with the annual event? It happens
every year, after all. Well, no, not always. At least not always like
this. The past few years were dry, to the point of officially being
drought conditions. The "fall spectacular" hasn’t been all
that spectacular because of that. Trees would lose most of their leaves
mid-summer, and what remained would simply turn brown and fall off.
This year has been unusually wet. The forests have been renewed and
amply fed. Revitalized, they did what they were supposed to do this
year. And it is proving to be a sensational show!
Here’s your quiz:
Do you make it a point to take a drive in the country as the fall colors
peak in your area?
Do you even live in an area where deciduous trees turn color and drop
their leaves in autumn?
Do you have mostly coniferous trees in your area instead?
Fall Travel - Where The Price Of A Great Show Is The Cost Of Gas
Cliff (the High-Tech Redneck who doesn’t rate a fancy ’signature pic’)
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Email Kirsten
“Making
the decision to have a child is momentous. It is to decide forever
to have your heart go walking around outside your body.”
~ Elizabeth Stone ~
In the middle of last week, my son James came home from school saying
that “everyone” had been punching him. My husband and I took this
very seriously indeed. James is not even four; with our year-end age
cut-offs and James’ Christmas birthday, he is the youngest kid in
his Junior Kindergarten class. He is certainly a reasonable size for
his age, but he’s still a lot smaller than the kids ten and eleven
months older than him. We are well aware that bullying can be a serious
problem from very early on, and that the younger and smaller kids
can easily be the targets.
On the other hand, as James was telling us this, he wasn’t acting
particularly victimized. He was relating events in a very matter-of-fact
manner. He named a couple of the kids who he said had been punching
him, but he did not display any anxiety. When asked if he wanted to
go back to school the next day, he nodded vigourously. And when asked
how one of the alleged punchers made him feel, he replied, “He’s my
friend. He makes me happy.” Besides, James regularly has to deal with
his older brother, who happens to be a very tall six-year-old. A bunch
of four-year-olds should be a piece of cake by comparison.
At no point did we ever think that James was lying, but we definitely
seemed to be missing part of the story somewhere. James was describing
a very garbled version of events that included something about him
(James) putting one of the other kids in the garbage. Whether this
had happened before or after the punching was not clear. The only
thing we could tell with any clarity was that James was using the
word “punch” as a generic term for hitting, kicking and pushing.
As I was getting James ready for bed that night, I scrutinized all
of his little body. I was hunting for bruises, cuts, scrapes - anything,
really, that would give me some indication of whether he was being
physically victimized. The only thing I found was a sizeable rip in
the pants he had been wearing. But still, I was deeply concerned.
Attacks don’t have to leave physical scars in order to be devastating.
After the boys had gone to bed that night (poor James was so exhausted
from all of our questioning that he fell asleep without even drinking
his beloved bedtime milk), my husband and I were discussing how we
were going to handle this. I wasn’t even moving, I was just standing
there, and all of a sudden I felt all of the muscles in my neck and
my upper back constrict. Last week was intense and stressful from
beginning to end - perhaps the cumulative effect of all the stress
was just too much for me. Whatever the cause, I spent the next two
days in pure agony, unable to look anywhere but straight ahead. Turning
my head was like trying to tie your thigh-bone into a knot without
breaking it.
The following day, we spoke to Mr. T., James’ teacher. Mr. T. assured
us that the kids in his class are under his direct supervision from
the time they arrive until the time they leave. He told us that he
had never witnessed any incident of James or any other child being
ganged up on. He took our questions seriously, though, and spoke to
James. It turned out that James had been referring to a number of
minor incidents that happened over a period of time. And the incidents
were not bullying, they were just childhood roughhousing with the
occasional spat. One of James’ friends is a big kid, one of the oldest
in the group, and from time to time he doesn’t realize how much stronger
he is than James.
So it’s all good. James is not being bullied, and he still likes going
to school. My neck is still messed up (now I can look in two directions:
to the right and straight ahead), but I’d rather have a sore neck
than a traumatized child any day of the week. My child is OK, and
that is all that matters.
Kaleidoscopically yours,
Kirsten
Comment
On This Article
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Today I’m going to ask you to make a decision. I’m going to give you
three choices, and you’ll have to pick one. You will be timed, so
your decision has to be made quickly. Put on your thinking caps, folks,
this is going to be a hard test.
We want students to be able to enter their cell phone numbers on
my web page, and we’re in a hurry to get it done. That’s easy enough
to allow, but it would also allow students to change their postal
address. The registrar’s office isn’t sure they want students to change
their address, but I can make the address a read-only field, so they
can’t change it. So here’s your test:
Should I:
A: Not allow students to change any contact information (the current
condition which higher-ups want to change)
B: Allow students to add their cell phone and possibly change their
address, or
C: Allow students to add their cell phone but not change the address
(a reversible modification so you have time to think about letting
them change their address)?
Did you make your decision yet? Let me help you a bit. A is wrong.
Things have to change. That leaves B or C. You can flip a coin and
be right half the time. Got the answer yet?
Need time to think about it? Then I’d pick C, and you can change
your answer to B later. Now do you have an answer?
Then someone please explain to me why it took our registrar’s office
so long to come to the decision? And why was the decision made on
a Friday afternoon, after I had gone home? Nothing gets changed on
a Friday afternoon. But I got this request: Because we don’t want
to stand in the way of the need/request, please activate the cell
phone aspect on the web asap. You’ve stood in the way of the “need/request”
since the spring. Now you want me to do this ASAP? Did you want the
“cell phone aspect” with or without the “change address aspect”?
I’m going to have to think about this.
Tim a’Musing
Having a Ball with Delays
E-mail Dear Tim
Comment
on this article
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Miscellaneous Tips
When working with dough, don’t flour your hands; coat them with olive
oil to prevent sticking.
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Emergency! We’re losing rhymers every day.
Send limericks quick!
Next opening line…
My best friend once quietly told me,…
Hints:
Here’s a great new rhyming/composition tool. http://www.writerhymes.com/
There’s also a great rhyming dictionary at http://www.rhymezone.com/
Limerick rules. http://freespace.virgin.net/merrick.sheldon/limerickrules.htm
Submit
Opening Line
Submit
Limerick
I
went in to try on a suit…
To wear while I’m playing my flute
A well fitted skirt.
Add a flattering shirt
And a jacket divine to boot. - Lola |
I
went in to try on a suit—
It was of the kind known as "zoot"—
but it was so bright
you could see it at night
it also had on it pix of fruit. - Cassandra in New York |
I went to
try on a suit
And found one I thought was cute
But when I looked in the glass
And saw how big was my ass
I jumped on a flight to Beirut. - Bonnie |
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Re: Nudity
I think it is better when there is enough public nudity that children
are not left in ignorance and frustrated curiosity, and so that they
won’t expect to look like the models they are more likely to see pictured.
They should also be warned that some people have a strong aversion
to nudity, and may react badly or feel injured when surprised by it.
It is better for children to have many casual glimpses of nudity and
other behaviour that can be sexual in adults, than one or two intense
encounters. They should be allowed to ask all relevant questions about
what they do encounter, not getting shushed except for public situations.
If I could send one message to myself as a boy, it would be that my
family was quite different from most families, except that like all
families, we thought we were the norm. - Bob of the North
Re: Winter Blues
I don’t
get the winter "blues"–I get the summer "blues".
Whenever there’s too much sunshine or heat I just want to crawl into
a dark room and sleep. Fall/winter and cloudy days are much better,
I even have more energy then. The cold bothers me, but I can always
put on more clothes to stay warm! - Ruth
in WA
Interestingly,
suicides in Greenland peak strongly in the summer, when there’s no
good time to sleep. As for SAD, (winter) Seasonal Affective Disorder,
I get some, but fight it with full-spectrum lighting and lots of vitamin
D. These days, with the snow arriving, I get excited, because of my
youthful delight over anticipating a birthday followed by Christmas.
I’m also glad to have moved to a place with sunny, bright winters,
even if the days are short and the sun low. - Bob of the North
Yes. Winter
blues start about the same time the furnace goes on all night.
Cause: winter costs more than mild weather. Everything goes up - groceries,
utilities, shopping, all of it. Why do researchers always think Fun,
Party, etc. when the Holiday Season is actually a pocketbook drain,
and few of us can afford it? Then there’s the who does all that fun
stuff ? Anybody with a couple kids and an extended family spends the
6 weeks of Holiday Season worrying about how their gifting will be
received, will the kids accept a brand other than what their friends
all have (according to their kids), or a substitute for what someone
says they Really Want. Later, when one gets two Thank You notes and
no word at all from others you shipped gifts to (at ever increasing
costs) it’s distressing.
Overcoming it: turn the mind to other stuff - visit museums, keep
warm, read books, plan a Project that will take four months to complete,
Begin the Project in November so taking time out to do the Holiday
thing means being eager to get back to it through January and February.
March is the worst month - muddy, messy, dormant, ugh. - Nancy L in
Ohio
Can you post a
pic of the pot of gold? I’m curious. It sounds like some kind of a
euphorbia. Lola
Re: Justice? of the Peace
Mike replied in
Justice of the Peace: "At what point do we consider them a
"welfare family"? After they have another child because
they couldn’t afford the birth control pill prescription anymore?
After their children go on welfare because mom and dad couldn’t afford
college and now they can’t find a job either?"
(first, what in the heck happened to the font stuff?)
First, birth control pills are paid for my Medicaid. They aren’t as
effective if the woman drinks to excess – really. Although that isn’t
often published, and I know of some people who found that out the
hard way. But IUDs are also covered by Medicaid.
Next, I am perturbed by people who keep insisting that without college
one is doomed. I’m not sure where it says parents should spend their
retirement funds to buy a college education for their kids. We have
two sons, one still paying off college loans and the other without
any college loans because he didn’t finish college. He started some
classes at a community college where he could pay for it himself and
then dropped out since he hated school from the time he was forced
to go to kindergarten. (When he graduated from high school, he handed
me his diploma and said I worked harder for it than he had.)
My college educated son and his college educated wife aren’t any better
off than the college drop out son and his college drop out wife. Both
families are struggling in this economic mess. But the plumber and
his family seem to be doing better than the other family. Being a
plumber is a skill and is always useful. His wife is an artist, and
her skill is also apparent.
College doesn’t have to be the only route to a better life. But if
you feel it is, college classes can be taken at community colleges,
at least for the first two years, making it more affordable. Student
loans are cheaper and more readily available to lower income families.
Thinking your parents should pay for your college is just another
one of those “self-centered” things. It’s amazing to me that people
who want MY money for their self-centered wants, call me self-centered
for wanting to keep what I earned. I put myself through college -
I have two different two-year degrees (one of them for being an RN
the other in computer networking) - by working at some really horrible
McJobs. -Patti
[The "font stuff" seems to be another of our Yahoo Groups
gremlins! I didn’t do anything different in editing the issue
and when I posted to Yahoo some of the text was screwed up.
I’ll remind everyone that if the email version is to difficult to
read there are links above the comments to the web version.
I use the same code there but the font problems didn’t show up there.
I didn’t know about Medicaid paying for birth control. I know
some people won’t use it even if it was handed to them. Fewer
won’t because of religious reasons. I was really only trying
to ask if a family was considered a "welfare family" when
they accept it on a short term, or does it need to be second or third
generation.
As far as college is concerned an education, like anything else, depends
on what you do with it. Of course there are successful people
who don’t have a degree, unsuccessful people with one. I do
think that if you don’t have a degree or some specialized training
you’re likely to never make much more than minimum wage.
I think where college or trade school can make a big difference is
in showing young people that it is possible to work for something
and rise above the poverty they have always known. I believe
that most poor have never seen any hope of anything better so they
accept a way of life that they have always lived. Key to this,
however, is the availability of scholarships or financial aid and
jobs upon graduation. If we keep sending jobs overseas or allowing
employers to fill jobs with foreign workers, no amount of education
or determination will make a difference.]
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Disclaimer- All quotes printed in this publication are believed to be
accurately attributed, but no guarantees are made that some incorrectly
attributed, or even outright false quotes won’t get in here from time
to time. I assure readers that I will do my best to weed out incorrect
quotes, and will print a retraction as soon as I become aware of any errors.
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