THERE'S COMMUNISM IN THE WATER!

Bloomsbury fails at covering their own asses. And also race. Discuss.

Doing motocross.

This is the best thing ever in the history of the internets.

This is quite possibly the most awesome iced tea ever. (Thanks, nilla and evilpuppy!)

My opinion of Sarah Palin is....well, it's irrelevant at this point. What is relevant is the disgraceful and disgusting way that some folks are throwing her under the bus - folks from McCain's campaign and people at FOX News in particular. I don't believe ANY of the stuff I'm hearing about her in the aftermath of the campaign, simply because it is so patently obvious that people are looking for a scapegoat. Campell Brown is spot on:

Me: Hey, you want to go to the Okie Noodling Festival this year?
Mr. Som: You won't let me noodle.
Me: Oh, I'll let you if you do it at the festival. It'll be safer.
Mr. Som: So you'll let me do the bunny hill of noodling? Like reach into a bucket and grab a perch?
Me: *dies all over the place*

(For the uninitiated, read up on noodling, the practice of catching catfish with your bare hands.)

A cute, funny cartoon brought to you by Planned Parenthood explains how pregnancy happens.

Now if only I could round up a few pro-life/anti-EC folks, tie 'em up, and make 'em watch it...

This is NOT SAFE FOR WORK.

So I've been reading Labyrinth fanfic lately, mostly in search of funny goblin stories, but tonight I came across a real, uh, winner.

Behold: "Mysterious As the Dark Side".

Go on, start reading the first chapter. Keep reading. You'll know when you get to it. ...see? I told you so.

For those who want the Cliffs Notes version, Sarah has converted to [evangelical] Christianity after a crisis in which she considers having an abortion. See, her dear Christian Aunt informs her that the fetus is a child - and apparently, it's news to Sarah that some people believe this. (She's old enough to get pregnant, but not old enough to have EVER come in contact with pro-life ideas? Riiiiight.)

Plot holes aside, this abysmal attempt at propagandizing a Jim Henson movie actually gets worse. By the end of the second chapter, after a few lines of bad poetry masquerading as a prophecy, it appears that Sarah, being God's servant, is supposed to save Jareth - from being a rapist. Because he already is one; he holds girls prisoner and rapes them nightly.

(ETA: Having now read the final chapter, I know for certain that Sarah does indeed end up happily married to Jareth, Former Serial Rapist. What part Jesus plays in this plot, I don't yet know.)

In the third chapter, we learn that Sarah homeschools her children (Damie and Damien) because she doesn't want them exposed to evolution.

Sarah home-schooled her boys for a few reasons. She’d grown up in a small town environment, and she didn’t want her sons to be tormented because of the circumstances surrounding their birth. She and her Aunt had also wanted to spare the boys from controversial issues the biggest being evolution until the boys were old enough to make informed decisions.

Yeah. I'm sure they'll be capable of making "informed decisions" with a skewed understanding of the scientific method, the laws of physics, and science in general.

There are 36 chapters in this fic. And you understand, I have to keep reading; how else will I know the author's [Christian] thoughts on feminism, sex out of wedlock, and (of course) yaoi?

[ETA] Chapter 6: Jareth, Serial Rapist and Future Husband of Sarah, rapes Sarah's best friend. The description of the rape is undeniably pornographic. How that fits into a "Christian" fanfic, I have no idea.

After the rape, Sarah's friend says: “I gave him nothing, Destiny. He stole from me and Joseph [her fiance]; nothing more...” Oh, honey, no. No. Raping you is in no way equivalent to raping your boyfriend. What part of you do you think your boyfriend "owns," that a man was capable of "stealing" through rape?

In chapter 8, it becomes apparent that Sarah is a rape victim herself. That makes the future romantic plot with a serial rapist even more loathsome.

[ETA II] Good fucking lord. The "prophecy" apparently involves Sarah saving the Underground and Jareth by sharing her personal Lord and Savior, Jesus, with Jareth. Jesus wants Sarah to be romantically involved with Jareth. And - get this - it's pretty much clear that it's Sarah's fault that Jareth is a rapist. He's a rapist because she beat him at his own game.

Uh, let that be a lesson to you ladies. Let the guy win for the sake of his ego.

This year, I bring you comfort food!

( Som's Very Own Chicken Pot Pie Recipe )

BOSTON!

BOSTON!

BOSTON!

SRES 001

S. Res. 001
In the House of Som,
January 30, 2006

Whereas headphone cords are highly conductive, despite the so-called "insulating" covering;

Whereas said headphones fit into the ear;

Whereas said into-ear-headphones have a metallic crossgrain a mere millimeter away from Som's inside-ear-skin;

Whereas the mere action of picking up and transporting a fuzzy synthetic blanket across the room generates vast amounts of static electricity;

Resolved, that Som should issue a proclomation:

GODDAMN, MOTHERFUCKER, THAT HURT!

Attest:

Clerk.

恭喜發財

Happy Lunar New Year, everyone!

Ah, and _midoriko_sama_, thanks for the tea and the candle! I have no idea why the post takes so long to get here, but I love the gift! I've set aside the candle for next year's Christmas decorations, but the tea...the tea I need NOW. *whimpers* I've been running low. Thank you! Thank you! *uberglomp*

Those girls of mine... *shakes head* Ariana brought me a piece of paper and asked me for a sail. I stuck a cheap plastic chopstock through it twice, and voila! Sail. Same for Izzy.

Then Ari brought me a crayon and asked for the Jolly Roger on her sail. *beaming proudly*

Now she's running around the house with the sail in her hand, singing, "What do you do with a scurvy pirate? Make them walk the plank!" Izzy is less garrulous: "Pirate! Arrr! Pirate!"

This rant has been building up for a long time. You've been forewarned.

( Cut for length. )

Ari's turning four in April, so she'll be starting Pre-K in the fall. In the area where we live, public school...yeah, it really isn't much of an option here. Thus, I've started looking into private school programs for her.

Did you know that people start signing up their kids for private schools when they're infants? ...I didn't.

So we're going to an Open House at a parochial schools on Thursday night. Ari is #9 on the waiting list there, so it's a bit of a stretch that she'll get in at all, but it's worth a try. And now I'm getting all anxious on her behalf. I'm trying not to let that show, because the last thing she needs is anxiety issues about school.

...but still, yeah, this is hard. I've been talking about looking forward to the day they'd start school so I could get more things done around the house. And now that the day is drawing near, it makes me want to cry.

I've been wasting hours reading a newly discovered blog: "I Am a Japanese School Teacher." This guy is an American teaching English in Japan to middle-school kids, and...you just can't make this shit up. The entry I just read, in particular, has me rolling on the floor. A little background:

Kancho is when the kids try to stick their fingers up your ass, ala Kakashi's "One Thousand Years of Pain" move (see: icon. Kancho predates Naruto, in case you were wondering.) The kids have been trying to alternately kancho the teacher and/or grab his penis. I shit you not. And this entry is from the day the kids finally won. He's already been kancho'd at least once, and then this:

Requiem for a Legacy: Part III. References to attacks from Naruto abound. It's fucking hilarious.

I just finished making a huge tote bag. It took me three days of sewing, but I'm happy with the result:



More pics at UrbanDecline.

So after two years of putting up with a cracked TV screen, we finally got to go buy a new TV. It only weighs 75 pounds, so Mr. Som and I just carried it inside. I made the unfortunate choice to be the one going backwards.

And I was moving at a pretty good clip when my hand got smooshed between the TV box and the edge of the open screen door.

Daaaaaaamn, that hurt. It's still a little swollen, but I don't think anything's broken.

But on the plus side, new TV! I didn't realize how horrible the picture on the old one was until we plugged this new one in. So very nice.

...I put up a short review of Kafka on the Shore on UrbanDecline. Don't worry about spoilers; plot-specific stuff is all hidden behind a link at the bottom.

I finally got around to updating UrbanDecline...twice today. Post 1 has pics of those hats and scarves I made for the girls, and Post 2 has lots of pretty fabric pictures.