Your video for the day is Pearl Jam's Just Breathe. Because it always makes me cry, but in a good way.
This week was wonderful because it went so fast.
I've been busy every night, but I haven't felt tired until today.
Last night, I tossed and turned and tossed and turned some more. By the time I was finally ready to really be asleep, the alarms were going off.
We went sledding on Wednesday! I haven't been in what feels like forever, so it was really nice to trek over to the sledding hill and go for it. E's yellow lab came with us and had fun chasing the saucer sleds, as though she thought they were giant frisbees - they sort of are, but they don't get as much air.
Sledding, followed by hot chocolate and pasole, was amazing! We all curled up in E's basement. It reminded me of college.
Last night, instead of going to trivia, K and I ordered Thai (again - we panicked and couldn't think of anything else) and stayed in. I think I'd like to keep him. We'll see how this works out, but I find him to be incredibly interesting. He's funny - deadpan sarcastic at all times; he's super sweet; he wants a Burmese mountain dog AND he likes artificial banana flavor. What more does a girl need? I've had a really nice couple of weeks and am terrified that I'll jinx it somehow.
Tonight, J is DJing at a gay techno party, so I'm headed there in time to see his set. I can't stay late because I have to be a responsible human being all day tomorrow. But hopefully there can be wild shenanigans tomorrow night (i don't know) and then snowboarding on Sunday, followed by the mad dash to the Avs games for H's birthday.
It should be fun!
Again, I can't stress enough how important it is to do self-breast exams. Please, please, please know their topography. Talk to your doctor at the first sign of any change. It could save your life.
Friday, November 04, 2011
Thursday, November 03, 2011
On Abortion Opinion Pieces (this is one of them)
I realize that there are different sets of beliefs on this planet. I really try to see the other side of things. It's so hard to understand where people who don't believe the same things as you are coming from. To understand that is the first step toward being able to rationalize their thought process. Or perhaps for mutual respect and compromise. Oh wait, compromise isn't real.
I get that you, believing whatever it is you believe, might want to turn a news story into something that fits your own agenda. So you write an opinion piece and then you publish it. People read it. That's great. Now they're aware of your opinion and they're seeing the connection between whatever it is that you wrote and your agenda.
Abortion accounts for only 3% of Planned Parenthood's services. 3%. Their agenda is not in fact abortion. It's not to kill of all the unborn babies. They're not grim reapers sitting in dark alleys waiting for pregnant women to happen by so they can lure them into killing the kid. They do a lot of other things, too. Good things. Cancer screenings, free condoms, birth control, testing.
Born February 24, 1955, Jobs was given up for adoption by his parents because of pressure his biological mother received due to her relationship with his biological father. He was adopted as an infant by Clara and Paul Jobs who named their new son Steve Paul Jobs. And, the rest, as they say, is history.
I get that you, believing whatever it is you believe, might want to turn a news story into something that fits your own agenda. So you write an opinion piece and then you publish it. People read it. That's great. Now they're aware of your opinion and they're seeing the connection between whatever it is that you wrote and your agenda.
Below is an article about how Steve Jobs' adoption "defied Planned Parenthood's abortion agenda."
Seriously? That's how you want to use his death? I guess it got my attention, so you must be doing something right. Actually, I was distracted while reading an article that used such terminology as "the abortion business" and how Planned Parenthood, said "abortion business", by offering birth control such as free condoms, is bilking Medicaid out of millions of dollars. Since I couldn't verify the validity of the article - and I tried - I could not tweet it for the healthcare company I do contracted social media work for. So naturally, my next move was to spend twenty minutes digging through this site reading anti-everything articles. To my surprise, there was a very rational one about Gardisil (the HPV vaccine) and religion, abstinence, and parenting. I recommend reading it. And then getting your kids vaccinated.
Seriously? That's how you want to use his death? I guess it got my attention, so you must be doing something right. Actually, I was distracted while reading an article that used such terminology as "the abortion business" and how Planned Parenthood, said "abortion business", by offering birth control such as free condoms, is bilking Medicaid out of millions of dollars. Since I couldn't verify the validity of the article - and I tried - I could not tweet it for the healthcare company I do contracted social media work for. So naturally, my next move was to spend twenty minutes digging through this site reading anti-everything articles. To my surprise, there was a very rational one about Gardisil (the HPV vaccine) and religion, abstinence, and parenting. I recommend reading it. And then getting your kids vaccinated.
Abortion accounts for only 3% of Planned Parenthood's services. 3%. Their agenda is not in fact abortion. It's not to kill of all the unborn babies. They're not grim reapers sitting in dark alleys waiting for pregnant women to happen by so they can lure them into killing the kid. They do a lot of other things, too. Good things. Cancer screenings, free condoms, birth control, testing.
As someone who was adopted (and was arguably closer to the possibility of abortion than most of you who came from married people or single mothers who chose to raise you), I am so pro-life it's ridiculous. While I would personally never have an abortion, I do see it as a viable option for those who fall pregnant in really bad circumstances. Of course it's not birth control. Of course it's actually not that hard not to get pregnant. But accidents happen. And abortion - in serious moderation - isn't the end of the world. (See the second article, below the Steve Jobs one, for 10 questions for pro-lifers.)
(I put a socio-economic rant in here but then deleted it. In conclusion: life is really beautiful, but it can be really ugly, too. Also, insert medical issues that could affect mothers' health. Those can get problematic under anti-abortion laws. Abortion isn't really the issue for me. It's not my thing. It's the fact that laws that govern abortion really govern my body. And my body belongs to me. I worry that it's a slippery slope from anti-abortion to anti-...well, anything. I don't want the government to be able to assert eminent domain over anything connected to my reproductive system or any other system either.)
This really bothers me on a personal level. Steve Jobs' biological mother was a graduate student. She made an active decision to give him up to a family. She made them promise he'd go to college. She wasn't plucked from the operating table mid-abortion to achieve some sort of salvation for the future-tech-god living inside of her. She made a choice that didn't involve Planned Parenthood at all. But again, it's just an opinion piece.
Steve Jobs’ Adoption Defied Planned Parenthood’s Abortion Agenda
by Ciara Matthews | Washington, DC | LifeNews.com | 10/10/11 10:21 AM
Following the news last week, the nation is in mourning over the loss of one of this country’s greatest innovators, a man who has shaped technology, communications and human interaction and networking in a profound and unprecedented way. Apple visionary and co-founder Steve Jobs has left an eternal footprint on mankind that will be forever seen in the way we interact and connect with the world around us.
But, if Planned Parenthood had any say over his destiny, chances are he would have never been given the chance to live such an extraordinary life and lead the next generation of technological advancements.
Born February 24, 1955, Jobs was given up for adoption by his parents because of pressure his biological mother received due to her relationship with his biological father. He was adopted as an infant by Clara and Paul Jobs who named their new son Steve Paul Jobs. And, the rest, as they say, is history.
Thankfully, the man the world has come to know and love due to his success as Apple co-founder, CEO, revolutionary, innovator, and entrepreneur as well as Chief Operating Officer at Pixar Animation Studios, was given a chance at life, a life that Planned Parenthood denies approximately 330,000 unborn babies each year. According to Planned Parenthood’s own numbers, in 2008 it was reported, the organization gave 2,405 adoption referrals the entire year. In that same time they performed 324,008 abortions. This means that for every adoption referral Planned Parenthood gives, it performs 134 abortions.
Clara and Paul Jobs valued the life of a child Planned Parenthood labels a “crisis,” and Steve Jobs did not become just another “problem” Planned Parenthood attempted solve. Steve Jobs adoptive parents, as well as his birth parents, what Planned Parenthood refuses to see – a helpless life with the potential for greatness. He could easily have been an abortion statistic. The world has been touched by Steve Jobs because he parents recognized the value his life held. While the beginning of his life may have been “unintended,” the life and legacy of Steve Jobs had meaning and purpose. He accomplished great things in his 56 years. Unfortunately, the abortion industry has ensured that the potential and greatness of millions of boy and girls will never be realized.
Learn more about other great thinkers, entertainers and leaders that were given a chance to accomplish great things thanks to their mother’s decision to choose life.
From Ms. magazine:
From Ms. magazine:
10 Questions for Anti-Choice Candidates
Amanda Marcotte posted an interesting rant at Double X yesterday about the cognitive dissonance between the desire of anti-choice individuals to make abortion illegal and their unwillingness to address the legal issues that would arise if that happened:
The widespread delusion that advocating for bans on abortion won’t mean that abortion is, you know, banned, runs so deep that if you ask a typical anti-choice obsessive how much time women should do for breaking the law they wished existed, they straight up can’t answer the question because they’ve quite literally never thought that banned means banned.
Click the link above and you’ll see what she means–many anti-choice individuals haven’t ever thought about that detail before. It made me think: There are a lot of questions I’d like to ask candidates running for office over the next year.
1. How many years do you consider to be a fair prison term for a woman who has an abortion?
2. How many years for a doctor who performs one?
3. Will the punishments be greater the second time around?
4. Where will the state get the money necessary to prosecute one-third of all American women for this crime?
5. Forty-two percent of women who have an abortion have incomes below 100 percent of the federal poverty level (that’s $10,830 for a single woman with no children, if you’re counting). When women are forced to have children they cannot afford to raise, will those children become wards of the state or simply new Medicaid recipients? Where will the state find the money necessary to support them?
6. Will you be willing to watch your wife die in front of you when her life is threatened by an unsafe pregnancy that no one is allowed to do anything about? Your daughter?
7. Will rapists have to pay child support to women who are forced to have their children?
8. Will the child of incest be in the custody of its rapist father or the father’s teenaged daughter, his mother? In fact, 18 percent of women who have an abortion in America are teenagers. Will they be required to drop out of high school to raise their children or will the state provide free childcare?
9. Will upper-class white women be prosecuted as vigorously as other women who have abortions?
10. You are aware that upper-class white women have abortions, aren’t you?
Help me out here, what else would you like to have asked? The only way to hold people accountable for their views is to question them relentlessly. These people are running for office–ask them what kind of society they envision creating.
.
Tuesday, November 01, 2011
On the Library and Occupy Denver
The library reminds me of childhood, of feeling safe and content, of feeling endless possibilities.
I love books.
I love taking books home with me.
I do not love the fines I tend to incur when I fail to return those loved (and lost, infinitely misplaced) books.
I nervously handed the librarian my driver's license, clutching a torn envelope with my address on it just in case. He informed me that I wasn't in the system - thank god they don't remember me - and then told me to apply for a new card.
Five minutes later, I had a brand new library card in my hand.
It was honestly hard to contain my excitement. I wanted to just open the first book I could see and breathe in its bookish smell.
(I didn't. I have realized that perhaps smelling books that have been touched by the population of any city may not be the best of ideas.)
At one point, I had eight books in my arms.
E and I wandered through the stacks, picking and choosing and chatting.
I will not be able to aptly describe the feeling of contentment that flooded my soul.
I pared my choices down to six.
Desmond Tutu didn't make it.
(He was replaced with a romance novel, but shhh, don't tell him that.)
Saturday, K (oh dear - now I have two K's; this may get tangled) and I went Halloween costume shopping. I needed a tutu and he needed everything. After we stopped at a vintage store, we saw a ton of cop cars headed toward Occupy Denver, and since he'd never been, we went to have a look. I tried to explain it all to him, but realized that it's a lot harder to encapsulate concisely now that everything seems to have fallen apart.
I love books.
I love taking books home with me.
I do not love the fines I tend to incur when I fail to return those loved (and lost, infinitely misplaced) books.
I nervously handed the librarian my driver's license, clutching a torn envelope with my address on it just in case. He informed me that I wasn't in the system - thank god they don't remember me - and then told me to apply for a new card.
Five minutes later, I had a brand new library card in my hand.
It was honestly hard to contain my excitement. I wanted to just open the first book I could see and breathe in its bookish smell.
(I didn't. I have realized that perhaps smelling books that have been touched by the population of any city may not be the best of ideas.)
At one point, I had eight books in my arms.
E and I wandered through the stacks, picking and choosing and chatting.
I will not be able to aptly describe the feeling of contentment that flooded my soul.
I pared my choices down to six.
Desmond Tutu didn't make it.
(He was replaced with a romance novel, but shhh, don't tell him that.)
Saturday, K (oh dear - now I have two K's; this may get tangled) and I went Halloween costume shopping. I needed a tutu and he needed everything. After we stopped at a vintage store, we saw a ton of cop cars headed toward Occupy Denver, and since he'd never been, we went to have a look. I tried to explain it all to him, but realized that it's a lot harder to encapsulate concisely now that everything seems to have fallen apart.
On some level, I still agree with the protesters. I see that the greed of our economic policies, leaders, bankers, etc. has gone overboard.
But I also don't see why you'd endanger your health to sleep outside in the snow or why you'd risk arrest just you could disrespect a police officer. Things have shifted drastically in recent days, and I'm finding myself more and more removed from the movement. I no longer think the people protesting are so adamant about their beliefs and goals, and instead, seem to have let a variety of distractions get in their way.
That, and hearing that there's been conflicts with the police that were instigated by protesters, is slightly off-putting. There's no need for violence and there's certainly no need for violence against the people who are supposed to protect you. Granted, the police may not always react appropriately or respectfully, but they need to know that they at least have the respect of the protesters. Otherwise, something violent will happen that could seriously endanger lives.
On Jumbled Thoughts and Butterflies
"May today there be peace within.
May you trust that you are exactly where you are meant to be.
May you not forget the infinite possibilities that are born of faith in yourself and others.
May you use the gifts that you have received, and pass on the love that has been given to you.
May you be content with yourself just the way you are.
Let this knowledge settle into your bones, and allow your soul the freedom to sing, dance, praise and love.
It is there for each and every one of us."
May you trust that you are exactly where you are meant to be.
May you not forget the infinite possibilities that are born of faith in yourself and others.
May you use the gifts that you have received, and pass on the love that has been given to you.
May you be content with yourself just the way you are.
Let this knowledge settle into your bones, and allow your soul the freedom to sing, dance, praise and love.
It is there for each and every one of us."
-From an email sent by Aunt S.
I know it's a lame forward, but I don't think anybody can surround themselves with too much good. So, there you go, some good for the day.
I'm not going to lie, I've been way too happy to even think about blogging anything.
Literally. It's like when things are going really well, I can't write. My fingers stop working.
Saturday: I had one of those really perfect, rare evenings where you stay up all night talking about everything. I got like two hours of sleep, but it was so worth it. I'm getting butterflies for the first time in a long time.
Halloween was a massive success. Between a house party, a bar adventure, and a laid back cider-y evening, I managed to enjoy myself immensely.
Last night, J hung up the phone and then looked at me. "Do you talk really fast?" he asked, but before I had time to react, he said, "Never mind. You talk a lot, but you don't talk fast."
It's sad but true.
We had a wonderful evening. I had wanted to sit on the porch drinking cider and pass out candy to trick-or-treaters, however, there were none. So instead, K came over to join J and Mike and me for dinner. We had Thai (thank god I didn't have to cook) and I made really good spiked cider and cookies. Between that and football, I think we were set.
Seriously. I have nothing to say. This is so lame. I keep smiling. It's weird.
I'm going to the library to see about getting a library card. That should at least be a good story.
Sunday, October 30, 2011
...on me being an idiot
...as it turns out, it was a legit date.
We hashed it out last night. All is well.
Turns out there might be more non-dates that are actually dates in the future.
I carved a pumpkin today!
More to come.
We hashed it out last night. All is well.
Turns out there might be more non-dates that are actually dates in the future.
I carved a pumpkin today!
More to come.
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