Isn’t it fascinating that the voice of God always sounds suspiciously like one’s own voice? When politicians start citing God as the authority for whatever they want to do, they are usually promoting some policy that defies human reason.
I'll admit it, I watch the occasional episode of the Family Guy. One night as we watched an episode before my favorite TV show, I marvelled at the juxtapositioning of the two.
Anyway, as part of their Christmas special, they featured a cartoon of KISS saves Santa -- which reminded me a little too much of all those 80's cartoons I used to adore (20! years ago).
... aren't nearly as fun as Arrivals -- at least, not when you're the one who's being left behind.
She blogs again! For the past week and a half, my parents have been visiting/spoiling me, hence the lack of posts. I just dropped my parents off at the airport. They're leaving the "balmy" -21 Saskatoon temps for the South (Richmond, VA) once again. It's been a good visit.
Hearing my dad admit that the last US Congress really was a "do-nothing" Congress -- anytime my dad admits to Republican faults, Armageddon is nigh
Introducing my folks to Thrills gum ("still tastes like soap!")
Having them feel my baby kick, and seeing the looks on their faces when they saw how big my belly is
Listening to the baby's heartbeat with them at the doctor's office
Taking them out to coffee/lunch/supper with several of you
Opening Christmas presents (and better yet, watching their reactions as they opened the presents from us)
Lots of conversations, laughs, embarrassing stories
Watching Christmas movies and listening to Christmas music (finally, someone else who appreciates them as much as I do!)
Going baby-stuff shopping with my mom, and oooh-ing and aaah-ing over the little things for my little one
Watching my dad rig a new deep-freezer on the top of my trunk, using a block heater cord and jumper cables (he later bought me some rope and bungee cords)
Filling said deep-freeze with lots of casseroles and food in prep for baby arrival
Speaking of which, watching my dad play sous-chef, Mr. Fix It, and sappy grandpa-to-be
Introducing the folks to BK's Veggie Burgers and my favorite Asian restaurant
Setting up the nursery (pictures to follow on the baby blog)
and the best part -- coming downstairs every morning to company.
The house feels awfully empty now. It's visits like these that really make me feel the distance between myself and my family. While I have amazing friends to fill in my missing family gap, it's still not any easier walking away from that departure gate.
EDIT (11:45AM): Well, I got very little sleep last night (due to setting up nursery and getting up at 4AM to take parents to airport), so I crashed pretty hard around 7am or so this morning -- only to wake up just now and hear that their plane was "defective" and they ended up waiting in line at the Saskatoon airport for THREE HOURS to rebook new seats. Here I was oblivious to it all, as I was sleeping like the gestating dead.
Anyway, all's well that ends -- they're going to be back on the pathway home in about an hour and a half, flying first class the whole way (with some coupons for money off their next flight, too!).
EDIT (part two): Maybe it's the wacky pregnancy hormones, but I'm really homesick all of a sudden.
EDIT (yet again): I just heard from them again, this time they're stuck in Minneapolis. They volunteered to be bumped off the flight, and now they've got two FREE vouchers to come see us in the Spring (along with a free hotel/food voucher for tonight). They're also letting us use the Saskatoon vouchers they got this morning, so that we can save some money if we decide to fly down for a visit this summer. Pretty good way to end an evening.
Scene: My parents and I are having breakfast around the table when Dido's song Christmas Day comes on my Mp3 player.
Mom: Oooh, I like this song. Who sings it? Me: Dido. Do you know the background behind her name? Mom: [blushing] Um, isn't it a ... sex toy? Me: It's not DILDO! Mom: Oh, okay. I always thought it was a horrible name a mother could give a child.
[When responding to the bishop of Oxford, after he asked if Huxley traced his gorilla heritage from his grandfather or his grandmother]
"I should feel it no shame to have risen from such an origin; but I should feel it a shame to have sprung from one who prostituted the gifts of culture and eloquence to the service of prejudice and of falsehood."
My mom reminded me of this picture today on her blog -- along with some special memories I have of Christmases past. While the meaning of the holiday is a bit different for me these days, there are some elements of it that are undeniably tied to me, and the way I approach the season.
And now that I'm done with my work, I can really focus on getting into that holiday spirit. Today Jerry and I even braved the crazyness that is a Saskatoon shopping centre, in pursuit of some last-minute additions to our Christmas list.
Tomorrow my folks fly in for a visit of a little over a week. Luckily for them, the temperatures look fairly survivable (well, for someone from Virginia, anyway).
Now's also the time to finally focus on baby-preparations. As someone who's already caught the "nesting" bug full-force, I'm sure my husband will be glad to pass on the baton of accompanying me on my quest for the most perfect dirty-clothes basket for the baby's room.
Wendy tagged me earlier this week, and since it was her birthday on Wednesday, the least I could do is indulge my favorite Guyanese-Canadian birthday grrrl.
Five things about me (you probably didn't care to know):
In first grade (or "grade one," if you live in Canada), there were two Beckys in the class. I had to decide to either go by Rebekah or Becky Jo. I chose the latter, and for the first (and only) time in my life, I had one hick of a name. One of my favorite ornaments on my tree is from my best friend Mindy, and it's addressed to one Becky Jo.
I've had plastic surgery. In high school I had a cyst develop on left side of my upper lip, and went to a plastic surgeon so that the scarring wouldn't be too bad.
When I sleep at night, I tend to burrow into the covers and I like to have a pillow over my head. It's a bad habit I got into when I had loud dorm roommates, and after baby comes along, I have a feeling I'll have to break myself out of it.
I'm a closeted Barbra Streistand fan -- I used to get a new movie of hers every Christmas. My favorites are Funny Girl and The Way We Were.
I'm FINISHED marking papers for the semester -- final grades submitted and everything. Now I can concentrate on Christmas and having a baby next month. (phew)
Enlighten me with some unknown characteristics about yourself in the comments below.
I love this headline from a quirky fundamentalist "news" service: Soy is Making Kids Gay. (you couldn't make up a funnier parody -- and it's a legit headline!)
From the article:
Soybean products are feminizing, and they're all over the place. You can hardly escape them anymore.
I have nothing against an occasional soy snack. Soy is nutritious and contains lots of good things. Unfortunately, when you eat or drink a lot of soy stuff, you're also getting substantial quantities of estrogens.
Estrogens are female hormones. If you're a woman, you're flooding your system with a substance it can't handle in surplus. If you're a man, you're suppressing your masculinity and stimulating your "female side," physically and mentally.
In fetal development, the default is being female. All humans (even in old age) tend toward femininity. The main thing that keeps men from diverging into the female pattern is testosterone, and testosterone is suppressed by an excess of estrogen.
... Soy is feminizing, and commonly leads to a decrease in the size of the penis, sexual confusion and homosexuality. That's why most of the medical (not socio-spiritual) blame for today's rise in homosexuality must fall upon the rise in soy formula and other soy products.
To give the author some credit, this is the most amusing argument I've heard so far from the head-in-the-metaphorical-sand side of the homosexuality debate in debunking the biological arguments. Who knew an excess of tofu had such (gasp) devastating effects?
Seriously, though, this is just another instance of the I-can't-believe-the-Religious-Right-is-going-there type of arguments. I post it here not because I take it seriously, but because I think it's seriously amusing.
This article reminds me of the past Daddy Dobson arguments that alert parents to be wary of their boy-child showing too much emotion and/or playing girly games -- you never know, he might turn out to be gay, and then you're stuck sending him off to degayification summer camp.
It's just not Christmas until you've watched this scene from Merry Christmas, Mr. Bean:
Christy blogged about a new addition to her family's nativity scene, which reminded me of what we used to do to ours, when we were growing up. A tradition we'd started as kids was to do something different to our nativity, and wait until our mom finally noticed (and reacted to!) it.
Once we put Superman in the place of the ArchAngel, guarding Jesus. My favorite addition was when we took our little brother's GI Joe machine guns and armed the Wise Men (effectively turning them into "wise guys").
Just when I think I'm out I can't get any bigger, they pull me back in I grow even MORE!
It's unavoidably obvious that I'm pregnant now. From the expanded girth I see in reflections, to the gazes of passersby looking at my midsection, I'm noticeable in a way I've never been.
Part of it is really fun -- I get to cut in front of washroom lines, and some people go out of their way to be nice to me. Last night I was at a party with some members of Jerry's family, and it was nice to have them fawn over me with their support. A girl could get used to the extra attention! (especially the offers of drink refills and plates of food delivered)
According to most of my books/email newsletters, the baby inside weighs almost 5 pounds now. It's hard to believe that in the next 6 weeks this little one will almost double in size (by some estimations). Every morning I wake up and look in the mirror, I swear I've grown.
By the end of this week, my workload will be finished (in terms of marking papers), and I can finally start preparing for this little one to enter the world.
In my sinus-congested state, I nearly forgot that two years ago yesterday a certain boy grabbed a certain grrrl's hand during a viewing of Lost in Translation.
I suppose it's fitting that the tagline for the film is "Everyone wants to be found" --
I'm stuck at home with a sinusy cold, and of my three channels, my choices are:
Red Green (ick, now there's some Canadiana I cannot get into)
a soap opera, heavy on the soap
and Dr. Phil's annual Christmas giveaway show. I cannot stand giveaway shows, be them Dr. Phil or Oprah. There's nothing worse than a bunch of greedy audience members screaming at the top of their lungs over the latest fad beauty product freebie. Yet today's Dr. Phil ick-factor is magnified because his creepy plastic wife is helping pass out stuff.
I suppose this is Fate's message to me to finish marking this last batch of student reports, and get onto the towering pile of final exams that await.
[Brad] Stine's daylong revival meeting, which he calls "GodMen," is cruder than most. But it's built around the same theory as the other experimental forums: Traditional church worship is emasculating.
... In fact, men taking charge is a big theme of the GodMen revival. At what he hopes will be the first of many such conferences, in a warehouse-turned- nightclub in downtown Nashville, Stine asks the men: "Are you ready to grab your sword and say, 'OK, family, I'm going to lead you?' " He also distributes a list of a real man's rules for his woman. No. 1: "Learn to work the toilet seat. You're a big girl. If it's up, put it down." [read the rest here]
Lovely. Whenever I encounter testosterone-driven mentalities like these, all I can think of is "someone's compensating." It doesn't matter if some guy peels out in a parking lot somewhere or they're talking up Pauline epistles in church, these attitudes just show me that there's some inadequacy that needs serious deflecting.
The other day I wrote about my bemused interest in Hollywood's latest "spiritualized money-grab" (words deliberately chosen) -- the Nativity film. I particularly liked the irony of the actor who plays Mary customarily not being invited to its premiere, given her young/unmarried/pregnant status.
Turns out there's more in the works for North America's favorite marketing segment -- it looks like Rocky VI ("Rocky Gets Pummeled into Retirement") is being marketed directly at the religious market segment. I suppose Stallone is taking a page from Gibson, and is sending out promotional materials to churches in order to get ministers to send their flocks out to the theatre in this ultimate "redemption" story. (gag)
Check it out: There's a whole "resource" website that churches can use in promoting preaching the film.
The best part of this story? It looks like a "Christian Rambo" film is next on Stallone's list. Seriously. From (my personal favorite) Focus on the Family:
So, what's next for Stallone?
I can only imagine Rambo sneaking into Burma to free Christian missionaries who are being held by militants. And, as the invincible one-man army looks into the eyes of the ordinary folks from Oklahoma and South Carolina who are risking their lives for the Gospel, he is swept up by their commitment.
Oh, wait.
I'm. Not. Kidding.
"It rekindles something in him. He doesn't believe at first, he's seen too much. He's bitter. But when he meets these people and looks into their eyes, he's swept up in it, and literally he's just taken on this journey," Stallone said. "He's a Christian warrior! Can you believe it?" [link]
I must have missed the "thou shalt blow away thy neighbor with semi-automatic weapons" commandment.
This would be uproariously funny if it wasn't so sad at the same time.
[story found via The Evangelical Right "The Internet's Home For Sinners Destined To Be Left Behind". The best line in their post about Rocky VI? "Of course, given Stallone's age it makes perfect sense that he'd find Jesus. After all, it would take divine intervention for the Italian Stallion to actually win a fight at this point."]
This weekend the film Blood Diamond comes out. So far, it's holding a little over 60% on Rotten Tomatoes, so it could be a decent film. I don't honestly know much about it -- but I do know about the issue of blood diamonds.
One of the things that intrigued Jerry about me was the fact that I didn't want an engagement ring. Not only am I not keen on jewelry (or the patriarchal traditions surrounding the giving of engagement rings), but all the controversy surrounding diamonds in Africa really turned me off on wearing one on my hand for the rest of my life. I know, I know, you can investigate where your diamond is from (and you SHOULD), but the connotation of what happens in Africa would still be in my mind everytime I looked down on my finger. So the two of us just stuck with our Celtic Link wedding rings, instead.
Anyway, I hope that there's some good that comes from Leo's latest flick -- hopefully it'll inspire some social awareness in the minds of Western consumers next time they're looking to go down upon one knee.
(and if anyone catches the flick, do let me know what you think of it!)
Participating Planned Parenthood health centers across the country will distribute free emergency contraception (EC) to women and men 18 and older tomorrow, Wednesday, December 6. EC lowers the risk of pregnancy when taken within 120 hours of intercourse, however the sooner EC is taken, the lower the risk of pregnancy. If EC is taken within 24 hours of intercourse, it can reduce the risk of pregnancy by up to 95 percent. [via]
Candlelight Vigil - 6:30pm - City Hall Civic Square In recognition of the 14 women tragically killed at Ecole Polytechnique in Montreal on December 6, 1989.
Interactiv(ist) Cafe - 7:00pm - Frances Morrison Library (basement) There will be a brief panel discussion on violence against women (participants will represent a variety of community groups) followed by an open mike portion for anyone else who would like to speak. I believe there will also be a slide show, a moment of silence, and a musical piece.
For more information, please call 966-2984 Organized by the Saskatoon Women's Community Coalition, the USSU Women's Centre, and the USSU Victim Advocate
I'll be off to my second of prenatal education classes tonight, but I'll be there in spirit.
Issue #4 of Geez Magazine came in the mail yesterday -- its headline reads, "Let's get Evangelical," and features a couple reading in bed. The mom's book title is "How to Raise a Godly Teenager," and has a picture of Benny Hinn on the back. I love it.
It should serve as a lovely distraction from the final reports & exams I have left to mark.
[a few articles from this issue can be found online here]
Have you heard about this? Just in time to rake in the holiday financial goodwill, Hollywood's released a filmic nativity story. Granted, I'd argue this probably has better qualities than a 2.5 hour crucifixion scene -- but when will religious folk realize that the intentions behind these projects aren't as lofty as they'd seem?
I wouldn't even bother posting about this, but I'm fascinated by the film's "premiere" at the Vatican a few weeks ago. Apparently the film's star, Keisha Castle-Hughes (same girl from Whale Rider), was ceremonially uninvited from the premiere. Why?
I just got my loan consolidation disclosure statement/repayment schedule in the mail. I've got at least a 10 year financial millstone now securely fashioned against my neck -- but what was really surprising is that my lender automatically enrolled me in a 25-year repayment plan. Sure, there's lower payments, but by the time you're finished actually paying off your loan, you've basically paid off the same amount of your loan principal in the amount of interest you've accumulated over the years.
Ugh, looking at these numbers of what I owe just makes me feel sick inside.
Moral of the story: stay AWAY from student loans. Far, far away -- unless you plan on having a career that will ensure you pay them off in a timely manner.
While I'm glad I was able to get a fixed interest rate (4.75%, to go down to 3.25% after 18 months) -- I'm still in shock over what's ahead of me, financially.
Maybe it's good I get this shock to the system, before I go out and buy Christmas gifts. Granted, I was going to make homemade gifts this year -- but at this rate (and according to how I feel right now), I may just have to stick with the extremely frugal side of things this holiday season.
Ugh.
[Can I also just mention how extremely UNhelpful Sallie Mae telemarketers are? Of the 3 times I was transferred to different numbers, I'm pretty sure I was outsourced 2 of the 3 times to non-English speaking operators.]
