'The Revenge of Ned Flanders'

"If you win by moral values, you can also die by moral values. By courting conservative Christians with a family values agenda, Republicans set themselves up as the party of superior morality. And when their glass house started to crumble, the very voters they had worked so hard to become active participants in the democracy turned on them."

The BBC reports on the swift change in American power

Ban organized religion, says Elton John.

Now, the question is - do I send this to my parents?

They could add it to their "Peace & Security!" pile of clippings!*



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(*This isn't going to make much sense to any of you non XJWs.)

The phrase "things fall apart" has been ringing in my ears the past couple of days.

It doesn't take a lot to make me happy and so Sunday was a very good day - I enjoyed having a room full of friends to sit with again. Especially nice, geeky ones who like a good scavenger hunt once in a while.

But other recent occurences have been been bringing me down a bit. My sister left on Monday night. And I spoke with my parents for the first time in six or more months (I stopped keeping track) on Friday and then saw them on Saturday. I learned from them that my beloved cousin's marriage disolved less then a year after it began due to some sort of abuse... but they weren't clear on what.

I didn't think I cared anymore about what went on in that 'other world' but it seems I still do because I'm so pained to think of her pain. And I want to call her but... at the same time I'm afraid to.

Another thought in my mind of late is that even friendships which survived the transition won't necessarily last forever, even though I hope they will.

People change. Am I changing?

Maybe so slowly that I don't even notice.

The Polls are in...

... and the Scavengirthdayparty was a success.

Its funny how fast good days go by. Yesterday is all a blur now.

A good blur, though.

A blur of lots of laughter and excitement.

Getting things started initially was a bit stressful. From past experience in organizing things like scavenger hunts or treasure hunts, I have learned that the breaking point of the event is when everyone gathers together to divide into 'teams.' With a fair number of people - some of whom know each other, some of whom don't, some of whom get along with everyone, some of whom don't - the challenge lies in creating teams in which no one will kill each other and everyone will have fun. The catch for the planners/hosts of said event is that sacrifice may be necessary in order for everyone else to have a good time. The sacrifice may be in using yourself as the 'social glue' in a team that would otherwise be dysfunctional - being the glue means everyone else gets to have fun but it can be a precarious balancing act of willed tactfulness and self-control.

Yesterday, when the team organizing process started to get out of control I decided to go and hide in the kitchen until it was all over, cowardly leaving it to Colin and Sarah to get everything settled. It was decided to use the democratic method of names drawn from a hat and soon I was being passed a handful of team member names to hold onto. (Later I learned that the hat method was not as simple as it was meant to be due to some confuffle on our dear ninja's side. *sigh* Silly ninja.) However, democracy was soon forfeit as everyone began to barter themselves onto more desirable teams in which they would know more people or feel more comfortable.

I soon ended up on a team (and we won't say how) that was altogether desirable - one person I didn't know but wanted to know and two people I knew and liked very much and wanted to spend more time with.

Soon everything was settled and there was a mad dash for the door to put on shoes, grab coats, take instruction sheets... and the race began.

Whoops! I mean, there was no race! See, Sarah and I had the good fortune to participate in a scavenger hunt a few weeks back. It was a car rally style scavenger hunt - like ours was - but in this one you didn't need to get out of your car to get answers for the scavenging questions. This may have appeared to be a brilliant idea for the Hunt organizers, but in reality it was a huge pain as it involved slowly driving a car up and down streets with other cars honking behind you as you frantically scanned buildings for the answers to clues. And as the driver in that particular hunt, it was no fun at all because of the hell of having multiple directions yelled at one and having to avoid hitting other vehicles... you get the picture.

So yesterday's hunt was much more relaxed as the oh-so-smart Sarah had intelligently planned the hunt around a few key locations in Winnipeg so that we could park and leave the car behind and walk around for what we needed.

To be continued...

I've been thinking a lot about school (as usual) and about what to do once I finish (as usual). A lot of times it seems that I think more about school then I actually am in school or doing school work...

Anyways...

One of the after-degree possibilities that interests me is the JET program (which has captured my imagination ever since I heard about it from a boy I used to date who was getting his Masters in English).

And so a few days ago I started to look up info on it and in the process I stumbled on to this absolutely awesome blog called An Englishman in Nyu-gun. Sadly, the guy who wrote it has stopped writing since leaving Japan and returning to the UK but there are still a good two years of posts to wade through.

It seems a common thing that 'expats' encounter cultural differences between our Western world and that of Japan - and Lewis the Englishman writes about many of them with hilarity.

My three favorite anecdotes so far are: bear bells, Japanese national holidays, and the samba-playing coffee machine.

In the spirit of global brotherhood and inter-cultural understanding, go and check them out!

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved, and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

JOHN MCRAE


Its simple but powerful. Isn't it?

I'm debating wearing the poppy this year. Its the meaning behind it I always feel confusion over. By wearing the poppy am I simply saying "I remember" all of the soliders (and civillians?) who've fallen in times of war? Or by wearing it am I silently giving my agreement and approval of warfare and saying that I believe that patriotism is a cause worth dying for?

I've never worn one before and I'm not sure I should start now. Supposedly there are white poppies you can get but I'm not sure where to find them...

I guess my fear is that by not wearing a poppy I'm being... disrespectful, unappreciative. I hate the idea of the older generation thinking the younger generation really has forgotten - because by no means have I.

Lately, I've been indulging my Anglophilia by reading a lot of British novels and watching a lot of British movies (and by a lot, I mean some because UNICEF/Boo stuff is currently consuming a lot of my time). I finished up Jane Eyre and loved it. Then I watched and read A Room With A View. Most recently I watched the BBC miniseries adaption of Middlemarch and now plan to read the book.

I'm finding that instead of being put off by movie versions of books, lately I'm being so inspired by them that I go out and find the book immediately after watching the movie - just so that I can read for myself all of the details that I know have been left out of (or botched up in) the screen play.

Anyways, Middlemarch was excellent. Extremely long, but excellent. It took me almost two and a half weeks to get through the entire thing - I think it was about 7 hours long! Which was annoying (damn those movie late fees!) but wonderful - to have something that good not be over in an hour. Happiness is a British miniseries!

(And chocolate - one cannot forget chocolate.)

There's a quote at the very end of the Middlemarch series that gave me tingles and the cinematography of the scene is beautiful itself, too.* So when Colin came home from the studio, there I was, scribbling it down into my notebook with the close-captioning on. I'm not even certain its a direct quote from the book; guess I'll find out when I start reading it...

"And Dorothea...

She had no dreams of being praised above other women, feeling that there was always something better which she might have done, if only she had been better, and known better.

Her full nature spent itself in deeds which left no great name on the earth, but the effect of her being on those around her was incalculable.

For the growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts, and on all of those Dorotheas who live faithfully their hidden lives, and rest in unvisited tombs."

George Eliot's MIDDLEMARCH

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*And when I Googled it, I was led to this discussion group of mostly women who gathered to discuss what the movie and book meant to them.... back in 1997.

I know its just a small insignificant page, but when I stumble onto some neat-little-coincidence-of-a-site like that I'm struck again by how amazing and cool this crazy thing called the Internet really is. Especially a site where it feels like you've come across... well, footprints in the sand as it were: you can see people were gathered there once, where they are now no one knows, but cyber traces of them remain - their words have taken on a strange kind of immortality.

I love this story...


The most visible action of CORE in the movement was the Freedom Rides, designed to test the federal law prohibiting discrimination on interstate public transportation. Small interracial groups boarded Greyhound and Trailway buses, beginning in Washington, D.C. They found that the "colored" and "white" signs had been removed in the bus stations of Virginia and they encountered no problems until they crossed into Alabama.

In Anniston, Alabama, their bus was fire bombed and the riders were beaten with sticks and had rocks thrown at them as they tried to get off. One sixty-year-old man went into cardiac arrest. When the riders were taken to the hospital, no one would treat them. The hospital demanded that they leave, but this seemed impossible because an angry crowd surrounded the building. Fortunately for the riders, a caravan of fifteen cars, led by Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth of Birmingham, showed up to rescue them.

As Hank Thomas, one of the Freedom Riders recalled "everyone one of those cars had a shotgun in it. And Fred Shuttlesworth had got on the radio and said – you know Fred, he's very dramatic – 'I'm going to get my people… I'm a non-violent man, but I'm going to get my people!"

The issue of armed self-defense highlighted one of the many differences in approach among those committed to non-violence. CORE and SCLC members were always unarmed during demonstrations and actions. Some like King and Lawson were committed to principles of non-violence as a way of life. Others like Shuttlesworth were committed to non-violence as a tactic, but reserved the right of self-defense. For hundreds of participants in demonstrations, non-violence was a useful and pragmatic tactic. Ernest Green pointed out the logic of non-violence in his situation as one of nine black high school students daily surrounded by hundreds of potentially hostile Whites – police and parents, as well as the other students at Little Rock's Central High. The white South had always held the upper hand in terms of guns and arms. To respond in kind would have been disastrous. Furthermore, the unarmed presence of demonstrators revealed the violence inherent in maintaining white supremacy. When dogs and fire hoses were turned on praying people in Birmingham, it was clear to even casual observers who the aggressors were. Or as King wrote in his "Letter from a Birmingham Jail," "we who engage in non-violent direct action are not the creators of tension. We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive."

from Chapter 11 "The Civil Rights Movement: Participatory Democracy and Nonviolence in Action" in the book The Missing Peace: The Search for Nonviolent Alternatives in United States History

Did you know that of the original, ancient Seven Wonders of the World, only the Pyramid of Giza remains?

Did you know that there's a competition under way to choose the new 7 Wonders of the World?

Go here to cast your vote!

There's nothing more attractive then church-strutting, is there?


(Yes, yes, I know - but I didn't really want an answer.)

(The image is from Final Fantasy's Advent Children - one I've had saved on my PC for over 3 years now.)