HGF

A friend is still trying to get himself a job in another country.  I so envy the idea yet can find no way to go about it.  Personally, I have three countries I'd like to live and work in, at least for a while.  One of the countries is very close, yet cold, I spent a few weeks there 17-18 years ago and loved it.  AND it has everything I want, art culture, European sensibilities, gay marriage, health care, and a lot of it is seriously cool.  Oh let's not forget it's huge...and mostly empty. What's not to like?

The other is actually in Europe and I've never been there, but it does call to me.  I'm no ace at the language yet, but I intend to get better, and when I do...

It's neighbor, though much smaller has a seemingly impossible language yet appeals even more.  I'd so love to just pack it all in and go. Unfortunately I read this morning that their unemployment rate just topped 20 %.  I doubt they'll be embracing foreigners anytime soon. 

Perhaps it's the residuals of the funk I've been in all week.  But I love the idea.

This morning's rain is nixing the idea of riding the bike to work.  I was assured by our local weather persons that this wouldn't happen until AFTER I got home this afternoon.  Alas.

Still hoping for a new job this fall, love the current one it's just not full time and I need benefits, so there's that.

But tonight is martini's and dinner with friends. Tomorrow obligatory attendance at the students annual play festival, then right back to it on Sunday.

Well, nothing hateful to report on the Catholics for the second time this week.  Too bad too, I was spoiling for a fight.

And to a young friend in New Mexico who has just allowed himself to be cast  as Romeo in a production directed by his Dad.

Child!  Have I taught you nothing?

And so it goes:

Windy City

And no I'm not going to Chicago, wish I were.  It's just ridiculously windy here today.  Things getting blown over on the deck...must be spring in the Midwest.

Funk is still not over, but I'm hibernating today, so that should help.  I'm staying home, throwing pots, working out and reading stuff I'm behind on. Perhaps no interaction with people will help this funk lift and be gone.

I should figure out a way to take a vacation though, THAT would REALLY lift my spirits.

Maybe a trip to Chicago would be the right thing to do...hmm.

Anyway BP says there might just be a liittle more oil leaking out of that hole in the ocean floor than they first led us to believe. Therefore the price of shrimp is going up, joy. John McCain isn't really a Maverick. (quelle surprise)  California has the most polluted air in the nation. Tom Cruise's stink has rubbed off on his wife and now she'll be portraying our most beloved first lady Jackie Kennedy...on the History channel.  Jesse James and Sandra Bullock's marital problems are still of immense interest to the American public.

In short no surprises here today.

Perhaps that funk hasn't lifted quite yet.

And so it goes:

Funk-y (not the good kind btw)

Totally in a funk today, and yesterday for that matter.  Trying desperately to want what I have.  But the fact is that I want new everything.  New locale, new life, new relationship, new job, new car, name it I'm dissatisfied with it.

In fact a facebook friend tagged me in the note "The ABC's of me" and I'm waiting to respond.  Right now it'd be:

A-Anger
B-Bitterness
C-Contempt
D-Disdain


Well, you get the idea.

So, I'm thinking I need to sit down and make a pot or two.  Something to take my mind off whatever's got me in this foul humor.
 
And I've pretty much convinced myself that I'm taking Thursday off.  I may just stay in bed all day, but I need to NOT deal with ANYONE for a day. 

Well it appears to be a slow news day no new Catholic Priests have been exposed as molesters, no acts of god have destroyed any part of the earth, at least not since midnight, the PM of Britain has made a really stupid gaffe on the telly.

Oh! I HATE funks they suck.

Well, tomorrow is another day.

And so it goes:

Diablo Cody doesn't do her homework

People who are not from the midwest shouldn't be allowed to write about tornado weather. They absolutely never get it right. From that travesty Twister, in which people watched cows fly by the truck they were in, which got not one broken window from flying debris, to last nights embarrassment when John Corbett's character Max brings the gay neighbors some water "in case the pipes break"

ROFL

It's not a fucking earthquake you morons.

This is completely the fault of Diablo Cody. She's the writer, producer, executive producer and maybe the gofer as well on Showtime's United states of Tara. Cody hails from Chicago so this is doubly ridiculous, she knows better.

It was made all the funnier that they appeared to use an actual reporter from one of our,local stations to announce the Torando watch. The misspelling they made a big deal of several times, it was stupid. The Gregsons, you see live in the fictional/not fictional city of Overland Park, KS. Mind you I live right next to Overland Park, KS.

Do I recommend that John Corbett Diablo Cody et al descend on Overland Park and begin filming for several months a year? No NO A THOUSAND TIMES NO!

Do I recommend they stop insulting the populace of the city they've chosen for their locale? Well, yes, yes I do.

I've tried twice to watch this thing after a friend recommended it.

Can't do it.

Nurse Jackie yes, United states of Tara,no.

The Tudors and that overacting mess Jonathan Rhys-Myers? That's another matter altogether.

Showtime keeps my attention with Californication, the wonderful Weeds, Dexter, and now Nurse Jackie, but they're missing the boat with Tara and The Tudors.

Noticed yesterday that I'm gettin' itchy again about moving somewhere. And there's not one thing to keep me here this time. We'll see what comes up when I put it out there.

I don't know if it's me being burned out after March Madness on the job, or if the students are ready for this interminable semester to end, but they put,um, shall we say...not one scintilla of effort into last nights class. I finally gave up and let them go home half an hour early. I'm too old to do all the work here,it's their grade not mine.

See...itchy.

And so it goes:

Wouldn't it be loverly

 As always any article tht has something bad to say about the Catholic Church i am totaly interested.  and this one is terrific.  Personallly I think Hitchens is a bit of a nut, but he hits the nail (ahem) on the head with this article.  Maybe one day my dream of a Catholic Church with less political power and less influence will be a reality.   Free the masses from its evil influence I say.

I can dream, can't I?

 

Bring the Pope to Justice

Detain or subpoena the pope for questioning in the child-rape scandal? You must be joking! All right then, try the only alternative formulation: declare the pope to be above and beyond all local and international laws, and immune when it comes to his personal and institutional responsibility for sheltering criminals. The joke there would be on us.
The cause of the Catholic clergy's sex-abuse scandal is no mystery: insular groups of men often do bad things. So why not break up the all-male club?

 

The case for bringing the head of the Catholic hierarchy within the orbit of law is easily enough made. All it involves is the ability to look at a naked emperor and ask the question "Why?" Mentally remove his papal vestments and imagine him in a suit, and Joseph Ratzinger becomes just a Bavarian bureaucrat who has failed in the only task he was ever set—that of damage control. The question started small. In 2002, I happened to be on Hardball With Chris Matthews, discussing what the then attorney general of Massachusetts, Thomas Reilly, had termed a massive cover-up by the church of crimes against children by more than a thousand priests. I asked, why is the man who is prima facie responsible, Cardinal Bernard Law, not being questioned by the forces of law and order? Why is the church allowed to be judge in its own case and enabled in effect to run private courts where gross and evil offenders end up being "forgiven"? This point must have hung in the air a bit, and perhaps lodged in Cardinal Law's own mind, because in December of that year he left Boston just hours before state troopers arrived with a subpoena seeking his grand-jury testimony. Where did he go? To Rome, where he later voted in the election of Pope Benedict XVI and now presides over the beautiful church of Santa Maria Maggiore, as well as several Vatican subcommittees.
In my submission, the current scandal passed the point of no return when the Vatican officially became a hideout for a man who was little better than a fugitive from justice. By sheltering such a salient offender at its very heart, the Vatican had invited the metastasis of the horror into its bosom and thence to its very head. It is obvious that Cardinal Law could not have made his escape or been given asylum without the approval of the then pontiff and of his most trusted deputy in the matter of child-rape damage control, then cardinal Joseph Ratzinger.
Developments since that time have appalled even the most diehard papal apologists by their rapidity and scale. Not only do we have the letter that Cardinal Ratzinger sent to all Catholic bishops, enjoining them sternly to refer rape and molestation cases exclusively to his office. That would be bad enough in itself, since any person having knowledge of such a crime is legally obliged to report it to the police. But now, from Munich and Madison, Wis., and Oakland, come reports of the protection or indulgence of pederasts occurring on the pope's own watch, either during his period as bishop or his time as chief Vatican official for the defusing of the crisis. His apologists have done their best, but their Holy Father seems consistently to have been lenient or negligent with the criminals while reserving his severity only for those who complained about them.
As this became horribly obvious, I telephoned a distinguished human-rights counsel in London, Geoffrey Robertson, and asked him if the law was powerless to intervene. Not at all, was his calm reply. If His Holiness tries to travel outside his own territory—as he proposes to travel to Britain in the fall—there is no more reason for him to feel safe than there was for the once magnificently uniformed General Pinochet, who had passed a Chilean law that he thought would guarantee his own immunity, but who was visited by British bobbies all the same. As I am writing this, plaintiffs are coming forward and strategies being readied (on both sides, since the Vatican itself scents the danger). In Kentucky, a suit is before the courts seeking the testimony of the pope himself. In Britain, it is being proposed that any one of the numberless possible plaintiffs might privately serve the pope with a writ if he shows his face. Also being considered are two international approaches, one to the European Court of Human Rights and another to the International Criminal Court. The ICC—which has already this year overruled immunity and indicted the gruesome president of Sudan—can be asked to rule on "crimes against humanity"; a legal definition that happens to include any consistent pattern of rape, or exploitation of children, that has been endorsed by any government.
In Kentucky, the pope's lawyers have already signaled their intention to contest any such initiative by invoking "sovereign immunity," since His Holiness is also an alleged head of state. One wonders if sincere Catholics really desire to take refuge in this formulation. The so-called Vatican City, a political nonentity covering about 0.17 square miles of Rome, was created by Benito Mussolini in 1929 as part of his sweetheart deal between fascism and the papacy. It is the last survival of the political architecture of the Axis powers. Its bogus claim to statehood is now being used to give asylum to men like Cardinal Law.
In this instance the church damns itself both ways. It invites our challenge—this is where the appeal to the European Court of Human Rights becomes relevant—to its standing as a state. And it calls attention to the repellent origins of that same state. Currently the Holy See has it both ways. For example, it is exempt from the annual State Department Human Rights Report precisely because it is not considered a state. (It maintains only observer status at the United Nations.) So, if it now does want to claim full statehood, it follows that it should receive the full attention of the State Department for its "lay" policies, and, for that matter, the full attention of the Justice Department as well. (First order of business—why on earth are we not demanding the extradition of Cardinal Law? And why is this grave matter being left to private individuals to pursue?)
It is very difficult to resist the conclusion that this pope does not call for a serious investigation, or demand the removal of those responsible for a consistent pattern of child rape and its concealment, because to do so would be to imply the call for his own indictment. But meanwhile why are we expected to watch passively or wonder idly why the church does not clean its own filthy stable? A case in point: in 2001 Cardinal Castrillón of Colombia wrote from the Vatican to congratulate a French bishop who had risked jail rather than report an especially vicious rapist priest. Castrillón was invited this week to conduct a lavish Latin mass in Washington. The invitation was rightly withdrawn after a storm of outrage, but nobody asked why the cardinal could not be held as an accessory to an official Vatican policy that has exposed thousands of American children to rapists and sadists.
Only this past March did the church shamefacedly and reluctantly agree that all child rapists should now be handed over to the civil authorities. Thanks a lot. That was a clear admission that gross illegality, and of the nastiest kind, has been its practice up until now. Euphemisms about sin and repentance are useless. This is a question of crime—organized crime, by the way—and therefore of punishment. Or perhaps you would rather see the shade of Mussolini thrown protectively over the Vicar of Christ? The ancient Roman symbol of the fish is rotting—and rotting from the head.
Hitchens, a NEWSWEEK contributor, is a columnist for Vanity Fair and the author of God Is Not Great.

And so it goes: 

 

hgf

af, originally uploaded by redgirl2008.

youngsters deserve love too

hgf

Tommy lifts, originally uploaded by Hairy Jacques.

good work

hgf

Robin, originally uploaded by Hairy Jacques.

weeks end.

late post

Had to sub again today.  Got to teach my favorite stuff.  Neoclassicism, Romanticism, Realism, postmodernism.

It was a thrill a minute today.  I could barely stay awake and I was giving the lecture. 

one more class for thew eek, then a few days off. yeah!  The end is near I can feel it,  finals are coming soon.



And so it goes:

no idea who this lovely is, but thank Gods he takes his shirt off on camera.  

no time

Catholics are promising that "something" will be done about sex abuse.

Burning at the stake comes to mind. Let's start with Benny.

Well enough fun for today I have minds to bend.

And so it goes:

not the age of aquarius

Yesterday the planets were aligned against communication of any kind for me. I couldn't blog, the post simply would not publish. I couldn't get anything constructive done, i.e. I was trying to mail off something I needed to get out, and one thing went wrong after another.  THEN i went and tried to teach.  oy!

They were obtuse, obstinate and simply obnoxious.  I had a group that I assigned a scene to.  To make the scene more fair to all participants I added a page.  ONE FUCKING PAGE! Instead of starting on Page 101 they were to start on page 100.  After I explained it FOUR TIMES while I was trying to do something else, I took the book, went ACROSS THE FUCKING CAMPUS and made copies of THE ONE EXTRA FUCKING PAGE!!!! At the same time I assigned a scene to another group.  They were told at the outset that two of the three people in the scene didn't get a copy of the last page on which there were three lines, and that they'd have to share the one copy of that page until the break and then I'd go make copies.  THREE TIMES I explained this.  When I went to make copies I asked the one student who actually had the page to give it to me.

He gave me the wrong page.  Imagine how amused I was on the other side of campus trying to make copies a few minutes later. 

They did not have a good class after that.

Luckily the planets did a 180 for me a couple of hours later and I...well, shall we say that there is now a 24 year old skater boi to whom I am deeply grateful. Such a grand end to such a crappy day.


I've whined enough. Turning our attention to more important matters.

None of our struggles and none of our victories could prevent the following story from happening in 2010?

Greene v. County of Sonoma et al.

Clay and his partner of 20 years, Harold, lived in California. Clay and Harold made diligent efforts to protect their legal rights, and had their legal paperwork in place—wills, powers of attorney, and medical directives, all naming each other. Harold was 88 years old and in frail medical condition, but still living at home with Clay, 77, who was in good health.
One evening, Harold fell down the front steps of their home and was taken to the hospital. Based on their medical directives alone, Clay should have been consulted in Harold’s care from the first moment. Tragically, county and health care workers instead refused to allow Clay to see Harold in the hospital. The county then ultimately went one step further by isolating the couple from each other, placing the men in separate nursing homes.
Ignoring Clay’s significant role in Harold’s life, the county continued to treat Harold like he had no family and went to court seeking the power to make financial decisions on his behalf. Outrageously, the county represented to the judge that Clay was merely Harold’s “roommate.” The court denied their efforts, but did grant the county limited access to one of Harold’s bank accounts to pay for his care.
What happened next is even more chilling: without authority, without determining the value of Clay and Harold’s possessions accumulated over the course of their 20 years together or making any effort to determine which items belonged to whom, the county took everything Harold and Clay owned and auctioned off all of their belongings. Adding further insult to grave injury, the county removed Clay from his home and confined him to a nursing home against his will. The county workers then terminated Clay and Harold's lease and surrendered the home they had shared for many years to the landlord.
Three months after he was hospitalized, Harold died in the nursing home. Because of the county’s actions, Clay missed the final months he should have had with his partner of 20 years. Compounding this tragedy, Clay has literally nothing left of the home he had shared with Harold or the life he was living up until the day that Harold fell, because he has been unable to recover any of his property. The only memento Clay has is a photo album that Harold painstakingly put together for Clay during the last three months of his life.
With the help of a dedicated and persistent court-appointed attorney, Anne Dennis of Santa Rosa, Clay was finally released from the nursing home. Ms. Dennis, along with Stephen O'Neill and Margaret Flynn of Tarkington, O'Neill, Barrack & Chong, now represent Clay in a lawsuit against the county, the auction company, and the nursing home, with technical assistance from NCLR. A trial date has been set for July 16, 2010 in the Superior Court for the County of Sonoma.

Ed note- this isn’t a 20 year old story, it’s happening right now.   I’m constantly amazed at the apathy people exhibit when marriage and/or equal rights come up.  Apparently these kinds of things take them by complete surprise…how sad.

 

And so it goes:

enrique

asian man

asian man, originally uploaded by 333stavros.

Happy HGF!

Spammed

I don't think I've ever been spammed in the comments before.  I've gotten hate mail, I've been berated, I've received nonsensical comments that proved my point, but spam...no...not until today.  A comment that not only made no sense, but seemed to be a link to an ad.  Reject!

Overdid on the bike ride Tuesday, as a result I hobbled all day yesterday.  last night POP!  and the knee is fine now,  old joints, one never knows what they'll do...pun intended.

Today there's rain in our forecast so if I can ride it'll have to be soon, unfortunately I have to deal with the IRS, and finalize stuff from the teaching gig.  Also I have to devise a few questions for a test tonight.

So there may be no riding until Saturday.  Not my favorite day to ride, weekend warriors out everywhere.  It's like New Years eve, amateur night. They're all out there in their spandex gray hair sticking out from under their  helmets huffing and puffing up an eleven degree incline, and riding three abreast along the trail.  Ya' know I love 'em.

In fact while I was researching this I am across a short blog post on website from some guy in Indiana.   he found a blog on dutch cycling culture and re-posted from them.

While reading about Dutch Bicycle Culture at Willothewisp Blog, I came across this bit about Bike Helmets (and Lycra)... Awesome, really just the best.


I hate bike helmets as they are truly worthless ,really just a way for a few companies to make some cash. Pretty much all the safety legislation that causes helmet laws around the world originates from helmet manufacturers. Most all the research shows that helmets on cyclists are pretty much worthless ans some indicates that they may actually do more harm than good by transforming direct impact to rotational impact ,which is much more traumatic. Anyway, Here is the most excellent commentary from Holland.




This is extremely important; do NOT wear a helmet. Three types of people wear a helmet on a bike in Holland;


1. The English.
2. North Americans.
3. The mentally afflicted.


The English and Americans wear helmets because in their worlds common sense no longer rules and people must be safe from their own actions at all times. Also it is a well known fact that when Americans fall off a bike they fall on their heads, why this should be we do not know. God gave us each an ass, in fact he appears to have given many Americans more than one ass each and yet they do not use them, you have to wonder why. On the rare occasion a Dutchman comes off their bike we fall on our well padded behinds (and it’s ALWAYS the fault of a German motorist).


The only time you need to wear lycra when riding a bicycle is when you are a speed rider at a velodrome or riding in the Tour de France, there is not any other occasion when lycra and bicycles should be mixed together.


I never wear lycra, well not completely true I  do put on the padded shorts under my regular shorts so my ass isn't sore the next day.  But I see way too many people out there sporting lycra and those very special clickety-clicky shoes that clip onto the pedals which I am certain help those seniors add smiles to their miles.  Or maybe that's just the Trek store that's smiling when they go to the bank.  


Oh!  and the Catholics are at it again.  Those fuckers never disappoint when it comes to spewing hate and misinformation around the world.  today it's:

Top Catholic exorcist: Pedophiles tempted by Satan, not possessed

From Morgan Neill and Hada Messia, CNN


- "The devil tempts everyone -- people in politics, in economics, in sport. And naturally, he tempts, above all, the religious leaders, so you shouldn't be surprised if the devil tempts those in the Vatican. That's his job."
Father Gabriele Amorth isn't speaking metaphorically when he says that. The 85-year-old priest means people can be tempted and literally possessed by Satan.
"It's not my opinion: I'm saying that if you believe in the Gospels, you believe in the existence of the devil, in the devil's power to possess people," he said in an interview with CNN.
The faithful believe "that there are people possessed by the devil, and ... in the power of exorcism to liberate from the devil," he said.
And as the chief exorcist of the Roman Catholic Church, it's his job to expel the devil when someone is possessed. Amorth, the founder of the International Association of Exorcists, has performed more than 70,000 exorcisms in his career, he estimates.
But there is a difference between possession -- where the devil takes hold of someone's body and actions -- and temptation, where Satan lures a person into doing evil, he said.
As a child abuse scandal sweeps across Europe, with accusations being made against priests in Ireland, Germany, Austria and the Netherlands, Amorth said the pedophiles are tempted, not possessed.
He has never done an exorcism on a child molester, he said.
"I have carried out exorcisms on some priests who had been molested by the devil," he said, without going into details.
"But cases of pedophilia exorcised, no. ... Pedophiles are not possessed by the devil, they are tempted by the devil," he said.
"They don't need exorcism, they need to be converted, to be converted to God, that's what they need. They need to confess, they need true penitence, true repentance, that's what they need. They're not possessed."
But no one is too strong a believer to be possessed, said Amorth, who is employed by the Roman diocese.
"Nothing occurs without the permission of God, and he allows even holy people, even saints, to be possessed by the devil," he said.

But, he added, he sees no evil in the Vatican today: "I just see good people in the Vatican. People of prayer, holy people, I don't see any evil." 

And so it goes:

How do they do it?

I've become convinced that the Kansas City Royals are engaged in a conspiracy to make me have blood pressure issues. 

How is it possible to start he inning with a 3 run lead and by the and of it be down by 2?  My jaw and the floor are becoming well acquainted this spring.

Ray Lahood is my new hero.  Yes, you read that right, Former Republican Congressman Ray LaHood is da man!

He wants to give bicycling a voice in American transportation. I was dumbfounded when I read that on ridemonkey.  Amazing, someone realizes that it's a form of transportation and not just a toy.

Truckers associations are not happy with the notion they might have to share some of their tax booty though, you can bet they'll fight LaHood tooth and nail.

My case is this.  I live exactly 4.5 miles from one of my jobs.  I live 8.2 miles from the other job.  I could and would happily bike to both.  Problem?  No way to do it in any expedient manner without riding on a busy street, which in rush hour is not gonna happen.  Not only by my own safety standards,but by the simple logic that I'd get killed by some idiot either driving with a cell phone in one hand and a Jeep Cherokee in the other, or be purposely run down.  Yes I've had people aim their cars at me while riding on the shoulder.

There ARE  bits and pieces of bike paths between one of the jobs and here, but they're circuitous and patchwork, and they add time and miles to the ride. Why can there not be a bike path alongside those busy thoroughfares for us bike riders?

No reason at all, except money.  The RNC spent $1946 last month on a visit to Voyeur, I have to wonder how much bike path that would buy.

So props to y and the DOT!  It's one of the few reasons I think this administration will need to be a two-term administration. (If Sarah Palin would just get the nomination that'd be possible)

These past few days I've seen lots of cyclists on the road, and they're no longer bashful about taking their share of the road. unfortunately that'll stop when motorists pick off a few of them, which happens every year. I agree that the only way to get our share of the road is to take it and refuse to give it up to cars, but it's a risky proposition.


I don't see the Catholics in the news today. Which makes me wonder what they're up to. Gotta keep an eye on those bastards.

I may have been hasty in my appraisal of the college in the west.  I found a form on my desk that I should have sent with the packet on the 25th, they let me email it to them. This means several things 1. they did get  my packet. 2. The search committee hasn't made any decisions yet. 3. My concern that they haven't taken the job off the website yet is unfounded because I realized that they keep them up and post the addendum (interviews scheduled) (interviewing) etc. after the job title during the process.

So it may not be over after all. And that's only the job I'm interested in at this point, there should be others soon. April is renewal month after all.

A new computer may be in my future soon.  this one has crashed twice in the last week.  I'm pretty sure it's because of software I installed though so when I get a chance tomorrow I'm going to take it back off and hope the problem goes away.  A new computer isn't in the IRS's budget this month.  

Update:

I spoke too soon:

By Philip Pullella

updated 30 minutes ago

VATICAN CITY - Gay groups and politicians condemned Pope Benedict's number two on Wednesday for calling homosexuality a "pathology" and linking it directly to sexual abuse of children.

The comments made by Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone during a visit to Chile, and the controversy they caused, were splashed on mainstream Italian newspapers on Wednesday.

The French foreign ministry and some Catholic blogs that support the pope also condemned the cardinal's remarks.

---

As the scandal over sexual abuse of children by priests has spread, some in the Catholic Church have called for a review of the Church's rule that prohibits priests from marrying, saying marriage would allow priests to enjoy a healthy sex life.

Bertone, the Vatican secretary of state, who is sometimes called the "deputy pope," told a news conference in Santiago on Monday:

"Many psychologists and psychiatrists have shown that there is no link between celibacy and pedophilia, but many others have shown, I have recently been told, that there is a relationship between homosexuality and pedophilia.

"This pathology is one that touches all categories of people, and priests to a lesser degree in percentage terms," he said. "The behavior of the priests in this case, the negative behavior, is very serious, is scandalous."

Gay rights activists reacted with derision and outrage.

"This is a scientific absurdity. The World Health Organization calls homosexuality a variation of human behavior. It is pedophilia that is a pathology, a crime, not homosexuality," said Franco Grillini, a former parliamentarian who was at the vanguard of Italy's gay rights movement.

"Because they have their own problems with the abuse crisis and don't know how to handle it, they are trying to pass their 'cross' from their shoulders on to ours," Grillini told Reuters.

The French foreign ministry called it an "unacceptable linkage that we condemn."

Criticism from Catholic blogSome pro-Vatican Catholic blogs said more controversy was the last thing the Vatican needed.

"Pedophilia and homosexuality: Bertone trips up — again — on gays," read a post in the Italian-language "Blog of the Friends of Pope Ratzinger."

It said the pope might now have to "clean up the mess made by his right-hand man."

A front-page editorial in Rome's left-leaning La Repubblica newspaper titled "The Confusion in the Church" said Bertone's comments would end up causing the Church more "harm to itself, not homosexuals."

Bertone was also criticized by Alessandra Mussolini, a right-wing parliamentarian whose grandfather, wartime Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini, sent gays into internal exile.

"You can't link sexual orientation to pedophilia ... this link risks becoming dangerously misleading for the protection of children," Mussolini said.

ArciLesbica, Italy's main lesbian rights group, accused the Vatican of using "violent and deceptive statements" to divert attention from its abuse scandal and said Italian parents should consider removing their children from Church-run institutions.

The pope did not make any direct reference to the crisis facing the Church during his weekly general audience.

He may address the issue when he visits Malta this weekend. Ten Maltese men who are suing three priests for alleged child abuse have requested a private meeting with the pope.

Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said he could not say if a meeting would take place. The pope has met victims of sexual abuse during trips to the United States and Australia.

And so it goes:

Just did my taxes...oy!

 My first question while doing my taxes was "What the fuck did I do with all that money?

 My second question was "How in the hell am I going to pay this bill?" This is, of course in direct relation to my current underemployment status, which sucks, but I have this sneaking feeling that the IRS couldn't car less about my financial dilemma.    Fuckers.

ok,so I didn't get all that stuff done yesterday, cause I spent two ours doing my brothers taxes. I had thought I was through with theirs, but we got rejected by the IRS and thank GODS we did, cause we submitted the wrong draft and instead of a refund which they could then use to pay their state taxes, it said they owed...a lot.  So, I fixed all that, added something I'd omitted, and got them printed and mailed.  Thursday I have to pay the  piper.  Not a minute before.

Rode the bike a bit yesterday for the first time this year.  I'm feeling pretty good considering how far I rode.  I hadn't intended to go 10 miles but next thing I knew I was 5 miles out and having too much fun, so I turned around.  I thought I'd be sore today but I'm not really. Going out in just a bit again for a morning ride before work.

I don't think my scales work. No, seriously, stop laughing. I got up this morning and they said I weighed 179.6.  I went back to bed for 45 minutes and got back on them and they said I weighed 184.3.  I'm sticking with 179.  We'll see when I put pants on this afternoon.

Got the cast picture re-sized and framed yesterday.  On Saturday I went to Hobby Lobby and Bought frames and frames he poster and re-framed a poster from the first show I directed a decade ago that was never framed properly, added the show to my CV and put the program in my portfolio. Done.

Turning my attention to the article below, which I've been avoiding.  Yet another exercise in hypocrisy by the catholic Church.  I'd work out my hatred of that organization in this post, but I'm certain there isn't enough room.  I was never molested, I was never sexually-abused, BUT, I did suffer from the rampant hypocrisy, and the constant denial of reality.  I have noted before that those people don't celebrate their faith, they mourn it, and go around way-laying themselves with self-hatred all the day long.  And they expect their followers to do the same.  it's unconscionable.  

And after wielding shitloads of political power for centuries they cash it all in for this:

 

 

Connecticut bishops fight sex abuse bill

From Jamie Guzzardo, CNN

April 11, 2010 10:30 p.m. EDT

The proposed change would put "all Church institutions ... at risk," a letter from Connecticut's Catholic bishops says.

Hartford, Connecticut (CNN) -- A bill in Connecticut's legislature that would remove the statute of limitations on child sexual abuse cases has sparked a fervent response from the state's Roman Catholic bishops, who released a letter to parishioners Saturday imploring them to oppose the measure.
Under current Connecticut law, sexual abuse victims have 30 years past their 18th birthday to file a lawsuit. The proposed change to the law would rescind that statute of limitations.
The proposed change to the law would put "all Church institutions, including your parish, at risk," says the letter, which was signed by Connecticut's three Roman Catholic bishops.
The letter is posted on the Web site of the Connecticut Catholic Public Affairs Conference, the public policy and advocacy office of Connecticut's Catholic bishops. It asks parishioners to contact their legislators in opposition of the bill.
The "legislation would undermine the mission of the Catholic Church in Connecticut, threatening our parishes, our schools, and our Catholic Charities," the letter says.
The Catholic archdiocese of Hartford also published a pulpit announcement on its Web site, which was to be read during Mass on Sunday, urging parishioners to express opposition to the bill.
The bill has been revised to address some of the church's concerns about frivolous abuse claims against it, according to Connecticut state Rep. Beth Bye, one of the bill's sponsors.
"The church didn't recognize that this bill makes improvements," Bye said. "The victims -- their lives have been changed and some will never recover from years of sexual abuse. For me, it's about giving them access to the courts."
Under the bill's provisions, anyone older than 48 who makes a sex abuse claim against the church would need to join an existing claim filed by someone 48 or younger. Older claimants would need to show substantial proof that they were abused.
"They were worried about frivolous lawsuits and so we made the bar high," Bye said.
The bill does not target the Catholic Church, she said.
The bishops' letter raised concerns that the bill would allow claims that are 70 years or older, in which "key individuals are deceased, memories have been faded, and documents and other evidence have been lost." The letter said that the majority of cases would be driven by "trial lawyers hoping to profit from these cases."
The bill passed in Connecticut's House of Representatives, and Bye said the state Senate should vote on it in the next week or two.

And so it goes:

Postponing the inevitable

I was less busy when I was working full time.  Today i have taxes to do, laundry, papers to grade, loads of laundry to do, and with this incredible weather I insist on taking the bike out for a ride. All this not to mention the fact that in about half an hour someone will be here to clean the carpets, AND I have to teach at 6.

Dixie carter has left us.  Sad, 70, from where I stand isn't that old.  No offense to those whippersnappers in their 40's, but seriously, look at all this from an AARP membership point of view and it takes on a whole new dimension.  So quit yer fuckin' whinin'.

Saw the latest episode of Justified last night. Surely I love that show for another reason than the obvious.  Is it possible that I could be that shallow?  (well, yes, yes it is)   I like the show though.  i'd probably watch it if Olyphant wasn't in it...probably.  In my defense, I like Breaking Bad too, and neither of it's stars are particularly attractive to me.  So there, I'm not shallow.

Even though it's well done I could never get into Mad Men.  tried, Jon Hamm is hot and I love watching him in it, but it's just not enough.


Ok enough procrastination.

Maybe not.

And so it goes:

 
 

There are good ideas and there are great ones

And I think Sarah Palin and Newt Gingrich as a GOP ticket in 2012 is a spectacular idea. 

She's such a universally recognized doofus and he's such a known...well, what is Newt?  Let's see, he's a philanderer, he's a liar, he's, if I recall correctly, a tax evader, he was brought up on 84 ethics charges by the house while he was speaker, oh yes, and he was conducting an extra-marital affair while prosecuting Bill Clinton for getting a blow job.  Yeah, Newt's a great guy. 

Sarah, well, she's after a little bling and that's about the extent of her ambitions.  And the Tea Party are her big supporters and since they've proven themselves to be a bunch of fucking nuts I see a wonderful future for all three of them.

As for me, a little time at the grocery this morning, and then a nap is in my future, followed by martini's and dinner.

The college in the west I applied to hasn't even closed their search that was scheduled to end last Friday.  I'm a little insulted.

And so it goes:

 

Don't know what to do with myself

The phone isn't ringing, there aren't 6 people demanding my attention at once, I don't have anything to plan for in the next 15 minutes, I actually slept until I woke without an alarm last night.

I could get used to this.

Someone clipped the front corner of my car the other day while I was parked somewhere, I just noticed it last night. It's not catastrophic, and since the collision deductible is $500 i figure I'll just fix it myself. The bumper is scraped a little and there's this teeny little dent in the bottom of the fender, it could actually be covered with a bra, but I'd still know it was there. parts for cars are cheap nowadays, I do not know why, but I can get a new fender and bumper cover for less than $300 amazing. I have to paint them of course, but that's not hard. I could actually skip the bumper and just paint the one I've got it wasn't torn or anything, and since it was the corner it didn't use up the one time use on the bumper absorber thingy underneath so it's still good to go. We'll see how expansive I feel when I start to order stuff.

Cnn has done something stupid. they lent credence to an already discredited author who claims homosexuality can be cured. Richard Cohen, who had his sexually confused nads handed to him by Rachel Maddow on MSNBC a few weeks ago is still promoting his sick little agenda. And without a balancing viewpoint a la Fox news, CNN presented his simple-minded ideas to the world. What could they possibly have been thinking? They're hearing about it, and they'll hear from me too. they should hear from you as well. I have to wonder when someone somewhere is going to assume responsibility and fix journalism so it reverts back to it's original function. To report the news not make it. And to give us info not tell us what to think.

Even though GLAAD has issued this call to action, I say call CNN anyway. (GLAAD is useless IMHO) Kyra phillips has done several gay pieces recently all with a decidedly anti-gay slant and she needs to be taken to ask for it. As do her editors.


Contacts:

Kyra Phillips
Anchor, CNN Newsroom
Kyra.Phillips@turner.com
(404) 827-1500

Karen Zuker
Producer, CNN Newsroom
Karen.Zuker@turner.com
(404) 827-1500

Bridget Leininger
CNN Publicity
Bridget.Leininger@turner.com
(404) 827-1500

And so it goes:

hmmm

Considering the length of people's memories, I have to wonder if they'll remember this is November.

Confederate History Month sparks anger in Va.

Civil rights leaders decry ‘offensive’ move; governor predicts tourism boost

By Anita Kumar and Rosalind S. Helderman

updated 5:29 a.m. CT, Wed., April 7, 2010

RICHMOND, Va. - Gov. Robert F. McDonnell, reviving a controversy that had been dormant for eight years, has declared that April will be Confederate History Month in Virginia, a move that angered civil rights leaders Tuesday but that political observers said would strengthen his position with his conservative base.

The two previous Democratic governors had refused to issue the mostly symbolic proclamation honoring the soldiers who fought for the South in the Civil War. McDonnell (R) revived a practice started by Republican governor George Allen in 1997. McDonnell left out anti-slavery language that Allen's successor, James S. Gilmore III (R), had included in his proclamation.

McDonnell said Tuesday that the move was designed to promote tourism in the state, which next year will mark the 150th anniversary of the start of the war. McDonnell said he did not include a reference to slavery because "there were any number of aspects to that conflict between the states. Obviously, it involved slavery. It involved other issues. But I focused on the ones I thought were most significant for Virginia."

---

The proclamation was condemned by the Virginia Legislative Black Caucus and the NAACP. Former governor L. Douglas Wilder called it "mind-boggling to say the least" that McDonnell did not reference slavery or Virginia's struggle with civil rights in his proclamation. Though a Democrat, Wilder has been supportive of McDonnell and boosted his election efforts when he declined to endorse the Republican's opponent, R. Creigh Deeds.

"Confederate history is full of many things that unfortunately are not put forth in a proclamation of this kind nor are they things that anyone wants to celebrate," he said. "It's one thing to sound a cause of rallying a base. But it's quite another to distort history."

'Sacrifices'The seven-paragraph declaration calls for Virginians to "understand the sacrifices of the Confederate leaders, soldiers and citizens during the period of the Civil War."

McDonnell had quietly made the proclamation Friday by placing it on his Web site, but it did not attract attention in the state capital until Tuesday. April also honors child abuse prevention, organ donations, financial literacy and crime victims.

After a fall campaign spent focusing almost exclusively on jobs and the economy, McDonnell had been seen in recent weeks as largely ceding conservative ground to the state's activist attorney general, Ken Cuccinelli II. The proclamation could change that view among Republicans who believe appropriate respect for the state's Confederate past has been erased by an over-allegiance to political correctness, observers said.

"It helps him with his base," said Mark Rozell, a political scientist at George Mason University. "These are people who support state's rights and oppose federal intrusion."

Said Patrick M. McSweeney, a former state GOP chairman: "I applaud McDonnell for doing it. I think it takes a certain amount of courage."

The Virginia NAACP and the state's Legislative Black Caucus called the proclamation an insult to a large segment of the state's population, particularly because it never acknowledges slavery.

"Governor McDonnell's proclamation was offensive and offered a disturbing revision of the Civil War and the brutal era that followed," said Del. Kenneth Cooper Alexander (D-Norfolk), chairman of the Legislative Black Caucus. "Virginia has worked hard to move beyond the very things for which Governor McDonnell seems nostalgic."

Emergency meeting King Salim Khalfani, executive director of the Virginia State Conference of the NAACP, said his group will hold an emergency meeting Saturday to discuss a series of problems it has had with McDonnell since he was sworn into office in January.

Virginia has had a long, complicated history on racial relations — long before Richmond served as the capital of the Confederacy during the Civil War. Many of its most prominent early residents, including future presidents, owned slaves, and the state openly fought desegregation, even closing schools instead of integrating them. But in 1989, the state made Wilder the first African American governor in the nation since Reconstruction.

McDonnell said Tuesday that people's thinking about civil rights and the role of the Confederacy in Virginia history have advanced to the point where "people can talk about and discuss and . . . begin to understand the history a little better."

"I felt just as I've issued dozens and dozens of other commemorations, that it was something that was worthy of doing so people can at least study and understand that period of Virginia history and how it impacts us today," he said.

'Distraction'The state's new governor campaigned relentlessly on improving the economy and creating jobs and received the strong backing of the business community. But the attention that Virginia will receive from the proclamation might take away from that focus.

Rozell said the proclamation is a "distraction" from McDonnell's desire to attract companies to Virginia. Businesses might begin to perceive McDonnell's latest decision — combined with Cuccinelli's decision to sue the federal government over health-care reform legislation and his advice to state colleges and universities that they remove sexual-orientation language from their anti-discrimination policies — as a pattern of behavior not conducive to relocating in the state.

Allen caused a national uproar when he signed a proclamation drafted by the Sons of Confederate Veterans. It called the Civil War "a four-year struggle for [Southern] independence and sovereign rights" and made no mention of slavery.

Gilmore modified the decree in 1998 by adding a condemnation of slavery, but it failed to satisfy either defenders of Confederate heritage or civil rights leaders. He later changed the proclamation by dropping references to Confederate History Month and instead designated April as "Virginia's Month for Remembrance of the Sacrifices and Honor of All Virginians Who Served in the Civil War."

But in 2002, Mark Warner, Gilmore's successor, broke

But in 2002, Mark Warner, Gilmore's successor, broke with their actions, calling such proclamations a "lightning rod" that did not help bridge divisions between whites and blacks in Virginia. Four years later, Timothy M. Kaine was asked but did not issue a proclamation.

This year's proclamation was requested by the Sons of Confederate Veterans. A representative of the group said it has known since it interviewed McDonnell when he was running for attorney general in 2005 that he was likely to respond differently than Warner or Kaine.

"We've known for quite some time we had a good opportunity should he ascend the governorship," said Brandon Dorsey of the Sons of Confederate Veterans.

Sen. Emmett W. Hanger Jr. (R-Augusta), who has spoken from the floor of the General Assembly about honoring Virginia's Confederate past with appropriate acknowledgments to its difficult racial past, said he believed Warner and Kaine "avoided" the issue by failing to issue similar documents.

"It would be totally inappropriate to do one that would just poke a stick to stir up old wounds. But it is appropriate to recognize the historical significance of Virginia in that era," he said. "I think it's appropriate as long as it's not fiery."

McDonnell's proclamation comes just before the April 17, 1861, anniversary of the day Virginia seceded from the union.

One mo' time

Today is my last day to teach full time, at least for a while.  One class this afternoon and then I'm through. I cleared out of the office and took everything home.  It's kinda liberating not to have to keep up with someone else's schedule and lesson plans.   Not that I haven't had fun doing this, because I have, but it wasn't my semester, it was one designed by someone else and I had to give it back somewhat intact.  I couldn't just come in and reinvent the whole thing like I did his show.  This requires a little more continuity.  

Alas, it's in the history books and i'm glad I can rest from this afternoon until tomorrow afternoon when I have to resume my own classes. Poor things, all but ignored this past month.  We'll take it easy on poor old me tomorrow though I can guarantee that.

So why do you suppose the Cuban government has chosen now to release that picture of Elian Gonzalez?

Governments so rarely do anything that's not calculated so I'm wondering what this is about.  Elian's birthday, apparently a national holiday is December 7, I don't get it.  Something's afoot or they wouldn't have done it.

A principal in Tennessee, (surprise, surprise), has sent a young man home from school because he was wearing a t-shirt that said something like "I (heart) lady gay gay."  Perhaps not the wisest choice of garments in Tennessee, but hey it's the kids choice.  But again we'll see a school district go to court over a students right to free speech.  the kids mom made a very good point, "Administrators have not sent home students who wear religious shirts and those bearing the rebel flag, she said."-towleroad.  Let's see if Tennessee is more enlightened than Mississippi.

Every time I write of Tennessee I am reminded of a friend from grad school who hailed from there.  He was always quite the exception to those southern rules I bandy about so freely.  Of course, in Hollywood all these years later he could have become a Scientologist, who knows. let's hope he's as smart as I always thought he was.

And so it goes:

 

Almost back to normal..whatever that is

Well, the show is over.  It went ok.  I'd have preferred things go a little differently, but I have to remind myself that these kids are barely out of high school, and their experience is limited.  So all in all i was happy with it. 

I was taken quite aback by the level of immaturity from one of the students i expected it from least.  he had repeatedly asked me if he could do something at the curtain call he knew before asking that i'd say no to. And I'm sure he did it to get to rise out of me, cause that's always entertaining.  But Saturday night he actually did one of the things I expressly told him he could not do.  I was not pleased.

In the end he took a calculated risk to impress his friends in the audience and it cost him not only his actor/director student/teacher relationship with me, but any chance of being cast in a show of mine again. Being the expert at student communications I made sure one of his comrades knew my feelings, knowing she'd meet him at the door minutes later.  He studiously avoids me now. He may be smarter than I gave him credit for.

Anyway, I 'm getting rested, and today begins the return to some sense of normalcy.  I go back to the grocery for a bit today then teach the rest of the week.

Mississippians are still being cowardly bigots, the pope is still hiding behind his altar boys, people are still going to jail to prove their point about gay rights,  and not much has changed since I last wrote here regularly.

BUT!  There are green trees outside my window, the temperature outside is decidedly more welcoming when I venture out,  I see people in the parks, and soon, perhaps tomorrow or Thursday I myself will be able to go out and play. 

I cannot wait.

So, hope is still alive, perhaps we will actually live one day in a world where the hatred borne of Christianity will no longer be a scourge on the land, and we will all see that letting others live their lives without the interference of religion and it's hateful ideology is truly the way to that light everyone seems to be seeking when they flock to houses of worship.

I have to note that the college rents out our theatre to a church every Sunday and  this Sunday was no exception.  In light of the fact that it was Easter I requested that the powers that be reiterate to the church group that they needed to, as stated in their rental agreement, be out and clear by 1pm so we could take possession of the theatre for our matinee. They did this, but not until after rearranging much of our set, using and rearranging actors personal belongings in the dressing rooms, and making sure their displeasure at our presence was registered.  They also drove the wrong way down the college drive as they exited. 

All that praying and preaching didn't even get them to their cars.  I find it ironic,sad, and unfortunately not a bit surprising.

And so it goes:

no time

the following posts are all out fo order and i ahve no time to figure out how to re arrange hem.  Read the last one first.

And so it goes.

colo

colo, originally uploaded by Niebieski..

all that other hot mess aside I'll leave you for the week with the sexiest man of the day. OOH lala he's a hottie. I'm such a sucker for a hairy tummy.