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Look! Up in the Sky!

INKLINGS posted something today that really got me thinking. She was wishing our brother, Twist a happy birthday and telling stories about him growing up. I am 13 years his junior, so I don't remember any of what she posted. I remember him returning from his LDS mission to Yucatan the night before we were to move to another state. I remember him attending college in that other state. I remember forgetting to relay his message to my parents one night that his car had broken down and he needed them to come get him (I don't think he waited more than three or four hours...). I remember his briefcase and his cat, and the days my dog tried to ruin both in various way (usually trying to eat the cat or pee on the briefcase). I remember going with the family to his wedding (and being scared clean out of my wits by all the older people).
 
But mostly, I remember having a not-too-small amount of hero-worship regarding both him and our other brother, Stick. Both of these brothers were already past high school before I was even out of elementary. Both of them served LDS missions. And both of them have always known more about some really cool stuff than I have ever even heard! And they didn't just know stuff, they DID it! I've never jumped off the roof holding nothing but a sheet. I NEVER found the hidden "room" in our big house. I have eaten frog legs, but I didn't actually kill, skin, and cook the frogs! I mentioned on Inklings' blog that I've always felt a little left out.
  
As I grew up, Stick and I shared a room, and as mentioned in another of my posts, he even let me drive his car (he taught me how to drive a standard--or should I say stick?). Most of the cool things I mentioned wanting in another post, I see them using first. I don't have to have everything they have, but some of the things sure make my wallet itch!
    
Now, don't get me wrong, I love my sisters! Delerious and I shared a room for about the first four years of my life, and I have many fond memories of times we shared over the years. I even went on Inklings' honeymoon! I was 1 year old at the time, and suffered from earaches, so that made for an interesting trip, but how many sisters out there would do that (BTW, Inklings, thanks for not letting Dee Ice come on MY honeymoon like he always threatened he would!). And Nene and I have more fun when we get together than most people would find anywhere else!
  
For those who don't know, I am the youngest in my family, and have always heard how spoiled I was (am?). This may be true, but I guess after dealing with the rest of them, my mom was just tired of worrying! I am sure that if I had been able to spend all day in the hills eating frog legs, perhaps she would have worried a bit more about me, too! Regardless, Twist, I hope your birthday was special. And to the rest of you, thanks for giving me enough heroes to look up to that I didn't need too many anywhere else!

Make$ the World Go Round

My brother Stick used to have a bumper sticker which said, "He who dies with the most toys WINS!" The true irony was that the bumper it was stuck to was an old orange Buick Opel. He swore by that car (and I believe, sometimes AT it). It was able to jump start bigger, newer vehicles many times. I drove that car to most of my senior year of high school, and even I have fond memories of it. Later, I saw that same slogan on a NO FEAR T-shirt, but slightly altered: "He who dies with the most toys still DIES."

Unfortunately, somehow, I have managed to buy into the whole propaganda. I seem to need material possessions to make me feel better. This last month, we have been getting a load ready to take to the D.I. (which for those reading unaware of this, is a thrift store started by the LDS church). We aren't even finished putting things together, and my truck bed is so full the guards at the prison where I volunteer sometimes have an apoplexy thinking there may be an inmate hiding in there somewhere.

There are obviously things we have to have in order to live, and some things that make our lives much more comfortable, but I worry sometimes that I may be too materialistic. Then I wonder: if I were wealthy, yes, i would have a nice house and good cars, and stock the house with some great "toys," but would I really feel the need to continue buying? If my life were smoother, would I have the compulsion to look in the Wal-Mart $5 DVD bin/rack every time I walk past? Would I feel the need to even spend more time and money than required to purchase my food, hygiene products and cleaning supplies, etc.

   

I know that the love of money is the root of all evil, and that being possession-minded is wrong, but I can't seem to help myself. I make more money than I ever thought I would, have more debt than I ever thought I could, and spend more than I ever thought I should, but I still gather and hoard whatever I can. Boy do I hoard. I have so many books, my shelves are too small now, and the books are in piles on the floor, which means, of course, that I will have to buy bigger and better book-shelves. My CD collections is divided into stacks located in at least 4 or five different locations (other than the CD drawers which can't hold all of them).

   

When do we reach critical mass? When is enough ENOUGH? When will I finally have enough of the things that I really want? And when will everyone quit getting cooler things, making me want to run out and spend even more? The saddest thing is, by the time I can finally get everything I want, I'll probably be too old to really enjoy it. Either that, or I'll decide that's when it's time to simplify my life. Alas, will ironies never cease? I'm just glad that darned bumper sticker wasn't true.....was it?

No Flying Piggies!

I went to the doctor on Monday because I woke up with a really bad cough. I was thinking the whole way there, "Oh great! Now I have swine flu, and I'll miss a whole week of school or more!" The tests came back negative, so he pumped me full of antibiotics and gave me a prescription.
   
While I was there, I had him give me a cortisone shot in my wrist to ease my carpal tunnel symptoms. I had forgotten just how much those shots hurt. Anyway, three days later, I still have the cough, but it's better, my wrist still hurts, but it's better. I used to hate shots (just like my oldest daughter still does), but now I usually ask for them!

New Blog

For all my family and faithful followers, I have started a new blog, titled "Riter's Bloque." This new site is for all of you who enjoy writing prose. Sorry, no poetry in this blog (unless it's a quote, etc.).

I hope this will be as fun as I hope it will be....!

Musical Pillows?

So I have been missing more sleep lately than usual, due to getting home late from our school musical practices and performances. This is fairly normal. What isn't normal, is the fact that I also have classes in the evenings at the college.
 

Today, while GIVING A VOICE LESSON, I actually FELL ASLEEP WHILE PLAYING THE PIANO! Alright, I really just drifted off for a second, but still. My student didn't say anything, so i don't think I was taking a nap or anything, but I suddenly found myself telling her something about the song. That isn't bad, but the fact that what i told her made ABSOLUTELY NO SENSE WHATSOEVER, could be. She didn't comment, but I sat there for just a second trying to figure out what it was I had dreamed for that fraction of a second that I felt was important. Then I realized it was just nonsense, so went on with the remainder of the lesson.
 
I've learned my lesson, though. From now on I will try harder to get enough sleep so I don't skijh mremnv o n oenjng ouiel gopn  pfinfkb...zzzzzzzzzzzzz...............

Nuff Said?

Nick Vujicic - One of My Heroes

I've been watching Nick for awhile now. I would love to meet him some day check out his website sometime. Life Without Limbs

Goodbye, Uncle Pat

A Riddle for You

Both of my brothers have received rejection notices from publishers for their books. This is not an uncommon occurrence in the publishing world, so I thought I'd lend a hand here. So, I have a riddle for you.You are preparing a script for a new movie you know will be a huge hit. You want the Hollywood execs to approve the script for immediate production. Here are the rules:

Your movie is a murder mystery.

Your main characters include:   A Judge, a lawyer, a police detective, a clergyman, a gay couple, and a prostitute.

In order to sell your script quickly, who was the victim? Who is the murderer? Why did they do it? 

I already have the answer, and am trying to think like a Hollywood Bigwig. Impress me.

Windfall Leaf Me Alone!

So I spent several hours in the last week outside in my yard with my leaf-blower. Several hours, and I am not even close to being finished yet. At least all the leaves are now on one side of my yard, even though they are all in a big pile. Sorry, a BIG pile. Oh, excuse me, A GINORMOUS PILE! I always wanted a wall next to my sidewalk, but this isn't exactly what I had in mind.

  The problem is, I only have one tree. It is a cottonless cottonwood, so the leaves are big, but that isn't the problem either. The main problem is I have no fence around my yard, and neither do my neighbors. The neighbors with 18-20 cottonwoods around their house. THEIR lawn looks pretty good. They do have a riding lawnmower that basically vacuums up the leaves, but the main reason their lawn looks so good is that all their leaves blow across the street into MY yard!

  

These are good people, but it annoys me to have to clean up after THEIR trees every fall. I don't even want to clean up MY leaves, but now it takes me days of working, and about a dozen leaf bags before my yard looks normal again. Oh well, since the previous owner of this house used the CHEAPEST PVC available for the irrigation system and did NOT install drains, I keep having my lines break, so I don't actually have a LAWN anyway! The plus side is that if I could put a fence around my yard to keep the leaves out, it's already to zero-scape....

My Homage to the Humor of Euripides!

Euripides put up a blog recently that I found quite amusing. Well, here are my (hopefully witty) Choral Responses to your own humor.

Only the most intelligent can truly laugh at themselves….boy, I am brilliant, then!

Q: How many Liberals does it take to change a light bulb?

A: One and only one, and he’ll change everything else while he’s at it, whether it needs to be changed or not, but don’t ask him for proof of citizenship.

Q: How many Socialists does it take to change a light bulb?

A: All of them. Duh, they’re socialists!


Q: How many Communists does it take to change a light bulb?

    A: One, provided he can provide proof to the government that the bulb NEEDS to be changed, submit the proper forms to the proper person in the proper way at the proper time, then wait in line behind the 6,000 other people in his city who need light bulbs changed before him.


Q: How many Gay Rights Activists does it take to change a light bulb?

A: Two, but they know the conservatives will try to pas a law denying their religious rights to change it together.


Q: How many Conservatives does it take to change a light bulb?

A: None. Obama already changed it without even asking whether or not it SHOULD be changed!

Q: How many Regular American Citizens does it take to change a light bulb?

    A: None, the government WANTS to keep them in the dark.

Q: How many Bloggers does it take to change a light bulb?

    A: Too many to count—Just one to change it, but then innumerable hosts of readers to comment on whether or not they liked how he changed it, and countless others saying that he did it wrong, and providing suggestions for better light bulb changes in the future!

What Next?

Okay, I'm not a political activist by any stretch of the imagination, but I was so disturbed by something this week, that I have to say something.

There is a man who is somewhat a celebrity in the carnival world who is trying to, basically, become a lizard or snake. He has tattooed his body with scales of varying sizes, shapes and colors, has shaved all the hair from his head (or more--don't know, don't want to know), and has had subcutaneous ridges implanted in his face surgically to make him look more reptilian. He has file his teeth down to points and had oral surgery to give him a forked tongue. He looks rather freakish, however much he may have come closer to achieving his goal.

Another man has had surgery to GIVE HIMSELF A CLEFT LIP! He then had that enlarged, and has surgically implanted little receptacles for whiskers, so he can look like a cat (or lion--who cares?).

My point, good readers (both of you), is that however bizarre these men may appear, they are still men. Nobody in their right mind would believe that the first guy is really a lizard or snake. In fact, he still has his arms and legs....a true snake man would have rid himself of these unseemly appendages. Nobody would really believe the second guy is a cat. He could even alter his eyes, but he is still a man.

Now, for (as Paul Harvey would say) "the rest of the story." The lesbian daughter of Sonny and Cher has decided that she wants to be a man. Really? Now, my question is... If her "partner" wanted a man, why did she become a lesbian in the first place?

But what really gets me is that the Hollywood TV reporter interviewing her (I refuse to call her "him") was buying in to all this baloney! This is when I realized that Hollywood is either completely clueless, or is in league with other forces to destroy the sanctity of marriage and family. This is all going to be building in the press and on TV and in movies (just wait, I'm sure one of those terribly popular teen shows will start having trans-gender characters) until they can start saying, "See? It's not a same-sex marriage, because now she's a man!" 

This individual is not the first, but here is the thing: this non-gendered person has surgically removed her breasts and uterus, and says she is now a man.....Wait a second. My mother had a mastectomy, my wife had a hysterectomy. That doesn't make THEM men, now does it? Of course not. This person also said she couldn't wait for the hormone injections to kick in so she could start shaving! That should be the kicker right there! Men don't need artificial hormones to be men, and NO MAN WANTS TO SHAVE! Young girls want to shave (their legs), but men do NOT want to shave their faces. We'd have beards to our knees if women could put up with it!

This person had what sounded like such a great quote on the TV show. She said, "Gender is between the ears, not between the legs." Wow. What a sound byte! The only problem is, the quote is wrong. Gender is in the genetic makeup of the individual, not in their choices. What is between the ears? Preference. Nothing more. In some cases, perhaps not even that much.  

Okay, so what does all this mean? I'll tell you--it is an insult to every truly gendered person out there. Not to mention the fact that there are in our town a couple of individuals who were born hermaphroditic. This is a huge insult to them as well. They actually were born with multiple genders, and in some cases, the doctors forced the parents to make a choice (a choice which didn't always come out right). People who take away their gender are a slap in the face to those who wish they could have had only one to start with.

So now what happens? Do we have to start having extra restroom facilities? One for male, one for female, one for lizard-boys, one for non-gendered individuals, one for those who don't fall into any category? It's time to get real. I once pretended I was a superhero. It wasn't real. I couldn't fly. Isn't it time to stop pretending?