Friday, October 31, 2008, 12:22 PM - Church Stuff
Indigo Incarnates
Today is the Samhain sabbat in the Wiccan calendar. It is the end of one year and the beginning of another. It is the third harvest (apples and pumpkins). It is the day when the Veil that separates the physical world from the spirit world is at its thinnest. It is a day to remember loved ones who have recently passed from this world into the Summerland. And so, on this day, there is a friend I remember.
I did not know Jewel for a very long time before she died. But sometimes it's possible to care for someone deeply without having to know that person for years. Maybe I knew her in a different life. I don't know. But I can say that Jewel had a kind of spirit that just shown with a warm, bright intensity that few others had. The brief time I knew her, she made a profoundly positive difference in my life. She just simply loved others unconditionally. She died of a brain tumor on February 10, 2008.
Her mother died five months after Jewel crossed the Veil. She could not live with the loss. She didn't commit suicide, nor did she have any long-term disease. She just simply died. theoretically it was heart failure, but I think she didn't want to be in this world without her daughter. They are together now.
I miss my friend. It's difficult for me to develop friendships. I am a strange and heavily damaged individual. Few can accept me as I am, as we are. But Jewel could. I miss her. But it's better that she is no longer being eaten by a terrible and incurable disease. She spead a lot of love and happiness in her brief incarnation. May she have peace and rest in the Summerland. May she be truly blessed in her next life.
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( 3 / 1500 )Wednesday, October 29, 2008, 09:46 PM - halo's thoughts
halo incarnates
skinny mom is in hospital again. is really sick. is too skinny. don't want her to go away. skinny mom has too much pain. am sad. don't want her to hurt. don't want her to go away. don't want her to hurt. love skinny mom. am sorry she's sick and can't get better. am sad. love her. am sad. don't want to be left behind.
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( 3 / 1612 )Tuesday, October 28, 2008, 08:39 AM - Random Thoughts
Indigo Incarnates
The interesting thing in Maryland this year is that the day after Thanksgiving has now been declared American Indian Heritage Day. I think it's a good thing, since it's good for white people to be reminded that the Thanksgiving feast the Native Americans helped provide for the colonists was repaid with betrayal and genocide.
When I think of how people of my ancestry conducted themselves, I feel ashamed. North America is a *very large* land mass. There is no reason whatsoever that Europeans and Native Americans could not have shared the land, shared the resources, shared culture, and shared knowledge. Instead, the settlers traded food from the Indians and in exchange gave them clothing and blankets that were purposefully contaminated with small pox. The white government conquered and subdued the Indians through the use of superior firepower and sheer manpower. And, considering that the Europeans came to America seeking religious freedom, they organized a campaign to wipe out the Native American religious practices as well as their culture.
Fast forward four hundred years.
The Religious Reich hasn't changed one bit. They still like it when misunderstood minorities die in huge numbers (remember how the Religious Right danced a jig when AIDS wiped out a big chunk of the gay population in the late 1980s?) They still make laws to punish people of different religions (it's still illegal to practice Wicca in some areas of the country, despite the 1st Amendment!) I guarantee that the Religious Reich would have no moral opposition to the government setting up death-reservations to exterminate gays (if only their elected officials would agree to do what is "right" for the sake of their "truth").
So, at least in Maryland, the white folks' betrayal of the Native Americans is thrown in their descendants' faces now. I think that's a good thing.
If I had a time machine and a universal translator (ala Star Trek), I'd warn off the native tribes. I'd tell them that it's really in their best interest to avoid the people who worship two perpendicular sticks because they are actually thieves and genocidal maniacs. People with a five-pointed star, on the other hand, are not thieves and aren't genocidal maniacs. If enough of the Religious Reich had been starved out in the early days of colonization, things might have been VERY different for this nation.
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( 3 / 1656 )Sunday, October 26, 2008, 07:48 PM - Church Stuff
Indigo Incarnates
It occurs to me that I'm getting pretty tired of the Religious Reich claiming "deeply held religious beliefs" as an excuse to hate gays and for pushing punitive laws down our throats. I was pretty angry about this and I finally found a deeper reason WHY I'm so angry at the Religious Reich.
It's bad enough that they use Jesus as a tool for hating people different than them. One even cited that hating gays was an innate "truth" of Christianity, despite the fact that Jesus never addressed the topic of same-sex unions but DID tell people that the primary commandment was to love God and love each other.
Well, in my faith (Wicca), homosexuality is NOT a sin. In my religion, it is perfectly acceptable for a man and a woman to marry, two men to marry, or two women to marry. The only qualifier is that they must love one another. My deeply held religious belief is that love is better than hate and courage is better than fear. In Wicca, we are told to have perfect love and perfect trust; to live and let live; to fairly take and fairly give.
Sounds simple, right?
I believe that my deeply held religious beliefs have just as much validity as those on the Far Right. Why should Wicca be considered an inferior religion in comparison to Christianity?
See... that's the reason why the Founding Fathers designed our government to be a secular republic and not a theocratic oligarchy. It's the government's job to print the money, secure the borders, enforce public safety laws, and maintain a military. It is NOT the government's job to say whose deeply held religious beliefs are valid and whose aren't. It's NOT the government's job to legislate who can love and who cannot.
It doesn't bother me when someone else's religious beliefs run counter to mine. It's a free country. But it bothers me quite a bit when someone uses their religion to write laws that have the effect of kicking me in the crotch. That's not a republic; that's a theocracy. And that, my friends, is why Sarah Palin and her Religious Reich allies are un-American.
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( 3 / 1532 )Sunday, October 26, 2008, 10:13 AM
Indigo Incarnates
The other thing I dread about the coming of winter is how cold weather makes old injuries hurt. I don't understand what it is about the human body that certain injuries can start hurting again years after the fact when the body is exposed to certain stimuli. There's a hip injury from ten years ago, a neck injury from 12 years ago, and an ankle injury from 15 years ago that sometimes just ache in a deep, unrelenting way. It's not debilitating, but it is inconvenient. But I don't understand why it should hurt just because the weather got cold.
If this human body matched my changeling life-force better (ie. if I had an actual changeling physique), this wouldn't be a problem. Changelings actually fully heal from injuries. Days like this is when I really hate being a spirit anchored to a body that is not my own. The original intelligence might have liked this body just fine. And usually I do to. But it doesn't match who I really am, and when it develops painful flaws, it just reminds me all that much more that I am a different kind of being that just happens to be stranded in a human body somehow.
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( 3 / 979 )Saturday, October 25, 2008, 08:52 AM - Cool Stuff
Indigo Incarnates
I was really happy to read that our itty-bitty Scion xD is rated by Consumer Reports as the most reliable car of the year (in its size class). A couple of our friends declared that a car that inexpensive couldn't possibly have high quality. Well, apparently they are wrong. Yay!
So far, after 5 months of driving, it has had zero problems and the fuel economy is actually about 2 MPG above EPA (probably because Doug and I aren't speed demons when we drive). For a $15,700 car, it basically came with everything: power door locks, power windows, CD/iPod interface, Pioneer sound, drive-by-wire power steering, antilock brakes, and airbags.
So... I feel pretty justified in the purchase.
The only thing I would change about it would be giving it a mild-hybrid option. Toyota's Hybrid Synergy Drive is too big to fit into the Scion. But Toyota does have a smaller system (in Japan only) called IISS (for "Intelligent Integrated Stop/Start). Basically, it's a mechanism that runs on a 32 volt system that shuts the engine off at stop lights and restarts it when the driver hits the gas pedal. It saves about 4 MPG.
But as it is, the little Scion is totally awesome!
Consumer Reports Summary Link
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( 3 / 1494 )Friday, October 24, 2008, 01:12 PM - Random Thoughts
Indigo Incarnates
Y'know... I thought that the McCain/Palin team couldn't get much more disconnected from reality than they already are. But I was wrong! The past two weeks have just been dizzying in their defiance of common sense.
Tell me: What was Palin thinking about when she bought $150,000 worth of clothes 13 days before the general election. That's twice what Doug and I paid for our friggin' HOUSE. What kind of wardrobe costs $150k? Is she going to write it off on her taxes as a "business expense", and thus make us taxpayers foot the bill for her wastefulness? How can somebody who claims to have "mainstream conservative values" blow in one day what it takes me five years to earn (before taxes)?! This is someone who obviously has no clue about how the average American has to scrimp and budget in these days of high inflation and stagnant income. And yet she thinks she's somehow representative of America because she knows how to shoot a moose.
Speaking of wildlife, Palin also thinks that "285" isn't a "small number" when referring to the population of Beluga whales. That's right: she fought tooth and nail to keep Beluga whales off the endangered species list despite the fact that they have been hunted to near-extinction. She was overruled, thankfully. But I can't help but to think that since she is a hard-core Creationist who thinks the world is only 6,000 years old, she can sort of pretend that Beluga whales never existed if they go extinct. After all, dinosaurs are extinct and she doesn't believe in them either.
Another departure from reality is how she instituted a policy in Alaska that rape victims have to *pay* for the forensic kits. That is just so harsh as to simply boggle the mind. But then, this is the same person who wants to deny rape victims the right to abortion if she is impregnated as a result of the rape. Palin obviously thinks it's fair that a rape victim be forced to carry a rapist's baby to full term. Once the baby is born, of course, the rapist has full legal right to visitation and can even sue to get full custody of the child and then ask for child support from the rape victim for raising the child! Unbelievable.
Oh, and the "family values" VP wants to undo all the gay marriages and civil unions in this country. That would be quickly followed up by nullifying all adoptions done by same-sex couples. She really does think gay people are inherently evil. I wonder how she'll be on separation of Church and State? I wonder how she'll be on civil rights? How will her treatment of other minorities be? She obviously thinks gays are evil, and she doesn't think much of people who aren't tongue-speaking fundamentalist Christians.
And, of course, there's John "Nine Mansions" McCain with his Wall Street Bailout Bonanza. It amazes me that the guy who claimed to be a fiscal conservative had no problem signing on to a piece of legislation that forked over nearly a trillion dollars to foolhardy speculators. And yet, the bailout did not provision one single penny for stabilizing shaky mortgages. So there are thousands of people every month who continue to lose their homes while millionaire bankers get a huge bailout check. Maybe McCain doesn't know that most citizens don't own nine mansions. Maybe he thinks that if one mansion gets foreclosed, the average citizen still has eight more mansions in reserve. Who knows? But what he seems to not understand is that most households are barely hanging on to the single (non-mansion) home they do have in the face of spiraling food, fuel, medical, and education costs that have completely outstripped any income growth this country has seen lately.
McCain is also a big fan of taxing health insurance. I guess he thinks the average American can afford an extra $50-$80/month in new taxes.
I realize that most Republicans who want to vote for McCain are doing so because they fear gays, that they think Bush was sent by God to lead our country, and that McCain will continue the Bush doctrine. But the American people really need to start thinking in terms of self-preservation. Yes, Obama isn't going to clamp down on homosexuals (sorry to the Religious Reich), but he's also less likely to keep sending our country down the path of absolute ruin (as the Bush doctrine has done).
With McCain/Palin, you get Bush-III (McCain) and an uber-bigot (Palin). McCain is just like Bush, but older and with a lousy temper. I think Palin is so far "out there" that she's from another planet!
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( 3 / 1419 )Wednesday, October 22, 2008, 04:18 PM
Indigo Incarnates
I really don't like this time of year. It's official now that I arrive at work just *before* the sun rises. The sky is beginning to brighten, but there's no sun in the morning now. I awaken when it is pitch black. It's still pitch black when I'm eating breakfast. Soon the clocks get changed around and it'll be dark when I get off work too. Egads. It's just so depressing.
I need to have more sunlight than I'm able to get at the moment. My new office has no windows so I can't get any incoming sunlight during my workday either. My energy is declining as it always does at this time of year. It's just hard to get motivated to *do* anything. I'm feeling depressed, sluggish, and fatigued. I just don't see the point of "Daylight Savings Time" where federal mandate adjusts local time so that the sun sets at 4:45pm in December.
I'm depressed, too, since I goofed up my checking account. I'm such a loser. I called the bank to see if they would reverse the charges since it's been a long time since I had a really bad accounting mishap. The rep said I'd get a decision back in 48 hours. Hmmm...
I feel bad, too, because I accidentally racked up a friend's cell phone bill. I didn't know her plan was a category smaller than mine. At the end of the month, I still had over 100 minutes left, but she was way over. It's my fault and I feel stupid.
Changelings need sunlight. I feel like I can't capture the energy I need to be fully empowered. I'm tired. I hate winter. I hate the dark season.
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( 3 / 998 )Monday, October 20, 2008, 07:50 PM - Church Stuff
Indigo Incarnates
So... Doug, Jeff, Ritchie, and Jeff got to do one of my favorite pastimes yesterday: playing my role-playing game! The heroes were once again charged with defending the town of Raindrop Fair from bloodthirsty outlaws. This time, it was from a nefarious assassination cult called "Murder Incorporated". Yeah, I wonder if they were fully incorporated or just an S-Corp.
The heroes had to face a darkened stone maze filled with booby traps of all kinds. Then there was a fight against an evil janitor that had an enchanted mop that shot streams of highly corrosive acid. Then there was a platoon of ultra-thugs that had poison daggers and grenades. They faced a giant sentry robot but managed to trick it into letting them pass (clever, since that thing is tough!) Finally, they fought a giant rat that was the size of a horse (and the rat had six legs too!)
All that was to reach the inner sanctum of Murder Incorporated. Next week they get to fight the actual assassins, heh heh.
Doug has a Gunslinger based on Annie Oakley (from the musical!) Jeff is playing an incredibly heavy-handed self-righteous Protector. Richie has a mentalist/thief that also serves as chief of Raindrop Fair's secret police. All in all, it's a pretty useful trio of unique personalities. Cool! I'm really glad that Doug and my friends like my game. I wrote it from scratch 13 years ago.
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( 3 / 1525 )Saturday, October 18, 2008, 03:12 PM - Random Thoughts
Indigo Incarnates
I started getting my case load this week. I now had 12 ne'er-do-wells under my direct supervision. I've got one burglar, two drunks, and eight junkies and a dope dealer. Ironically, the dope dealer is the only one with a legitimate job too. Eventually my case load will be built up to the 60-70 range. But I am very glad that I'm not in the violent offenders unit. Most of my cases are going to be junkie bums, drunk drivers, and dope dealers.
Doug and I did our usual Saturday morning pancake breakfast at First Watch. The pancakes are huge and the food is pretty inexpensive. Yay!
It was really sunny today and windy. Thistle got to fly for a while. It's good for him to have energy. It will be a shame when the skies grow dark with the upcoming winter. Halo doesn't mind the dark, but it's hard for Thistle (and me too!) Thistle likes the music written by a recording artist named Hae. I'm not sure what Doug thought of it, however, heh heh.
I did a prayer ritual for my mom today. She is very ill and doesn't have a lot of time left. The last time I talked with her, she said she was in pain almost all the time and that she was just getting worn down from being in and out of the hospital all the time. She's down to 81 pounds. She told me she wanted me to remember her how she was when she was healthy. I wish that she was not in pain. I don't want her to go, but I know that it'll be time soon. I hope the cigarette company executives get reincarnated as laboratory rats in their next life.
I went to the gym and did a good workout. The body weighs 182 pounds. I try to stay healthy because I never want to be a burden to Doug.
Oh... I also found out from mom that my bogus sister (Jenny) is basically acting like a teenage slut. She's 36 years old but has been sleeping around town with a seemingly endless string of 20-25-year-old young men. She's still married (but separated) but I imagine she was cheating on her husband long before she moved back to Altoona. Maybe that's also why her finances are so bad: keeping an array of boy-toys happy can get pretty expensive quickly. She didn't put her 16-year-old daughter back in school in Altoona either. She told the school board she is being "home schooled". Yeah, right. Alli (the daughter) has mostly been helping to take care of my mom while Jenny is out whoring around. But she hasn't been schooled at all lately. I find it amazing that Jenny and I actually have the same parents.
Jenny doesn't like to pay bills. She has close to $70,000 in credit card debt and she currently has no income (she ought to become a prostitute, since then she'd be getting cash for her favorite activity). She's declared bankruptcy twice. She also embezzled money from my grandmother (when my grandmother was still alive). By contrast, I have only ONE credit card ($2,100 balance) but I also have $1,900 in a CD, so I'm technically only $200 in debt. Gee... I live within my means. What a concept. When I got my raise, I added $50/month more into automatic retirement savings.
So... that's what's going on this weekend. Whoo-hoo!
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