Draped to the Ankles

Henny Penny

I think the world is coming to an end. I found myself agreeing with the president on not one, but two issues. Yes, the sky is falling.

The first one is that we need to develop alternate fuels. I don't understand how we can continue to believe that gasoline prices will never go up and that oil will always be plentiful. Anyone ever heard of inflation? Who remembers when gas was 25 cents a gallon? I don't, but I know it was. This whole thing about oil companies and price gauging just sounds like whining to me. The oil companies function in a free market, and they charge what the market demands. Who are we to tell them they can't? And what do we plan to do when the supply starts to dwindle? Granted, I don't know how far down the road that is, but it has to happen sometime.

The other thing was something he said in response to this new version of the national anthem that has been written - in Spanish. He said it should be sung in English, and that immigrants to this country should learn English. Personally, I don't consider this version our national anthem at all. As well as being in the wrong language, they've changed some of the words and meaning. It's different, and therefore not in any way "official."

And while we're on the subject, there has been a call for all "immigrants" to stay home from work on Monday. I assume they mean the Mexican ones. And I assume they mean legal ones, because apparently, "no human being is illegal." I say go for it. Then, when the INS people show up at their door, they can explain why they don't have a green card. They can also explain to their co-workers and employers how they're such good and conscientious employees that they should be allowed to stay in the country.

Wildlife Meme

I've decided to start a meme, just a little one. What kind of wildlife can you see from your window? (Or that crawls into your house!) Here are 5 birds, 4 insects, and 3 land creatures from my yard. If you decide to do it, use the most exotic things you find (you may need to look something up.) And let me know.

Roadrunners (my personal favorite)
Woodpeckers
Rock Doves
Crows
Robins

Praying Mantids
Ant Lions
Stink Beetles (I find them in the back room all the time)
Yellow Aphids (little bastards really like my oleanders)

Texas Blind Snake (found in my mother's bedroom one year)
Box Turtles (found one trying to cross the street last year)
Lizards

In the past, I have also found quail, a rattle snake, scorpions, tarantulas, centipedes and millipedes, but not since I moved off of the mountain. Not sad about moving away from there, I have to say.

Fool Me Once

My husband answered the phone last nigt while I was watching "Star Trek: Nemesis" on DVD. Normally, if it's a sales call, there's a 3-5 second lag between "hello" and the time someone comes on. I guess this one was quicker because he didn't hang up like we usually do (you gotta' be quick to get a phone call into this house!) He tells me there's a "Cammie" on the phone, asking for me. I figure it could be someone I know. It's not. Its someone from the Dove Foundation trying to get me to agree that movies are too violent and that someone should make an effort to make more family oriented movies. OK, I was in the middle of the climax of "Nemesis;" fights, shooting, explosions, the whole works. I had to pause it to listen to this.

So when she asked "Do you think movies have gotten more violent in the last few years?" I said "I don't know." That kind of threw her, because she hesitated. Then she started to explain about this Dove foundation. She asked another question, I answered "yes" and she moved on. She wasn't really telling me what she wanted, so I asked, "What are you getting at?" Her response was a hesitation then, "I'm sorry, I didn't get that." Then she started to repeat herself. That's when I got suspicious. I asked "Is this a tape!?!" She responded, "I'm sorry, I didn't get that." That's when I knew for sure I WAS TALKING TO A COMPUTER!!!! I hung up immediately, but damn, I will give it to them for trying. I never, ever listen to a taped recording, nor will I "hold for an important message." But I really thought I was talking to a person. Way to go Dove. Just don't call me again.

Book to Movie Meme

I found this at Atypical Homeschool where they apparently don't watch as many movies as I do. The list is of books that have been made into movies. "B" indicates I've read the book, and "M" indicates I've seen the movie (or a movie in the case of re-makes).

1. 1984
2. B, M - Alice in Wonderland
3. American Psycho
4. Breakfast at Tiffany’s
5. Brighton Rock
6. B, M - Catch 22
7. B, M - Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
8. B, M - A Clockwork Orange
9. Close Range
10. M - The Day of the Triffids
11. Different Seasons (includes The Shawshank Redemption)
13. M - Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (aka Bladerunner)
14. M - Doctor Zhivago
15. Empire of the Sun
16. The English Patient
17. Fight Club
18. B, M - The French Lieutenant’s Woman
19. Get Shorty
20. The Godfather
21. B, M - Goldfinger
22. Goodfellas
23. Heart of Darkness
24. M - The Hound of the Baskervilles
25. Jaws
26. B,M - The Jungle Book
27. A Kestrel for a Knave
28. LA Confidential
29. M - Les Liaisons Dangereuses
30. Lolita
31. B, M - Lord of the Flies
32. B, M - The Maltese Falcon
33. M - Oliver Twist
34. B, M - One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
35. B, M - Orlando
36. B, M - The Outsiders
37. M - Pride and Prejudice
38. M - The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
39. B - The Railway Children
40. Rebecca
41. The Remains of the Day
42. Schindler’s Ark (aka Schindler’s List)
43. Sin City
44. B, M - The Spy Who Came in From the Cold
45. The Talented Mr Ripley
46. B - Tess of the D’Urbervilles
47. Through a Glass Darkly
48. B, M - To Kill a Mockingbird
49. Trainspotting
50. The Vanishing
51. Watership Down

I once took a course in college called "Books into Film." It was one of my favorite classes. We read - and saw - Clockwork Orange, The French Lieutenant's Woman, Picnic, The Maltese Falcon, and a few others I can't remember right now. Does this mean I have an unfair advantage in this meme?

My favorite pairing - though not my favorite book or movie - is A Clockwork Orange. Both were "real horror show."

Wife Swap

Every time I catch this show I think, "That would be an interesting thing to do." Even my family thinks so. We actually sat down together, AS A FAMILY, and watched the show. This does not happen very often.

So, I was thinking, how could they find a family who was "opposite" to us? It would be damned hard. Politically, I'm a registered Democrat who leans to the center. My DH is a registered Republican who leans to the center. Religion-wise, I'm a Buddhist-Unitarian Universalist and the DH is an atheist. The DS is still working on his faith, and will for many years to come, I'm sure. I'm a homsechooler who is very structured and who creates her own lesson plans - no boxed curriuculum for us! I'm a terrible housekeeper, but I don't really enjoy living in a dirty house. And on top of all of this, I don't really want to be on TV.

But I have a witty family. We were talking about how we would impress the producers so much that they would want to do a spin-off. Yeah, we're witty alright.

I might actually fill out the application, just to see if they would find us a witty as we think we are. And to see if they could find someone who is our opposite. I dare them to try.

Wiki Meme

I'm always interested in what happened on my birthday, so this meme caught my attention. 3 events, 2 births, and 1 death that happened on my birthdate, found by typing it in at Wikipedia.com

1836 - Texas Revolution: Battle of the Alamo - After a 13-day siege by an army of 3,000 Mexican troops, the 189 Texas volunteers defending the Alamo are defeated and the fort taken.
1899 - Bayer registers aspirin as a trademark.
1981 - After 19 years presenting the CBS Evening News, Walter Cronkite signs off for the last time

1475 - Michelangelo Buonarroti, Italian painter (d. 1564)
1619 - Cyrano de Bergerac, French soldier, poet (d. 1655)
*1885 - Howard Hurford Van Sweringen (this one wasn't in Wikipedia)

1982 - Ayn Rand, Russian-American author (b. 1905)

The Lost Gospel of Judas

When I was working on that last post, I forgot all about The Lost Gospel of Judas that was on Sunday on the National Geographic channel (it's on again tonight). It deserves its own post anyway.

So this Gnostic manuscript surfaces in Egypt in 1978. The dealer has a hard time getting the oodles of money he wants, so he locks it in a safe deposit box in NY for 16 years (!) As someone who works with old books, that was just horrifying. This dealer managed to do more damage to the codex in 16 years than the desert had done in 1600 years. Jerk. Anyway, it was bought and its authenticity verfied and then painstakingly restored.

I liked the explanation of how the different gospels were chosen for what is now the New Testament. By the time The Gospel of Judas was copied down, there were over 30 different gospels, stemming from varying oral stories and teachings. The reason Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John made the cut was that they told a more straighforward story of Jesus and his life and teachings. The others were more philosophical in tone and emphasis, and were perhaps too cerebral for the "common man." I wonder if these weren't the stories they told the children, while the other gospels were for the adults. That's the feel I get from them, anyway.

What it tells is not such a surprise if you know anything about the Gnostics. They were a very spiritual sect of Christians who believed the body was corrupt and the soul was pure. To them Judas was a hero, doing as Jesus asked him to do in order to throw off his mortal body and become pure spirit. I don't think this is so far from what actually Christians believe. After all, if Christ hadn't died for "our sins," he would not have accomplished his mission on earth. So why wouldn't Judas be a hero in that sense? And why wouldn't the Jews be more appreciated? Christianity has a lot of mixed messages.

And poor Judas has been so reviled that no one will even name their dog Judas. He has been portrayed as this evil man, when even the gospels tell of his remorse. He did kill himself over it, after all. I'd say he was pretty damned sorry. The National Geographic show made connections between Judas and the Jews. As in Jewish=Juden in Germany. I had never made that connection, but I'm sure the Christians did. It seems Judas was definitely a Jew, but Christ was not. Figure that one out.

I am doing some research - as time permits - on the representation of Judas in art. It's not something I've really looked at before, but I think it will be a fascinating subject. School ends May 5th, and I have a whole month before summer classes start. Maybe I can do that Judas post AND re-design my blog. We'll see.

TV Watching

I don't spend a whole lot of time watching TV, but what I do watch I enjoy. So here's what I've been watching recently.

DR. WHO - I am enjoying this immensely. I am a long time fan of the old show, and was really looking forward to the new one. I have not been disappointed. The same campy aliens are there, the same decent Sci-Fi stories are there, but the special effects have been updated, and you don't have to watch one story line over a serie of days or weeks. This new doctor seems a bit edgier, but that fits the times.

Digression: the DH and I had discussed the fact that the BBC accent is a thing of the past. It used to be all British actors were just British, unless they were playing a quirky character like a farmer or a village idiot. Dr.Who really points that up. In the old series, everyone was every proper and posh. Now, everyone has a different accent, including the Doctor himself who seems to be from "up north" somewhere. Just an observation from someone who pays attention to that kind of stuff.

GHOST HUNTERS - Jason and Grant are back. Unfortunately, so is Brian, the doofus. I think they just have him to add variety. Anyway, the ghosts are a bit more co-operative this season than last, when they just would not come out for the cameras. This season, there have been a few interesting sightings.

STARGATE:SG1 - I'm still watching it, even though it has lost some of its appeal (Jack O'Niell). Some of the stories have been good, but it seems like half the time they are really trying, and the other half the time, they're stealing ideas from Star Trek. And now, Richard Dean Anderson is doing Mastercard commercials and the Simpsons in his "I want to separate from SG1 and remind everyone I used to be McGyver" role as a celebrity.

STAR TREK 2.0 - This experiment on G4 TV has its moments. It's the original ST shown with a "Spock Market" ticker on the right side, chat room chat on the bottom, a things happening counter (i.e. Spock says "illogical" 6 times), and a running commentary up top. My TV isn't quite big enough and my eyes are quite good enough for me to read most of it comfortably, but I like the running commentary. My son tried to log into the chat rooms, but I don't think we have chat enabled (he's not going in any chat rooms while I'm not around!) The whole things is "amusing."

I watch other things intermittently, but only when I catch them. I like Trading Spouses and Wife Swap, but I couldn't tell you what time or day they come on. If I catch 'em, great. Otherwise, I'm doing other things.

Color Changes

Ok, so about a week ago I decided I was sick of looking at the peach background on this blog. So I went through my stylesheet and replaced all the #FFCC99 with #FFFFFF. I did everything right, but that white background would not show up. So I left it. I get on here this morning, and there's my white background, plain as day. But not all of it is white. So, I've gone back and fixed the ones I missed, but I guess it will be another week before that shows up as well.

I want to redesign the whole page, but I just don't have the time right now. Maybe when I get some vacation time (smirk).

We're Off and Running!

The store is finally up. I've only been working on it since September. I've heard that the more work you have to put into something, the more successful it's likely to be. I sure hope so.

To see why I'm doing this, you can read all about it here, here, here, and an amusing tidbit here.

More Blogs

I do love Blogshares. I have found more craft blogs and homeschool blogs through them, although some of the homeschool blogs came by way of the Carnival of Homeschooling. Check out all the wonderful new blogs in my blogroll. I have been so pleased to find so many homeschool bloggers who don't quote scripture verses. It's very nice.