Off Our Back Deck...

Sometimes words are completely inadequate.

Hope you're having a great week!

ATM

Bad Idea #125---Gettin' Your Coyote Ugly On...

This being the holiday season, I thought a cautionary tale about the effects of drinking too much demon eggnog might be in order.

Ever hear the term "Coyote Ugly"? Not the forgettable movie, but the term. It comes from the idea that a coyote stuck in a trap will chew it's own paw off to escape. In the same vein, it's a description of the "morning after" when you wake up next to the [koff] babe you picked up at the bar the night before.

You're so horrified that you'd rather chew your own arm off to get away than wake him/her up.

Bad, bad eggnog!

So this guy (who wasn't named in the article) in Winnepeg was so drunk that he broke into a couple of garages and rooted through some stuff. A concerned homeowner called the police, who eventually found the guy passed out in somebody's boat, with his Coyote Ugly by his side.

Except that his date wasn't alive.

It wasn't even human.

It was a stuffed dog.

"He was lying there with his genitalia exposed next to the stuffed dog," said Crown attorney John Peden. "While the police report doesn't describe it this way, the dog might be appropriately characterized as now being anatomically correct, as opposed to its condition before he removed it."

Gak!

Ok, I have to admit, I laughed hysterically when I read that.

The guy's defense attorney explained:

"All (his offences) involve being drunk, usually drunk as a skunk."

The authorities actually had to take a DNA sample in their investigation of the plush po-po perp.

Yes, I can't help myself. I'm still laughing hysterically.

Of course the article quoted a psychologist who talked about stuffed animal fetishes, which made this seem ever so creepy. I found it when I was looking for a picture of a stuffed dog.

So let that be a lesson to you!

If the Elmo you bought your kid for Christmas starts looking like a Tickle Me George Clooney...

Put the eggnog down!


Here's my latest on Disaboom, if you feel like dropping by!

Happy Turkey Day!

I know you've probably gotten this in email, like I did, but I still wanted to put it up! Hope you have a wonderful day, and don't burn that bird!

Yum!

Quit Yer Bitchin'!

Sorry I haven't been around lately---between the Big Kid and I, we had 9 papers and 3 exams due this week. I'm not going to whine about it---ok, maybe just a little bit. Yesterday I felt like my eyeballs were staring at the inside of my skull.

But whew! It's done. There's only about 3 weeks left of school, and the last big hurdle will be finals. I can't even complain about Ms. Bigmouth that much. The professor realized a couple of classes ago that we weren't even half-way through our objectives and has been hurtling through the material. When she tries to stick her 27 cents in, he shuts her down pretty effectively. She's been reduced to trying to correct his Latin two or three times a class. Ex-partay, anyone?

So while I've been feeling like a big crybaby, an article caught my eye this week.

It's from The People's Republic of Boulder. If you aren't from Colorado, that reference will probably fly over your head, unless you watch South Park. No, it's not the one about gay cowboys eating pudding. ;-)

Anyway, the Boulder Valley school district has decided that starting in 2010, there will be no more high school valedictorians. There were too many complaints from the non-winners (or I suspect, their parents). They've decided that recognizing high achievement (like class rankings) fosters "unhealthy competition".

Ok, fer pete's sakes, "unhealthy competition" is Tegwin, Zaq, and Hunter pulling their pants down and competing to see who can light the biggest fart. And filming their heinie explosions to send to Jackass.

"Unhealthy competition" is Madyson, Irelynd, and Dilyn keeping a book to have a record in a contest of "who can blow the most players on the football team" (this actually happened in our little burg several years ago).

How are our kids going to learn to compete in a global society if Mumsy and Daddy insist that "everybody" has to be the winner? And what's the point of buckling down and doing well if your hard work is going to be unrecognized?

Sheesh.

How I Feel About Football Season

Film + Faith--Oh God!

I was supposed to participate in RC's Film + Faith blogathon earlier this week, but my back wasn't cooperating and I didn't get to post in time.

He's graciously allowed me to submit it late!

First and foremost, I have to confess that I have a real problem with organized religion. I don't have a problem with other's participation, I'm not going to advise or advocate one over another or insist on none. It's just my own journey, as I think it should be for us all.

When I was a kid, we were originally members of the Lutheran Church, Missouri Synod. Quite a bit of fire and brimstone there, and I thought God was a very very scary old geezer who was going to send me straight to hell for wishing my older brother would eat a bug in his sleep and choke on it. In my mind, He wasn't accessible to me. I couldn't relate to Him as someone I could confide in, confess to, ask forgiveness from, or thank for my blessings. He knew all my secret bad thoughts and would "get me" in the end.

Although we were members of the Lutheran Church, my mom was pretty broadminded in our religious instruction. She thought it was fabulous that my Jewish kindergarten teacher taught us about Hanukkah, the dreidal and the song "Hava Nagila" (oddly enough, this came in handy years ago when karaoke was in its infancy---I was a DJ in a number of clubs in the city---that's how I met my current husband--and a middle-aged woman with her elderly mother had scoured the area to find a show that not only had the song on it's playlist, but someone who'd sing it with the mother. So they'd visit this rather seedy little club twice a month, drink a club soda, and we'd do a duet! ;-))

But yes, I'm digressing. Nowadays, if a kindergarten teacher in a public school did this, there would be indignant screaming all around!

Mom also sent us to different churches for summer day Bible Camp as well. Maybe she was looking for a break (which I get), but also I think she understood that the Bible Camp in our church was pretty damn grim. My favorite was the Baptist camp. Their message included uplifting music that just made my heart sing! Over the years we went to Catholic Bible school, Presbyterian Bible school---a huge variety of faiths.

When I was 10, the movie Oh God! came out. What a revelation! Instead of scary Santa, George Burns was God! It made me start thinking.

Jerry Landers (played by John Denver) says: But I don't even go to any church!

and God (played by George Burns) says: Neither do I!

Huh? What a concept!

My mom was active in our Church. Our minister would tell her over and over again, "Hope (not her real name, but she has one that is equally as religiously appropriate), I don't know what we'd do without you! You have a true calling to our faith!"

When my dad ran off with one of his employees (I loved him to death---he was a great dad, but a total shit as a husband) after 24 years of marriage around 1978, Mom found herself at odds at the age of 46. She had a graduate degree (worked as a teacher while putting my dad through college to his doctorate), and felt she had a calling and asked our pastor to mentor her.

He completely slapped her in the face. "We hardly allow women to become pastors", he sneered. "What makes you think we would allow DIVORCED women to do so?" Like it was HER fault my dad was a dog and couldn't keep his dick in his pants.

Big first blatant strike against organized religion for me.

But my mom was a champ.

She basically said "f*ck you" and got her Masters in Divinity as a United Methodist minister instead.

The odds were against her. Out of her graduating class, there were very few posts available, and not many churches were willing to accept a 40+ divorced woman as their first choice. She ended up as an interdenominational protestant circuit preacher in a small farming town. She'd drive 100 miles every Sunday to do three services in three towns. One of the services she held was in the basement of a hall, and the entire congregation consisted of one family, 6 members in all, who'd be there every week.

I went and lived with her my junior year in high school (my brothers and I had moved in with my dad to stay with the school system we'd grown up with when she was posted). I was appalled at the small-town patriarchal system that was ingrained in the citizenry itself. There was a new power facility being built (a 2-3 year endeavor), which brought a large number of new people from all over to the area. Mom was new, and actively worked to help these people feel like they could find a home in our church, and tried to make it truly interdenominational. She was pretty successful (increased the membership by about 40%).

The old folks didn't like it and tried to have her fired. They wrote letters to her bishop. They held secret meetings just for this purpose. They didn't approve of having a "woman" minister. They didn't approve of the improvements or changes she was implementing. Their efforts didn't work, but it hurt her terribly. She'd come home and cry. The politics disguised as "faith-based" can be loathsome when spewed by supposedly-Christian people.

It was another strike for me against organized religion. Although it hurt my mom a lot, I volunteered to work at my job at the local bakery on Sundays. I couldn't bear the hypocrisy of being pleasant to these people who were nice to my Mom's face on the Sabbath but were scheming behind her back. I simply couldn't "turn the other cheek". I wanted to punch them in their sanctimonious mouths, and had to remove myself.

Essentially, this ended my tolerance for the behind-the-scenes political bullshit that happens in church that can only be realized if you've actually been there, done that. Over the years, we've attended a few different parishes, but at the slightest whiff of anyone approaching us with the "us against some other faction of members" I've yanked us out, lock, stock and barrel. It might not be really fair to the kids, and I've had some guilty feelings over it.

So it comes back to Oh God! and how the message affected me as a person and a Christian.

Do I have to confess my sins to a priest, or wear magical underpanties, or speak in tongues to reach the stairway to heaven? All of that foolishness is a result of organized religion, in my opinion. I don't do any of those things, and no, I don't think that George Burns is God, but it helped me clarify a lot of things in my mind and in my heart.

I don't have a problem with an atheist message, or an agnostic one either. To each his own. I can profess my faith without pushing it on others.

Bottom line, Oh God! helped God be accessible to me. Instead of being a formidable and punishing presence, I can think of Him as being benign and loving. I can pour my heart out when I talk to Him---articulate my fears and follies, thank Him for every blessing in my life, ask Him to watch over soldiers and people who've had tragedies and my children, etc.

"I know how hard it is in these times to have faith. But maybe if you could have the faith to start there, maybe the times would change. You could change them. Think about it. Try. And try not to hurt each other. There's been enough of that. It really gets in the way. I'm a God of very few words and Jerry's already given you mine. However hopeless, helpless, mixed up and scary it all gets, it can work.

If you find it hard to believe in me, maybe it would help you to know that I believe in you."

For me, that's it in a nutshell.

As a postscript....after 6 years in that small town, over the years, my mom went on to be posted as a minister in several other small parishes (she wanted to live closer to her children)---none of which had ever had a woman minister. After she moved on, they all specifically requested a woman to replace her, which really made her a pioneer. She retired at the age of 70 a few years ago.

I'm so very very proud of her. She's such an admirable woman.

Gah!

I did it again, although I'm not sure how.

Threw my lower back out, that is. Why does it always seem to happen in the same spot?

Anyway, it's been excrutiating to sit for even short periods, so I've been AWOL. Will be back in a couple.

In the meantime, I was supposed to participate in RC's blogathon---Film + Faith. I had a half-finished post about how the movie "Oh God!"---which I watched as a kid---really changed my perception about how I viewed my faith. George Burns as God.

If you have a moment, drop by and read the entries. Really interesting stuff!

Life's a Stage

Is this guy for real? Does he regularly eat big steaming bowls of stupid for breakfast?

That's what I've been asking myself for the last day after reading about the verdict in the Vincent "Don Vito" Margera trial.

On Wednesday, Margera, 51, whose claim to fame is from the MTV show Viva La Bam (about his nephew Bam Margera) was found guilty of groping two underage girls (12 and 14 years old---and not the women pictured) at an autograph signing at a Colorado skate park.

"Big Boob," he said to the 12-year-old.

His attorney claimed that, "her client may have been obnoxious and vulgar but said he was acting according to the character that his fans loved and expected to see."

Oookay. I don't know on what planet I'd "love and expect" to see a slovenly old creep grab little girl titties, but maybe that's just me.

He's also charged with 12 counts in breaking conditions of his bail, which will be heard in court in December. 12 counts? Wonder what he did? Offer a 10-year old a bite of his salami sandwich?

After the verdicts were read, Margera threw himself on the floor and flailed around, knocking down his attorney in the process.

"Jesus! I can't spend the rest of my f------ life in jail! Just f------ kill me now!"

"I can't stand up! My legs! My legs! I can't move," he yelled as deputies tried to calm and subdue him.

"I didn't f------ do nothing. You can rot in f------ hell!"

"I can't move. I can't move," he shouted as deputies surrounded him and the astonished jury looked on.

"I can't get up!" Margera said. "My legs are broke! Help me. Help me!"

It took four deputies to carry him out of the courtroom. All the evidence that was left of the scuffle was a lonely little Hershey bar on the floor.

At the initial incident:

"When two female police officers arrived at the mall parking lot to arrest him, Margera called them "psycho lesbian b------" and thought he was being "punked."

During the arrest, Margera claimed his arm had been broken, prompting a visit to an emergency room. He was cleared and taken back to the police station, only to be returned to the emergency room when he complained he couldn't breathe and was having a heart attack."

I've never seen the TV show that he was on---in fact my original interest was piqued when the incident occurred simply because it happened in the neighborhood where I grew up---but it makes a person wonder.

Is that guy so clueless and histrionic in real life? Was the whole incident a part of his "schtick"? In a world where 4-year-olds get suspended from school for kissing other 4-year-olds, did he think that it was ok for his "character" to grab the breasts, butts and thighs of young girls?

Stupid or creepy, take your pick, I guess. His family must be so proud.

Sheesh!