Today, at 5:01 PM Pacific time, same-sex marriage became legal in California and several dozen homosexual men and women were legally married.
The stunning news is that the universe did not collapse in on itself. The sun did not go supernova. Jupiter did not alter its course and crash into us. And Earth itself did not explode.
Guess we dodged a bullet. Whew!
UPDATE: 6:30 PM on June 17th. Hundreds more same-sex marriages performed. Earth still exists. No reports of comets or asteroids altering their course to collide with us. Will report back later if Earth destroyed.
Maybe heroes is too strong a word, but I’m going to go with it for now. Maybe I’ll make this a category and add to it over time. Maybe not.
I’m not going to go into any detail about why I classify these people as heroes. I’m just going to list them in alphabetical order with, in a couple cases, a link or two to something relevant or that exemplifies them.
Ayaan Hirsi Ali - Author of Infidel. Co-writer of the short film Submission.
Richard Dawkins - Author of numerous excellent books. My favorite of which is The Blind Watchmaker. Check out this short video on YouTube where someone asks him the question, “What if you’re wrong?” Absolutely great answer.
Fight It!
You say that I don’t want it.
You tell me that you need it.
And everything you’re feeling says I need you.
So I just try to fight it.
And keep it nice and quiet.
It’s getting hard to hide it.
Let it out? No.
I . don’t . want . to . lose . control .
so . keep . your . head .
don’t . let . it . out . just .
Fight It!
When you want it, try.
When you need it, fight.
Tell me.
Don’t you feel alright?
Fills you up inside.
All the love you find.
Tell me.
Don’t you feel alright?
I try to understand it,
but I can’t comprehend it,
and everything I’m feeling takes me over.
It’s all I ever wanted.
I’m hooked and I’m addicted.
A self-imposed prediction.
Keep it filthy.
I . don’t . want . to . lose . control .
so . keep . your . head .
don’t . let . it . out . just .
Fight It!
When you want it, try.
When you need it, fight.
Tell me.
Don’t you feel alright?
Fills you up inside.
All the love you find.
Tell me.
Don’t you feel alright?
What you wanted.
What you needed.
Yeah, you really want it.
Say you’ll bleed it.
Gut it.
Get up all inside it.
An ex-gf of mine (not Hollie) told me about a show called Man vs. Wild on Discovery. I’d never seen it because I don’t have TV any longer. I have AppleTV, which I really like. Well, AppleTV recently got Man vs. Wild and offered a free preview, so I downloaded it. The host’s name is Bear Grylls. And, apparently, he’s insane. Below is the last few minutes of the free preview. What the hell? Have you seen this show? Is this guy for real?
Someone came to my blog by googling for “jana post”. Who would search for “jana post”? Seems like an odd phrase to search for. (Sorry, I meant “for which to search”.) So I googled for “jana post” to see what would come up. The first search result turns out to be the Just Jana blog! Hmmm, could this Jana be anything like the Jana we all know and love?
Let’s take a look!
Well, what do you know, she’s got a picture of herself right on her home page. Hmmm, she is blond, but the resemblance seems to end there, especially when you read the caption, “Me and the Munchkin”.
Well, best not judge a book by its cover, let’s dig a little deeper.
Uh-oh.
Under the About Me section, it clearly states, “I love everything and anything to do with Scrapbooking!” She has links to such sites as, “Scrap for a Cure” (a cure for what? scrapbooking?), “The Scrapbook Zone”, “Faith Sisters”, and “Scrapstreet”.
This is not looking good.
The word hubby is used 3 times on her home page, and BFF twice. Can anyone imagine our Jana using either of those?
She did use the word freakin’. But this is more than offset by Yippee!!
I’m afraid that we have not found a kindred spirit for our Jana. Rather, I believe we have found the Anti-Jana.
Now that I have invisible friends in Chicago who would prefer to attend dance recitals and infect me with tuberculosis rather than entertain me and my ex-gf with their antics, I feel it is appropriate to engage them in a wager.
The currently first place Phillies will be heading to Chicago to trounce the currently first place Cubs on the last weekend in August. It’s a four game home stand for the Cubs. Since both teams are in first place in their respective divisions, and the Phils have to play in Chicago, I am willing to wager that the Phils will win at least 2 of the 4 games. The specifics of the wager to be discussed.
If you want to travel light, and save a little money now that airlines have started charging for checking even one bag, check out One Bag.
This guy has some pretty good tips and recommendations on what to pack, how to pack it, what to pack it in, etc. I found his recommendations on how to pack your stuff in a way to prevent/minimize wrinkling to be quite novel. I read it and thought, “Of course!”
I saw Iron Man last night with a friend of mine, Jeanine. It was really good, better than I was expecting. I was thinking that it might devolve into too much CGI (computer-generated imagery), but it didn’t. Obviously, there was a good amount of CGI, but it blended well and wasn’t overdone. Robert Downey, Jr. was excellent in the role of Tony Stark. And the score and background music was simply perfect. All in all, a really fun, and often funny, movie.
If you haven’t seen it yet, don’t forget to stay through the end of the credits.
Thanks to everyone who contacted me yesterday to make sure I was okay. I was, and I still am.
As mentioned in my previous post, my friends, Ellen and Alan (a.k.a. Walendo), lost their home in yesterday’s fire here in the Santa Cruz Mountains. They live about 10 miles from me. Which may not sound like much, but in a case like this, makes all the difference. The picture above is one that Ellen snapped as she and Walendo were evacuating their home early yesterday morning. At the time, they still weren’t sure they were going to need to leave. It’s a riveting story, and you can read it all here.
This morning I woke up to the smell of smoke. I got up, looked outside and could also see smoke. The winds must have shifted overnight because I didn’t smell smoke last night. I immediately checked online. I’m still safe. The fire did jump Summit Road last night, but the firefighters are working to keep it contained. It still hasn’t moved significantly further, if at all, in my direction. The winds are much lower than yesterday.
UPDATE: Ellen just posted an update over on her site, complete with some pictures of what’s not left of their house. Here’s a shot taken from approximately same vantage point as the one above.
A wildfire broke out early this morning about 10 miles from my home in the Santa Cruz Mountains. I’m not currently affected, but they have closed Summit Road. A couple good friends of mine live on Ormsby Road, where the fire supposedly started. I haven’t yet been able to get in touch with them.
UPDATE 1: I just heard from my friends, first in a text msg that said, “We’re ok - house is gone though”. I immediately called them and got the story. They were woken up by some neighbors about 6am. They saw the fire, and quickly realized that it was going to get to them. They had about 45 minutes to pack up as much stuff as they could and leave. They had to drive through the fire on Ormsby Road to get out. They have a rental property in Capitola that their tenants just vacated recently, so they’re going to stay there for now.
UPDATE 2: The evacuation area starts about three miles down the road from where I live. I am not affected. Summit Road is closed from Old Santa Cruz Hwy (about half a mile from my street). My friends just finished a large renovation/addition to their home a couple months ago. I feel so bad for them, but I am glad to know they at least have a place of their own to stay until they can rebuild, if that’s what they decide to do.
