I want my money back!

Well, have you heard that the fabulous (and no doubt expensive) custom made Bears helmets that were intended for the lions in front of the Art Institute are too small?? How funny is that? The really funny thing is that they paid all these people to come out and measure the lions heads and then a team of artists and engineers worked on these stupid things for weeks. Finally they went to put them on the lions and they didn't fit. After attempting to blame it on the cold (it caused the helmets to shrink!) they finally admitted that they were just too small.

This just cracks me up. The last time the Bears went to the Super Bowl in 1985, the lions sported similar helmets. Do you know how those helmets were made? They were made out of the bottom of a big Weber grill. Yep, no special calipers were required to measure the lions heads. No engineers to make sure they were the right shape. No special art teams to get the logo just right. It was someone ordinary...like a janitor or something. And they were made in his garage. He was probably sucking on a six-pack at the time. ( I mean, how else would you come up with the idea to put a helmet on a statue of a lion? You'd have to be drunk. That's also my theory on how someone came up with the Teletubbies.) And, wonder of wonders...the stupid Weber Grill helmets fit.

My question is...why didn't they just do that this time? It worked last time, right? I bet it would have been cheaper too...just the price of 2 grills and a six-pack of beer. Voila! But, no. The Art Institute had to go and get all fancy and have some team of experts do it. Now, I am a member of the AI. How much of my membership money went towards the making of not one, but now TWO sets of over sized helmets? By the time they get the fit correct, it will be baseball season. I thought my membership money went towards the protection and procurement of great pieces of art...not lion accessories. I'm a little pissed off. I think the AI owes me, and the next time I go I am going to touch a Monet. I've always wanted to and now I feel I have the right to do so. When they escort me out I'll be screaming, "Oh yeah? Well, how about those helmets, you genius's! How many artists does it take to screw in a light bulb? 20! One to take the price of the light bulb out of my membership cost and 19 to make sure it's the wrong size for the socket!"

LJPPKGFGS (trust me, it's relevant)

It's really hard to be a good Christian. I know that it's part of our human "sinful" nature to screw up and, as a Christian, to be able to recognize it and repent but it seems like I am going to have to spend an inordinate time praying for forgiveness lately. I am going to blame that on have a pre-teen daughter. This morning she was bound and determined that she wasn't going to take a shower even though that is what she does every morning before school. When Tony woke her up and said, "Good morning sweetie! Time to get up and take a shower," she replied with a simple, "No." Not that she wasn't going to get up, but that she just wasn't going to take a shower. So, I listened as Tony reminded her how she takes a shower every morning and she said she just wasn't going to take one. Then he told her that she should just go get in the shower because I was going to make her take one anyway. She said no. Then he took her Ipod away for a day. Brenna said she didn't care. Then he took it for 2 days. As she argued (while laying on the floor of her room, I might add) Tony said, "Fine. I'll take it for a week." And that is when she she started screeching, "No! No! I don't want to take a shower."

Well, I guess this is when a good Christian mother would intervene and say something like, "Brenna, let's pray for a minute until we calm down," or "Is this what Jesus would want you to do; argue with your parents?"

But, I already admitted that I am a flawed sinful human being so it will come to no surprise that I opened the door to her room and screamed, "I don't give a shit what you want! Get in the shower. NOW!!"

Okay, at this point a good Christian mother would feel really bad and calmly apologize to her daughter for swearing and ask her why she didn't want to take a shower and then talk about it. But, as previously established, I am a floundering Christian parent and I just glared at her until she got up off the floor and got a towel and headed off to the shower.
Did I mention that I try really hard to be a good mother? That I really want to raise my children in a Christian environment and be a calm reasonable mother that responds well to every situation? I imagine other mothers praying with their kids every night before they go to bed and smiling as their children act inappropriately while thanking God silently that they have such smart spirited kids. Then I imagine their kids stopping their silly tirades and saying, "Mom. I'm sorry. I was behaving badly and I hope you can forgive me. I am going to pray that God helps me be more respectful in the future."
That didn't happen in this case. Before Tony left for work he asked Brenna if she had anything to say to him (he was hoping for an "I'm sorry") and she said, "No."
I was just about ready to lose it with her again, but instead I went to my room and wrote her a note to put in her lunch bag. It said something like this:
Brenna, we had a tough morning. We both need to pray to God for patience and strength. However, you are grounded for a week and can't have any friends over. I love you. Mom "So as those who have been chosen of God, hold and beloved, put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience." Colossians 3:12
Now, don't get me wrong. Brenna is a really great kid. She is smart and funny and usually very well behaved and grateful. But, she just was a brat this morning.

As a Christian, I try to remember the fruits of the Spirit when I am responding to a situation. (The fruits of the Spirit are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. I know this because we just went over this in the Bible study I help lead for 4th-8th grade girls. The funny thing is, we were looking at this list and we took the first letters of all the fruits and tried to come up with a way to remember them. So the first letters, in order, are LJPPKGFGS. So the girls are coming up with stupid sayings that don't make any sense like, Light Jellybeans Put Pickles Keep Great Fast Gooey Snot. But, Brenna wanted to come up with an actual saying that made sense. After thinking for a while she came up with this...Lions Jump Past Primates, Killing Giraffes, For God's Sake! I laughed my ass off. I realize she used the Lord's name in vain, sort-of, but it's really funny and I will never ever forget the Fruits of the Spirit now)

Anyway...I feel guilty for not handling this morning in a Christian way, and I do pray for patience and anger management. But I can't guarantee that I won't yell at my kids in anger and frustration again. I, however, can guarantee that no one loves their children more than I do and that I try harder to be a good mom than anyone I know. I want to be a good Christian, but I also have to be an honest one. I can't be Susie Sunshine all the time, and I don't start every day with Bible Study with my kids and I don't fall to my knees and pray over every situation. I don't always listen to Christian music and I watch movies with sex in them and I swear and gossip sometimes. (More swearing than gossip, but I am guilty of both.) But, I love Jesus Christ and I feel Him in me. And I feel bad when I screw up. And I am trying...

Don't forget the shower cap!!

So, I scooped CNN with the Nancy-Pelosi-blinks-too-much thing. Apparently they have a video clip on their website and they clocked her at 85 blinks per minute. I'm telling you, there's something wrong with her. Now, every time I see her on TV I will just be watching her eyes.

Maybe it's just some kind of weird nervous habit, or maybe she was blinking back tears because she was so moved by what Bush had to say. (That's a joke, by the way.)

If it's a nervous habit, it sure is a weird one. When I am nervous I pick at my cuticles. Maybe I should try blinking...I'm less likely to bleed then.

In any case, I can't believe that CNN didn't cover Kerry's fake tan too. It was as distracting as the blinking. Actually, the tan itself isn't as funny as imagining how he got it. I can't imagine John Kerry laying in a tanning bed. But, even funnier than that, try to imagine him getting one of those spray tans! For those of you who haven't had a spray tan, let me fill you in. First you go into this room where the big spray tan booth is. In that room (after you shut the door, hopefully) you take off all your clothes. Then you put lotion on your cuticles and feet so that the self tanning spray doesn't make them really orange. After that you put on a paper shower cap thing to protect your highlighted hair. (I say that because, let's face it, if you are going to pay upwards of $15 for a fake tan then you probably have highlighted hair too. It's equally frivolous. Keep in mind that I have highlighted hair, so don't get all pissy with me about that remark.) Anyway, when you are done with all that and you are ready to get in the booth, you open the door and put your feet on the marks on the floor so you are in the proper place for the spray to hit you. You make sure your legs are about shoulder width apart, put your arms out slightly and push the button for the spray to begin. About 4 feet away on the wall is a line of spigots which emit the self tanning spray. Now, let me tell you, this is not like a lovely spring shower. It's like a car wash. It is loud and it is cold; the line of spigots go up and down to hit your whole body and the aftermath is a big visible fog of smelly self tanner. Then you have to turn around and position yourself to get your back sprayed. I was so completely not ready for this experience the first time I went into one of these booths. My friend who used to own a tanning salon (the same one who got my Valium for the flight to D.C....see earlier blog) had invested in two of these spray booths and wanted me to try one out as an experiment because she wanted to see what it would do to "the whitest person I know." Well, I can only tell you what it did to the front half of me, because when the spray started so loud and cold and just weird, I immediately freaked out and had an asthma attack and left the booth to get my inhaler. Therefore, only my front got tan.

This is not as bad as what happened to a friend of mine. I took her to the tanning salon to try the spray booth and she got naked, got in and pressed the cleaning button at which point the cleaning solution started spraying out of the hidden ceiling spigots. She didn't get tan, but she sure smelled good.

In any case, once you are done being sprayed, you get out of the booth and towel off the excess self tanner, get dressed and go on your merry way. A few hours later---voila! You look like George Hamilton. Now, the only way this effect can be ruined is if you go outside the tanning salon and it is pouring down rain. Then you are going to end up looking like you have vertiglio or something.

Can you imagine John Kerry doing that? Do you suppose he lifted up his "little John" half-way through the front spray so he would get an even tan? And, what exactly would be his motive for getting a fake tan anyway...is he trying to impress catsup-girl? (I'm talking about his wife, but I can't think of her name. I do know that her last name is Heinz though.) First he gets Botox, and I think he had a face lift or something too. Why did he have that done? He had to KNOW he was going to get skewered in the press. I mean, he's in politics, not show-business (at least not officially) so why get plastic surgery and tanned? It's just strange. And to think, he could have been our President. I have a hard enough time with the one we've got!

Yikes!!

I'll have a C section, thanks.

Okay, is it just me, or does John Kerry look like a freak? Did you see him at last night's State of the Union address? Like he wasn't scary looking enough before with that bizarrely long head. It's like he looked in a fun house mirror too long and his head just stuck like that. His long horse head is the reason that millions of laboring mothers nation-wide scream "Do a C section!" when they see the forceps coming.

In any case-he now sports an orange fake tan. What the hell is that? Is he a stripper on the side? This stupid orange-tan was made even more freakish because Kerry was seated next to the whitest guy in the room.

And how about the new Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi? Did you watch her during the State of the Union? She must have blinked a zillion times. She blinked so much and so rapidly it would have been easier for her to just keep her damn eyes shut. Why does she blink so much? What is wrong with her? Conversely, the Director of Homeland Security never blinked. He looked like maybe he'd died and been restored by a taxidermist. Or--did you ever see the movie Pet Semetary? In this brilliant movie (the brain child of Steven King) if your pet died and you buried it in this sacred ground (you know it's special because it's spelled wrong on the sign. Semetary--kind of like the meaningfulness of the Pursuit of Happyness. Misspelling = meaningful.) then the pet would come back to life. Sounds great, until you realize your pet comes back weird and demonic. Despite this, of course folks started burying people there. Without giving away the genius plot, let me just say that the Director of Homeland Security looks like he spent some time underground in the Pet Semetary.

That leads me to Hillary Clinton. She appeared to be doing her best Jacqueline Kennedy impersonation-right down to the oversize pearls. Well, I've never met Jacqueline Kennedy but I have seen her clothes at the Field Museum when her outfits went on tour. Let me tell you...even the most hideously out-dated, pillbox hat and pearl accessorized suits are classier than Hillary Clinton just by the benefit of once having been on Jacqueline's body. Even if she puked while wearing it. Even if there's a puke stain on the front.

Charlie Gibson ( I can call him Charlie instead of Charles if I want to. I just feel like he'd want me to. Call it a weird sense of entitlement on my part. I once dated a guy in college who labeled his cassette tape of "The Stranger" as being recorded by Bill Joel. "Bill?" I asked him when I found the tape in his glove compartment. "Yeah, so?" he said. Did I mention he was a junior with some made-up major like "Art Therapy" or something and he drove a SAAB with heated seats? I'll wait for his rebuttal to this because he'll be reading this. He'll tell me that he did have a real major and that the car was his parents. Well-duh! However, my parents drove a Cadillac and they never let me drive it back to Iowa.)

So, back to Charlie. He pointed out how there is this new trend for the members of Congress to get the President's autograph as he leaves the chambers. He then surmised that, like everyone else, the Congresspeople are not above collecting autographs. My theory on this "new trend"? I think it started right about the time ebay did.

How about Jim Webb-the guy who gave the Democratic response? When he started his speech he was so stoic and serious. He ended that was too...however, in the middle (when he was talking about President Roosevelt) he started to lose it. I thought he was going to start laughing uncontrollably. Because we could only see his upper body, I began to imagine that perhaps Monica Lewinsky had snuck in the room holding a cigar and was unbuttoning his pants.

I could be wrong on that.

Here's the coolest part of The State of the Union Address. I got to follow it up with "The Office"!! Now--there's a combo. Talk about Must See TV!

Globes

I know that a lot of my friends were expecting me to write something about the Golden Globes on Tuesday. Well, the Golden Globes were kind of boring this year. The only categories that I could even begin to make an educated guess about had to include either "Grey's Anatomy" as a nominee or involve animation in some way. Everything else...well, I didn't really care about. The funniest part was when Prince won for some song from the movie "Happy Feet" and then, unexpectedly, wasn't there to receive it. Justin Timberlake was presenting it (he's really cute now, and dresses great, but look back on his old N'Sync days. ARF!!) and then he announced Prince as the winner. Well, there was some awkward looking around and the camera just stayed on Justin because, apparently, Prince was supposed to be there. Well, he wasn't. So Justin bends his knees so he appears a foot shorter and looks up at the microphone and says something like, "On behalf of Prince I would like to thank you for this award."
It was wicked funny. I wonder if he will get any backlash for that. I doubt he and Prince are friends, so it really looked like he was making fun of him. I laughed, but I don't know if Prince did.
Anyway, my point in mentioning this is...where was Prince? Well, I read that he was stuck in traffic.
Now, I'm thinking that, if I were Prince and I was actually nominated for a Golden Globe I might plan to leave a little early for the ceremony. It's not like he's going to get nominated every year like Susan Lucci and the daytime drama awards (although I think they're about the same size). The last time Prince was nominated for a Golden Globe (and I'm guessing here) was for Purple Rain, if at all. So, if you are Prince...wouldn't you make sure you were there on time for crying out loud? He was at the ceremony later I know because they showed him at one point. Now, again...if you are Prince and you already missed the part where you won the stupid award...wouldn't you just skip the rest of the ceremony and start hitting the party circuit? You know, just send Morris Day or someone to pick up your statue and pony up to the open bar at the In Style party or whatever??
The other memorable moment was when Tom Hanks was presenting Warren Beatty with the Lifetime Achievement Award or whatever it is called. He was doing a fine job of it (constantly repeating how WB had gotten the Most Promising Newcomer Award in 1962...which of course means that WB is really old...)until he brought up the fact that Warren used to sleep with everyone with a pulse. Then he asked for a show of hands in the audience of who had actually slept with Warren. At this point, the camera lands on Warren and his lovely wife, Annette Benning. Man, did she look PISSED!! I don't think she thought it was as funny as everyone else did. Then, just to rub salt in the wound, when they showed this big montage of movie moments in Warren's career the song playing was "Sooner or Later" by Madonna who was Warren's girlfriend right before Annette. I doubt Warren got lucky on Golden Globe night!
Which leads me to my point...who writes those speeches? I always thought that Tom Hanks looked like a pretty nice guy as well as a smart guy. (I remember the year he was interviewed by Barbara Walters on the eve of the Oscars. Tom was nominated for Philadelphia or something and had won the year before for Forrest Gump...or vice versa. But anyway, Barbara said, "Well, you're up against 5 other men who also gave compelling performances. So, Tom. What do you think your chances are?" and Tom replied, "Uh...one in six." Hilarious.) I feel a little disappointed in Tom for having not realized that part of his speech wasn't wholly appropriate. It would be one thing if he were talking about Jack Nicholson because he isn't married and his 25 year old date probably wouldn't care. But WB was sitting next to his WIFE. I just felt bad for her.
Other than those 2 things, I was fairly bored with the Globes. No drunken outbursts like Reese Witherspoon's husband (now ex) did last year. (I can't even think of his name. He is SOOO yesterday!) Nobody giving their award to someone else like that one guy did when he tried to give his to Jack Lemmon or something. Nothing. Boring.

And, it's slimming!!

Remember how I pointed out that 6th grade boys love to put each other down by saying, "You're gay"? Well, something happened this weekend that proved it! Bronte has a friend who has 3 older brothers. The oldest is in 6th grade and when Bronte was over at her house on Saturday the whole bunch of them were playing in the basement. At one point the 6th grade brother got annoyed with the 5th grade brother and told him he was, "so gay!" Both Bronte and her friend heard it and saw how upset it made the insulted one. So, a few minutes later Bronte's friend asked her, "What's gay mean?" and Bronte had an answer for her. Are you ready for this? Bronte said, "It means you wear a lot of black."

I was not in the basement when this happened. This is how I found out. At about 8:30 that night my kids and my husband and I were all sitting on the couch watching Mythbusters on Discovery. All of a sudden Bronte crawled over from one end of the couch to sit on my lap and she whispered in my ear, "Does "gay" mean you wear a lot of black?" I looked at her and said, "What??" and she repeated the question.
OK. As a parent, what do you do at this point? My daughter is 6, by the way. I did what all parents are wont to do when faced with a question like this...I stalled. I asked her, "Why do you ask?" and she told me about what happened at her friend's house and that she told her pal that gay meant you wear a lot of black. Then she looked up at me again and said, "Was I right?" I said, "Well, not exactly," and she said, "Well, then what does it mean?" I told her we would talk about it later.

Now, the big question is...do I actually have to address this with my 6 year old or should I wait until she brings it up again? Secondly, where in hell did she get the idea that being gay means you wear a lot of black? What kind of answer is that?

So, after the kids went to bed I told Tony about this. He died laughing but didn't seem overly concerned. I am worried that Bronte is going to tell the entire Kindergarten class that being gay means you wear black and all the kids are going to start calling people in black "gay", which is going to be bad, especially if they are Catholic and call the priest gay. (Which has about a 50% chance of being true, right? Man, some of you are going to crucify me for that comment!)
My point is that Kindergartners will believe about anything. When I was in Kindergarten someone told me that when a boy lays on a girl that makes a baby. So, a couple of days later I was playing kickball and ran into this boy (he was right in the baseline...I had no choice) and he fell right on top of me. I started to cry hysterically and wouldn't tell the gym teacher why so he sent me to the nurse who called my mother to come and get me. When we got in the car my mom asked me why I was crying and I told her that Sean Grieser made me make a baby. I'm sure my mother experienced the same feeling I did when Bronte wanted to know what "gay" means.

Anyway, so Tony wasn't concerned. That's typical. He's not the one who is going to have to field all the phone calls from mothers telling me that Bronte told their precious kid that they were gay. Whatever. All I know is that every time Tony wears black (which he does quite often) I am going to say, "You look great...fag."

Steve Carell, I think...

Have you seen the movie "Little Miss Sunshine"? If you haven't seen it yet, you need to rent it. It's about this very ordinary looking little girl with this totally screwed up family who enters a pageant a la JonBenet. It is brilliant. Let me just tell you my favorite line. At one point her uncle, played by the guy who was in The 40 Year Old Virgin...what's his name...anyway he is telling her that the reason he tried to kill himself was because of a series of events which included falling in love with another man. When this girl questions him about being in love with a MAN he replies that, yes, he was in love with a MAN and she says, "Well, that's just silly."

I think that about sums up how kids at the age of 8 feel about homosexuality, don't you? I remember when Brenna (my older daughter) and I were getting to the point when I thought we needed to have the "sex talk". I went to Barnes and Noble and went to the information desk so they could guide me towards the appropriate books for Brenna on this subject. I told the 20 year old boy behind the desk that I needed sex books that I could read with my daughter. Judging from the look on his face, I must have phrased it wrong. (Like I was looking for family friendly porn or something) Anyway, I explained that I was going to have "the talk" with her and I thought I needed some visuals. But, I explained that I didn't want "The Joy of Sex" or anything like that. I wanted something that I could use to explain to an 8 year old where babies come from and also all the glorious things that happen in puberty (I'm being sarcastic here). Let me tell you, I was amazed at the number of books he found for me. I had to buy myself a Starbucks and sit down and study them. Some were very liberal. I kept expecting condoms to fall out from between the pages like those subscription cards in People magazine. Some were WAAAYYYY too God-ish. They talked about intercourse as a wifely duty and a means to an end (babies) and I almost expected them to have advice like, "close your eyes and go to your happy place and try not to wince and soon it will be over". (That reminds me of something my friend told me after she had "the talk" with her daughter. She took this child to a resort hotel somewhere for the weekend just to have this chat! Anyway, she told her the details on how to make a baby, and her daughter said, "So, you have to do that every time you want to have a baby?" Her mom said, "Yes..." and her daughter said, "But I want to have three babies. Does that mean I have to do that three times??")
Okay, so I needed something in the middle. No crosses on the cover and no chapters about masturbation. (This is true...there are actually chapters on masturbation in some of these sex books geared towards tweens. Seriously. One had a drawing of a girl holding a shower massage and smiling knowingly.) However, almost every book I looked at had a chapter on homosexuality. What it means, how to tell if you are a homosexual, how they pleasure each other...etc. In my opinion the entire chapter on homosexuality could be summed up with that line from "Little Miss Sunshine"...That's just silly. But I am not gay, so what do I know? My point is, it never occurred to me that Brenna might want to know what a homosexual is. But, being the good mom that I am I bought a book with a gay chapter so she would know what being a homosexual is all about. Besides, I happen to know for a fact that one of the favorite phrases of a sixth grade boy trying to put down another sixth grade boy is, "You're so gay." I thought Brenna might want to know what that meant.
Well, she was less than interested. I asked her if she knew what being gay was. She said no. I asked her if she wanted me to tell her and she thought for a minute. Then she said not really. When she finally does ask me I think I will answer, "That's just silly."

I'm not bad...I'm just drawn that way.

Okay, so back to the fact that I go to Bible Study once a week. This Bible study, as I mentioned before, is really hard-core and very conservative. It's only for women and there are about 250 women in it. We all gather in the sanctuary of our host church (it is non-denominational) and sing some hymns and the leader prays a group prayer and then we splinter off to our discussion groups. My group has about a dozen women in it. Then we get back together in the sanctuary for a "lecture" which basically goes over the material we discussed and fills in any blanks we may have had in our discussion.

Now, don't get me wrong, I enjoy Bible study in general. This one though, well, it's really something else. The first time I walked in I thought maybe I had been sucked into a vortex that took me somewhere down South because all the women were dressed up and some even had on hats! This is at 9:00 on a Thursday morning. I was wearing jeans and a t-shirt. A lesser women might have felt self-conscious and under dressed, but I suffer from an overly healthy dose of self-esteem so I didn't. Then the "lecturer" starts getting into the rules...if you're more than 10 minutes late don't come in, don't read the notes in your Bible to help with the discussion questions, no perfume, no drinks, etc. Rebellion was already stirring up inside me as I vowed to always use the notes in my Bible.

Anyway, we are studying the book of Romans. In this book Paul is writing to the early Christian churches...bucking them up and reiterating the rules of being a Christian. Read with the right mind-set, it can be a very uplifting book. Well...not with this group of over-dressed zealots.
For the most part I leave every Thursday feeling doomed. But, then I put it in perspective and I am better. One week the lecture went on and on about how our culture is bringing down Christianity in general. According to her the downfall of Christians is People magazine (which I subscribe to) secular music (which I adore, especially Justin Timberlake. On his new CD he has a song which repeats the phrase "Damn Girl" over and over. You know, not like he's cursing the girl, but like "Damn girl, you're so fine." Love it!) and television (which I don't really watch, but I do make it a point to always see Gray's Anatomy in which everybody is sleeping with someone and they make dubious and capricious medical choices based on how hung over they are...I could only hope to have doctors that hot and interesting if I ever get really sick. Of course, they'd probably kill me in the process of healing me, but...Oh! And did you ever notice that on these shows the men don't shave? It's like, the more pronounced your five o'clock shadow is, the hotter you are considered. Weird. If only that held true for women and leg hair. I could save a lot of time in the mornings.)
So, where was I? Oh...the downfall of modern Christians. The answer, according to the "lecturer" was to be "in the world but not of the world". As all the other 249 women were nodding their heads and going "Ummm hummm, oh yes" I was thinking, "You have GOT to be kidding me!"
I mean, let's face it, the problem with modern Christians is not that they read People magazine or know all the words to "Sexy Back"! If all it took to be a good Christian was listening to Amy Grant and reading "The Left Behind" series of books (which is a Christian series about the rapture. There's a reason why Christian literature isn't on the best seller list...it sucks.) then anybody could be a Christian. The problem is that all these women were in there agreeing that they were going to shun television, with the exception of "The 700 Club" and re-runs of "Touched by an Angel" and stop reading gossip mags and only listen to KLOVE the Christian radio station and then going home and watching Jerry Springer. My point is that hypocrisy is the downfall of Christianity. If people were more real and accepting of our culture instead of walking around with their eyes closed and their fingers in their ears singing, "I'm not listening, I'm not listening," then Christians wouldn't have such a bad reputation. How many more pastors have to get caught in a huge scandal before we realize that it is really hard to be perfect? Now, I am not condoning preachers using drugs and having gay sex with a paid pretty boy...but I don't think I am a bad Christian because I watch T.V. or read In Style magazine. If these women are so worried about the effect modern culture is having on Christians then why do they get all dressed up for Bible study? Shouldn't they be wearing sackcloth and repenting?

Now, bottom line is that I am learning a lot about the book of Romans in this study. I am also learning a lot about how easy it is to become filled with despair in the name of Christianity. I should feel bad about writing a blog because I am not writing all about the Glory of God (and I admit that I do feel somewhat bad about not liking that woman from school so much. Yikes!) but I am not going to! I guess I just don't think that this group has any right to judge me and tell me that what I do is wrong. If I were some kind of pedophile porn abuser, well that would be a different story, but I try pretty hard to do the right thing and be a good person (which may be hard to see from the stuff I've written. Oh well. As my husband would say...My bad). I'll keep going to the study because I like what I am learning.

I will also keep going because it amuses me.

Product Placement

Well, I went to my Bible study this morning and it was cancelled. Well, not exactly cancelled...we have one more week of Christmas vacation until we start meeting again. For those of you who have read the other posts on this blog, the idea of ME going to Bible study may sound incongruous to my very nature, but I do take it very seriously. Besides, just think how crappy I'd be if I weren't in Bible study. Anyway, this study is very hard-core. There are a lot of rules and I just chafe every time they come up with a new one. We aren't allowed to talk about books or movies or concerts because not everyone has had the same experiences so it's not fair to use pop culture as a frame of reference. We aren't allowed to respond to each other in discussion and we need to limit our answers to what we have written on our study sheets. We aren't allowed to wear perfume because some people are sensitive to smells. We aren't allowed to have drinks (I think they mean coffee or pop, but let me tell you, the more time I spend in this study the more I want a vodka tonic) in our discussion groups. Blah, blah, blah. I hate rules.

Anyway, so my study was cancelled and so I was all dressed and made up and perfumed (I told you I hate rules) and had no where to go. So, I went to the bookstore to have a Starbucks. I called my coffee bud and asked her if she could meet me and she said she would be there in a half hour. (That just goes to show you that stay-at-home moms have nothing better to do than meet their friends for coffee, which is what people who aren't stay-at-home moms think we do anyway. Yup, we just lounge around and meet for coffee because we are too stupid to get "real' jobs.) So I had a half hour to kill in Barnes and Noble. Yippee!! I got my Starbucks and headed over to the comfortable chairs we always like to sit in. I sat down and started to look at the books in the section that was facing my chair. That section was "Self Help". Because I have a very healthy self-esteem, I don't spend a lot of time in that section so it was very interesting to me. (My self esteem is so healthy, as a matter of fact, that in college a dear friend of mine accused me of suffering from a "superiority complex". That still cracks me up...but not because it isn't true.) Anyway, those self-help books have the damnedest titles. The Easy Way To Stop Drinking for example. I am going to buy it for every alcoholic I know because apparently all they need to do is read this book and they will be un-addicted. Judging from the title, it will be EASY.
My favorite self-help books were those yellow and black ones that look like Cliff notes, only bigger. All the titles of these books end with the same 2 words..."for Dummies". I know you've seen these books. There are a million of them...Soduku for Dummies, Wine for Dummies, Microsoft Word for Dummies. I've always been really surprised that people actually bought these books. I would never buy a book that even implied that I was a dummy, let alone came right out and called me one. (That reminds me of a story. When I was a freshman in college I took economics. I don't know how the rest of you feel about econ, but I hated it and didn't understand it. Furthermore, I couldn't understand why anyone would want to understand it, let alone come to enjoy it. So, needless to say I wasn't doing very well in that class. Luckily, my boyfriend was getting his Masters in Business and so I asked him to help me. So, the poor guy is trying to explain some really pedestrian economic subject to me and I am staring at him blankly, probably thinking about shoes or something. So, he gets done with his explanation and I said, "I don't get it." So, he tries again and still I don't get it. So, he dumbs it down and I still don't get it at which point he calls me stupid. He was really frustrated, but he didn't know I wasn't even paying attention. I was thinking about shoes! Later on in our relationship he told me he could never marry me because I would go out and charge heedlessly and then hide all the bills under the bed. Wonder why he got that idea?)
Back to the books. So, here are a bunch of books with titles like, Anger Management for Dummies and Eating Disorders for Dummies.
Do I even need to explain why:
A. I found this very funny.
B. I couldn't believe that the publishers thought it would be a good idea to come right out and call someone with anger issues a "dummy".
C. I wondered if people actually bought these books.

I almost bought the one called Anger Management for Dummies just so I could carry it around everywhere with me with the title out in plain sight just to see the looks I'd get. I'd even bring it to my Bible study and hold it while I asked why we have to have all those stupid rules!