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I'm leavin' today...

I am officially on a dot*com using Expression Engine.

So, come and see me. I'll leave this up for a few days while I try to get around to everyone. Can you do me a favor with a Blog Chain Post? You know, mention it just in case mutual bloggers stop by your place? Thanks :D I will soon have a redirect available and then, with the final archive and template boxes unpacked, will dust the place and move off of MuNu.

Sparring

Wanna debate?

E is in the Forensic Club at her high school (yes, I mentioned she would be going in the fall). Since I lettered as a freshmen and since none of the sponsoring teachers have ever coached, I offered my services. They have their first tournament next week.

They are only going to do Student Congress next week due to limited time, so today we discussed the Resolutions. Wanna have a go?

Resolution 1: Resolved: That the US Representatives and Senators be limited to twelve years of continuous service.

Resolution 2: Resolved: that the goal of US foreign trade policy should be worldwide free trade.

Resolution 3: Resolved: that the federal government should mandate comprehensive sex education in all public secondary schools.

Resolution 4: Resolved: that the federal government mandate that all states require job training and community service for any and all welfare recipients.

And the national debate topic:

Resolved: The United States federal government should substantially decrease its authority either to detain without charge or to search without probable cause.

We discussed terms and the importance of defining them. Then we extemporaneously talked about pros and cons. I had to frequently challenge them to not use "I think" statements. We sent them off with cheerful admonitions of: "Research!" "Three different supportive sources!"

I told them my two rules: 1)No private conversations while someone is speaking, and 2)Raise your hand to speak or be recognized. Everyone deserves the chance to be heard, and everyone enjoys being heard.

I look forward to watching them develop their rhetoric, logic and debate skills.

Take One in the Morning

This is one of the reasons I love reading Melissa. She cracks me up!

Yella Isn't My Favorite Color

Those who must hide behind false email addresses, false names, and false websites are C-O-W-A-R-D-S. This means you.

If you are as knowledgeable as you pretend to be and have claimed in the past then you would know that what you attempted was not in the least a joke, nor am I in LaLa Land or crazy for finding your "joke" about a man accused of murdering his wife not funny. Got it?

Now, go away and don't come back unless you are willing to comment under a real email address. Using a phrase with which I am sure you are familiar:

"Don't let the door hit ya..."

Lookin' For Something?

Did you come looking for your cryptically sick message making light of a man murdering his wife? I deleted it and blocked your sorry a$$ from commenting.

You are wrong if you think I don't know who you are (look in the mirror "man of the cloth" and examine yourself carefully). Don't do this again or I will take stronger measures. Never think you can intimidate me again.

Domain Name mchsi.com ? (Commercial)
IP Address 12.217.34.# (Comcast Cable)
ISP AT&T WorldNet Services
Location
Continent : North America
Country : United States (Facts)
State : Missouri
City : Columbia
Lat/Long : 38.9218, -92.2271 (Map)
Language English
en
Operating System Macintosh MacOSX
Browser Safari 1.3
Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; PPC Mac OS X; en) AppleWebKit/312.5.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Safari/312.3.1
Javascript version 1.5
Monitor
Resolution : 1024 x 768
Color Depth : 32 bits
Time of Visit Nov 8 2005 8:26:31 am
Last Page View Nov 8 2005 8:26:31 am
Visit Length 0 seconds
Page Views 1
Referring URL
Visit Entry Page http://likethelanguage.mu.nu/
Visit Exit Page http://likethelanguage.mu.nu/
Time Zone UTC-6:00
CST - Central Standard Time
CDT - Central Daylight Saving Time
Visitor's Time Nov 8 2005 9:26:31 am
Visit Number 77,859

It's interesting to me that people who come and comment on blogs "anonymously" have very little idea that their identity can be easily found out.

Interesting.

This doesn't taste right...

Next time you go to the theater, supermarket, or convenience store, don't accidentally grab a cute nursing top instead of your favorite candy because Hershey is really, really concerned you just might.

Shhh...Super Secret Post!

Bertie Botts: $3.29
Chocolate Frogs: $2.98
Whizbees: $2.37
Harry Potter t-shirt for E: $14.99
Advanced tickets to the 12:01 A.M. premiere of The Goblet of Fire: $13.00

Spending time with my 14 year-old who now has less years left with me than she has spent: priceless.

Apple Pie and Baseball

Today in the checkout line, the cashier, obviously Hispanic, told me that my Spanish was spoken with an Italian or maybe even a Portuguese accent. He then asked if I was Italian or Brazilian. I asked if I looked Italian or Brazilian and he and the co-worker with whom he was conversing replied with a solid, "Yes!"

Hmmm, I don't think so, but am not sure if I am complimented or not. It was meant in a complimentary way, but I am proud to be an American woman. I do have an admitted fascination with Europe, and am a confessed Anglophile, but Italian? Brazilian? I don't think so.

Magical

I have forgotten how I found Suburban Bliss, but I did and I love her style.

From there, I found Kelly. I just love her photography. This is the latest; it's her favorite new one, and mine, too.

© Kelly McCord

Happy Birthday, Erm, Belated Birthday

Stacy :D

HHBBOSYT

Happy Birthday, R. You are a wonderful father to our four girls. Thank you for being so.

As a rock in stream has its edges smoothed by water propelled by time and force, so I find the memories as the one I posted last night. I don't think about these things everyday. They are a part of me and will never be gone; the points having been polished don't cease to exist, they simply find a different existence.

*not edited because I am exhausted.

My mother left David the summer of 1980. She had returned home one night to find me asleep, my nose swollen, my face bruised from the blow of my shoe. He had come home in a rage. I could discern the coming tempest by the sound of the brakes as he turned into the driveway, the way he slammed the door, the sound of its echo in the carport. I knew there was nowhere for me to hide that I would not be found. Lacking certain innocence, but so full of childish hope, I extended polite conversation, got him a glass of water. He was seething. I was petrified.

I don't remember what it was exactly that set him off. I only distinctly recall being shoved down the hall and pushed through the doorway to my bedroom. He told me that I was going to bed. " At 5 o'clock," I stupidly questioned. Seeing stars, or at least bright spots of expanding, fading, overlapping light when sudden sharp pain to the face or head occurs is very real. The blood immediately began to rush from my nose and into my mouth, down my chin, past the curve to my neck, into my throat, choking me, soaking me. I began to sob and was berated. At ten, my breasts were barely budding, but enough was there to facilitate embarrassment when he raised my shirt to wipe my chin and upper lip and exposed my training bra, the little blue flower drenched from the stream that flowed past it, pooling against the strap beneath.

"Get into the bathtub," he commanded. I obeyed, my head pounding, my eyes throbbing with each pulse. The pocket door to the hall bathroom afforded me no stay of security as it was without a lock. I dared not look in the mirror, afraid of what I would see. I stepped into the tub and startled violently when he threw back the door.

"Is that how you treat the watch you grandmother gave you?" Around my wrist was a Mickey Mouse watch my grandmother, the only one I had, sent me as a birthday gift. The red leather straps had yet to become one with my tiny arm and were still stiff and difficult to maneuver when buckling.
"No," I stuttered. My lips felt soft and sluggish when I spoke.
"Take it off. Now."
I complied. He took it, set it on the side of the tub and stomped on it. The glass crushed, the blow breaking the mechanism. The watch had been a daily, hourly, reminder that someone, somewhere loved me, thought of me, considered me. Once during free time in Mr. Brewer's class, I had lain the watch across a map of the United States. It perfectly connected Oklahoma City to Washington, D.C.

My mother returned later that night from somewhere that she had been. All I knew is that she hadn't been there. I typically begged to attend meetings with her, to accompany her to dinners and happy hours at restaurants. She would sometimes acquiesce, but I would be awakened in the night by a glass of milk thrown against my face and told not to bother her anymore.

The next day, she wrapped all my clothes up in a sheet, tied it, and then packed her own clothes. We shared a mattress on the floor in a room in the house of one of her friends. He would call in the middle of the night, begging her to come back. I feigned sleep. Turning over on my side, I followed the paisley wallpaper pattern around and around while begging the God to whom I had never been properly introduced to, yet somehow believed, to keep her from feeling sorry for him, to keep her from returning.

We moved back two weeks before school started. It was awkward. He had committed to not harming me, but in order to do so, he had to drug himself into a profuse stupor. He once put the BMW into first instead of reverse and slammed into a retaining wall and crushed the garbage cans. He slept. A lot.

I had seen him once shooting up once between his toes while sitting on the toilet, and another near his ankle as he sat on the edge of the bed half dressed in boxers, broadcloth shirt and tie, one black sock, Gabardine sport coat hanging on the bedpost next neatly laid out pants. I mentioned it to my mother, thinking nothing of it. I recall her brow wrinkling, and being asked for specifics: what kind of medicine? where did the needle go? But she never asked for more and I thought nothing more of it. He was a doctor. Doctors gave themselves medicine.

One Saturday he took me to see Pete's Dragon. I made small talk; he didn't talk, and when he did, it was constrained to statements not requiring a response. The movie ended and I thanked him for taking me, telling him how much I enjoyed the movie. I attempted to talk about it. He, however, was clearly finished with the penance required of him for the day. I heard him tell my mother when we arrived home that I had been so sickeningly sweet he couldn't stand it.

The next evening, Sunday, October 19, my mother grilled hamburgers on the Hibatchi. She was making every effort to have us be the happy family. David had gone in to the hospital earlier having been beeped for an emergency surgery. My mother was expecting him soon. I was watching "The Jeffersons" on the Zenith in the den when the phone rang.

Her cries of disbelief drew me into the kitchen and I saw her sitting on the floor, her body supported by a chair. Each exclamation of "NO!" was punctuated by the sound of her head hitting the wall next to her. Seeing my mother like this was too much for me. I began to cry. She finished the conversation with minimal and shortened replies of yes and no. It was obvious the conversation was over when her grip on the receiver slackened and it slid into her lap, cradled by the excess of material from her still-too-big maternity overalls.

"David's dead." Pause.
"David is dead!" Sharp exhalation followed naturally by a quick inhalation not unlike a child between sobs and then, "My God, my God." I watched her small frame heave in attempt to hold the weight, but even for a brief second, she could not. I ran around the corner into the dining room and watched myself cry in the large mirror that hung above the antique Chinese buffet. I mourned not for him being gone, rather in seeing my mother's heart break before my eyes.

Later while she called his family, I went into my room and shut the door behind me. I listened to be sure no one had followed me, wrongly thinking I needed comfort. I cautiously smiled, lips together. I bit my index fingernail, filed the edge with my teeth. I practiced a mournful composure before returning to the living room where my mother and a few people had gathered. Someone handed me a Valium and quarter glass of wine. I don't remember going to bed, but was there in the morning. I had never felt such possibilities as when my eyes opened that next day, and in the same house, beneath the same roof, in another bed, my mother had never known such despair.

It's K's birthday today :D

Happy Birthday to my exuberant, zesty, beautiful, thoughtful, smart, strong, loyal friend.

A Dry Erase Board?

Yesterday, in the course of a discussion of "Iphis and Isis" (Book IX) from Ovid's Metamorphoses, one of the women mentioned that she could read a bit of constructionim, as in social constructionism, in the story. That led the professor to mention a book he had read, The Blank Slate by Steven Pinker (his own bio).

I found an interesting discussion with Pinker on Wordsmith.org from February 01. He has linked on his homepage a list of articles he has either written or to which he has contributed. I find some of his statements thought provoking, and although not directly on the same religious page, I don't find him offensive...so far.