musical monday: Madonna

Silly Sunday: Sarah Haskins

Oh yes she did!



Can I again express to you my love for Sarah Haskins? =)

best part of the debates

VOTE!!!!!!

I don't care who you vote for. I mean, yeah kind of, but I really care that you do your part like I'm doing my part. Pass it on...

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Musical Monday: Push It

Funny Friday: Wanda Sykes

Thirsty Thursday: We need John McCain

The Top Ten Questions People are Asking The John McCain Campaign

#10 “I just contributed to your campaign – how do I get a refund?"

#9 “It’s Sarah Palin –- does this mean I’m pars’dent?”

#8 “Can’t you solve this by selling some of your houses?”

#7 “This is Clay Aiken. Is McCain single?”

#6 “Do you still think the fundamentals of our economy are strong, Genius?”

#5 “Are you doing all of this just to get out of going on Letterman?”

#4 “What would Matlock do?”

#3 “Hillary here –- my schedule is free Friday night.”

#2 “Is this just an excuse to catch up on napping?”

#1 “This is President Bush –- what’s all this trouble with the economy?”

Musical Monday: Three Little Birds

Slightly off the origional, but a good song indeed. Plus the clip is cute.

Silly Sunday: Why did the chicken cross the road?

> Why did the chicken cross the road?
>

> BARACK OBAMA: The chicken crossed the road because it was
> time for a change! The chicken wanted change!

> JOHN MC CAIN: My friends, that chicken crossed the road
> because he recognized the need to engage in cooperation and
> dialogue with all the chickens on the other side of the
> road.

> HILLARY CLINTON: When I was First Lady, I personally helped
> that little chicken to cross the road. This experience makes
> me uniquely qualified to ensure right from Day One!
> That every chicken in this country gets the chance it
> deserves to cross the road.
> But then, this really isn't about me.

> GEORGE W. BUSH: We don't really care why the chicken
> crossed the road.
> We just want to know if the chicken is on our side of the
> road, or not.
> The chicken is either against us, or for us. There is no
> middle ground here.

> DICK CHENEY: Where's my gun?

> COLIN POWELL: Now to the left of the screen, you can
> clearly see the satellite image of the chicken crossing the
> road.

> BILL CLINTON: I did not cross the road with that chicken.
> What is your definition of chicken?

> AL GORE: I invented the chicken.

> JOHN KERRY: Although I voted to let the chicken cross the
> road, I am now against it!
> It was the wrong road to cross, and I was misled about the
> chicken's intentions.
> I am not for it now, and will remain against it.

> AL SHARPTON: Why are all the chickens white? We need some
> black chickens.

> DR. PHIL: The problem we have here is that this chicken
> won't realize that he must first deal with the problem
> on this side of the road before it goes after the problem on
> the other side of the road. What we need to do is help him
> realize how stupid he's actin g by not taking on his
> current problems before adding new problems.

> OPRAH: Well, I understand that the chicken is having
> problems,
> which is why he wants to cross this road so bad.
> So instead of having the chicken learn from his mistakes
> and take falls,
> which is a part of life, I'm going to give this chicken
> a car so that he can just drive across the road and not live
> his life like the rest of the chickens.

> ANDERSON COOPER, CNN: We have reason to believe there is a
> chicken, but we have not yet been allowed to have access to
> the other side of the road.

> NANCY GRACE: That chicken crossed the road because he's
> guilty!
> You can see it in his eyes and the way he walks.

> PAT BUCHANAN: To steal the job of a decent, hardworking
> American.

> MARTHA STEWART: No one called me to warn me which way that
> chicken was going.
> I had a standing order at the Farmer's Market to sell
> my eggs when the price dropped to a certain level.
>No little bird gave me any insider information.

> DR SEUSS: Did the chicken cross the road?
> Did he cross it with a toad?
> Yes, the chicken crossed the road, but why it crossed
> I've not been told.

> ERNEST HEMINGWAY: To die in the rain, alone.

> JERRY FALWELL: Because the chicken was gay!
> Can't you people see the plain truth? That's why
> they call it the other side.
> Yes, my friends, that chicken is gay.
> And if you eat that chicken, you will become gay, too.
> I say we boycott all chickens until we sort out this
> abomination that the liberal media whitewashes with
> seemingly harmless phrases like the other side..
> That chicken should not be crossing the road. It's as
> plain and as simple as that.

> GRANDPA: In my day we didn't ask why the chicken
> crossed the road.
> Somebody told us the chicken crossed the road, and that was
> good enough.

> BARBARA WALTERS: Isn't that interesting?
> In a few moments, we will be listening to the chicken tell,
> for the first time, the heart warming story of how it
> experienced a serious case of molting, and went on to
> accomplish its lifelong dream of crossing the road.

> ARISTOTLE: It is the nature of chickens to cross the road.

> JOHN LENNON: Imagine all the chickens in the world crossing
> roads together, in peace.

> BILL GATES: I have just released eChicken 2008, which will
> not only cross roads, but will lay eggs, file your important
> documents, and balance your checkbook.
> Internet Explorer is an integral part of eChicken 2008.
> This new platform is much more stable and will never crash
> or need to be rebooted.

> ALBERT EINSTEIN: Did the chicken really cross the road,
> or did the road move beneath the chicken?

> COLONEL SANDERS: Did I miss one?

Eve Ensler Poem

I couldn't have put it better myself. I am an avid non-Palin fan. Eve Ensler said it first, I'll repeat it, and if you agree please pass it on. I hope this country will make the best decision for us, for me, for my son, for all of our futures.


Drill, Drill, Drill
I am having Sarah Palin nightmares. I dreamt last night that she was a member of a club where they rode snowmobiles and wore the claws of drowned and starved polar bears around their necks. I have a particular thing for Polar Bears. Maybe it's their snowy whiteness or their bigness or the fact that they live in the arctic or that I have never seen one in person or touched one. Maybe it is the fact that they live so comfortably on ice. Whatever it is, I need the polar bears.

I don't like raging at women. I am a Feminist and have spent my life trying to build community, help empower women and stop violence against them. It is hard to write about Sarah Palin. This is why the Sarah Palin choice was all the more insidious and cynical. The people who made this choice count on the goodness and solidarity of Feminists.

But everything Sarah Palin believes in and practices is antithetical
to Feminism which for me is part of one story -- connected to saving the earth, ending racism, empowering women, giving young girls options, opening our minds, deepening tolerance, and ending violence and war.

I believe that the McCain/Palin ticket is one of the most dangerous choices of my lifetime, and should this country chose those candidates the fall-out may be so great, the destruction so vast in so many areas that America may never recover. But what is equally disturbing is the impact that duo would have on the rest of the world. Unfortunately, this is not a joke. In my lifetime I have seen the clownish, the inept, the bizarre be elected to the presidency with regularity.

Sarah Palin does not believe in evolution. I take this as a metaphor. In her world and the world of Fundamentalists nothing changes or gets better or evolves. She does not believe in global warming. The melting of the arctic, the storms that are destroying our cities, the pollution and rise of cancers, are all part of God's plan. She is fighting to take the polar bears off the endangered species list. The earth, in Palin's view, is here to be taken and plundered. The wolves and the bears are here to be shot and plundered. The oil is here to be taken and plundered. Iraq is here to be taken and plundered. As she said herself of the Iraqi war, 'It was a task from God.'

Sarah Palin does not believe in abortion. She does not believe women who are raped and incested and ripped open against their will should have a right to determine whether they have their rapist's baby or not.

She obviously does not believe in sex education or birth control. I imagine her daughter was practicing abstinence and we know how many babies that makes.

Sarah Palin does not much believe in thinking. From what I gather she has tried to ban books from the library, has a tendency to dispense with people who think independently. She cannot tolerate an environment of ambiguity and difference. This is a woman who could and might very well be the next president of the United States. She would govern one of the most diverse populations on the earth.

Sarah believes in guns. She has her own custom Austrian hunting
rifle. She has been known to kill 40 caribou at a clip. She has shot
hundreds of wolves from the air. Sarah believes in God. That is of course her right, her private right. But when God and Guns come together in the public sector, when war is declared in God's name, when the rights of women are denied in his name, that is the end of separation of church and state and the undoing of
everything America has ever tried to be.

I write to my sisters. I write because I believe we hold this
election in our hands. This vote is a vote that will determine the future not just of the U.S., but of the planet. It will determine whether we create policies to save the earth or make it forever uninhabitable for humans. It will determine whether we move towards dialogue and diplomacy in the world or whether we escalate violence through invasion, undermining and attack. It will determine whether we go for oil, strip mining, coal burning or invest our money in alternatives that will free us from dependency and destruction. It will determine if money gets spent on education and healthcare or whether we build more and more methods of killing. It will determine whether America is a free open tolerant society or a closed place of fear, fundamentalism and aggression.

If the Polar Bears don't move you to go and do everything in your power to get Obama elected then consider the chant that filled the hall after Palin spoke at the RNC, 'Drill Drill Drill.' I think of teeth when I think of drills. I think of rape. I think of destruction. I think of domination. I think of military exercises that force mindless repetition, emptying the brain of analysis, doubt, ambiguity or dissent.

I think of pain.

Do we want a future of drilling? More holes in the ozone, in the
floor of the sea, more holes in our thinking, in the trust between nations and peoples, more holes in the fabric of this precious thing we call life?

Eve Ensler
September 5, 2008

Musical Monday: I Kissed a Girl

Manic Monday: Hooked on a Feeling

Musical Mondays: Sharon, Lois, and Bram

It's been on repeat. I guess it is Alec's new favorite.

Musical Monday: Cat Stevens

Woke up singing this song. Not sure why...

He smells like

Fresh linens and lilacs
Comfort and calm
Relaxing my soul
The fight for freedom ceases
Finally
I am home.

Reality: Congitive Perceptions or Absolute?

I am going to start out this blog with a few Webster’s definitions. I am doing this because I do not have my own working definitions and I plan on using these to help jump start my understanding and base for my argument…ahem…discussion.

Winning- 1successful or victorious, as in a contest. 2charming; engaging; pleasing

Reality- the state or quality of being real

I was watching television the other day when my dad came in the room. I think the last line the person said on the show was, “And thank you all for telling the truth.” My dad then promptly replies, “How does she know who was telling the truth and who was lying.” I said, “well I guess only they will know that.” He says, “Well I know how to always tell when someone is lying or being truthful.” This starts the, ahem, discussion.

Continuing, he says, “You start out with a series of questions. In that series state one question that you know the absolute truth. Watch their face as they answer, and if they are lying then you have their lying face. You will then know every time they lie. You will consequently know if they are lying to you currently or being truthful”

Well maybe this starts the discussion. My comment, “So do you ask a question that you know how they are going to answer as truth to them, or do you look for the answer that is truth to you?”

“No, Jenni, you ask a question that has an absolute answer.”

“Like what, because I could probably argue any answer.”

“That’s because you are argumentative (ouch to me by the way). No, like for an example…two guys get into a fist fight. One guy knocks the other guy out. He’s down for the count. Who wins? The guy that knocked the other one out.”

“ummm, well I don’t really agree. I think some people could say that the other one could have won, or that neither of them did.”

“Okay, I would LOVE to hear the dispute on that one. It would seem someone is wanting to engage in a battle of wits.”


That wasn’t the end, but instead of boring you with our otherwise heated conversation, I am bringing my argumentative ass here to type about it.

I am going to start with the first part of the situation that bothers me. It is the easiest for me to communicate my misunderstanding. I have a picture in my mind of two men fighting. I have no idea why they are fighting. I don’t need to. In my opinion neither of them are winners. Back to the Webster’s definition, winning is “charming, engaging and pleasing.” Fighting is in no way charming or pleasing. Although it could be considered engaging, I don’t think this is what Webster’s had in mind. Fighting is an animalistic show of aggression and dominance. Being domineering and aggressive is NOT charming. Think back to a time when you were being picked on or told you could not do something you wanted to do. Were you pleased? Charmed? Egh…no. I think my mom put it best when she said, “Well, what did they win?”

Moving on…The idea of absolutes.

In a world where reality is just a cognitive state of perception, how can there ever be one real absolute?

In Jean Piaget theory of learning, a person only truly sees what they know. To extend this example, I think about my car. I have the most obnoxious car in the world. It is bright pinky/purple. When I bought it my exact thoughts were, “well everyone will see me coming and know where I’ve been.” I have had the car for a year now. I have seen more than 20 of my same car on the west side of Indy. One even is owned by a person that works out at my gym. I never saw it before, but I never knew it existed. How could I have really seen something that I didn’t know was there to begin with? If someone is asking me random questions and I am not aware there is an absolute truth to any of the answers, then can I answer them absolutely truthful?

In a similar theory, William Ayers (and other elementary education researchers) believe that everything you learn is based upon previous knowledge. I say the word ball. You automatically see something that has a round shape. It can bounce, and is full of air. I say ball to a baby, is hears, “blakdofidlfk.” When you produce an object and call it ball, they baby says, “oooh, ball.” The baby still does not know it can bounce, or that it is full of air, or even that this shape is a round shape. These things the baby will come to know over time, through experience with the ball. Some of you might say, “Hold on a minute, not all balls are round.” Oh, yes, I know this. You have just helped me prove a point. In my reality all balls are round. In your reality not all balls are round. What, you want me to prove it? Okay…Football.

So I guess my true question is, can there ever be a true, absolute reality? If we ever could exist in this reality, would we have an opinion?

Right now, as it stands for me, there can’t be a true reality. There is a reality for me, one for you, and one for your neighbor. Maybe I live in a world of gray. Maybe that is my absolute. I would like to think I’m open to ideas and might change my mind. I guess it would have to depend on how it fits with my previous knowledge on the subject.

Update on Alec

I know you all have been waiting patiently on an update on Alec. We just came back from a visit to Riley and his orthopedic surgeon. They took the temporary off, took some x-rays, and came back to tell us he is perfect (not that I didn’t already know this). Joking aside, his bones look solid and healthy. Even though they said they would probably cast him, they decided to leave him alone for now. I just have to keep an ever close eye on his activity to make sure he isn’t favoring his arm too much. If he does, then it is back to the drawing board. Thanks everyone for the prayers and well wishes…it meant the world to me.

Musical Monday: Whistle for the Choir

Silly Saturday: Sarah Haskins

My Short Story.

I got a phone call that every mother dreads last night. "We are headed to the Emergency Room." My stomach dropped through the floor and for one brief moment, nothing existed on the planet but my son.

"What is going on?"

"Alec fell and he keeps complaining about his elbow hurting." I can barely make this out as I hear crying and screaming in the background. I know he is talking louder than a whisper, but my highly tuned mommy senses know that my baby's cries are all I can bare to stand.

"The Avon ER? I'm there."

"Well I have to wait..."

"It doesn't matter, I'm there."

"On Erin to get here for Cooper."

"I'll see you when you get there."

All I could think about was the story I was told many many times many many moons ago. Alec's father went through the same thing at about the same age. He shattered his elbow climbing a tree. He had many surgeries, and the doctors couldn't promise anything. Well as we know he is fine, but there were many sleepless nights on his mother's behalf, praying that her son would be okay. I turned my eyes up, and prayed a small prayer as I passed the parking lot of the hospital.

I could hear my son asking for me as I walked up to the truck. I scanned the body of my toddler, checking to make sure everything "looked" intact. I know every fiber, every inch of that child, down to the freckle on his pointer finger and small birth mark on his shin. He seemed okay, no tears on his cheeks, but fear and anguish in his eyes. My heart broke.

"How are you feeling sweetie?"

"My elbow hurts, Mommy."

"I heard that you fell. That's why I'm here sugar. We are going to go in this building and the nice doctors are going to help the pain go away."

"Okay," a tiny, small, defeated voice echoed back in the hallway.

The visit was short. We were there only an hour and a half. All the doctors fell in love with the blonde haired, blue eyed angel. They brought sticker, graham crackers, saltines, cheese, and juice just to see the tiny smile on his cherub cheeks.

My heart swelled with pride when one of the nurses introduced Josh and I to the X-ray tech as Alec's wonderful parents. A small victory for me. I loved hearing these words.

"It's not broken." I loved hearing these words even more. "It seems like there might be some fractures in the bone. We are going to wrap him up in a temporary cast, and you will go see an orthopedic surgeon tomorrow or Friday to see what is exactly going on."

I breathed a sigh of relief. We were going to be okay. My son was going to be okay.