And Another Thing

If you are a person who buys into the God thing -- and it's pretty clear by now that I'm on the fence -- then you know what else is really cool? That he made people with spare parts. And interchangeable parts! I mean, imagine the moment when the first doctor realized he could take an artery from a person's leg and use it to repair a damaged heart artery! Or when they did the first donor-to-recipient organ transplant. God is somewhere watching this and thinking "YES! They finally figured it out!"

And if you buy that, then it's pretty clear that God has given us the mental capacity to ultimately cure what's wrong with us, or at least a lot of it. Who's to say that the whole stem cell thing isn't his idea, because, you know, if everything comes from God, well, so do all the scientists' ideas and discoveries, too. Who are any of us to say that some of these things are okay with God and some aren't? None of us actually knows. So if you're taking stuff on faith, why not that?

I'm done now.

Ahem, moving on. The SCM is out again today, what a surprise. Not at all, actually, because I knew in advance, so, whatever. I got a lot done this morning of one kind or another, but this is a crazy week, no school for the next two days, so you kind of feel you don't want to get too involved in anything. I only had one class in today, but I set up the schedule for freshman orientation in a few weeks.

My other possible choice for the SCM's replacement emailed me this morning -- K had left her a message on Facebook -- and I emailed her back, but I haven't heard yet. I'm sure this is because she sent me her personal email address and she's at work all day, which was the right address to use if she's at work, because using your work email to talk about a new job is tacky. I'm sure she guessed right away why I wanted to hear from her. I'll check my work mail from home tomorrow and see if she's answered.

We all got the annual statements of our sick days today, so that we can check them and see if they're correct. I found a mistake on mine last year, and every day potentially counts for me, so I checked carefully. Turns out they did make one mistake, but so did I in my own record-keeping, so it all came out the same. I am carrying over 23 sick days, which is what's left of the ... um, counting ... roughly 411 I've been given over the years. Sheesh, not a great track record. Add to that this year's 10 plus this year's 3 personal days, and I've got 36 to work with, the equivalent of about seven weeks of school. I also have some extended leave days and some sick days less substitute pay that they haven't given in years, but they can't take away from oldtimers like me who got them under a previous contract. Anyway, let's all hope the word "surgery" doesn't come up at the gynecologist's office tomorrow. Why do I think it might? Have you met me?

New grammatical pet peeve: myself. Okay, it's not new, but it's been driving me batty lately. Even well-spoken people who should know better cannot figure out how to use this word. Or maybe it's that they can't figure out how to use the word "me" correctly, so they use "myself" instead. (That really is the problem.) Case in point. Last week, I heard the SCM, who is nothing if not pretentious in his use of language, explain to a student that when she was done with something she could "give it to myself or Mrs. Chai." Wait a minute ... no. No no no. This is how I hear myself most mis-used, when people are afraid to say "Report that to Mr. Jones and me" because they think "me" sounds stupid, so they say "Report that to Mr. Jones and myself," or worse, "to myself and Mr. Jones." Want to get it right? Take Mr. Jones out of the sentence for a minute. What sounds better? "Report that to myself" or "Report that to me." Me is a good word, people, but it's gotten a bad rap. Okay, we do not say "Me and you are going to the movies" because it's not correct. But when the "me" in question is the recipient of the action object in the sentence -- which we call the indirect object of the sentence -- me is the correct word to use, and if there are two indirect objects, the "me" comes second. Are we good?

(So what is "myself" for? It's a reflexive pronoun used for emphasis. "Whoever painted your house did a really good job." "I, myself, painted my house!" or "I did it myself!" You could just say "I painted my house" or "I did it", but the "myself" adds the emphasis.)

(I haven't particularly noticed this in diaries, btw, so it's not aimed at any of you out there. I keep hearing it in person and on TV. From lots and lots of people who really should know better.)

And as long as I'm rambling, let me add this: Can we please initiate a world-wide boycott of all food and medicine made in China until they get their shit together? Did we not create food safety laws in this country for a reason? Can we just decide that we're only importing food and drugs from countries with laws at least as strict as ours? Come on, guys! We do we go through all the trials and testing for new drugs if they're just going to made in China out of rat feces and poisonous chemicals?

WATCHING GILMORE GIRLS :: ENTRY #1866
READING: Welcome to the World, Baby Girl! by Fannie Flagg

Here We Go

I'm going to have to start with this, because I just read two articles in the last five minutes on more or less the same thing -- they're listed in my shared headlines box over there on the right if you're reading this entry today or tomorrow -- and I have to get it out.

There is religion and there is science. They are two separate things, but they are not incompatible. However, claiming that your religious belief -- whatever it is -- is science is not smart. It is ignorance, in the sense that you are ignoring something. Listen:

I worked with a man for several years who taught Anatomy and Advanced Placement Biology. He was an incredibly good teacher. I also knew him to be a very devout and faithful Catholic person, and I asked him once how he kept his religion and his science from contradicting each other. He smiled. He said that all the evidence of evolution was clear, and that scientists could study it and see it happening every day. There was no question about evolution or the age of the earth: these were scientific, proven facts. However, he continued, evolution is such a complex and beautiful process that it could only have come from the mind of God. How could anything else explain how evolution came to be? As for the story of creation in the Bible, he thought it was a beautiful story, and explained -- using terms that an earlier, unsophisticated society could understand -- exactly what had happened. Did God create the world in seven days? He smiled again. The word "day", he believed, was used in the story because it would have been difficult for people then to comprehend the amount of time that was really involved, and there were no words to explain it then. "Day", he felt, was a metaphor for what really happened, which was evolution as science describes it, and all because of God.

Makes sense to me.


Okay, on to life. Turns out I will only be working two days this week -- Monday and Thursday -- because we have Tuesday and Wednesday off, and I'm taking off Friday to take R for a medical test. (Not a big one -- I've had it twice this year -- but requires a driver, and perhaps a mommy to hover.) She's feeling much better, actually, and has a new theory, which I won't mention until we hear from the doctor, since all former theories have been WRONG.

I haven't spoken to my sister for a few days because she was away at a parents' weekend or something for Little K, and although I think she's home now, I tried a little while ago and there was no answer. But sometimes she just doesn't answer. On the other hand, I believe the bride and groom are due home from their honeymoon today, so she could be over there, too. Anyway, I'll try her again shortly.

So that's my story, folks. I slept much better so far this weekend, so I don't feel like I'm totally dragging. Always a nice thing.


WATCHING DOC HOLLYWOOD :: ENTRY #1865
READING: Welcome to the World, Baby Girl! by Fannie Flagg

And ...

Interesting comments on yesterday's entry. One in particular gave me some thinking to do, the one about Jehovah's Witnesses not pledging or standing. I admire a greal deal about Jehovah's Witnesses, and I knew their beliefs prohibited them from pledging, which I have no problems with, of course, as I said yesterday. I still don't get the no standing thing, though.

Here's the ultimate question: when one religious belief conflicts with others, and the people are trying to co-exist, how do you decide which one gets precedence; in effect, which person gets to offend the other person? Now, I realize in this case, the pledge is not a religious thing, but it is an important part of many people's belief system. If they are offended by someone not standing in their midst, again, who gets to have the dominant beliefs?

I'll give you a different hypothetical, one that is a big issue for lots of people: abortion. In my spiritual view -- and this is spiritual, not political -- a fetus is not a human life in the sense that a living person is. Abortion is a personal decision, as far as I'm concerned, and people who choose to have them, I think, do not think of fetuses as human beings. There are many others whose religious beliefs are different, and who believe that fetuses are human being from conception, and therefore abortion is wrong. I support their right to have these beliefs, of course, and these people should not have abortions. Should one set of beliefs dominate over the other? I don't know, I'm asking, not answering. And this is a much more serious issue than standing or sitting for the pledge of allegiance.

Here's another one. Certain religions forbid eating certain foods. If a member of one of these groups is living as a minority of one among people of different religions, should that one person be forced to eat the food the others are eating, even it violates their beliefs? What if there are no other foods available?

Again, these are questions, not answers. I'm reading an interesting book at the moment -- see below -- that addresses a variety of questions raised by religious faith. So I'm more off the wall than usual.

I got my hair cut today, and saw a doctor to get meds for a sinus infection. It was my doctor's day off, so I got to meet the other internist in the group, who was very nice. Tomorrow, essentially my last day of vacation *sob*, I'm getting some blood work done and then going to the nutritionist. So there ya go.

WATCHING MSNBC :: ENTRY #1844
SUMMER BOOK #8: The Year of Living Biblically by A.J. Jacobs

The Meme ... and More

Here's the one that's making the rounds these days:

Five Things I Just Don't Get

1. Why people don't automatically walk on the right side of the hallway or stairs, and leave room for people coming the other way.
2. Why there are so many drivers (and other people) who think that the laws and rules and posted signs just don't apply to them.
3. Why 99.99% of people with any authority at all are just assholes.
4. Why or how people can be mean to other people for fun
5. How anyone can take another person's life


Five Things, Other Than Money, I Wish I Had More Of:

1. Good health
2. Energy
3. The concentration to read more
4. Time and opportunity to listen to music
5. Winning lottery tickets


Five Least Favorite Words or Phrases:

1. Oh, never mind (when I didn't hear what was said and asked someone to repeat it.)
2. It just takes time, don't worry about it
3. Please excuse this interruption (before they make a long announcement in school in the middle of class)
4. Right after this commercial
5. Anything whined at me (that payback really is a bitch)


Five Famous People I've Spoken With in Person:

1. Alan Alda
2. Mike McCormack (Speaker of the House at the time)
3. Paul Simon (sort of)
These next two I didn't actually speak to, but my grandpa did and got autographs for me, so I'm counting them
4. Ed Sullivan
5. Cary Grant
And one of my kids ran into our Congressman at the local pizza place -- his house is across the street from it -- and talked to him for a while, and his kid goes to my school now; does that count for anything? Not so much.


Five Things I Do Nearly Daily That I Don't Enjoy

1. Take out garbage
2. Do dishes
3. Deal with stomach and other pain and discomforts
4. Wake up and go to work
5. Listen to people whine


Five Things That I Wish I Had the Chance to Do More Often:

1. See music and books, above
2. Go to Disney World
3. Go outside without a jacket on
4. Hang out with my sister (who met Howdy Doody, btw, although I didn't)
5. Be outrageously happy


Five Things I Have Actually Done That Sound Like Lies:

1. I had brain surgery
2. I dated a guy named Phantom for two years
3. I worked in a trophy factory
4. I took two math courses in college and got A's in both of them.
5. I didn't get into the state university in NJ because I didn't want to go there, so I left all the punctuation and correct grammar out of my application essay.


Five People I Hope Will Fill This Out:
Anyone who wants to. No one tagged me.

And now, the More. It's time to get *gasp* political again.

I just read an article about a former CIA guy who says that " [waterboarding} provided an intelligence breakthrough that "probably saved lives," but that he now regards the tactic as torture." Oh, yeah? Listen. We cannot ever ever ever sanction torture. Not ever not no how. The Geneva Convention was written and signed to prevent the abuses of torture, and that's beside the fact that torture is abuse itself. This end does not justify this means. And here's why:

It's all well and good if we have intelligence that helps our troops, and that's what I've heard people say: if torturing the enemy brings our troops home sooner, so much the better. Well, here's what happens. If we torture them, it's like we are giving them permission to torture us. That's how it works here, turnabout is very fair play in war. The very reason the U.S. signed the Geneva Convention was not to protect enemy troops, it was to protect our own troops. Right? If we hear news reports that any of our own military personnel have been captured and tortured, we will be outraged! And we should be! But what's to stop the other side from doing it if we're doing it to them? And if waterboarding isn't so bad, why don't we practice it on our own troops? You know why. Because it's torture, and we don't want our troops to suffer it. Let's grow a brain in Washington, shall we?

Next. Mike Huckabee has no business being the president of this country. He cannot separate church from state in his own mind and heart, and will not be able to do so in office. Besides that, he is crazy, and makes his religion mean whatever he wants it to for political purposes. (I believe it was he who said once -- I don't have the reference -- that Jesus must have supported capital punishment because when he was on the cross, he didn't say, Hey, it's wrong to execute people. Uh, okay. You know, I think Jesus had other things on his mind right then, little things, like having to decide to give up his earthly life to save mankind. He probably wasn't thinking about making political statements so that in 2000 years, some buffoon could use him for his own ends. Now that I think of it, Jesus was the one who established the separation of church and state to begin with. ["Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s, and unto God the things that are God’s."] Right? No one was more apolitical than Jesus.)

If you are not a Christian, and maybe even if you're not a fundamentalist Christian, for all I know, people like Huckabee are very very scary, and all these others who trumpet their religion above all are too. At first, Romney, pleading for understanding since his is not the mainstream Christian religion, said he just wasn't sure what place there was in this country for atheists and non-believers. WTF? Since when? He has since clarified that, saying there probably is a place for them/us, but come on: how could we see this and not be terrified? How soon will they be rounding up the people who don't go to the right churches, and can I book my flight to New Zealand before that happens?

(Ah, New Zealand. You all know how well I deal with change, which is to say, not at all. Can you imagine me moving to New Zealand? I'd have to be sedated for the flight and the first year I lived there. But it's far away from the craziness, and they speak English, and I understand it's a beautiful country. I only hope they have good cable and high speed Internet.)

WATCHING LAW & ORDER :: ENTRY #1645

Let's Talk

about atheism.

Last night's debate prompted me to think about what I would ask if I submitted a question for the Republican debate in September. I worked it out to be about the influence of religion on today's politics, as well as the alienation of those who do not share mainstream religious beliefs.

Only recently did I become aware of something that was said by former President Bush, and this was back in 1987. Here's part of the interview:

Interviewer: Surely you recognize the equal citizenship and patriotism of Americans who are atheists?

Bush: No, I don't know that atheists should be considered as citizens, nor should they be considered patriots. This is one nation under God.

I can't tell you how angry this made me. Am I an atheist? Probably not. I would be better described as an agnostic, but most certainly, I am someone who does not belong to or take part in any organized religion, and someone to whom faith and/or spirituality are personal and have nothing to do with anyone else. I think that the Constitution protects my right to be that way, if that's what I want. But I know atheists, and have known atheists, and I'm going to tell you about some of them.

The goofiest atheist I know, and you won't be surprised, is the SCM. He is smug and superior in his atheism. He thinks that taking part in any religion is a waste of time, and that people who do so are saps. When I ask him if he supports their right to do so, he agrees, in principle, but believes that on the whole, belief in a higher power is evidence of lesser intelligence. I am not kidding. He is just as self-righteous as any religious-right-wing fundamentalist, but he doesn't see the comparison because, after all, he's right.

My husband, who was raised Catholic, simply does not believe in the existence of a higher power. He believes in science, and does not see the two as compatible, and he's seen no evidence of a higher power to convince him otherwise. He fully supports any individual believing whatever it is he or she wants to believe, and practice. His parents are regular church-goers, and that's fine with him, as long as he doesn't have to go himself. (He doesn't.) It would never occur to him to belittle anyone else's faith, or to share his own beliefs with anyone, unless asked, and even then, he wouldn't go into detail at all.

My father, when asked, would say he was an agnostic. I heard him say that most of my life. He was raised by immigrant parents who were very, very Jewish in their language, their food, their daily lives, but who were not observant of the Jewish religion in any way. He did attend Hebrew school, but was allowed to choose for himself whether or not he would be Bar Mitzvahed, and take the role of an adult member of the synagogue's congregation. He chose No, as his own father had chosen at 13.

There were no discussions about god in my house as I grew up, unless we specifically asked Jack "So, do you believe in god?" and he would usually say "I'm what's called an agnostic. That means I haven't decided yet." Sometimes he would say that it meant he wasn't sure. The last time I asked him -- this was after my mother had died -- he kind of rolled his eyes and made a sort of dismissive "shhh!" sound and said that no, of course he didn't. "So you're an atheist," I asked, "not an agnostic?" He answered that there was no need to put a name on it, he saw no reason to believe that there was a god and that was that. That he'd always felt that way. I asked, was it the war that made you feel that? He thought, and said Maybe, but that he was probably this way before the war. (I should remind former President Bush that Jack, atheism and all, was decorated for bravery for his service to his country during World War II.)

Jack would not discuss his beliefs with us as children, because he didn't want to influence us. He wanted us to decide for ourselves. He deeply respected people with sincere religious beliefs. He loved my Grandpa Sam, his father-in-law, who was the most devout person I have ever known personally. Jack was a big fan of Billy Graham, whom he thought did very good work in the world.

My own beliefs are my own. If I believe in the written tenets of anything, it would be the Constitution of the United States. I'm a very big fan.

WATCHING DR. PHIL :: ENTRY #1532