a Love Letter to Capitalism

Free Enterprise. Yummy. Wish I ate pork.

NRSC Ad: Never Again

Smooth, jazzy. This ad is like sitting in a darkened club, mellowed lamplight only, listening to the base instruments warm and hearing a man in monotone recite, rather poetically, the utter lunacy of Obama's doublespeak.

I'd go to a club like that except I have nothing suitable to wear.

Because he made me laugh

Via MommyLife, a great blog from a patriotic mother of 12 with the kind of sharp, no-nonsense, common sense zings only a mom can deliver.

Check out her site if you get a chance. But for now, check out Brian Regan. Funny and clean. Possible? Absolutely. When you're talented.



I love Pop Tarts. I miss Pop Tarts.

NY women go celibate, experience great awakening

Not having sex is sexy. Having sex is not. And New York women apparently need to have terribly degrading sexual experiences to discover this, according to a New York Post article.

No more sex in the city

By MANDY STADTMILLER

Two weeks ago, Katie Jean Arnold had her celibacy wake-up call. After hooking up with a stranger on the L train platform and going back to his place, she woke up at his apartment and decided to leave. On her way out the door, he came up to her, naked, and said the words she’ll never forget: “What’s your name?”
It was then that she made her Big Decision.
No. More. Sex.

Of course, Christians have been saying this forever. But Christians are stupid, of course. Don't listen to them. Sleep around first. Be treated like an object. Feel cheap. Contract a disease or two. Earn those emotional scars. Then not having sex is a well-informed, well-educated, even cosmopolitan decision.

She’s led a sex-free life ever since. It’s not a long time to remain chaste, you might argue, but the 29-year-old musician did a “celibacy cleanse” back in 2003 for eight months and says it made her feel fantastic.

Similar to a colon cleanse. But with incurable sexually-transmitted diseases.

This time, she says she’s going to wait until she gets a record deal and puts out her first album before succumbing to temptation.

Because a record deal makes it classy.

“Not having sex is like giving up junk food,” says Arnold. “Sex in New York for me had become like the 99-cent package of Ding Dongs on the corner.”

She's upgrading to $2 Krispy Kremes.

Arnold is more of a trendsetter than she realizes. In this month’s Playboy, Ashley Dupre says of sex: “I’m very good at it, but I’m saving that.” In April, Lady Gaga said, “I’m celibate, celibacy’s fine,” adding that it was something she wanted to “celebrate” with fans. Courtney Love is also on the no-sex bandwagon, declaring she’s been celibate for four years — adding that without it she never could have finished her new record, “Nobody’s Daughter.”

Good thing we've got celebrities to lead the way.

Less — when it comes to sex — is definitely more, argues Hephzibah Anderson, the author of “Chastened,” a new tome touting the lessons she learned during a sex-free year, from August 2006 to August 2007, a quarter of which she spent in New York.
“By tuning out some of that hyper-sexualized, porn-y clamor, you find yourself tuning into a sort of a subtler romance and being attracted to a different kind of guy,” says the 34-year-old London resident who frequents Manhattan. She was inspired to give up sex right before turning 30 when she saw her college boyfriend walking out of De Beers on Fifth Avenue with a smiling blonde.

Golly. A whole year. She's like a female Ghandi with deplorable taste in men.

“It broadens the erotic spectrum having a contrast,” says Anderson. “Otherwise it’s all full-on the whole time.”

So celibacy is the path to true enlightenment. And better casual sex after you've forgotten casual sex made you miserable.

Nowhere is it more full-on all the time than in New York, where men declare frustration over having to wait more than one date for sex and — as Arnold proved — hooking up is as simple as waiting for a train.

New York. If you can make it there, you'll make it anywhere.

Or showing up for a job interview.
When Miss Teen Alabama 2007 Canden Bliss Jackson moved to Manhattan in August at the age of 19, she was excited about making it in the big city.
She quickly landed an interview for a job as a personal assistant to an international businessman. Soon after, he asked what would happen if they “started to like each other,” offering to put her up in a flat in SoHo, pay for travel expenses and talking about a salary of $120,000. The now 20-year-old asked him, “What — if I sleep with you?” His response: “Well, let’s not say it like that.”
Jackson explained that she was celibate and planned to be so until marriage. He took this as a negotiating technique, responding, “I like that even better. I’ll make it $150,000.”
Jackson quickly asked for a taxi.

Good girl.

“I feel like society has become more sex-focused,” says the Long Islander and Stony Brook University student. “Whatever happened to appreciating somebody holding your hand or giving you a sweet kiss? I love cuddling. The little things can be so much more intimate.”

I can tell you what happened: the sexual revolution. Free love, baby.

Even former dating columnists are saying no to the carnal deed. When 29-year-old media personality Julia Allison went through a very public online breakup in March, she found herself canceling date after date until something finally clicked.
Celibacy was the answer to her problems — and may be the answer for quite a while.

That was some "click". Like a vertebrae snapping into place. And all she had to do was endure a public humiliation to discover this untold secret of celibacy. Thank goodness for humiliation!

“I had man whiplash,” she says. “I needed to put my neck in a brace.”

See? Told you. Vertebrae.

She issued a proclamation, writing on her Web site last week, “I decided to codify my unofficial gut reaction of ‘I really don’t feel like dating’ into an official ‘No Dating, No Sex’ stance, at least for the next month, and perhaps beyond that.”

A whole month. Now that's a way of really giving it your all. Way to go, girl. No sex with random or otherwise uncommitted men who begrudge waiting through dinner or learning your name before having sex with you. And for a full 30 to even 31 days. No more public humiliation for you.

She’s at the point, she says, where she doesn’t want to seek intimacy without the potential for a serious relationship. “I’ve always been against the New York version of fast-food sex. Believe me, come on, please, I’ve slept with guys I don’t love before, but I’ve frankly reached the age where I don’t want to do that anymore. I’ve dipped my toes in those waters, and it’s cold.”

And with age comes flimsy and porous wisdom.
This entire subject is tired. For me, anyway. I'm not sure how much evidence people need before they realize a sexually promiscuous life brings nothing but damage. That celibacy is not only possible, but preferable, outside of marriage. That people are not animals and can control themselves. Yes, people includes men.

And ladies, if you are unsatisfied in your relationships, frustrated with the lack of commitment in men, stop sleeping with them. He'll either commit. Or he'll leave. And you are free to find a man of integrity, purpose, and honor who does not view women like a plastic play toy. Oh, and you'll like yourself more, too. Guaranteed.

Problem solved.

As one woman in the article put it, “But I think it’s harder to not have sex than to have sex.” Exactly. So the men who stick around without sex must think you are worth it.

Quote Them: Inigo Montoya

Via HopenChange Cartoons, with a little Spanish lingo mixed in.

Much love, Your Daughter

My Mother, 26. Me, 3 months. What a fluffy ball of pinkness I was.



This is an article I wrote for Mothers Day, published a few years back. I thought I'd give it a repeat performance because my mother deserves all the praise I can lavish on her. Truly. She's an angel.

This is for you Mom, the woman I hope to be when I grow up.

Just like your mother

I don’t remember the first time we met.

First impressions are important, but I was somewhat preoccupied at the time, recovering from birth and all. There was this whole-wide world out there to see, food to taste, air to breathe, crying to do, sleep to be had, fingers to discover. It wasn’t a good time to remember meeting someone, not even someone as significant as my mother.

But every year on my birthday she retells that fateful morning. “I started having labor pains at 2 am…” and that’s where our story begins.

We went through a rough couple of years – her trying to figure me out, me doing the same. She did most of the talking. I just sort of blinked, mumbling odd noises from time to time.

Eventually, we figured out a mother-daughter language and have been speaking it ever since, even 29 years later. (It’s now 33, fyi)

When people ask me about my mother, I usually elevate my voice level to this slightly higher pitched, wispy tone where I give my impression of her saying, “Well, hello there and how are you? Isn’t this a wonderful day? Isn’t life just marvelous? Is there anything I can do for you?”

I make her sound very innocent, very loving, and, as she has pointed out, rather stupid.

She is not in any form nor could ever be surmised as lacking in intelligence. She’s a voracious reader, theological addict, knows every move in the national political arena before George W does, a woman’s bible study leader, recreates heaven with a non-stick frying pan and flour, loves the outdoors and all things green, can turn chaos into comfort, and makes a room more like home just by walking into it.

And she does everything with a smile and pleasant attitude.

She is Mom.

She is the mystic creature that can handle all things great and small. She knows when to hug me, when to simply listen, when to smooth the hair from my face and pat my arm, when I need to hear laughter, when to call, and what to say to always make me stop, make me think, make me evolve into someone a little deeper, a little kinder, a little more capable of being called her daughter.

She is wonderful.

There are few magical memories of my childhood that did not revolve around my mother. She made things happen: You want to create? Let’s make play dough. You want to paint? I have it ready. You want to turn the living room into the planet Nooron where aliens resembling fuzzy bunnies live? Clean it up after you’ve landed back on earth.

Days with her were timeless lessons of morality and judgment, all taught in the classroom of her kitchen, rolling pie crust or snapping green beans. To me, she seemed to know everything and explained it all in my language.

At the time, I thought I was speaking on her level. Eventually, I learned she was speaking on mine.

When the teenage years came, I learned a few inarguables.

First, never talk back to mother. She has a third arm hidden for just such occasions. She medaled in backhanding, winning the Tour de yur Face.

Second, you can’t make it out the door before she comments on your clothes and hair. Forget arguing. It’s a waste of breath. Just pull your skirt down, your hair back, and that sour expression off your face.

Third, no one cares about your broken heart more than Mom. She’s never too busy or too tired to mend your hurting. Keep her up all night crying. She’ll make your favorite breakfast the next morning.

I spent my childhood trying to hurry up and outgrow her, be my own woman, be different than her while being just like her.

As an adult, I finally get it. I’ll never be her. I couldn’t on my best days. She is Mom. And there is no comparison.

Instead, I admire her, how she can touch anyone with just a soft expression, how people gravitate to her for comfort, how she gives of herself without pity or complaint, how her mashed potatoes are always creamy.

She has taught me a few things in life, none more important than honest devotion to my Savior. And then she leads by example.

So for my mother and all other mothers keeping us in awe and wonder at the richness of your heart, Happy Mother’s Day.

You helped us dream big.

the Watson to my Sherlock

I mean to start my day, everyday, with prayer.

But I get busy. I get distracted. There's breakfast to eat. Emails to return. Blogs to write. Wrinkles to iron out. I really dislike wrinkles.

So this morning, I awakened to a computer that did nothing but run that silly round "processing" icon over and over and over. It sucked me in like a trance. It wouldn't move. Wouldn't begin. Wouldn't cough and hack and kick itself into gear. It just processed and processed and processed, around, around, around.

The motion sickness forced my eyes away.

That's when I started praying. I prayed rather heavily. I found time to pray as I worked on getting my gimpy computer to awaken. I found time to pray while I typed out long emails on my blackberry. I found time to pray as I waited without patience for the dang screen to do something, anything but nothing.

I've had my computer for five years. It's a good little thing. A white thing. A shiny, hard plastic and some kind of filmy screen thing. It's been a good companion, the best of all the laptops I've owned coupled into one, since it's the only laptop I've ever owned. We've laughed and talked and stared at each other for hours. It's possibly the best dang relationship I've ever had.

And today it got a new life. A fresh start. It awakened, yawned, and, with heavy lids, asked me what all the fuss was about? I'd kiss it, except I won't. I'm rather particular about mixing my personal life with my professional one.

It shouldn't have taken the near loss of the only tool required for me to produce an income to scratch a morning prayer out of me. But it did. Are computer glitches really required before I notice my Creator is there and wouldn't mind a simple "Morning! Sure are glad to see you! Thanks for the sunshine and stuff."

Tomorrow, I think I'll fix God a cup of coffee. We can sit back, exhale and chat before the deadlines start tugging at my coattails.