Adam and Steve, Madame and Eve
I’m going to say something really fast about homosexuality. It’s going to be awkward, and someone will hate me (because it’s such a big issue that someone will hate you no matter what you say).
I’m a religious Jew, okay, and I stick to my religion. Which makes a very interesting paradox when gay comes up, because I also believe that there’s at least a partial biological basis.
The way I see it is, look – God wants us to be fruitful and multiply, too, so what if you’re infertile? Many people in the Torah (Old Testament) were. Clearly that’s God deciding that you have a different purpose. On the other hand, if you are fertile, you shouldn’t waste it.
That’s how I see homosexuality, to some extent. I think if that’s the way God set you up, I mean, what are you going to do about it? But that doesn’t mean you should be gay if you’re straight, or vice versa for that matter. I don’t think God wants a gay person to act straight, either – that’s denying what you are. I like to interpret the famous ‘gay clause’ as saying that you shouldn’t do that sort of thing if you’re straight, which loads of people in the surrounding area did all the time.
Because look – I have a really hard time with people other than maybe Hitler or Osama bin Laden going to hell. I don’t think God would send me to hell for eating a cheeseburger. I’m not saying I should, or will – I’m not allowed to – but that doesn’t mean that if you screw up once, you’re just damned to hell. I can’t believe that – that’s one of the reasons I’m not a Christian, among many. Christians do a lot of great things, and they really do have a very good emphasis on behavior and how you should treat others that I really respect, but things like Damning to Hell don’t sit well with me. That doesn’t seem like my God.
So I have a really hard time seeing Kurt, Magnus and Alec, Mitchell and Cam, or any other gay character I know (an insular Jewish community where I don’t know many boys, let alone gay ones, makes it hard to have any real people I can relate to on this) going to hell because God set them up the way he did. That’s just my stance on the issue, and if it ever gets back to my community or family they will be very disappointed, but that’s just how I see it. I can’t change my position.
~DreamingOfNothing
P.S. “I’m going to say something really fast.” I still crack myself up.
Delurk, please
I just discovered that this thing has poll capabilities SO: Could y’all answer this? If you’re even there? If I have readers in the woodwork I’d just like to know, so I can be even more panicked than I am. Please delurk, y’all, so I know.
(And I’ll know if I should keep using y’all, since that’s plural, and if there IS no one in the woodwork then I should only be using the singular, to my lovely BA.)
Not Me! Saturday
I’m writing my essays. I’m not possibly searching for weird Psych openers on Youtube. Absolutely not. I mean, especially after I had to set myself a television-hours-per-week limit. I’m not even thinking on renegading on that. Not even close.
(Psych does lots of weird openers, just btw. They did it in Hindi once and Spanish once and with Christmas Flair once. All sorts of goodies.)
Not that I know this for certain. I mean, I’m working.
~DreamingOfNothing
Ginger – The Rhizome’s Revenge
Sugar literally hates me. I’m not even joking.
This tale begins in a store named Uwajimaya, which is gigantic and carries every Asian ingredient you could imagine. They also carry stuff like fennel and durians, which are below and just as weird-tasting as they look.
They also carried many different varieties of ginger. Generally you see the bark-covered stuff, that’s big and looks like roots? Well, they had baby ginger, which is much less fibrous and has thinner skin.
I recently saw an episode of Good Eats (which I’m not even going to explain beyond, “It’s about food and incredibly geeky”) that featured ginger. They candied ginger, and it looked so good and yummy and it’s healthy, too, so I decided, “Let’s candy ginger!”
Came home, peeled and sliced the ginger very thinly, and nearly cut my hand. I cooked the ginger for 35 minutes, like I was supposed to, and burned my hand trying to drain the water. I then added the sugar, brought to a boil, and simmered.
One thing you have to know about sugar is that it will bite you if it has the chance. It has no mercy. You have to watch that stuff like a hawk or it will burn. It burns almost in an instant, and once it’s burned it all tastes like burnt sugar. There’s no margin of error with sugar.
So you can guess – I burned it. Again. I was watching and watching and *KAZAM* instant burnt sugar.
It’s supposed to look like this, by the way:
And another thing? They are wicked spicy. I don’t think I cooked the ginger down enough, which also frustrates me a little. But hey – not going to culinary school, folks.
I’ve made some carrot cashew cardamom muffins to console myself (I make muffins pretty well, and it’s fun, in a way) but those are in the oven so I don’t know how they’ll come out. I might give y’all an update here on them, after I’ve tasted them, but they’re likely to come out okay.
~DoN
Crepes and Buttercreams
I was looking at the Bloggie Awards today (if you’re much of a blogger, you should look, unnamed [probably fictional] followers) and stumbled upon a blog called 17 and Baking. It was in the Best Teen Blogger category, which I paid extra attention to because they are my kin. Much cooler and more popular kin, but still.
She’s a writer, photographer, and most importantly, baker. A good one too, from the looks of it. I’m just starting to bake (and loving it) – so her blog really intrigues me.
So: Best Cull from this year’s Bloggies, to me. Best New Discovery – and she has my vote.
~DoN
blind block in front of a stumbling man
I stole this prompt off lj. Live, suckers. It basically asked whether I’d ever said anything to an online friend that I would never say in person and what I thought about the emotional disconnect.
I don’t have any good friends that I only know online – my best friend and I only communicate online now, but that’s because of a long-distance relationship issue and we were friends IRL, so I don’t know that that completely counts. But I will say that we’ve become much better friends since (probably because I quit hero-worshipping her) and I attribute that at least partially to online communication.
See, I have a really hard time saying things flat out. Verbally, I mean. I couldn’t even say this. Writing (which is what I love to do anyway) is a much easier way to say it. See, I can say then, “I miss you,” or “I hate that this happened to you,” or “I’m worried about you,” which I’d like to think I could say to someone’s face if I needed to, but I probably wouldn’t.
So for someone as socially awkward as I am, online communication is the best thing since penicillin. I’m not really addressing the prompt, but if it’s making me blog, is that really important?
Blogging’s part of that entire relationship thing too. For instance, I referred in an earlier paragraph to hero-worshipping my best friend, which I never told her, and right now I can pretend that she is never going to read this post and that I can say it without feeling totally embarassed. I can pretend that this thing is my giant diary that I’m not possibly going to publish for all the world to see or anything like that, I mean, seriously. But it means that I can say all sorts of things I need to say without actually telling people in person.
See? I am well skilled in the art of avoiding sticky topics. I blog about it and everything.
And I was going to write a summing-up CM post today, but I spent the last two hours watching Psych and then realizing that they’re full length, not 20 minute. Idiot me.
~DreamingOfNothing
When you’ve got a hundred voices singing
Firstly – go to facebook and vote for Friendship Circle, because they’re amazing. Honestly – I knew there was a branch where I live, and I’ve gone a few times and seen it (my friend’s sister-in-law runs the local branch), but mercy, I had no idea it was so big. And awesome. So go vote, ASAP, and you get five votes for five different groups, so you can vote for other people too. Invisible Children is also an amazing charity.
So that’s my major suggestion. Go vote for FC. I’ll be waiting for you when you come back, possibly to recap CM’s new season to the best of my ability, especially the awesome that was 5-12.
~DreamingOfNothing
could be my ADD acting up
A long day and even longer week all made better by Psych giving me both the trauma and the humor I was needing. Only that show can simultaneously have gunshot wounds, kidnapping, stealing shirts, and Hefty commercial ideas.
It doesn’t translate well but trust me – it was emotionally abusive and hilarious at the same time, and that is like a massage to me. Magic.
~DreamingOfNothing
England’s winning, anything is possible!
I just finished Flushed Away and I think I have a crush on an animated British mouse.
Somebody shoot me.
~DreamingOfNothing
The Sound and the Fury
Here’s what I say on my break from filling college apps and working on my critical analysis like a madwoman:
Yes. Good times.
~DreamingOfNothing
