Mission Accomplished
Ladybugs scattered on what remains of the snow...........
No neighbors noticed (I think) a slipper shod woman with a trenchcoat over her nightgown skulking about in the dawn light, scattering pink eggs about. If they noticed, they were kind enough not to honk and wave!
Now to make a cake.............

Pleh!
My sister can write backwards. The schools never accepted her work in a creative form.....

The teenager's essay began: "My smmr hols wr CWOT. B4, we usd 2go2 NY 2C my bro, his GF & thr 3 :- kds FTF. ILNY, it's a gr8 plc."

The 13-year-old girl submitted the essay to a teacher in a state secondary school in the west of Scotland and explained that she found it "easier than standard English".

Her teacher, who asked not to be named, said: "I could not believe what I was seeing. The page was riddled with hieroglyphics, many of which I simply could not translate."

Why did the teacher ask that she not be named? Was she ashamed to have such dreadful students or was she ashamed that she couldn’t decipher the ‘code?’

Time Flies..........Happy Birthday Franny!

Wish I had seen this earlier. The perfect item for our No. 1 Dali Fan!
Oh, well, maybe next year.



Dali’s “Persistence of Memory” Clock
Computer / Desk Clock adapted from Dali’s “Persistence of Memory” painting. This fully functioning quartz mechanism clock has an adjustable built-in stand which allows it to be displayed on a computer monitor, shelf or desk. Hard plastic clock, hand-painted, adjustable stand, 6"H x 4"W.
TAL802, $16 SALE!!! $12.99

Candy is in the Eye of the Beholder
Interesting article about the making of Johnny Cash’s Hurt video.
(link courtesy of Relapsed Catholic)

In the short history of music videos, few have had the emotional heft and visual impact of the clip shot by director Mark Romanek in the Tennessee home of the ailing country legend.

"This [concept] is completely and utterly alien to what videos are supposed to be," Romanek said. "Videos are supposed to be eye candy — hip and cool and all about youth and energy. This one is about someone [moving] toward the twilight of his career, this powerful, legendary figure who is dealing with issues and emotions you're not used to encountering in videos."

No mention of Caravaggio influence. But interesting anyway. And I do think it is eye candy. Of a serious sort. Eye candy with a bite.

100 Things.....
Gospel Minefield discusses the making of 100 Things lists. I haven’t tried this. Perhaps I should. I still don’t have three things in case I get another chance at Jeopardy. So what’s an extra 97?

Reassurance...
That great minds (or the sweetly naive) think alike...... T. S. O’Rama is not the first person to think that those measuring charts next to the door at Taco Bells and Quickie Marts were for amusement purposes. It took me a long time to figure those out.

A Mind-Numbing Work of Maternal Devotion
Tomorrow is our dear Frances’ 22nd birthday.

I set a goofy sort of precedent on Bridget’s birthday by covering the lawn with about 75 plastic bumble bees, as a salute to her nickname “B” and her affinity for bees. The curious reader may wonder from whence these plastic bees came. Even if you’re not curious, I’m going to tell you. I like those commercial operations that show up on special events and decorate lawns with flamingoes, dinosaurs, penguins, etc. I don’t know if they do bees and how much it might cost - but if I have to ask how much, that means I can’t afford it. Around Easter last year, while putting away the plastic eggs, I had the inspiration to stock up on discount eggs, put black stripes on the yellow ones and give Bridget the Bee Salute that she deserved. Playing my cards right, I was able to purchase a lot of eggs for around $.20 a dozen. The downside was that the eggs come evenly color-distributed, so each bag contained only 2 yellow eggs. So I now own a lot of other colored eggs.

Fran has had her ‘thing’ about ladybugs, especially dating back to the few years at the old house when we were overrun by veritable plagues of the critters. (Some were actually shipped in to the house by my mother-in-law, where they were stored in the refrigerator awaiting repackaging and sale at the garden club’s annual spring garden market.) There was something apropos about the surly ladybug in A Bug’s Life being named Francis. Just close enough to truth.....

I have just completed putting spots and faces on about 60 pink plastic eggs.
And if we must have snow (and we sure do..........I slipped twice on my way out of church, leading Chuck to ask why the little old ladies were walking OK, but I was having trouble) please let it last just one more day. The pink bugs will show up so much better on a white background.

Although the children are getting older, I still want to do things to make their birthdays memorable. I remember my 22nd birthday. One of my gifts (sorry I can’t match this one, Fran) was $220. The memorable part was not the money - it was the fact that I received 11 twenty dollar bills hidden throughout the house. My mother wrote rhyming clues to follow through the house as I hunted for my cash. I wish I could do something really cute like put a $2 bill in each egg. Oh, well. I’m trying.

And I’m getting better at this. For the bees, I used a Magic Marker. The smell of Magic Marker is like a sweet perfume, transporting me back to the halcyon days of first grade. An afternoon locked in my bedroom with an open Magic Marker left me a bit woozy. Bridget likes Magic Markers too, I’m surprised the smell didn’t attract to my room to find out what was going on.
This time I used a Sharpie. Less odor and a less attractive odor, so when it became too much, I left the room.

6:00 am - already afflicted with envy.........
Read Fr. Jim Tucker’s account of dinner with parishioners. I think my kids are Smart Kids, but just between you and me I can’t count on them behaving like Fr. Jim’s young parishioners. I’m sorely tempted to read them his post, saying, “Isn’t that charming?” - unspoken subtext - “Why can’t you guys make cogent comments like that?”

The way it stands now - no clergy invited to dinner until we can exorcise the tuna from the dinner blessing. ....it’s not nos et haec Tuna dona........ And any day now, Eddie will have given up on the humorous declamation of his state of being, such as “Pugno, ergo sum.”

Oh, well, in my dreams............

Very Guilty Pleasure......
I never watch COPS. I mean.........COPS? I'll make an exception for Mardi Gras COPS tonight. It'll get my mind off the random snowflakes floating past my window. And it is more fun than watching the man hassle miscreants hanging out in the neighboring apartment complex.

The police in New Orleans strike me as the most calm, self-controlled law enforcement people I have ever seen. I guess they had better be, considering the chaos that surrounds them at times.

They were very hospitable when my sister and her friend (a northern Wisconsin law enforcement professional) paid a call at the French Quarter police station. Not only did they accomodate a request for a souvenir picture, but offered them a choice of cuffed against the wall or in the back of the squad car. Where was I when this opportunity arose? Probably looking for 'rare' holy cards in a voodoo shop....

Saturday Scruples
link from Amy Kropp

1. You're driving alone on a highway at night when a desperate looking person tries to flag you down. Do you stop?No. Prudence dictates caution. But I would stop as soon as possible and call the local constabulary etc. (Sorry, no cell phone.) I wouldn’t just keep on driving and put the person out of my mind. Likewise, if you knew what my car looks like, you would have to think that the person was truly in distress or criminally insane to risk flagging me down.
2. You're summoned for jury duty in what promises to be a tedious trial. Do you pretend to have views which will disqualify you? No. That would not be honest. I do have some views that might disqualify me in many cases. But I wouldn’t worry either way. It might be educational. And it is a service we are sometimes called upon to perform as citizens. If tedium is the worst consequence of public service, that’s a good thing. And if I’ve avoided jury duty after 30 years as a registered voter, I would have to accept that my number is up.
3. You smoke. Your teenager wants to smoke because you do. Do you quit? I’ve never smoked. Two of my ‘children’ in their early twenties do smoke. I’ve wondered at times if too much anti-smoking education has set children up with a device for bothering their parents while achieving a certain amount of individuation. If I thought that my smoking would give it all some ‘anti-glamour’ I would start tomorrow. (Hopefully, not for long......)

An Apt Mommentary Commentary.....
or or Elinor Dashwood says it all.....
Above all, I've said it, and I stick to it: anyone who claims, in the presence of parents, that children's noise or movement distracts them, has to expect to be laughed at. If I permitted my attention to wander every time my children were cranky or restless, they and I would have been dead long ago. Toughen up, folks, worse things happen in war. In fact, worse things happen in the sanctuary and the pulpit, so ease up on parents.

We’ve always tried to remove our children from the pews before they became an outright menace to society and we’ve managed to avoid any truly nasty comments from fellow parishioners. Some of the things I’ve heard from other moms are just outrageous - one mom on one of the homeschooling lists I belong to said that an elderly woman approached her in the parking lot after Mass and told her that Satan uses little children to distract people during Mass. Oy!

We have to attend to our ‘business’ at Mass - and be willing to offer up our distractions and aggravations, whether they be squirmy babies or old folks coughing like they just escaped from the local TB sanitarium.

I must admit I did succumb to disraction at Mass the other morning. There was a mother and her very active 3 year old son (last time he visited the rectory he wandered off and made it 2/3 of the way upstairs in the thirty seconds it took his mother to fill out a form or some such paperwork. Retrieving him made me very nervous - women just don’t go up there. I think the cleaning lady does, but that’s the only exemption.....) in attendance and I found my mind wandering in a sort of sweet nostalgia. Remembering the times when I had wanderers. It was almost enough to make me cry. But then I remembered how I could leave church drenched in perspiration and I was glad (in a bittersweet way) that those days are behind me. BUT that distraction was my problem, not the little boy’s. He was just being....a sweet little boy. A sweet little boy fortunate to have a mother who brings him to Mass.

Just one more time...........
Has anyone seen my Greetings from Asbury Park towel? It looks like this:

but it's a towel. Why would someone take an old lady's Bruce Springsteen towel?

Caught the last ten minutes of Springsteen on CBS. Now back to our regularly scheduled Ferris Buehler marathon.........

Karen Hall’s “Ooky” Detector is A-OK!
It’s not too often that I direct Martha’s attention in the supermarket queue away from People Magazine and tell her to see what’s in the new Vogue or what Bat Boy is up to. But, like Karen, Joan Lunden’s anticipated motherhood by surrogate sets off my “ooky” detector.

The announcement was that, at age 52, she was about to be the proud mother of twins. Nothing wrong with that, I say, as a proud 46 year-old mother of a toddler. Except that Joan isn't carrying her twins. She is paying someone to do that.

But did I mention, Joan already has children -- three grown daughters. She wants children with her current husband. That's nothing I can throw stones at either. But something about this entire story is setting off my "ooky" detector.

I can’t answer all of Karen’s questions about the Church’s teachings on fertility treatments (I always refer the shrill indignant callers to a priest. “Just what is it about the Catholic Church and in vitro?” is enough of a tip-off that it’s more than I can handle. And enough that I can warn the fathers to brace themselves....) but I do find the Catechism quite helpful. Especially in its reminder that no one has a right to a child. And that for some people, childlesness may be their cross to bear. But many people don’t wish to hear that.

And articles and TV appearances by celebs such as Ms. Lunden just innoculate society at large against the evil that is involved in so many fertility procedures by giving it a cute gloss. How many People readers will question what could be so wrong with someone being so full of love and desire for a child that she would do anything to have one? Or two? Slow, gentle exposure to evil, under the guise of the sweet and lovely is very insidious.

How's the Weather in Your Neck of the Woods Infinite?
The Curt Jester presents the ultimate Weather Pixies............

Hi-ho, Hi-ho....
Off to work I go. I think we're doing a Lenten mailing. At this point, I'd be happy to go in to work to sort paper clips and rubber bands.

The boys are both sick. That figures, since I spent yesterday in meticulous planning of the schoolwork that their pater should be leading them in today. I don't know how much he'll accomplish. Eddie was whimpering most of the night plus he had bad dreams which caused us to be up watching Cartoon Network at 4:00am.

Martha is not so sure she wishes to continue on the track team. I don't want to 'take sides,' but I can't say that I blame her. Practice until 6:00pm 5 nights a week plus Saturday mornings and a schedule of 20 meets seems a little intense to me. I've probably already stated here that in these post Title IX days, girls have a lot more sports opportunities but they sure don't look like they are enjoying it. When Embot was on the track team I always came home from meets rather depressed by the look of grim determination on the girls' faces.

At dinner last night, Rick had a look on his face not unlike Mary Tyler Moore in Ordinary People when she found out Conrad quit the swim team. Not a pleasant dinner - I'm still a bit dyspeptic. Then he was offended when I asked why all the fuss over heaving an 8(?)lb. sphere of metal.

All in all, the rectory will provide a bit of sanctuary for me today.

The Boss Knows Whereof He Speaks
The Smoking Gun has amusing excerpts from riders to celebrity performance contracts. What caught my eye was #7 from Bruce Springsteen’s last tour.....

7. A K9 sweep of the immediate stage area may be requested from 2 hours prior to performance in order to lessen concern for crank bomb threats.
Police escort to and from the venue shall be made available upon request by the ARTIST.

Perhaps this is just SOP, but I also know that a crank bomb threat can really foul up an evening musicale. I took my sister to see Springsteen in 1975, at the lovely Uptown Theater in Milwaukee. About three songs into the show we were asked to evacuate because a bomb threat had been called in to the theater. Most of the crowd hit the local bars. I was stuck with a sixteen year-old with no fake id. It was a long couple of hours hanging around. I think we went to the Red Barn for a root beer and then loitered on the sidewalk until we were readmitted to the theater. Of course, because we were loitering while others were boozing, we negotiated better seats when the door reopened. Ah, the memories.

Thanks to Catholic Light for the link to the story on the mother of six who left the kids home alone for a 17 day excursion through Italy with her paramour.
I was sure that I had heard about this on the TV but didn’t see it in print anywhere. I was starting to think it was a hallucinatory product of a bad dream brought about by obsessing over finding someone to watch Eddie while I was at work on Saturday morning and Rick wanted to attend Martha’s track practice. Chuck is old enough to babysit, but he doesn’t command the same respect from his little brother as he would from other children and I am not comfortable with the thought of leaving them alone together for an extended period of time (i.e. more than fifteen minutes) I am still reeling from the bike accident that took off the end of Eddie’s finger last spring while I was at work. Rick was gone for about 15 minutes. Fran (age 21) was in charge, but with no car she had to call 9-1-1. Fran had all the blood cleaned up and Rick was at the hospital with Eddie by the time I left work and returned home ASAP.

AND I FELT LIKE A ROTTEN MOTHER!

When Jennifer Farrell learned her six children had been taken into police custody and placed with relatives and in foster homes while she was vacationing, she decided to stay in Italy for two more weeks to finish her trip.

he concluded that the children were in good care, said her boyfriend Hank DePetro.
"She said, 'The kids are being taken care of, they're already out of the home, so there's nothing I can do,' " said Mr. DePetro, 60, who invited Mrs. Farrell to accompany him on the 17-day trip.
In what's been dubbed the "Home Alone" case, Mrs. Farrell, 33, faces the prospect of neglect charges after leaving her six children, ages 14 to 6, at their Greeley, Colo., home while she toured Italy with her boyfriend. She returned to Colorado on Thursday.

Possible Signs of ‘Chemical’ Threat
or
Why I may never watch The American Experience - Pill episode.
It could lead to many sensitive people suffering from watery eyes, twitching, choking, having trouble breathing or losing coordination.


All manner of media will be used to sell you on the wonders of The Pill, The Patch and The Shot. And whatever atrocity is next cooked up in the lab.




Don’t let Mom watch that PBS show. If she does, be prepared for the moment she starts foaming at the mouth.


Slink away quietly and move rapidly to the nearest exit. Unless you want to be subjected to Mom’s ranting.


If Mother should watch “The Pill”.....
To limit the amount of ranting you are exposed to, think about shielding, distance and time.

* Shielding: If you have a thick shield between yourself and Mom’s voice, more of the sound will be absorbed, and you will be exposed to less irritation.
* Distance: The farther away you are away from Mom and the fallout the lower your exposure.
* Time: Minimizing time spent exposed to Mom will also reduce your risk.

Oh, Happy Day
With thanks to my friend Kit who called to tell me the good news.

The Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that a federal racketeering law was improperly used to punish aggressive anti-abortion protesters, a major victory for people who regularly block clinic doors.

The court's 8-1 ruling applies to protests of all sorts, not just at clinics.

Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, writing for the majority, said that when protesters do not "obtain" property, they cannot be punished for civil disobedience with the federal Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations Act, an anti-racketeering law.

The court's ruling is a victory for Operation Rescue, anti-abortion leader Joseph Scheidler and others who were ordered to pay damages to abortion clinics and barred from interfering with their businesses for 10 years.

Rehnquist said that their political activity did not qualify as extortion.

Now, back to my regularly scheduled school stuff.