Monday, 02 May 2011
So, I was talking with one of my new co-workers today and, at one point, we began talking about movies. As we discussed some recent films we’ve seen, we eventually began talking about actors. She mentioned a movie with Robin Wright. Robin is probably best known for playing Forrest Gump’s wife in Forrest Gump, but whenever I hear her name, I automatically think of The Princess Bride.
“I like Robin Wright,” I said, “remember, she was Buttercup in The Princess Bride.”
To my surprise, my co-worker said she’d never hear of The Princess Bride. When I expressed this surprise, she responded with, “Well, I don’t have any kids.”
I then explained that it’s not a kids’ movie, and supported this by saying I originally saw the film when I was a teenager and that I loved it long before I became a parent (I hate that saying “a parent” sounds like “apparent”). I said it wasn’t animated, and then my co-worker asked if it was the movie that starred Anne Hathaway. I then explained that, no, she was thinking of The Princess Diaries. I said, admittedly, the movie has a poor title, but it’s not a “princess movie,” nor does it dwell heavily on a royal wedding (that’s just the catalyst).
Anyway, I’m not picking on my co-worker or anything like that. I just think it’s amazing that a self-described movie-lover such as herself had never seen or even heard of The Princess Bride. I encouraged her to immediately rectify this situation.
Tuesday, 03 May 2011
So, as I’ve mentioned here before, I’m attempting to keep a running tally of the money I find during the year. If you don’t recall me discussing that, perhaps you should read this blog post.
Now that the year is one-third over, I figured I’d provide an update.
So far, I’ve found $3.72. This is, of course, far lower than I would’ve liked to have found by this time, but it’s still a decent haul; I’m well on-track to beat my goal of finding one hour’s worth of minimum wage during the year.
There are many days in which I found absolutely no money, including a thirteen-day gap from February 17th to March 2nd. The most I found in any one day was 52 cents (on April 2nd). The most popular place to find money is just outside on the ground, though that’s quite a large area. If I include only specific places, both our apartment’s laundry room and the floor at my job’s cafeteria are pretty much gold mines in this area. I have also found money while at college, while pumping gas, at Half-price Books, and at Mississippi Market.
I found money on February 2nd (1 cent), March 2nd (1 dime), and April 2nd (that 52 cents I mentioned above). Sadly, my second-of-the-month streak died out yesterday. So far this month I haven’t found anything, in fact.
Wednesday, 04 May 2011
Someone posted this video on a blog of State Representative Steve Simon giving his view of the proposal to put a marriage-defining amendment onto the state constitution:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hXpOA3jPC04&sns=fb
Simon’s argument is brilliant. Assuming is basic premise that the god of the Christian bible is real and that he created the universe (a premise I’m willing to accept for the sake of Simon’s argument), then it’s difficult to find a flaw in his comments.
Of course, if I was still a Jehovah’s Witness I would take issue with this video. Well, perhaps I wouldn’t even watch the video in the first place because the government is just UNDER SATAN’S CONTROL!!!!! AND GOD WILL DESTROY THEM ALL VERY SOON!!! (at least, that’s the ‘good news’ we used to tell people). But, assuming that I did watch the video, I would just ‘reason’ that Simon has it wrong: god doesn’t create people gay, he just lets people be born with any and all sorts of defects and traits and we have to muddle through until he comes along and murders 99.9% of humans and then lets all the righteous people live on into paradise. There, in paradise, he will correct any imperfection we may have, whether we are blind, missing a limb, or even if we’re gay. I would reason that just as some people have a tendency towards alcoholism and need to curb this behavior in order to win god’s approval, so the homosexuals need to curb their bad behavior in order to live according to god’s standards.
Of course, this is about as fucked up as any ‘reasoning’ can be.
For one thing, nearly all ‘defects’ in the congregation were recognized as such and were accommodated. To my knowledge, no one was discriminated against if they were deaf, or paraplegic (just to give a couple of examples). No one thought they were some weird deviants. To the contrary, such differences were, as I said, accommodated: sign language was provided, as were wheel chair ramps. About the only defect that was discriminated against was the poor souls born penis-less. We called them “women” and we wouldn’t let them do anything except clean the building and knock on doors…’cause those jobs sucked anyways and so we normal humans (i.e., those having a penis) wanted all the help we could get.
Second, homosexuality was viewed as pretty much the most grievous sin there was. When I went on the Oprah Winfrey Show, for example, my grandfather said he didn’t mind that so much (as if I was seeking his permission), but that I better never go on Rosie O’Donnell’s show. He didn’t like her because she was a lesbian. Oprah, incidentally, has, for years, lived with a man to whom she is not married, and is therefore equally culpable as per the bible, but somehow her sin wasn’t as bad.
Third – and here’s the key point – the government is and should be separate from religion. Regardless of the Witnesses’ low opinion of gays, they don’t ever have to perform any gay weddings if they don’t want to (and they won’t). However, the government should not stipulate against such marriages if the only argument put forth is a religious one (and it is). In fact, Witnesses should welcome a legalization of gay marriage, as it will make their religion stand out even more from mainstream America and it will help prove to them that this whole world is SATAN’S!!!!!!