Peony Moss: November 2003 Archives

Just got back from Pennsylvania. Traffic was horrific, so we peeled off at Breezewood (half an hour's wait just to get into the toll plaza leading to that graceful metropolis, so like Paris with its profusion of lights and fine cafes) and took the back roads through PA and Maryland, a route that took us through Emmitsburg (alas, no time for a pilgrimage, so we just said a rosary in the car.) I'm still not sure what flight from sanity led us to try the Pennsylvania Turnpike.

I may pop in for an occasional visit on a Sunday, but otherwise I'll see you after Christmas. Do drop me an email, if you feel like it. Have a blessed and fruitful Advent.

And, if I may....

Tomorrow, November 30, is a good day to start a novena for the Feast of the Immaculate Conception.

A suggested intention: over at his blog, dylan's mom says December 10 is going to be a key day for him.

Thank you, RC, for all your help with our new banner and purple template!

Just a few off the top of my head....

Thank You, Lord for...

my husband and our dear little boy
for our daily bread
for the roof over our head
for my husband's new job
for the little luxuries in our lives, including our computer
for the Sacraments
for our Holy Father, our bishops, and pastors
for the Saints and our Guardian Angels
for our family and friends
and for our St Blog's friends ('specially Pansy :) )
for a fun day today
for the opportunity to live near Washington DC and all its opportunities
for the ability to travel freely
for the expedient solution of Safeway's boxed Thanksgiving dinners

Today I have a really big day planned, including getting ready for our Thanksgiving trek to my mil's, so I may not get a chance to post again today. We're leaving first thing in the morning tomorrow and we'll probably be back on Saturday (avoiding the unbearable traffic on Sunday.)

I will be putting blogging (posting, reading, commenting) aside for the duration of Advent (though I may pop in on a Sunday.) Four weeks too long to endure the deprivation? I will be checking email. :)

So anyway, if I don't get a chance to post later, have a blessed Advent and a joyous Christmas.

here. I'll try to get my thank-you note up later today.

Mothering and Justice, by Juli Loesch Wiley

In our static links, I've tagged our link to the journal Caelum et Terraas "how Peony discerned her vocation." Articles like this one were what woke me up to the fact that I didn't really like being single, that I really wanted to get married. I had never heard the loving descriptions of family life and the vocation to married life that I came across in CetT. It was through the pages of this journal that I learned why contraception is a serious evil and learned about the beauty of being open to life.

here. I am frantically busy today and won't have time to address her objections point by point.

Michelle's first principle seems to be that breastfeeding in itself is an act that, like defecation, "bodily housekeeping," blowing one's nose, and the marital act, should be performed in private.

I believe this premise is incorrect. Breastfeeding is about feeding a baby, and eating is an act that is considered acceptable to perform in public. I wonder if American culture in particular has gotten a little prudish about breastfeeding simply because, with the aggressive marketing of artificial formula, it became so uncommon during the twentieth century. In centuries past, women of means did not breastfeed in public, but they also avoided appearing in public when they were pregnant and even avoided saying the word "pregnant." (For that matter, they avoided the trouble of feeding and caring for their children at all by hiring a wet-nurse.)

My other premise is that mothers who nurse in public should extend courtesy for others around them and make a reasonable effort to keep things under control.

Michelle brings us the news of an amazing new technology called "bottles." I addressed that in a comments box but briefly, some nursing mothers find pumping to be very difficult, especially for an occasional outing. With bottles, you have to buy them, clean them, sanitize them, fill them, bring enough with you, make sure the milk doesn't spoil, warm them when you get there... a different order of planning altogether than choosing a shirt with nursing openings. If the baby drinks only part of the bottle, the rest of it has to be wasted. And, again, what happens if you do all that and still "get caught"?

Bottles are not only an expense and a hassle, they are not always a workable solution. There is a theory of "nipple confusion" that cautions against using artificial nipples or pacifiers at all for very young babies. Slightly older babies may refuse to take a bottle at all, particularly when Mom is there. If a mother has a very young baby or is going to be out and about for a while, there's also the issue of her breasts getting full.

A mother boarding an airplane got hassled about her bottles of expressed breastmilk and was forced by a TSA official to drink some to prove it wasn't some dangerous substance. All that to avoid getting hassled over nursing her baby on the airplane, when she could have just excused herself, turned away, latched on the baby, and provided the baby with fresh clean nourishment (and instant relief from the ear pain caused by pressure changes.)

Michelle notes that the Holy Father describes breastfeeding as "an individual and private act." (emphasis on "private" is hers.) Private doesn't necessarily mean "hidden from the public eye"; the context of the paragraph seems to indicate private in the sense of an individual or family action, as opposed to a big social movement, so that reflecting on the actions and needs of a single nursing mother can lead us to consideration of large societal trends.

"Think of the children!" Answering awkward questions is part of parenthood. If another little child asks, "what is that lady doing?" and the other parent doesn't want to get into it (even with a straighforward answer such as "she's feeding her little baby") how about "she's taking care of her baby"? Should anyone who might prompt an awkward question stay home? Then all people who are pregnant, remarkably fat, disabled, extremely tall, extremely short, speak languages other than English, or wear clothing that's the least bit out of the ordinary should all stay home.

Again, my own experience is that most nursing mothers prefer to seek out a secluded place, but secluded places are not always available.

My father-in-law died when Hambet was three months old. We got an urgent call at six-thirty pm, urging us to hurry to Pennsylvania, as it would be unlikely he'd live through the night. I threw some clothes in a suitcase and we were on the road in an hour. For a week we lived out of a hotel room. I was spending most of the day in the public eye. Was I to pump bottles for eight to twelve hours' worth of feeding a day (plus keeping them cool, and washing and sanitizing the bottles and the pump at night in the hotel room sink?) Was I to stay home and send my husband off for a week?

How about moms who are on vacation?

Vales first: looks like Vociferous Yawpings is bowing out. Bummer. I'd read it just for the title.

Aves: Speaking of Caritate Dei, Robert Diaz is inviting everyone to check out his group blog Eternal Rebels, which has a cool Chestertonian title and some new members.

Hambet was sitting on my lap while I was surfing, and perked up when he saw the picture of Saint Anthony over at Caritate Dei.

Peony: Do you know Who that Baby is?
Hambet: Baby Jesus ("Baaaaaaaaaby JEEEEEEEsus!")
Peony: Right! That's Baby Jesus! and that's Saint Anthony holding Him.
Hambet: (furrows brow, getting upset, angrily addresses monitor:) No no no! Saint Anfony, needs give Baby Jesus back to Mary!

T.S. O'Rama posts on economic systems and "bridling capitalism:"

One of the negatives of a global economy is that inefficiencies are squashed, and inefficiences can be humane. For example, companies in France and Germany are having to become leaner in order to remain competitive with the U.S. and Japan. Vacation time and benefits in European companies are higher, and they are paying the price for it. Instead of America tending toward the "more civilized" European model, the Europeans are tending towards our more cut-throat model.

It would be interesting if we could get a sustained conversation on distributism and Catholic social teaching going around St Blog's, maybe after the New Year.

I allude, of course, to Burger King's new corporate policy, which states clearly that mothers who nurse their babies at BK will not be harassed, and that other diners who claim to be offended by the sight of a baby being nourished by the means designed by God will be invited to sit in another spot in the restaurant.

The policy was announced after an incident in a Utah BK on November 8, in which a mother nursing her baby was asked to either nurse in the restroom or leave the restaurant. In giving her that choice, the manager of the restaurant was breaking Utah law, which states a business "may not prohibit a woman's breast-feeding in any location where she otherwise may rightfully be, irrespective of whether the breast is uncovered during or incidental to the breast-feeding." (Nineteen other states have similar laws.)

But it seems like many people think BK made the wrong decision. I first heard about the policy over the weekend, when a local talk show host desperate for some calls was braying "so does this mean she can WHIP IT OUT whenver she wants?" The phrase "WHIP IT OUT" makes me see red, so I changed the channel before I drove the car off the road.

Now I see that Michelle has picked up the topic and reiterates her lack of sympathy for nursing in public (much more politely, of course, than the talk show host.)

Let me first issue my standard disclaimer: Babies have a right to be fed. Nursing babies have a right to nurse. Nursing mothers have the right to nurse their babies, including in public. Nursing mothers have the responsibility to make a reasonable effort to avoid overexposure. I don't care what they do in Scandinavia, nobody wants to see (warning!) this. ("Helsekost" means "health food;" this was a public service announcement.)

But really, is that what we're talking about? I wish that people who dislike nursing in public would be more clear what exactly makes them so uncomfortable. Is it mothers who overexpose themselves out of lack of concern for the feelings of others? Then I'm with them on that point; nursing mothers should be polite just like everyone else.

But the vast majority of nursing mothers are not "whipping" anything out, and are not interested in overexposing themselves. In the Burger King case, the mother was nursing her baby under her sweater. With a little practice, most moms can easily use clothing, slings, and blankets to preserve their modesty while nursing a baby. Check out these photos (scroll down to the bottom) from the Elizabeth Lee website to see what I mean (warning, text alludes to sewing, nursing, shopping, bargain-hunting, and other estrogen-soaked topics.) Are these mothers really invading anyone else's visual privacy? When I talk about nursing a baby in public, that's what I mean.

Is the sight of a woman nursing a baby offensive, even if nothing's showing? Is the mere fact that a breast is in use offensive? Is a nursing mother supposed to just stay home all the time, then, in case the baby might get hungry while she's out and can't find a place to hide?

Michelle wonders "....why anyone would need to breastfeed in a public restaurant anyway. Certainly doing so is going to hinder your own eating, which is the point of restaurants. Couldn't you feed the baby before going out to forage in fast-food establishments for your own nourishment?"

Why would one need to breastfeed in a restaurant? Perhaps because the baby is hungry? Nursing hindering your own eating? Welcome to motherhood! (although one of the nice things about nursing is that, if the baby cooperates, you can feed the baby and still have a free hand to eat, type, manage other children, etc) As for pre-feeding, that's not always an option -- you can't force a nursing baby to eat when he's not hungry. Or you could feed the baby before you go in the restaurant, but find that he's still hungry or thirsty once you get inside.

Let's say you're a mom with a nursling and a couple of older children. You've been running errands and are still a long drive from home; maybe you're travelling. Your baby fell asleep in the car, and your older children fed in a hurry because they're hungry and crabby (and come to think of it, you're getting hungry too.) So you feed the older kids, get a bite to eat yourself, and turn the older ones loose to burn off some energy in the ball pit. By now, the baby's waking up from his car-induced slumber and is ready to eat. What do you do? Let the baby scream in hunger while you round up the disappointed siblings, stuff their feet into their shoes and their arms into their coats, and drag them out to the cold car where they just sit there while you feed the baby, twisting yourself behind the steering wheel? Or turn your back to the restaurant, get the baby started, arrange your sweater so nothing's showing, and feed the baby while the other kids play?

I suspect most nursing mothers prefer to find as private a place as possible to nurse, both to avoid attracting unwanted attention ("eeew, that's gross, can't you go sit on the john, tie up the stall for fifteen minutes, and feed your baby there?") and to get a little rest and quiet themselves. But it's not always easy to find a nice, private place. Nordstrom's and IKEA are the only stores I can think of that have mother's rooms. And then what if there are other people with you? Maybe you'd like spend your time out with them, to enjoy that nice dinner with your husband at the table you're paying good money to sit at.

This is a life issue. Pope Pius XII stated that "it is more desirable that the mother should feed her child at her own breast", and Pope John Paul II has also warmly encouraged breastfeeding, noting that nursing mothers need "support." How do we show support to nursing mothers by chasing them out of public places when they try to feed their babies? One of the reasons women don't breast-feed is that they think they'll be tied down at home all the time. They hear people moaning about how unreasonable BK is being, and think they're going to be harassed if they go out to run their errands or get some lunch and find that they need to nurse their baby. It contributes to the idea that babies are troublesome and unwelcome, and that motherhood is drudgery and an end to normal life.

Michelle notes that BK's new policy states that if a customer complains about a breastfeeding mother, the complaining customer is to be offered another place to eat in the restaurant. Michelle's comment: "Ah, the old "If you don't like it, it's your problem" argument. How enlightened and mature; the perfect example for young children."

So instead, BK should offer that same argument ("If you don't like nursing in the john or leaving the restaurant, that's your problem") to a mother who wants to feed her baby?

Pope John Paul II again:

"Even this brief reflection on the very individual and private act of a mother feeding her infant can lead us to a deep and far-ranging critical rethinking of certain social and economic presuppositions, the negative human and moral consequences of which are becoming more and more difficult to ignore. Certainly, a radical re-examination of many aspects of prevailing socio-economic patterns of work, economic competitiveness and lack of attention to the needs of the family is urgently necessary."

Sparki had a good post a couple of days ago on avoiding Chinese-made products. Davey's mommy picks up the discussion and links to this article on the fight to keep Wal-Mart out of the little town of Abingdon, Virginia.

I would like to add to the discussion, but my thoughts are all a-jumble and today's to-do list is very long. A few random thoughts:

1. I dislike Wal-Mart because it's a crowded, cluttered, ugly store. Yet there are a few products that I know I can reliably find at Wal-Mart. Last summer I underpacked and needed some plain white cotton underwear. We were traveling through Michigan's Upper Peninsula and I knew Wal-mart would have them, even in my size, and that I'd be able to get them on Saturday evening.

1.5 But then did I really need them? Couldn't I have just washed out a couple in the sink and dried them overnight?

2. It's true that Wal-Mart drives small retailers out of business. Just ask my uncle. He used to have a hardware store in a small town in South Dakota. Wal-Mart opened up outside of town. He scarcely lasted a year afterwards. I'm told that most of the other downtown merchants succumbed as well, and that now the downtown is a ghost town.

2.5 Wal-Mart brings products to small towns that small-town retailers might not otherwise have been able to stock. But is it worth it? Couldn't they have ordered those products in the mail? Did they even need those products? Was it worth destroying their downtowns?

3. I hate buying Chinese products (and it really frosts me when you see religous goods made in China.) But as Davey's mommy and Sparki point out, it's getting harder and harder to find things that aren't made in China. Are there any lights for the Christmas tree, for example, that aren't made in China?

4. It seems like our entire economy is based on retail these days, but very few retail employees are in unions.

5. I've been a member of a union (most bedside nurses in Washington, DC are union) and I was horrified by how thick-headed our leadership was. After I left my union position, the nurses went on strike -- this at a time when the hospital was struggling to stay afloat. I thought the timing of the strike was a poor idea to begin with, and then the strike dragged on for a couple of months. Striking nurses who were out of money started to sneak across their own picket lines and return to work. The union ended up accepting a proposal that the hospital had offered four weeks previously.

I also saw nurses with bad attitudes hiding behind union rules. My husband, who works for the federal government, sees the same thing all the time: lazy and incompetent people hiding behind union rules. I would have a lot more sympathy for unions if they weren't so stupid and did more to encourage excellence in their employees.

6. I ordered our Thanksgiving dinner (long story) from Safeway. Should I cross the picket line to pick it up?

7. Hambet wants cornflakes. Time to wrap up.

8. I am growing more and more uncomfortable with the way we're shaping our economy. I'm growing mistrustful of globalization -- the world is simply too large and complex to be considered as a single market. People's needs are better served by smaller, local institutions whereever possible.

Is our economy going to end up destroying itself and seriously damaging our country? What are we going to do when we run out of countries with cheap labor to produce our goods for us? What are we going to do if we go to war with China and can't import from them?

What good is it going to do to have all these U.S. companies making goods overseas and importing them back to the U.S., if people back in the US can't afford to buy them?

Through zoning and other projects, cities are aggressivly wooing singles and childless couples (including homosexual couples) because they pay in more money to the city treasury than they take out. Children are seen as an economic liability, as a civic burden. So families with children have fewer places to find housing.

It just doesn't seem healthy. The economic decisions our country is making seem to be based on short term gain and not on the long-term economic health and security of our country. But who cares if we have a major depression in the future? We've got to show a big profit this quarter so our stock doesn't tank!

And then what can we, as individual consumers, do about it? As Davey's mommy writes,

...I feel like without organized resistance on a large scale to Chinese-made products, avoiding them is like taking a penny out of the pocket of Bill Gates and a lot of dollars and hours from ourselves trying to find alternatives.....

The Washington Post (marketing questions) had two interesting book reviews yesterday on globalization and debt (and the abyss of our trade deficit.)

9. And then I haven't touched the Catholic social teaching on these topics.

10. I haven't touched distributism either.

is here.

I wonder if Burke and Pieper count as "major philosophers"? Oh well, it wouldn't make a difference in my results: "the downtown library serves most of my needs."

Actually I order my library books online and go to the branch to pick them up.

Lift up your heads, ye mighty gates;
Behold, the King of glory waits;
The King of kings is drawing near;
The Savior of the world is here!

A Helper just He comes to thee,
His chariot is humility,
His kingly crown is holiness,
His scepter, pity in distress.

O blest the land, the city blest,
Where Christ the Ruler is confessed!
O happy hearts and happy homes
To whom this King in triumph comes!

Fling wide the portals of your heart;
Make it a temple, set apart
From earthly use for heaven’s employ,
Adorned with prayer and love and joy.

Redeemer, come, with us abide;
Our hearts to Thee we open wide;
Let us Thy inner presence feel;
Thy grace and love in us reveal.

Thy Holy Spirit lead us on
Until our glorious goal is won;
Eternal praise, eternal fame
Be offered, Savior, to Thy Name!

This hymn is usually sung to Truro but I think it sounds awesome -- a sure bringer of "Godbumps" -- sung to Jerusalem.

The Curt Jester brings our attention to Steve's great post on the seven capital sins, Seven Means to Seven Sorrows:

It’s amazing really. From Bach to Eminem, every bit of music is a variation on eight simple notes. The same goes for literature – the Greeks identified roughly a half-dozen different plots, and that’s all anyone has ever used. Unhappiness is the same way. There are only a handful of ways to become unhappy....

Take that, Tolstoy! I hope Steve follows up with a discusssion of the seven cardinal virtues.

1. List five things you'd like to accomplish by the end of the year. Establish a better daily routine. Establish a daily exercise program. Write and send Christmas cards. Finish potty-training Hambet. Get pregnant.

2. List five people you've lost contact with that you'd like to hear from again. Only one: I'd like to talk again with my high school English teacher, Ms. Priscilla Rooth. Mostly to fall at her feet in homage.

3. List five things you'd like to learn how to do. Knit. Play the piano with more skill. Sew better. Write clever rhyming poetry. Dress better.

4. List five things you'd do if you won the lottery (no limit). Send big checks to my favorite charities, including anonymous gifts and donations to individuals and families I know who could use a little good news. Fix up and sell the Prussian Green Money Pit, get a nice old house, fix it up, and decorate it. Visit my mom more often and buy her new furniture.

5. List five things you do that help you relax. Surf the net. Make something. Read. Rent movies. Go someplace beautiful (basilica, garden, historic house, even a store with pretty things to look at.)

Well, actually kind of a bluish-greenish grey. A few weeks ago I mentioned taking Hambet to the pumpkin patch, and how Iris and I brought home some heirloom pumpkins.

Mine was a bluish-gray thing, and I recently discovered that it is a"Jarrahdale" pumpkin.

Last weekend I set about cooking and eating it. This was the first time I'd cooked a pumpkin (I usually use canned.) I took out the seeds, scraped out the pulp, and cut the pumpkin into wedges. The wedges went on a baking sheet and into the oven for about at hour at 300 degrees.

After the pumpkin was cooked, it was time to puree the flesh. That was such a hassle. I went for the food processor first and discovered it's broken. So then I tried the blender, which was miserable -- I had to puree the stuff in microbatches, and even then it didn't work well -- the thick pumpkin kept getting wedged under the blades. I had to add bits of water so that it would move around in the blender jar.

Eventually I got the knack of it, but it wasn't until the second to last batch that I remembered the food mill. That would have been the ideal tool.

One pumpkin yielded about two pounds of cooked, pureed pumpkin flesh. I made a pie with half of it, and I might make some muffins with the other half.

I did save the seeds, so maybe I'll be able to grow my own grey pumpkins next year.

my smelling salts.... head...swelling.....

Worst Episode EVER!

Are my husband and I the only people in the lower 48 watching this show? It seems like it sometimes. If that's the case, the writers should not antagonize us, as they did so egregiously last night.

The word spoilers never seemed so appropriate: the show stank morally, dramatically, and every other way you could think of. Good points first: they showed the Captain's dog. Hambet is always pleased when they show the dog. I think he thinks the dog is the star of the show.

The premise of the episode is that Tucker, the chief engineer, suffers "neural damage" in an accident and needs some kind of transplanted "neural tissue" to recover from his coma. I guess in the future they don't have ordinary closed-head and spinal cord injuries. Time, of course, is of the essence since they are in some kind of anomaly field and the ship's getting covered with big blobs of metallic crud -- the typical Treknobabble setup. They need Tucker to recover so that he can come up with the way to get them out of the field so they can go hunt down the evil Xindi and Save Earth. (Apparently they set out with only one officer in Engineering who went to engineering school, and there's nobody else in the department who can be promoted. So without Tucker the whole mission is in jeopardy and the Earth is doomed.)

In the future they also seem to have forgotten all about the promising adult stem-cell experiments run in the twenty-first century. Instead, Dr Phlox (creepy alien ship's doctor) uses some kind of alien critter's skin as a substrate and they make a "symbiont" -- actually, a clone -- of Tucker (a procedure illegal on the critter's home planet.)

First objection: Trek writers. Don't try to pull a fast one on us. They didn't make a symbiont. They made a clone.

Bigger objection: nobody seemed to have any problem with this at all. Captain Archer gives only a token three seconds of reflection before he concludes I don't care what we've gotta do, we've got to save Tucker so we can Go Save Earth! And nobody is shown even suggesting to him that this is wrong.

Clones made from this critter, like the animal clones being made now, mature and age rapidly. So the clone, which they cruelly name "Sym," goes from infancy to adulthood in about a week, with a life expectancy of fifteen days. And in a touch of extremely bogus science that brings the ol' voluntary suspension of disbelief crashing to the floor, Sym has Tucker's memories. He actually thinks he is Tucker until they tell him the truth.

The Trek writers wimp out and do not show the moment when they tell Sym the truth. They just show him afterwards looking extremely happy and well-adjusted, as if learning that all your memories are false and that you were actually concocted in the lab with the express purpose of providing tissue for a transplant isn't anything that would shake you up. Sym conveniently possesses Tucker's memories of engineering school, so he sets about making himself useful down in the engine room.

It comes time to perform the transplant, and it becomes apparent that, contrary to initial expectations, Sym will not survive the tissue donation. Archer is angry but wants to proceed with the surgery. For a moment the clone behaves somewhat realistically when he angrily resists -- he wants to live out his life. Archer warns him that he doesn't "want to be forced" to force Sym to submit to the surgery.

Now, instead doing something really dramatic and showing Archer marching Sym to the O.R. under an armed guard, the writers wimp out again. Sym sulks for a couple of minutes and then cheerfully trots off to give up his neural tissue: "I guess this what I'm here for!" He is even shown thanking the crew for a happy life. Problem solved. The transplant is successful and Tucker recovers so quickly, he's able to attend his clone's funeral.

And are they going to show Tucker's reaction next week, when he learns about the short life of his identical twin? (Tucker recently lost his only sister when the evil aliens attacked Earth.) If they do, I doubt they'll show him doing anything more than shrugging it off.

If TV shows are going to be entertainment, let them be entertainment. But if they're going to try to Look At The Issues, then they shouldn't wimp out.

I complain again that they are also showing way too much of the Vulcan woman. This "Vulcan acupressure" she's teaching Tucker seems to entail postures that are less about acupressure than about seriously titillating adolescent male viewers. Even the sexuality on this show is cynical and jaded. The original Enterprise certainly had its implied sins against chastity, but even with their torn shirts and go-go boots, Captain Kirk and his crew seemed a bit more professional and concerned with decorum than this bunch (and more sincere and likeable in their amorousness.)

I know, Pansy and Victor, we should be watching Angel instead, but it comes on at nine and we are early-to-bed types. Plus, we haven't been watching it, so we'd have no clue as to what was going on.

If you are interested in sending her a birthday card (or even a present), the Foundation has a mailing address and suggestions.

Just don't send flowers. Michael says Terri's not allowed to have flowers.

Over at Catholic Light, RC links to this article by Stanley Kurtz about the implications of the Supreme Court of Massacussetts (SCoM): get ready for polygamy!

Thank you, feminists and other '60's radicals, for working for a society where women would no longer be treated like property! No more of those wicked days -- we've made progress! We have dignity! Now we're treated like.... rentals!

We live on a busy street, so I have taken to asking my Guardian Angel for help getting out of my driveway, particularly if I want to go left.

Today when Hambet and I were out driving around, I heard on the radio that the Massachussets Supreme Court decision would be announced today, so I said the St Michael prayer. I was delighted to hear Hambet pipe up from the back seat, "Gua'dian Angel, hewp us! Mehwy, hewp! Aaaaa-men!"

My little heathen won't stay put in church and won't let me teach him the Sign of the Cross, so I'm glad something's sinking in. Thanks for indulging me in this proud mommy moment.

Do You Know Where Your Children Are?
Most likely, they're watching PG-13 movies. Those would be the ones with the foul language, oral-sex references and torture scenes.... (WaPo; marketing questions)

An interesting and disturbing article about "ratings creep", exacerbated by the introduction of the PG-13 movie rating (and ultimately made possible by parental inattention and laxity.) Thank you, Hollywood, for serving up incredible filth to teens and younger, all in the name of greed.

Case in point: the new Cat in the Hat movie (which looks awful to me.) This movie is based on a book beloved of preschoolers and beginning readers -- and is rated PG. Couldn't Hollywood show a little restraint (and a little consideration for the parents of young children who might want to see the movie?)

Ugh. I can't write more about Hollywood and the laughable ratings system without resorting to invective.

Flannery O'Connor wrote your book. Not much escapesyour notice.


Which Author's Fiction are You?

brought to you by Quizilla

I'll be ordering some peacocks terreckly. Thanks to Michelle for this quiz.

Erik gets the gold star!

Steven Greydanus, my movie guru, raves Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World -- and he's even read the books! (Thanks, Victor, for the heads up.)

I could blog on and on about how much I love the books. I'm still only halfway through reading the series for the first time -- I'm pacing myself to prolong the pleasure of the first reading. Come for the adventure, but stay for the characters and O'Brian's exploration of how we humans can be so intelligent, stupid, noble, base, sinful, curious, obtuse, calculating, loving... all at the same time. Nothing that is human is alien to O'Brian.

Nat Hentoff, a writer of great integrity, has been writing a great series this week about Terri Schiavo. He takes up the abuse question in this piece: Was Terri Schiavo Beaten in 1990?

Welcome to....

Bettnet
Sancta Sanctis is the only blog I know with contact info for a Guardian Angel.
Southern Appeal lays on that Southern charm by numbering two sleepy Yankee mommies among the Belles....
Vociferous Yawpings

Thanks to all these bloggers for the links.

I've also updated our link to Amy's blog, which has moved and is now titled Butterfly blog (apologies for taking so long to do it!)

While we're talking about blogging, allow me to direct you to Mr Jeff Miller's post about feeds and aggregators. (Unlike most of the Jester's posts, you can safely bring food and drink to this post.) Only two short months ago I didn't know what feeds and aggregators were. Now I still can't explain them, but I couldn't live without them.

Basically you can get a reader (I guess this is the aggregator), enter the code for your favorite blogs' feeds, and then open the reader to get a list of your blogs that tells you when they've been updated. It is a great feature, especially for following lots of blogs. I use FeedDemon.

Jeff also links to a tool for adding a feed to your blog if you use Blogger or other blog software that doesn't come with a feed. I share his disappointment with BlogMatrix; I've found those feeds to be very unreliable as well.

So if you don't have a feed or a reader, please consider getting one. You'll love it and so will your readers.

....The same people who want to kill Terri believe death row cases are never final, no matter how many courts and juries have spoken over how many decades.

Moreover, it's not as if court after court has heard testimony on Terri's wishes and have all unanimously agreed that Terri would have chosen death. One lone Florida circuit court judge, George Greer, credited Michael's testimony, finding "clear and convincing" evidence that Terri said she would not want to be kept alive on feeding tubes. Because Judge Greer was acting as the finder of fact, his finding is essentially unreviewable by any other court.

Judge Greer's finding on Terri's wishes may be immune from legal review, but it's not immune from criticism. He's a finder of fact; he's not God. A few years ago, Judge Greer found that Helene Ball McGee did not have reasonable cause to believe domestic violence was imminent and denied her an order of protection. Two weeks later, Mrs. McGee was stabbed to death by her husband. So judges can make mistakes....

Thanks to Earl at Times Against Humanity for this link.

Jeff Culbreath presents Mr. Matt Anger's commentary on leftism, racism, paleo-conservatism, slavery, throwing babies out with bathwater.... oh, just go read the essay, it's good:

Catholics don’t defend something on the basis of whether it is "old" or "new," but right or wrong. Mr. [Sam] Francis, however, believing that whatever the left hates must be good, defends all aspects of the Old South, including its "peculiar institution."
....I admit to feeling a bit impatient with those who howl at the least imposition of the IRS, and the "slavery" of the federal government, yet think nothing of consigning whole groups (like non-whites) to a second-class status... especially if they are members of the exempt class.

Later, if you're in the mood for illiterate mumblings on a related topic, I blogged a few months ago on Patrick Buchanan's book Death of the West.

Welcome, Catholic and Enjoying It! readers!

November is when autumn gets down to business. No more of those sunny days, ablaze with brilliant scarlet and gold leaves. No more of that mists and mellow fruitfulness stuff. Now it's time to get to work: raking the leaves, getting the garden ready for winter, getting the last of the deer-chow and squirrel candy bulbs planted. The sky is a dull gray. The rain is a cold, miserable drizzle. (Thank you, Lord, for your servant Thomas Edison and his invention of the electric lightbulb.)

I so want a cup of coffee today. I so want one. It's the perfect day for a hot cuppa joe. But I am having some kind of test on Friday, and I can't drink coffee until the test is over, not even decaf.

Maybe we'll bake something this afternoon.

Elinor Dashwood has a delightful thread going on on Literary Loves: What fictional character or characters have you ever fallen in love with?

Now this is how much of a plunker I am: Elinor first floated this idea in an email to me. Not only have I not come up with any literary loves, I haven't replied to the email yet. My apologies, Elinor; I'll try to write back today. I am pleading absence -- the Maryland Mosses went away for the weekend, and I am trying to restore order to the household.

As for the literary loves question, I'm thinking about it. I'm probably thinking wayyyyyy too hard about it and I'm too embarrassed to ask something as geeky as "define falling in love, please." Perhaps part of it is that I'm not prone to crushes in real life (exactly three over the course of my entire life: one in high school; one in college, complete with the requisite heartbreak; one on the gentleman I eventually married.)

I need to go sort laundry.

From Cella's Review:

“For the average person, all problems date to World War II; for the more informed, to World War I; for the genuine historian, to the French Revolution.” — Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn, Leftism Revisited

Steven is drawing attention to (and inviting intelligent comments on) a post by Steve Bogner on inclusive language.

"Intelligent comments" -- that would exclude me; I'm not good at discussing these things anyway, and I'm especially short on time and neurotransmitters today. So I'm just going to come out and say it (with apologies in advance for the rant):

My personal perspective as a woman, a reader, a mother, and a Christian, is that I hate inclusive language.

I hate it because I feel patronized when it's in use. I hate it because I feel like its promoters, well-intentioned though they may be, are saying to me, "O woman, you are not smart enough to know when the words 'men' and "man" refer to the whole human race and when they refer to males. All those times you thought you were being "included"? Nope, you were being fooled. And your feelings are not strong enough to handle being excluded, even if you didn't know you were being excluded until we told you. You can never focus on the universal, on what you have in common with men and women; you must always be focused on the particular, on yourself, your femaleness. Your feelings are too delicate to withstand the knowledge that there are males on this earth, and that they did things. The very fact that Jesus was a male is a stumbling block to you, and we must smooth it over. The very fact that He told us to call God Father -- 'Abba', 'Daddy' -- was an error; the only-begotten reproduced Son Offspring of God, who comes to make all things new, was a prisoner of His own time. (Jesus was not as enlightened as we moderns, of course.)"

I hate inclusive language because it insists that all the places I thought included me were actually excluding me. It seeks to drive a wedge between me and pretty much everything written before 1970. Inclusive language has robbed our language of the little honors paid to the feminine in the tradition of using the feminine pronoun for ships, countries, and abstractions. Inclusive language is the Mrs Elton in the garden of literature, the tacky boor who wrenches every spotlight towards herself.

I read pretty widely as a child and a teen, and I can remember one time and one time only when I misread the context of the word "man": it was in a satirical essay by H.L. Mencken, when he abruptly shifted from "man" as "mankind" to "man" as "all males."

In real life, we can't have relationships with Its. I can have a relationship with my mother, my friends, my husband, my little boy: they are Shes and Hes. My little boy doesn't have Parents or Father-Mothers; he has a Mommy and Daddy. The Coneheads have "parental units" because they're aliens; humans have mothers and fathers. Words such as He, Him, Father invite us to see God as a real Person who seeks a real relationship with us. If we have poor relationships with others, including with our earthly fathers, our Heavenly Father can help us relearn Whom those earthly relationships are supposed to model. We need this intimate, personal vision more than ever in this impersonal age of bureaucracy and broken families.

We should not worry about "placing limits on God." We should be thanking Him for, in a sense, placing limits on Himself, for the scandal of particularity. God, Who is so beyond us in every way, came to live our grubby daily lives with us, reveals Himself in images drawn from our grubby daily lives, ones that even little children can understand: Seeds. Drinking water. Daddy.

A Saintly Salmagundi has joined us here at stblogs.org!

This one goes out to Terry and the Summas: an alternate to wadding. Works well with hanging, too.

October was our first full month at stblogs.org. We love our new home, and we're so grateful to RC for setting us up, and to all the bloggers who gave us technical hints.

Some statistics:

We saw a big jump in readership in October. Our average number of page views per day went from the 90's to an average of 161 visits a day! (Peak days were October 22 and 23; I suspect that spike reflects interest in the Terri Schiavo case.) Thank you, everyone, for coming by.

Thanks, Davey's mommy; chirp is our number one referrer from St Blog's and our third overall. (Number one is our old address, and number two is a URL from Calabria, Italy(?!) Benvenuto!)

Judging from the search strings (listed in rank order), people seemed preoccupied this month:

terri's fight (right there on the sidebar. Hope we could help.)
saints costumes (these searches came rolling in late; looks like Pansy wasn't the only one caught by surprise)
terri's fight.org (try http://www.terrisfight.org/)
pictures of terri schiavo (go for the pictures, stay for the movies)
wicca barbie
saint costumes
halloween constumes (did we really spell that "constumes" too?)
secret spell barbie
terri schiavo
pumpkin chocolate chip muffins (Hambet loves those muffins)
secret spells barbie
wiccan barbie
theresa schiavo
terri fight
lizzie maguire lyrics (of course)
x-men quiz
charmed barbie
secret spells kayla
terri schiavo broken bones (see for yourself)
barbie wicca

Our neighborhood, which is a pretty average suburb with some very busy streets, backs up against a heavily wooded neighborhood that is completely self-contained -- no through traffic at all except for people going to the country club in the middle of their neighborhood. My friend Iris (one of those people whose sincere love for animals is completely unsentimental) once remarked that the club neighborhood would be "lousy with deer." We doubted that the deer would ever wander over to our side, though; there are only two sidewalks and a back road connecting the two neighborhoods, and we figured that the traffic and lack of hiding places in our neighborhood would make it unattractive to deer.

Or so we thought, until last week, when I stepped out my front door at eight o'clock in the morning and found a deer standing in the yard across the street. The traffic whizzed by. Suddenly he leapt across the street, and in four great bounds he was over our side fence and in our back yard. I ran back inside and yelled for my husband and for Hambet. We stared at him out our patio window. He paced around, stared back at us for a long minute, and then jumped over the fence into the neighbor's yard.

I wasn't thinking about that yesterday, though. It was around two in the afternoon. I had been digging the new flower bed, and I was concentrating on putting in the tulip bulbs and finishing the bed before the rain came. Hambet was bored with gardening and was playing inside. I thought I heard him come back outside. I looked up. The deer was standing about ten feet away from me.

We stared at each other for a moment, and then the deer took off again towards the back of the shed. I looked around the corner to watch him leap over the fence, but instead I found him coming straight towards me! I made some kind of eek! noise, and he turned tail and ran back around the shed to the other corner of our lawn. He cleared the neighbor's tall fence with one great leap and ran off, back towards the wooded neighborhood.

I know deer are supposed to be more common that people think in suburban neighborhoods, but I'm still amazed that I've seem him twice now, especially in the middle of the day, and especially from just ten feet away (three feet, if you count when he was coing around the back of the shed). I've never been that close to a deer. I'm glad Hambet was inside; I don't know what the deer would have done if Hambet went running up to him. Maybe I should call animal control and see if there's anything I should do if he gets so close again.

And what do these Bambi sightings mean for my tulips this spring?

...and as Wesley Smith points out, the court-appointed guardian thought it would be better that way:

Because of these conflicts of interest, the Probate Court appointed Richard L. Pearse Jr. of Clearwater, Florida, as Terri's guardian ad litem and instructed him to investigate the matter and report back with a recommendation. Pearse filed his report with the court on December 28, 1998 urging that the court deny the petition to remove Terri's food and water.

Thank you, Father Johansen, for this link.

UPDATE: Judge Greer has agreed to hear the Schindlers' case that Michael's guardianship be revoked. Push 'em back, push 'em back, push 'em waaaaaaaayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy back!

kill as few patients as possible

Thanks to Ellyn for this quiz.

We have been enjoying temperatures in the 80's for the last few days. We took Hambet to the zoo on Saturday (a bit of a waste of time -- he was interested in everything but the animals -- never mind the elephant, Mommy, I'm trying to climb into the basket of the stroller!)

Yesterday was a big gardening day. I dug manure and compost into one of my vegetable beds, installed the raised bed my husband made for me, and planted some garlic. (We'll raise the other beds in the spring.) All that's left to do is mulching the vegetable beds, and I'll probably use chopped leaves for that.

Today I plan to dig a flower bed along the side of the shed, and plant some bulbs. I will probably be scarce this week; I want to take advantage of the nice weather, and then when it gets chilly again, I'll be catching up with all the stuff I didn't do before.

Remember those white eggplants I've been coddling all summer? What a story -- I think I planted fifteen seeds and got five seedlings, of which three plants survived. I planted this just because it was cute, and figured that if I got one crummy eggplant the experiment would be a success.

Our summer was so cool that I didn't end up setting the plants in the garden until mid- July (they just looked to small, but that was a mistake.) They liked being in the garden, though, and started to take off in August and set a few lavender flowers in September.

One plant has several fruits on it now! So even this experiment had some success.

Thanks to a kind benefactor, I was able to get a digital picture of the costume!

addendum: The white stripes across the front of the jacket are red reflective tape, reflecting the flash.

No, there is no little boy in the picture. This is mostly because, per my husband's request, pictures of the Maryland Mosses do not go on the internet. But the little boy is still refusing to wear the costume.

On Halloween night we bribed him with a piece of candy, stuffed him into the costume, and took a few pictures for the grandmas. Then, before he had time to protest, I whisked him out the door so he could show his costume to the neighbors. We kept going and trick-or-treated at a few houses. Hambet liked carrying the flashlight and checking out the jack o'lanterns. The candy seemed to please him, too (and he said "thank you" like a little gentleman.) But when we got home, he had the coat peeled off before I'd closed the door behind us.

Halloween was successful in other ways, too. Over the last two years, we had exactly two trick-or-treaters, but last night we had almost twenty little ninjas, singers, angels, and Piglets at the door! I finally got to meet our new neighbors across the street. It was nice to see people coming out around the neighborhood.

Today's poem at Flos Carmeli is Leigh Hunt's Song of Fairies Robbing an Orchard. I would be surprised if Hunt didn't intend that poem to be amusing, as well as these two:

To a Fish

You strange, astonished-looking, angle-faced,
Dreary-mouthed, gaping wretches of the sea,
Gulping salt-water everlastingly,
Cold-blooded, though with red your blood be graced,
And mute, though dwellers in the roaring waste;
And you, all shapes beside, that fishy be,--
Some round, some flat, some long, all devilry,
Legless, unloving, infamously chaste:--

O scaly, slippery, wet, swift, staring wights,
What is't ye do? What life lead? eh, dull goggles?
How do ye vary your vile days and nights?
How pass your Sundays? Are ye still but joggles
In ceaseless wash? Still nought but gapes, and bites,
And drinks, and stares, diversified with boggles?

A Fish Answers

Amazing monster! that, for aught I know,
With the first sight of thee didst make our race
For ever stare! O flat and shocking face,
Grimly divided from the breast below!
Thou that on dry land horribly dost go
With a split body and most ridiculous pace,
Prong after prong, disgracer of all grace,
Long-useless-finned, haired, upright, unwet, slow!

O breather of unbreathable, sword-sharp air,
How canst exist? How bear thyself, thou dry
And dreary sloth? WHat particle canst share
Of the only blessed life, the watery?
I sometimes see of ye an actual pair
Go by! linked fin by fin! most odiously.

Smockmomma, how will I evertop this?

A is for Aficionado: the Apologia groupie site