My stepdaughter has all the cool points in the WORLD!

A couple weeks ago, I posted a blog article about how proud I am of Susan the Wonderchild for her ad on Craigslist. She has continued in the same vein and has just posted a new ad on Craigslist that is at least as good as the last one. (No, she has not received any weird schnarky comments yet, but she has gotten email from a couple of people saying how nice it is to see a nice, Christian girl on Craigslist. Her response to these two has been along the lines of "Dude! Read the ad again!")

I love and am proud of all three of my stepkids, but Susan is just winning all the cool points right now. Here's her latest ad:

A friend of mine recently blogged about how Craigslist is God's answering machine. He said that if you ask Craigslist for what you want, it will deliver it to you, as though God personally reads each post and delivers what it is each person is asking for.

So, I'm going to write this ad as though that statement is true.

Dear God,

Hey Fella! How's the weather in Heaven? Let me guess - 72 degrees and sunny with low humidity, and conditions are predicted to remain the same clear through the rest of eternity. Gosh, it must be nice to live in Heaven.

I know You already know this, being omniscient and omnipotent, but I'll go ahead and tell You anyway: I am writing to You because I want to meet a man who is compatible with me and create a romantic connection with him. I am open to both short and long term relationships, but I am not open to causal encounters or one night stands. Like I said, I want to make an actual connection.

When You created me, You made me tall (5'10") and strong. You gave me brown hair and blue-green eyes. You gave me a talent for sports and a love for people and animals. You also made me intelligent, confident and assertive. I appreciate all these things, and I take care of the gifts You've given me - my body and my mind - by regularly exercising, eating healthy, working two jobs and attending school.

But You also gave me some traits that I find puzzling. For example, You made me in such a way that I don't really believe in You. I am open to the idea that there is some higher power or deeper understanding out there in the Universe, but I don't really buy into the Holy Book thing. I don't think You'd really care if we ate pork, or if we married people of the same gender, or if we didn't pray to the East five times a day. That seems a little petty for a being as all-encompassing as Yourself.

Additionally, You put into me traits that quite a few people find disturbing. I don't particularly care for children, and don't want to date someone who has or wants to have children. Don't get me wrong, God - children are great. It's just that, personally, I don't want to have any and I don't want to be a parental figure.

You put in me a steadfast belief that honesty really is the best policy. I am honest to the point where I sometimes make people uncomfortable. I am honest about sex. I enjoy sex and I enjoy talking and learning about it. I am honest about emotions. I often tell the people I love that I love them, and I don't hide or disguise my emotions for the sake of someone else's comfort. I am honest about my opinions, which has earned me the label of "outspoken" and sometimes "bitchy." A lot of people say that they want honesty, but I have found that many of them are not strong enough to handle it.

You failed to include any sense of shame or embarrassment in me. Instead, You gave me the courage to love myself. I'm a loud person. I LOVE to laugh, and You gave me the wit to make sure there's always an opportunity to do so. I am proud of my accomplishments and totally comfortable in my skin.

Perhaps to make up for all these things, You gave me a deep and abiding desire to make people happy. I express my opinions clearly, but I try not to do it in such a way that it makes other people feel like I am putting them down. I think that everyone, everywhere, wants the same thing: to be happy. We're all in this together, and it doesn't make sense to put down your fellow human so that you can feel better about yourself. Putting down other people only ruins someone else's day and diminishes your personal dignity. When I console a friend, or return a lost cell phone, or help someone find their way - that is when I am happiest.

So there it is, God. This is me, Your child, leaving a message on your answering machine, asking You to deliver to me a man who sees all of these things about me and wants to know more. I hope that, like me, he has a passion for physical activity, intellectual inquiry, understanding and compassion, self-love, and laughter.

Sincerely,

Me

P.S. I hope You don't get too offended by the whole "I don't believe in you" part!

My stepdaughter has all the cool points in the WORLD!

Achieving a goal for this blog this year

I'd wanted to get this blog to be more active this year, as the quantity of posts had dropped considerably from the last two years. When I posted the quote a moment ago, I realized that the number of posts this year was already well above last year's posts and we're barely past the halfway point of the year, too! Oh, a lot of these are cocktail peanuts of information, little tiny blog posts that are just idle trivia to brighten the day, but I'm pleased nevertheless that I'm keeping up with the blog and it's not a complete tombstone.

Achieving a goal for this blog this year

Quote du jour

The plural of "anecdote" is not "data." --Frank Kotsonis

Quote du jour

Email info for the hard-of-thinking

I realize that anyone who is reading this blog is probably not going to be in need of this particular link, but we all have relatives who are not as computer-savvy as we are and don't really get it. Forward this as you see fit. :)

Email info for the hard-of-thinking

The latest impressive stupidity from Faux News (it's a corker)

Just when you think that Fox can't outdo itself (e.g., Glenn Beck, Bill O'Reilly, Ann Coulter), they break new ground.

Note where Egypt appears on the map. Be sure to read the comments, too; they're really lovely.

The latest impressive stupidity from Faux News (it's a corker)

Cat Drinking Songs

Okay, you know I love cats. Well, I just got sent this link of Irish Drinking Songs for your cat. I like that idea.

Cat Drinking Songs

Joke du jour

Neil, my agent, proffered this one:

A little boy comes home from school and says “Mom, I got a part in the school play!”

His mother says “That’s great, honey; what part did you get?”

The boy says “I got the part of the dad!”

His mother says “That’s wonderful, honey! And if you do well, I’ll bet next year you can get a speaking part!”

Joke du jour

New book is in!

I just got an advance copy of the latest book. It's also available on Kindle.

New book is in!

The physics of sexuality

Dr. John Marshall has a site entitled Sexual Physics. His motto is "Love is a matter of chemistry. Sex is a matter of physics."

In a Q & A format, Dr. Marshall seeks to answer questions such as "Sex at the speed of light," "It wasn't me... it was the rest of the Universe," and "Relativistic penile length enhancement." Particularly good is the short essay "Top 10 reasons why sex at the speed of light is not an advisable form of procreation" (which brings to mind the classic "Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex," a piece about the problems of Superman having sex).

This is kind of the advice column for people who read XKCD and understand why it's so funny.

The physics of sexuality

"Congress-Created Dust Bowl" signs

Hank Graham reports seeing a great many large, well-printed, expensive "Congress-Created Dust Bowl" signs in Southern California, blaming the California drought on the government.

So, just to be clear here: Human-caused global climate change completely exaggerates our abilities (and you'd be a fool and a Communist to think so), but droughts affecting major portions of the country are completely within our control? Riiiiiight.

"Congress-Created Dust Bowl" signs

Are you troubled by infestations of artists?

I happened to see something today that rang funny. The city of Paducah, KY (a perfectly nice place, I understand), is trying to encourage a measure of revitalization of the downtown area. They want more artists to come to the downtown area and make it more scenic, more interesting, and generally more colorful. It's pretty cool, too: artists from all over the country have come to the town. The city is trying to create an atmosphere of an artists colony and, from the look of it, they're doing a good job.

All this is well and good. I like the idea very much, honestly.

The part that comes off a little strange to me is the name: the Artist Relocation Program.

It just sounds like they're trapping artists in the city when they get too close to human populations to safely interact and then they're transporting them 50 miles out into the country to release them into the wild to make a new home.

I know, I know, it's just me....

Are you troubled by infestations of artists?

Fun: An exercise in editing

This is an article from Vanity Fair. It's the text of Sarah Palin's resignation speech, red/blue penciled. It really needed a lot of editing, but if you listened to any of it, you knew that already.

Fun: An exercise in editing