Words Like Locusts Flew From Her Fingers

More on “Girlie Men”

Salon.com Life | Democrats: Schwarzenegger’s “girlie-men” comment sexist: “‘It uses an image that is associated with gay men in an insulting way, and it was supposed to be an insult. That’s very troubling that he would use such a homophobic way of trying to put down legislative leadership,’ said Kuehl, one of five members of the Legislature’s five-member Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Caucus.”

If that’s an “image that is associated with gay men” then I say gay men ought to seriously re-think the images they associate with. Gee…let’s see…is “asshole” an image associated with gay men? State Senator Sheila Kuehl is an idiot and I very much doubt that she’s qualified to comment upon the “images” gay men associate with. “Girlie men” is an amusing term used to describe men who don’t measure up–physically, or in terms of bravery or character. It’s clear that this is the context in which Schwarzenegger was using it. He said, “”If they don’t have the guts to come up here in front of you and say, ‘I don’t want to represent you, I want to represent those special interests, the unions, the trial lawyers … if they don’t have the guts, I call them girlie men…” I like it. I think it’s funny and I don’t think it has anything even remotely to do with homosexuality or with disparaging women (who aren’t “girls” to begin with.)

Chirac and Sharon Spat…battle of the bigots

Salon.com News | Chirac says Sharon not welcome in France: “President Jacques Chirac said Monday that the Israeli leader would not be welcome here until he gave a satisfactory explanation for saying Jews should go to Israel to escape anti-Semitism in France.”

Damn, and here I was ready to think nice things about Chirac. I thought maybe he didn’t like Sharon because of all the heinous things Israel has done to the Palestinians over the years. Wrong! It’s because Sharon–probably with some justification–accused the French of being anti-semitic. The French may be intolerant of minority religions (and if you doubt that just do a little investigation into their “anti-sect” laws and the French ban on Muslim women and girls wearing head scarves (hajib)), but at least–so far–they haven’t put up walls and barbed wire to keep the Muslims in “their part” of the country. It’s probably just a matter of time.

Girlie Men!

Schwarzenegger Assails Opponents as ‘Girlie-Men’ (washingtonpost.com): “Assemblyman Mark Leno, a San Francisco Democrat who is chairman of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Caucus, said he was glad Schwarzenegger didn’t repeat the ‘girlie men’ remark Sunday, saying it was ‘as misogynist as it is anti-gay.’”

Oh puh-leeze! This is idiotic. If people want to criticize Schwarzenegger, criticize his politics. There’s plenty there to be concerned about. “Girlie men” is an amusing disparagement. It’s neither misogynist NOR anti-gay. Mark Leno is being a weenie. He’s being…a…a…a girlie man!

Heh, heh…I’d have loved to have heard Schwarzenegger saying “girlie men”…with his Austrian accent it would be just great.

Gay Marriage

I’ve been thinking about this whole Anti-Gay Marriage Amendment thing a lot over the past few days and I’m hugely relieved that it didn’t pass in the Senate. Quite honestly, I’m still not sure what all the fuss is about. Why are some people so offended by the idea of gay marriage?

Do they think homosexuality is perverse or morally wrong? Considering that history clearly shows us there have been homosexual humans for as long as anyone’s been keeping track–thousands of years–it’s obviously a normal, though relatively uncommon, variation of human sexuality. Any concerns about the morality of homosexuality are based in religious teaching. I have absolutely no objection to people believing whatever religious teachings they want–but LAW should be blind to religious preferences.

Do people fear homosexuals? Do they believe them to be more prone to child molestation or other crimes? Research has proven this fear to be unfounded. Homosexuals are no more likely to molest children than are non-homosexuals. Do these people think gays are going to make unwanted sexual advances on them? The very idea is ridiculous. Gay people–like any other people–want to be accepted. They are not going to hit on someone they know is straight because they don’t like being rejected any better than you or I do.

I fully support the right of religious groups to deny sacramental marriage to gay couples if that’s what they want to do. LEGAL marriage, on the other hand, MUST be an option for gay couples. Just laws MUST be based upon humanist values rooted in individual rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Denying the tax and other legal benefits of marriage to gay couples is just plain wrong. It is, I believe, unconstitutional!

If there’s going to be any constitutional amendment regarding gay marriage at all, it ought to be one that GUARANTEES the right of legal marriage to gay couples in every state.

The American Housewife Offers Interior Decorating Tips!

First of all, get RID of all that clutter. If, for example, you collect these “Precious Moments” figurines, here’s what I want you to do. Gather up all those dear little statues in a box. Take them out to the curb. Smash them on the sidewalk while chanting over and over, “I will never, NEVER again spend my money on such ugly, useless crap.” Believe me, it may hurt at first but eventually you’ll be glad you did it.

Next: Leather furniture, plasto-wood (you know, like lots of entertainment centers and desks are made of), and anything that’s PLAID has to go. Out with it all!

Here’s what you need. Get yourself some real wood furniture. Real wood is always ALWAYS preferable to anything made of plasto-wood. If you can’t afford new real wood furniture, check out the Salvation Army or Goodwill store nearest you. People often give away perfectly nice real wood stuff. You can always refinish it if it’s in rough shape or is painted some bizarre color.

Keep in mind, too, that you don’t have to use a piece of furniture for its original design purpose. If you cut the legs down a bit on an old wood kitchen table, it makes a wonderful big desk. An old buffet is good for storing your computer accessories. If you cut the legs down on a kitchen table even more it makes the best coffee table you ever had in your life.

When it comes time to get upholstered furniture, make sure you get something PLAIN AND SUBTLE. No plaid, no big flowers, no leather. No, no, NO. If you insist on having plaid or flowers or (gads) leather, get a couple of pillows with this stuff on it.

A good way to add color to your house is to use nice pieces of art glass. Just a few pieces. Don’t over-do it. And don’t be intimidated by the term “art glass.” Art glass is just anything you’re using as a decorative object (and not, for example, as a fruit bowl.) I have some colored glass bowls that were absurdly cheap (less than $10 each) that are really beautiful as artistic objects. Art doesn’t have to cost.

People have a real tendency to want to line every wall with furniture and pictures. This is a mistake. Less is more. Space is a good thing and will make your home feel much more restful.

Personally, I don’t care much for Victorian or French Provincial type decorating. I think it’s fussy and uninviting. What I’ve been doing for years is a mixture of Scandinavian, Japanese, and Contemporary styles. When I get around to it, I’ll take a few snaps of the interior of my house and put them up here for you to see. (I know…the excitement is almost unbearable.) Our furniture did not cost a lot of money. Most of it was purchased from Ikeaback when Ikea was still making their furniture out of real wood. (Now they use a lot of plasto-wood. Sigh…) To that, we added some inherited stuff and some flea market stuff. Voila!

The American Housewife Cleans!

I have one question that I wish someone could answer to my satisfaction: Why are people such slobs? I’m serious. How do people live that way? It’s a mystery to me. I can’t really relax if the house is a mess. You know what I’m talking about? If there’s stuff lying around on the countertops and tables, dirty dishes in the sink, crud on the bathroom floor… It just makes me tense. Maybe it’s a control issue. I need to be in complete control of my environment–and that means it needs to, at the very least, be NEAT and CLEAN.

The way some of my (messy) friends explain it is that they don’t have time for cleaning their houses. It all just seems so overwhelming that they don’t know where to begin. It’s easier to just keep adding to the mess. I suppose there might be some truth to that– once your place has become a big mess, it takes a bit of extra work to clean it up. For these folks, then, I offer my plan for taking charge of your environment!

The initial work of getting your mess under control will take some time so…if you work, you might want to consider taking a week off. Here’s the Beginner’s Program:

Get rid of your junk. It’s amazing the crap people save. Throw it out, for God’s sake! You don’t need most of the stuff you’re hanging onto. You’ll be surprised how freeing it is to unload a bunch of your stuff. Look at it this way: Do you want to be defined by your stuff? Of course you don’t. You want to move on. You want to be free to become.

Once you’ve cleared out the junk, organize what’s left and put it away somewhere. Stuff that you don’t use often can be put away in a relatively inaccessable place (attic, garage) and stuff that you use often can be put away in a place that’s easy to get to. Makes sense, right? Be aware, though, that an “easy to get to” place DOES NOT mean a pile on the counter in the kitchen. Buy yourself some organizers or something…baskets, attractive boxes, whatever.

Okay! That’s the hardest part! Now comes the easy stuff…

Clean up while you cook. Rinse and put pots and pans and dishes in the dishwasher as soon as you’re done using them. You’re already just standing there in the kitchen! Make use of your time! Put that stuff away!

Same with the mail. Look through it as soon as you bring it in. Immediately toss the junk mail. (You’re not going to have time to look at it anyway. Be honest with yourself.) Immediately open the bills, toss the junk that comes with them, and put the bills all in a single place to await payment.

PUT THINGS AWAY WHEN YOU’RE DONE WITH THEM. Jeez! Were you born in a barn??

Now that you’ve got your stuff under control, you’re ready to move on to actual cleaning of your space. Do this:
Vacuum everything at least once a week. Get yourself a really good vacuum cleaner with multiple settings and attachments. Nothing can beat a good vacuum cleaner for all-over cleaning. Use it on the floors (of course), the furniture, the window blinds, attach the brush thingie and use it to clean dust and cobwebs off the walls and ceilings, vacuum out the insides of the cupboards.

Get yourself a Swiffer wetjet mop. Laugh if you will, but the Swiffer is a good product. Sure, it’s expensive… well…heh, heh,…I guess there’s no getting around that. But it’s the best tool for quick mop-up jobs that I’ve seen. Don’t bother with the other brands. Swiffer is the best by far. The pads are thick and absorbant–like disposable diapers. The liquid cleaning stuff smells pretty good. Wash your floors regularly. It’s simple if you use a Swiffer.

Dust. I’m actually not all that crazy for the Swiffer brand dusting-thingies. They do pick up the dust, but they don’t shine your furniture like good old-fashioned furniture polish and a rag will. Dust once a week. It’s easy and pleasant. Put some really good music on the stereo and just…dust. Since you’ve thrown out most of your knick-knacks it won’t take all that long. (You have thrown out those goofy knick-knacks, haven’t you?)

The best way I’ve found for cleaning bathrooms is to use just one product (Pinesol), hot water, a cleaning rag, and some rubber gloves. Put on your rubber gloves. Fill the bathroom sink with some hot water and Pinesol. Toss in your cleaning rag to get it good and wet. Start cleaning. It actually only takes a few minutes to clean a bathroom using this method. Use the same rag/Pinesol/hot-water approach to every surface. Wash down the counters first, then bathtub/shower, then the toilets (you’ve got rubber gloves on…don’t be shy), then drain and wipe out the sink. The last thing you clean on your way out is the bathroom floor (assuming you’re not going to Swiffer it.) Just get down on your hands and knees and wipe the floor up while you’re backing out of the bathroom. TaDaaaa! Done! And fast. I learned this method of bathroom cleaning when I worked as a hotel maid a long time ago.

That pretty much covers it. If you keep up with things, it will never get out of control again. If you keep up with it, it doesn’t take long at all. Don’t be a slob. Get neat!

The American Housewife Cooks!

I’ve been a vegetarian since 1975 which, not coincidentally, is the same year I graduated from high school and moved away from home. It’s nice to know that I’ve been a vegetarian for longer than I was ever a meat-eater. If you’re interested in knowing why I became a vegetarian, please feel free to write to me and I’d be glad to go into it in excruciating detail. It’s been my experience, though, that people–particularly people who eat meat–are not interested in hearing about this and, in fact, quite often find harangues about the evils of eating meat quite off-putting. It seems to me that the best way to persuade people over to my point of view (at least as regards diet) is to demonstrate how healthy and tasty and ethical a vegetarian diet is with the example of my own life. Nobody like an uninvited lecture.

My husband is not a vegetarian but he is impressively supportive of my diet choice. Not only is he okay with not cooking meat in the house, he also specifically chooses restaurants for us to eat in that have some vegetarian choices on the menu. What a guy! Since the spouse does eat meat and likes that flavor, we have made some compromises on the kinds of foods we eat at home. For example, we use Morningstar Farms “Breakfast Patties” (a meat-y tasting vegetarian product) in spaghetti sauces and tacos–when I’d probably be quite happy without that stuff. It’s pretty heavily processed and is high in fat. Apparently, though, it’s a fairly convincing meat substitute. Every one of the people I’ve served this stuff to (all meat-eaters) has liked these Morningstar Farms products. It’s not what I’d probably choose just for myself but it’s a reasonable compromise.

As I mentioned on the American Housewife at Home page, I cook most of our food from scratch. For the past couple of years, we’ve really been getting into Indian food a lot. What a discovery this cuisine was for me!! Incredibly delicious– and so many MANY different vegetarian recipes.

Here are some of my favorites:
Daal
Spicy Indian Potatoes
Curried Squash Soup
Labra

….actual recipes will appear in future blog entries!

If you’re not familiar with Indian food, don’t let these recipes scare you. The spices are different from what you’re used to, but once you try it you’ll be glad you branched out. Even my sainted mother (a midwestern meat-and-potatoes kind of gal if ever there was one) found that she really liked Daal and Spicy Potatoes once she’d tried them.

In truth, I don’t use actual recipes much anymore. When you cook a lot you develop a sense for which spices tast best with different kinds of foods and how much you’ll need. The best thing is to cook a lot and experiment. If you’re home all day, you’ll have time to do that. Of course, if you don’t like to cook (strange, but I’ve heard it sometimes happens), you probably aren’t cut out to be a housewife. In that case, go to a good restaurant for your meals. Just about anything’s better than most of the prepared foods you get in grocery stores.

The American Housewife At Home!

I can almost hear all you men who are reading this page thinking, “Oh sure… if only the average American housewife DID look like that!” Well, we can’t all be Bettie Page. Actually, when I snagged this photo off the web, I had no idea who this woman was. I just liked the look of her–sort of naughty and coy. My husband recognized her immediately, though. “Wow! Bettie Page! I haven’t seen any pictures of her in years!” (Yeah, sure.) He claims a guy he knew while he was in the Navy who had an entire scrapbook filled with photos of Bettie Paige. Apparently, this photo is one of tamer ones she ever did. She also posed for a lot of pictures wearing strange leather outfits and a ball-gag. And all this was back in the 50s! I had no idea.

Whatever. Enough about Bettie Paige. Let’s talk about me. These days, being a housewife is a pretty rare thing. Being a housewife and being healthy and educated and not having any children is almost unheard of. I think it’s revealing, though, that very few people ever ask me why I wanted to quit work and stay at home. Just about everyone I know wakes up every morning desperately wishing they could just stay home. It really makes you wonder about the kinds of jobs people are getting themselves into, doesn’t it? There is one question, though, that almost everyone does ask: “Don’t you get bored?” There are two ways to approach that one. The Short Answer and The Long Answer. I recommend you take The Long Answer but, if you’re pressed for time or you just don’t care, feel free to go with The Short Answer. (Of course, if you’re pressed for time or just don’t care, I’d have to wonder what you’re doing reading my web pages to begin with, but far be it from me to pry into your personal. business. So… Go ahead… Choose either The Short Answer or The Long Answer.)

In case you’re wondering, here are some of the reasons for why I wanted to become An American Housewife.

• The food is better.
• The house is cleaner.
• There’s no more arguing with the spouse over housework. I do it all. I do it better than he ever could anyway. When the spouse gets home from work we have our evenings and entire weekends free for relaxing and goofing around. There are no chores waiting to be done because I’ve done them all during the weekdays. Consequently, we both have more time to do the things we really like to do.

When I decided to become a housewife, there were certain expectations I developed for myself. After all, since my husband makes a very meaningful contribution to our household by bringing home money every week, it’s only fair that I should also make a meaningful contribution.

I prepare a lunch for the spouse to take with him to work every day.

I have dinner ready when he comes home from work.

I do all the household chores including laundry, yardwork, cleaning, cooking, dealing with repair service people, taking the cars into the shop, picking up packages, taking out the garbage, whatever.

The idea is that when the spouse comes home from work every day, he isn’t expect to do anything but relax and enjoy himself. This makes his life easier. It makes my life easier. There’s considerably less stress for both of us. And we both feel that we’re making worthwhile contributions to the relationship.

Here’s the deal: If you can afford it and you don’t particularly care about a career, I highly recommend that one of the people in a couple become “the housewife.” It’s a lot more affordable than you might think. You’ll actually find that you save a LOT of money by cooking your own food and doing your own laundry and cleaning. Believe it or not, I usually spend around $75 per week on groceries. If you do any grocery shopping, you’ll recognize that as a fairly low grocery bill. (At least, it is here on the east coast where we live.) It’s surprising how much cheaper it is to buy a bunch of fresh raw vegetables and some flour and yeast and make your own veggie pizzas than to buy frozen ones made with questionable ingredients. If you make your own food, you know what’s gone into it. You know all the bugs were washed off before it was cooked. You know the potatoes didn’t have rotten spots in them. Have you ever experienced this? You’re digging into some frozen concoction from the grocery store and you come across some odd little grayish-brown bit. Is it a mushroom? A hunk of rotten vegetable? Or a shriveled up bug?? Who knows??? If you’d cooked the food yourself from scratch, YOU would know.

Very Dark Apocalypse Fiction, Indeed.

Hotgoat: Bride Of The Apocalypse Archives

I really like this series. It’s well-written and the images are memorable. Be warned, though…It’s grim. Very Very grim. The author (whose real name I’m unsure of) has the series organized from oldest to newest so, all you have to do is click on the link above and start reading!

Enjoy? Well. Maybe.

Apocalypse Fiction Magazine

. . . the NEW apocalypse fiction . . . Vol. 2

I’ve been reading this since…since it was just Volume 1! There are some great short stories here. (And some not so great ones…but what can you expect for free?) I also heartily recommend a trip to The Dwellers of the Wastes bulletin board–an adjunct to the AFM site.

There’s a guy there–Steve (a mutant desert triffid, in fact)–who’s been doing an ongoing fiction project called “Diary” for about a year now. It’s really an excellent read…all about the every-day life of a fellow who’s survived a plague that killed 99.99999% of the population. Great!

There’s another fiction project called “The Journey” by Matov. It’s got a similar premise to Steve’s “Diary” but is set in England. (As is Matov, himself, from what I understand.) “The Journey” is also a really fine read, though Matov hasn’t added anything new to it in a while.

There are other fiction projects on the BB web site but these two are my favorites.