Here comes the neighborhood!

This article in the Salt Lake Tribune caught my eye because on the same day this story on the increase in gay households in Utah ran, my son became one of those households.  He and his partner acquired a large mortgage and a house and are moving in together.  They are movin' on up to the west side!  Watch out you Mormon neighbors, the gays are a comin'!

But seriously, I hope the neighbors treat them like any other family that moves into the neighborhood.  Take them cookies or fresh baked bread.  Help them build a new fence and finish the yard.  Wave when you drive by.  Just be kind to them.  Because they are your neighbors now and according to that article, there's only going to be more and more of them. And they are just people.  And one of them is my son.

What the hail!

                                                                                                    

I drove home through driving rain and pounding hail.  Or as Utahns say it, hell.  Yes, I literally drove through hell.  Hell and crazy weather.  I was afraid it would dent my car! 

And on a related note, I had a lot of firsts on my last trip to Vegas.  Most of them I won't list here but include walking the strip in a strappy sundress.  Go me!  I did it!  I fit into a sundress and actually wore it.  All day.  Without a sweater.  And my shoulders are slightly less white.  Tan was asking too much.  I will never be remotely tan.

Another first occured when I got to the airport to return home.  I had two hours to kill after I got through security.  I was depressed to be leaving after having such an awesome time.  But what did I spy near my gate?  A bar and grill.  So I bellied on up to the bar and ordered the one thing I could think of that wouldn't contain wicked sugar.  "Give me a rum and Diet Coke... and make it a double."  Damn, was I smooth.  Just like I'd been doing it all my life.  Yeah.  Unlike a drink in Utah, I could actually taste the rum and that big ol' glass gave  me a gentle, fuzzy buzz that, sadly, wore off before I got home. Back to reality.  Reality sucks sometimes.

                                                                                                     

Utah porn

What passes for porn in Utah?  Why THIS does!  The parents in Kaysville think this window display is immodest!  Goodness!  Gracious! 

I'm jumping in my car now to go and buy me some brassieres before those idiots run this woman out of business.

Going all Sally Field today

OMG! OMG! OMG! They like me!  They really like me!  The most talented bloggers in the ExMosphere have published a guest post--by me! If you haven't checked out White and Delightsome yet, you really need to.  That blog is positively inspiring!  And if you don't understand the Sally Field reference, I have to wonder why you're reading an old lady's blog.

Now I'm off to provide retail therapy for all other heathens like myself here in the bosom of Zion.

Flying chicken cutlets and random weird stuff

Last week I felt a curious hollow feeling in my bosom.  At first I thought it was a message from the holy ghost and then I realized it was my diet-shrunken boobs rattling around in my padded D cups. (My poor boobs are the first casualty of any diet.)  I rummaged around a bit and found my trusty pair of breast enhancement devices.  You know, the ones that look like they could be breaded and fried.  My trusty chicken cutlets.  I tuck those puppies underneath my own saggy, stretch-marked ones and I'm perky once again. 

It wasn't until I was at the airport waiting in the security line that I thought about those things hiding in my bra.  I was waved over to a body scanner and had a quick flash of panic.  What would show up on the screen?!  Would I be pulled out of line and strip searched?  Would they think I was hiding explosives in those fleshy gel packets?  If I'd looked any more nervous they probably WOULD have pulled me out and searched me.  But they just calmly and politely waved me on to retrieve my shoes and bags.  Whew!

I also learned the proper way to carry your handbag.  Mine kept sliding off though.  I thought maybe my hair would give it traction but the big bottle of vodka inside kept shifting around and making it fall off.

I saw Batman!  If Batman was a woman with saggy boobs who smoked and wore a costume that looked like bad pajamas.  She was hanging with some Elvii and a decapitated Winnie the Pooh.  If I were a kid this would have been nightmare fodder.

I really wanted this Tshirt but I didn't think it would go over well at home so I got one from Hard Rock Cafe.

I'm not eating sugar but even if I was I'm not sure I'd try this chocolate.  "Bald" and "chocolate" should never be used in the same sentence but that's just my opinion.  I don't like cat hair in my food either.

In their world but not of their world

As I lay in bed in a Vegas hotel room gently testing my eyes and head for signs of a hangover, a friend texted me.  "Sis perfect sitting by your girls."

Sis. Perfect is, indeed, perfect. Quiet and hardworking, she has never worked a day outside the home for filthy lucre.  She has instead worked for the Lard for free while raising her righteous Mormon children.  She's put decades of time in Primary and as YW president.  This year with her husband being in the bishopric, she is only serving as camp director.  This had involved multiple visits to our home the past week as she delivered and picked up various camp paraphernalia.  Both my girls are helping with camp this year and they were up to their necks in the preparations.  In each visit, Sis. Perfect had spied my new mode of summer attire--tank tops.  I've been much more open about it this year.  Last summer I kept the shoulders undercover around others.  This year I'm out of the closet, so to speak.  Well, my sleeveless shirts are.

Now, I can only guess Sis. Perfect's motivation in suddenly deciding to sit by my family during Sacrament Meeting.  I haven't attended church in over 18 months and attendance was spotty long before that.  My chair has been empty this whole time as far as I know.  Yet this is only one sign of the gaping divide that has formed between me and my daughters.  Anything church related is not discussed with me unless it involves needing a ride somewhere.  Where I was once in the thick of things I am now on the fringes. If I suggest something inappropriate (such as hooking up the swamp cooler on a record-breaking Sunday) I am put firmly in my place by my youngest.  She has become even more rabidly righteous than before. 

As I dropped my girls off with their camp gear, the leaders lined up near the vehicles (all women with one lone Priesthood Holder to oversee things) waved politely to me.  These are the women that share a significant portion of my daughters lives.  I wondered if one of them would be sitting in my place in the temple one day watching MY daughter's marriage.  Because as unfair as it seems to me, religion seems to trump nine months of pregnancy, giving birth, nursing, changing, comforting, feeding, teaching, snuggling, laughing and loving. 

Showin' off the goods -- Vegas, part 1



What's wrong with this picture?

I flew to Vegas on a small "regional jet".  You know, the kind of plane that's so small even your standard carry-on has to be checked at the gate. I always get an aisle seat.  I'm borderline phobic about being smooshed into the window seat where the only way out is by crawling over virtual strangers.

These jets have four seats across--two and two.  My seatmate was a seemingly nice young man but as we settled in and buckled our seat belts I remembered why I don't like to sit by men.  They Sprawl.  Why do men feel the need to sit with their legs so far apart?  Are they trying to send the message that they are more well endowed than they really are?  I'll bet even Ron Jeremy doesn't need that much room!  Or maybe the boys just need to be aired so they don't get moldy? Maybe men just feel intitled to more leg room because they're men!  Who knows?

Being the owner of a pair of stunningly long legs I need all the room I can get. I beat this guy's inseam by a good six inches.  If I had taken my fair share of leg room we would have been intimately rubbing thighs for two hours.  And since I never rub thighs with strangers I was forced to sit with my knees locked together and facing the aisle while Mr. Big sprawled.  Next time I'll bet a quick grab and twist would give me some leg room.  Let the sprawlers be warned.  Gimme some room or you'll be singing soprano for a while.

Awe inspiring Sunday music--Gregorian - Ordinary World (ByZakelis)

I just had to share this incredible video.  I'm learning to survive in an ordinary world.  And some days it sure isn't easy.

"Ordinary World"

Came in from a rainy Thursday
On the avenue
Thought I heard you talking softly

I turned on the lights, the TV
And the radio
Still I can't escape the ghost of you

What has happened to it all?
Crazy, some are saying
Where is the life that I recognize?
Gone away

But I won't cry for yesterday
There's an ordinary world
Somehow I have to find
And as I try to make my way
To the ordinary world
I will learn to survive

Passion or coincidence
Once prompted you to say
"Pride will tear us both apart"
Well now pride's gone out the window
Cross the rooftops
Run away
Left me in the vacuum of my heart

What is happening to me?
Crazy, some'd say
Where is my friend when I need you most?
Gone away

But I won't cry for yesterday
There's an ordinary world
Somehow I have to find
And as I try to make my way
To the ordinary world
I will learn to survive

Papers in the roadside
Tell of suffering and greed
Here today, forgot tomorrow
Ooh, here besides the news
Of holy war and holy need
Ours is just a little sorrowed talk

And I don't cry for yesterday
There's an ordinary world
Somehow I have to find
And as I try to make my way
To the ordinary world
I will learn to survive

Every one
Is my world, I will learn to survive
Any one
Is my world, I will learn to survive
Any one
Is my world
Every one
Is my world

Holy farts

I just ran into this awsome blog post on Modern Mormon Men  "On Queers and Marriage: Messieurs, I Respectfully Disagree".  I find the message that a "good" Mormon can actually support gay marriage interesting.  It's not what I believe but it's interesting.   

But what really caught my attention were the comments. All that I read were quite respectful but some were like this one by "Dusey":

I am not in support of gay marriage, but I am in support of showing love to everyone. It is possible to have a good relationship with a friend or sibling and still disagree with their lifestyle...
I do not question that gay couples can have good relations ships, however, I question how they fulfil some of the commandments of God, in both ancient and modern scripture, such as "go forth and multiple". Having a sexual relationship with someone of the same sex seems mostly for mutual gratification, as it cannot be used for creating a sacred family unit.* While I am huge proponent of adoption (I myself was adopted at birth into my family, who where unable to have children) because there are so many people out there who cannot have children, it seems selfish, to me, to choose to enter a relationship where procreation cannot happen, and then adopt a child into that relationship, or ask someone to go through the travails of birth for you.

*I am not against sexual gratification in marriage, to be clear. I am against it as the sole purpose for sex.


Soooo...sex should be for procreation. Not for fun.  So don't mate if you won't procreate.

Or how about this one from "Kristin":

I love gay people. I believe that they truly love their partners and I won't deny that love they share. I believe they should have civil rights that married people have. I do not believe it is right for them to get married. Our Church considers marraige a sacred, sacred thing even if they world has forgotten, i.e. infedelity and divorces. If you know the Plan of Happiness and have a testimony of it, if you've been to the temple and have a testimony of the things that proceed there how does gay marriage fit into it? It doesn't.

Sure you love gay people, Kristin. But not enough to let them have the same rights as you do.

A Mormon mommy blogger posted this comment:

My husband works at the church office building and he attended a devotional a month ago or so given by a lawyer who works for the church who talked about the churchs' involvement in this issue. After the devotional my husband and I discussed this subject and I wish I could remember more specifics (pregnancy brain) but here is my understandin.

Basically it has something to do with court precedent. Where at some point a court made a ruling that if the general public agreed on a specific belief/law that a church/religious group cannot break that law or do contrary to it. (vague memory of washington state and indians who wanted to smoke religious peyote sp? but it was against the common law). Also I have a vague memory of a gay couple that wanted to marry in a church and the church wouldn't allow it, but a court may or may not have forced the church to allow it ( I can’t remember for sure).

Anyway in the long view of things this could have huge consequences to the church in the future. It opens a huge legal can of worms for the church and could put us at odds with the laws of the country.

So imagine a gay mormon wants to get married in a chapel by a bishop. The state he lives in has legalized gay marriage. The bishop refuses, and the church is sued for not allowing someone the right to get married. Despite logic (the law probably doesn’t allow the right to get married wherever you please) a judge sides with the gay mormon (like that judge in cali after prop 8 that said you can’t vote based on religious belief, huh?) and the church is forced to either marry the couple in a chapel by a bishop or face some consequence that I can’t imagine.

She sure knows how to wow a person with solid facts!  A later comment easily whacked down these paper-thin arguments.

Or this gem:

An earlier commenter stated that being gay isn't a sin, but fornication is. I totally agree with this. However, as we are taught that homosexuality is an abomination to God (I would say the act not the being), it would seem that God would not recognize a homosexual marriage. So in His eyes that couple would be fornicating (thus sinning)even if in the eyes of the law they are married (kind of like a common law marriage, maybe, not sure how the church handles common law marriages) So then by advocating for homosexual marriage are you not advocating for sin?

So letting gays marry would be advocationg for sin?  My brain hurts just trying to get around that thought process.

And the big WTF:

God has given us each challenges to overcome in this life. I personally have to overcome being overweight. But, would I not have to take care of my temple better if everyone around me was saying that God wanted me to overeat?

So sexual orientation is like an eating disorder.  Yeah.

There were sooooo many more in the same vein but what they all boil down to is farts.  Holy farts.  No substance to them, just hot air.  And they stink.