Catching Up

So much going on...so much NOT going on. I don't know. I see haven't posted since July 14. I have no excuses other than it is summer, I am feeling lazy, and I don't have a coterie of guest bloggers on hand to fill in for me. Anyway, a bunch of utterly unrelated thoughts...

We're still waiting for someone to buy the house. Laura decided to order a St. Joseph statue. Supposedly burying this upside down will help sell the house. I think this sounds bizarre, but who am I to argue? I am anxious to sell the house and get on with this move. It feels like we've had our lives on hold forever. Laura's place has many more posts about our impatience.

Several of the Montana Bloggers are protesting a Las Vegas businessman’s attempt to trademark the phrase “The Last, Best Place.” This is the phrase used as the title of William Kittredge's anthology about Montana. I think we own a copy of that book, actually. Anyway, to protest this, the bloggers are temporarily changing the titles of their blogs to "The Last, Best Place." It looks like Watermark has a pretty good list of participants so far.

This is a terrific post that nearly made me cry. I will only quote this tiny bit, because you really must read the whole thing:

At two years old, Christopher has the angry fuck-you attitude I still don't have, a willingness to suffer a broken nose from getting smacked with the back of a shovel if it means not losing face. I can't think of a single incident in my early childhood when I had that raw anger necessary to protect myself. Instead, I mistakenly believed if I was nice, and fair, and showed a willingness to get along, bullies would leave me alone. And if worst came to worst, I'd follow the popular advice of teachers and parents and just ignore them.

I have no idea why this advice is so popular. As adults, haven't they figured out that the joy of bullying is bullying itself? Ignoring the problem doesn't make it go away. What makes it go away is that willingness to step up to the edge and jump, even if it means getting hurt.

During the month of July, John Scalzi took a break. He DID have a coterie of guest bloggers to fill in for them, and they were all very entertaining. Which reminds me, I've added mythago to my list of links over there on the right.

Finally, there is this post from Jason at Positive Liberty (which, incidentally, has recently become a group blog). I really don't have much to add. The pictures do a terrific job of rebutting the utterly nasty e-mail Jason is recounting. I've noticed that the "ex-gay" people tend to focus mostly on men, not women, so I've never been the target of this sort of thing. Jason did a terrific job. The post has lots of great comments, too.