Clever words, all in a row...

This is such a clever writing, I'm keeping it here for perpetuity.

Americans forget their sins. Russians forget their weaknesses. The French forget that they’ve forgotten God. And, in the Middle East, they forget everything but their resentments.

From the New York Times, by David Brooks.

Spamalot

I get a lot of emails from people I don't know, so I have to check my spam folder regularly, and one out of every 100 spams is actually a real email.

But it means I read through the headings of all that spam, and it got me thinking. I so don't care about penis size, but all that hysterical blathering (it's too small, too thin, increase your manhood, come 10 times in one day - and frankly, who wants that! - and my favorite - you have to thicken your love root.) makes me wonder who does, and are there things I care about, only because society is blathering at me so strongly, that it's hard to shut out the message.

I don't care about penis circumference, but I do care about weight, and every so often the weight ones will grab my eye, and then I have to forcibly look away. If anyone was at all vulnerable to any of these spam issues, I can see how this constant hysterical repetition could wear them down. It so clear to me that it's rubbish, because it's talking about something I don't care about. But if I did care... it's easy to see how you could be sucked in.

I do wish there was something we could do to lessen it, it just seems like a negative energy that we let loose in the world.

Happiness is...

a newly painted bathroom (the paint was peeling and chipping because I love long hot showers)
and a clean hampster suite (those 4 babies made it stink!)
But now all is clean and ordered and I'm happy again. (though the back still aches... but that too shall pass)

This one made me laugh...

After being married for 40 years, a man took a careful look at his wife one day and said:
‘ Honey, 40 years ago we had a cheap apartment, a cheap car, slept on a sofa bed and watched a 10 inch black and white TV, but I got to sleep every night with a hot 22 year old gal. Now I have a $500,000.00 home, a $45,000.00 car, nice big bed and a plasma screen TV, but I’m sleeping with a 62-year old woman – it seems to me that you’re not holding up your side of things.'

Now the wife was a very reasonable woman, so she told her husband to go out and find a hot 22 year old gal, and she would make sure that he would once again be living in a cheap apartment , driving a cheap car, sleeping on a sofa bed and watching a 10 inch b/w TV..

Aren’t older women great? They really know how to solve your midlife crises.

Nothing Sexy about it...

This past week has not been a good one :(

I've had a terrible back ache with shooting pains down one leg, so bad that every time I move at night, I wake myself up. A friend diagnosed sciatica - even the word is ugly! - and I googled it and she's right. I've been to the doctor and got some pills but it's still not sunshiny in my world right now. More like limping and wincing along

Interesting article in the Atlantic Magazine about marriage and settling, from a woman who had chosen to have a child alone. I laughed and winced... This was a line I liked -

Marriage isn’t a passion-fest; it’s more like a partnership formed to run a very small, mundane, and often boring nonprofit business. And I mean this in a good way...

Hamster Love

You know if someone would have offered me a pregnant hamster I would have absolutely refused to take her and given you a 'what, are you crazy?!' look. But having been given one, seeing Amelia and her babies is just a pure delight.

The babies are huge now, no longer the tiny pink worms, barely bigger than the tip of my finger. They are now furry and scampering and lots of fun. Occasionally Amelia climbs to the top of the habitat, where they can't reach yet, and hides from them. (reminding me of the mothers who hide in the bathroom, where the toddlers can't get to them.) But they still sleep all on top of each other, cozy. We've named 2 of them, Hazelnut because s/he is all one colour and Ruby, because s/he has red eyes, but the other 2 stripy ones are harder to tell apart. We don't know what sex they are yet, but we have stroked them, and they are so very very soft, it's amazing.

I'm such a herd animal, that the thought that they grow up to separate and live in their own burrows, only connecting with other hamsters for sex, saddens me. They seem so content now. But even at this tender age (they are about 2 1/2 weeks now) the babies are starting to roll over, snarling at each other, and as they grow older, the fighting will get worse. Hamsters are apparently solitary and territorial.

But now, seeing them clasp the celery stalks in their tiny hands and nibble on it, seeing them try to climb the vertical tunnels that Amelia scampers up, and falling down, seeing them grow, it's just all good. At night, at about 11pm, it's party time in the Hamster suite and three babies at once get into the wheel and run together! And sometimes Amelia gets in and makes it go so fast that they just fly out. (there's lots of soft bedding, no one gets hurt)

We'll miss them when they go (we already spoke to the pet shop, and when they are weaned - between 3-4 weeks - we will return them.)