EWWW!!

Remind me to decline a glass of water if I'm ever in space (click on title for full enlightenment).

Where is my baby going?

I have such mixed feelings as I watch Nathaniel grow and develop.

On the one hand, I love how independent he is and how he has to do everything himself. I love how verbal he's becoming and how he's actually trying to use sentences. I love that he feeds himself and can get most of his clothes on (not nearly as quickly as he whips those puppies off, my kid is a closet nudist, I tell ya!). I also love that he can play by himself part of the time (at least, when I don't have to do homework. The second I sit down to work on a paper he's all in my lap vying for my attention).

But, today I was unpacking a bag someone gave me that had 8 brand new baby outfits in it. I got all gooey at the little clothes and got so excited that in a little more than 2 months I will have a little body to put into those little clothes. Even Nathaniel seems excited. Whenever he sees babies he gets excited and points them out to me. He is definitely hyped about being a big brother, especially when I tell him how cool it is to be one and how he'll be even more like daddy when he is a big brother.

In three weeks I will be completely done with all of my homework. I'm definitely looking forward to that. I will never have school again. Ever. That's hard to wrap my mind around, especially since I've been in school for the past 22 years...

Finally, I will close this by writing fun Nathaniel stories.

1. Nathaniel is obsessed with picking his nose. Seriously. I think it's getting way out of hand and now he's just torturing his poor mom. He will stand in a room calling my name and when I get in there I find him with his finger crammed up to the second knuckle grinning like a fool. "Look!" Ugh...And if I don't let him pick his nose, he will do a farmer blow right in my face. Yuck!

2. He calls men "man" and women "person". I recently noticed that this week as he was running in our complex and he passed a guy and said, "Hi man!" and then when we were walking with one of my female friends he called out, "Person! Look!". I guess I can pride myself that my son knows women are people...

3. He's learning how to talk on the phone. The other night I laughed out loud when he was talking to "Aunt" Bethany and he said, "How you doing?" with a tone that only reminded me of Joey from Friends.

4. Today I dropped him off at a friend's house for nap time while I had orchestra rehearsal. He knew it was nap time so he said, "ni-ni!" and walked into the room he normally naps in. By the time my friend's husband went to tuck him in, he was asleep. Why does this only happen for others? I have to read two stories, say lengthy prayers, get a glass of water and cuddle!

5. I have been forced by my son to eat an m&m after I go to the bathroom because that's what he gets when he goes potty. When I use the restroom Nathaniel comes barreling into the room and says, "Mommy! Potty and wash hands and treat!" I try to skip the treat and he keeps harping on it until I go and eat an m&m. He's an equal treatment kid. And why shouldn't I be rewarded for my potty habits?

That's about it. I'm going to bed...I'm tired! Sam will be home on Tuesday for Thanksgiving! We are so excited. His mom will be here on Wednesday and we are looking forward to her visit as well.

Song that speaks to where I am right now.

If you read my previous blog, you might think I'm just procrastinating.

Well, yes. But, I have also meant to put this song on our blog for quite awhile. I encourage you to really listen to the lyrics. This song really resonates with where I am right now in life and my attitude. It's kind of like, "Okay, I really don't like this right now and this is NOT the path I would have chosen for myself, but I really believe that God is in charge and that His plan is always better than my own so I'm going to just hold on and trust and go through this." (yes, an incredibly annoying run-on sentence just now...).

So, enjoy the song. I don't know if it will impact you like it does me, but you really should listen to the whole thing. It's only three minutes long so...yeah.

Signs that the semester is winding down (and that I have a crapload still to do).

1. My kitchen floor has been mopped twice today (can I help it if the first time was because my foot got stuck in some mysterious goo at breakfast and then after supper I just had to re-mop because I saw a spot on the floor?).

2. I have caught up on everyone's blog (and have even looked at several more than once in an hour. Who knows, maybe something cool like this will happen to me someday).

3. My bathroom is clean, the toys are organized and I have stayed on top of scooping the cat box.

4. I have my bibliographies written without one single word of my research papers written.

5. Nathaniel has been getting a lot of face time with mommy these days.

6. I am a week ahead of teaching for church.

7. I have even considered shaving my legs...

8. I find myself making up lists for my blog instead of writing my Acts paper.

Oh dear Lord, I am totally going to be exhausted if I don't go work on my paper RIGHT NOW. One more month until graduation...

Wildfires.

Because I live in a hole I had no idea that the wildfires were that close to me until I looked out the window and saw the "snow" falling. I knew that there were fires nearby because I smelled the burning, but when Nathaniel's tricycle got covered in ash in a two hour time period, I realized it's probably a different fire than I thought.


Here is a shot from outside my patio. Notice that the smoke is hovering above us. The black spots are the ash that is falling.

Here is the North view. Yeah...it's pretty gross out.

I actually swept my patio this morning and this is the accumulation since then. I have since closed my door.

We are safe. I just hope the power doesn't go out because my laptop battery doesn't hold a charge and I'm actually doing homework right now! Let you all know if things change!

Why I just want to sit down and cry

AUGH!

It's so hard when Nathaniel doesn't nap. I just don't know what's wrong with my kiddo. Last week he took 3-4 hour naps every day (getting to the point where I had to wake him up at 5:30pm just so I knew he would sleep that night). Monday he didn't get a nap because the sitter had him out all day long, so I got to deal with no-nap Nathaniel. Today he didn't nap either.

I think it's because he's cooped up all day long because even though there is a park about 50 yards from my front door he doesn't get to it much. Why? Well, the sitter doesn't take him outside and by the time I get home and he's up from his nap it's dark and there aren't any lights at the park. Plus, with the bajillion cats that are roaming around this complex, I have a slight phobia of him accidently playing in some sort of fecal matter.

So, today as I was exhausted from not sleeping well and doing work all morning, Nathaniel decided not to nap at all. I even cuddled with him for awhile and ended up zonking out myself, waking up covered in my own drool with Nathaniel calmly looking at "Green Eggs and Ham" then ripping his blanket out from my arms and saying, "Down!". It was 4 by then and I knew my day was shot.

So, I have extra grumpy/needy boy here with my group coming over to work on a project (which is due in a week). I already bathed him though I have kept him away from all t.v. (at least, under my supervision. I'm thinking of getting rid of the t.v. for the next few weeks to ensure that he really doesn't watch it all day long) so that he can watch a movie while I try to get some work done later.

Sigh. On top of that he peed all over the floor after his bath and has been getting into EVERYTHING!

But, he just just redeemed my whole night. As I was typing this he came running in the room and said, "Mom! A pirate ship! Arrrrr!!" and made me laugh. There's a reason he's so cute! I think he's hinting that he wants to go to Disneyland...

Well, that's reassuring!

Last night I had a dream that I was in an earthquake. It was so real (along with other portions of my dream, including flying in an airplane to Indiana...weird) that I was sure that perhaps something happened last night.

I didn't hear of anything on the news so I will chalk it up to pregnancy hormones taking control of my body along with a general lack of sleep (which reminds me, I need to go to bed NOW!). However, I did read this online today which actually freaked me out a bit. Of course it's mostly doom and gloom, but I wonder how I would fare in the online game? I bet I would die. I thought I was supposed to go in a doorway during an earthquake. Hmmm...

Happy Veteran's Day.

I realized that I don't have any good, recent pics to put on here so I won't.

Happy Veteran's Day to all who serve(d).

Take some time today to hug a soldier. I wish I could hug mine...

Children of the World Choir

Today marks the beginning of the Mission's Week at our church. One of the many things I love about Cypress Church is it's heart for missions. As a church we support missionaries all over the world and are definitely very mission minded.

Last year we had a worship team fly in from Hawaii which I hear was an amazing night (I was at Sam's step-mom's funeral so I wasn't there to witness it first hand). This year, we were blessed to have the Children of the World Choir visiting our church. It was amazing. First of all, some of the families in our church opened up their homes to host these children (and the chaperones). I wish we could have but one of the guidelines was two parents in the home and since Sam is gone that instantly counted me out. It was probably for the better given how much stress we've been under, but it would have been so cool for Nathaniel to be able to experience another culture like that.

When we walked into the service today there was about 15 young children on stage singing and dancing and truly praising the Lord. Tears instantly sprung to my eyes because it was just so beautiful. Then their stories began to unfold. They shared with us how all of the children on stage were orphans, either orphaned because of the AIDS epidemic in Africa or simply abandoned by their parents. They were all from Uganda (which is a land terrorized by the Lord's Army, an army led by a man who kidnaps young children and forces them to fight in tribal warfare) and all were sponsored by Americans. To see these little children sing and dance and watch the joy shining from their eyes was amazing. Check out this video to get an idea of what worship was like for us this morning.




After church Nathaniel wanted to go see the kids, so we went over to some of them and they all kept touching Nathaniel's hair (which was cute) and kept hugging Nathaniel. My normal socialite turned into a shy guy though and just looked at the ground. Poor boy. He thought it was cool though (the singing and dancing).

On a funny note, I think Nathaniel is going to be a performer when he gets older. He's gone to a couple of live shows this week (Seussical, Jr. and then worship this morning) and he is enamored. He also then points to the stage after it's over and wants to go on stage to sing as well. He has pulled out his microphone from his room and stands in front of me singing, dancing and taking a bow, expecting applause. Heaven help me, this kid takes after his mommy!

We are surviving.

Well, it's been two days sans Sam and we are surviving. We are eating healthily (pancakes with applesauce totally counts as healthy!) and things are getting done. I have a new outlook on parenting. I'm just kind of letting it go. I am still strict with Nathaniel. He gets disciplined and he has his regular routine (limited t.v.--at least when I'm around--regular snack-time and nap time plus his boundaries of what he can/cannot do and how he can treat others) but, when he is just acting his age and being difficult I find that I'm much calmer. In turn, he's a lot calmer. It's nice.

What's also nice is the 3-4 hour naps he's been taking all week. That makes my day great. I get a lot more done that way.

I'm on top of my homework, my house is clean (at least, it isn't filthy with grime and dust, there are currently toys and dvds all over my living room, but that will be picked up by Nathaniel before bedtime, and the dvds are keeping him busy). I think we will be okay.

It also helps that Sam and I can talk on the phone every night. That will be harder when he's abroad.

I still need more recipes. I was literally wandering down the aisles of the grocery store yesterday going, "What can I cook!?" I did grab cans of cream of mushroom soup because I have some pork chops that I think I am going to throw in the crock pot tomorrow and I know one of the recipes calls for cream of mushroom soup. Yum!

Also, anyone who reads this who lives in my area, my regular sitter is on vacation the first 9 days of December and I still need spots filled for the 2nd-4th and 7th-8th. Please email me if you can help. I pay!

I promise.

Well, Sam is officially gone. It was a crappy morning because I got up a little early so I could spend time with Sam before Nathaniel woke up and Sam was called into the office because the Colonel decided that he wanted to be briefed when he got up to Monterey so Sam had to return all of the binders that he had taken home yesterday. Grrr...luckily Sam was able to push back the leave time so we did get some time this morning to sit and drink coffee (and hot cocoa for Nathaniel) before rushing out the door.

Anyways, my title of the blog is purposeful, I swear.

I just want people to know that there may be times where I sound like I'm whining or complaining or fishing for extra help in a passive manner. While I can't promise not to whine about Sam being gone and being both mommy and daddy (and student/intern as well) full time, I can promise that I'm not being passive-aggressive on this blog. I promise that if I need help I will ask for it unashamedly. I know I'm not super woman, and as much as I would love to be Super Woman (she looks great in tights and she can fly!) I know my limits and I know when I need help. So, I'm not trying to guilt anyone into anything if I am ever complaining about how I'm supposed to get my hair cut or get the car fixed or treat my cats for worms. I am simply venting.

On another note: If anyone has any healthy, easy recipes that I can use, that would be great. I'm not normally the cook in the house but I know it isn't healthy to eat corn dogs and chicken nuggets for the next 13 months!

On a completely different note: Is it healthy if I can feel my heart skipping beats and making sounds like, "ka-chug, ka-chug, ka-chug"? That happened about 10 minutes ago and it did it for about 5 beats. Kind of freaked me out...

Thank goodness it's all over.

I'm so thankful that the election is over. Now I just have to listen to people whine and complain (or gritch and moan as one of my co-workers puts it) for about a week before things calm down.

I have to say that I got REALLY sick of all of the one-sided arguments coming from different people, all of them assuming that I was voting the way they were. Or people who just wouldn't get off of one topic and who kept on beating the dead horse (yes, one of those people ended up with a really long post on this blog. That's what I get for sharing authorship with my hubby!). Let's just say, I'm glad it's finished.

I also have to say that I will not share with anyone how I voted. One of my students asked me today how I voted and I told him that it was a private matter that I chose not to share with people. He then prodded me even more saying, "I at least have to know how you voted on Prop 8. It's a Christian thing, I need to know if I can respect you." Even though this response made me frustrated, especially after the two part series our pastors just gave on loving our neighbor and not judging or over spiritualizing things, I responded again that it was a private matter and that there is a reason that voting is done in little booths. He eventually dropped it.

So, since Sam leaves tomorrow for his long deployment I will now get off of the internet and watch him put his boy to bed for the last time for a long time. It's hard. Please pray for us and if I don't update on this thing for awhile and seem like I've fallen off of the face of the earth, give me a call, I may not be doing that great.

Hugs!

A Rebuttal from a Friend

I want to publish a rebuttal to one of my arguments that a good friend who goes by the blogger name Aristocles sent me. I publish it not because it has me convinced or because I think it is airtight; I publish it because it addresses head on some of the issues I have been raising. And I think it is important to air a disagreeing voice before election day. I respect Aristocles very much, and want to give his impassioned argument some space on my blog.

"I have now realized. I was mislead. In many of my replies and counter-rebuttals concerning the basic argument --if you're pro-life you oughtn't vote Obama-- I continually made a mistake.

What is it? I'll get to that, in a jiff.

When pro-lifers-for-Obama responded, they never failed to bring forward this question:
What will reduce abortions the most efficiently?

They all believe that Obama's planned-out strategy will reduce the number of abortions to a far greater extent than McCain's policies. This has led to the oft quipped: "Obama is more pro-life than McCain." The argument is, of course, based on a calculation concerning consequences. The consequences concern the very lives of human beings. McCain, it's granted, has a pro-life ideology on his platform. McCain has even voted many times in the past for pro-life laws. McCain will appoint judges that will likely be favorable to overturning the Roe v. Wade precedent.

Yes, yes, and yes. BUT, they, the pro-lifer Obama fans, will say: Obama will tackle the root causes of abortion. He's focussed and poised to address this typical shortfall in the history of the pro-life movement.

Thus, this reasoning concludes: only with an Obama not McCain presidency (the official pro-choice platform is not a big concern) WE the WISE voters can know with confidence that the bad consequences will likely be reduced. Only with Obama can we the conscientious pro-lifers be confident that the death toll will go down, the bloodshed lessened, the underlying causes finally addressed. After all, the reasoning continues, overturning Roe will barely, if at all, reduce abortions. After all, the reasoning continues, it will only go to the state legislatures, allowing a neighboring state to accomplish the abortion where one's homestate won't. After all, the reasoning continues, what will McCain do to address these causes? The case seems obvious. How, the table turns, can a pro-lifer who is truly in the know, vote for anyone BUT OBAMA?

I admit this has a definite ring of wisdom. And then my argument trots up to the plate. I suppose I was an underdog from the get go. The pro-life Obama friends take aim at my argument.

The fist volley: this argument assumes a dubious one issue voting mentality. The second: Republicans/conservatives have too long been duped by the simplistic adherence to a myopic strategy --Overturn Roe. The third volley: McCain isn't pro-life to the core anyway (he's even a flip-flopper on the matter). The fourth volley: and even if he is, he won't address these causes that motivate abortion in the first place; McCain's pro-life platform is window dressing as the death knell rings its frightful voice for more innocent unborn. The fifth volley: Christians and the Political Right have wrongly and too long been captive to naivete and emotive appeals, and, have too long paid not heed to the real guts of the matter. And the guts of the matter are nuanced and informed calculations of probabilities. Thus, the final volley, back to the unanswerable question: Under which candidate in the given political air of the future, the context of our crystal ball of 2008-2012, can we bet on abortion be more likely reduced than not?

And, supposing all the volleys are countered by the old school, underdog, like me, but that last one, number six, remains firm, tall, and undefeated. What can I possibly do? How can I resist the force of this tide of political wisdom? How can I at once distance myself from the myoptic, the naive, the old Republican war-hawks, corporation loving, oil motivated conservatives and yet at the same time advance an argument with a conclusion these devils would probably agree with? Thus, I embark upon, what to you pro-life Obama fans, seems an impossible journey. And, then, in attempting to respond I get caught up in the task of projecting future probabilities. I'll call it the fortune teller context. I have to now bear the burden of explaining how we can think, prior to the future term, that it is more likely that with McCain it is probable abortion will be reduced versus what will likely happen with Obama.

The opposition, you pro-life Obama fans will say. "Sure, sure, Obama will sign FOCA, but who cares if it doesn't go through congress? Sure, sure, a judge or two might get appointed, why think Roe will be challenged soon, and if it were, why care? Will it reduce abortion much? And if so, how long do we have to wait? Sure, states will get in the mix, but then we'll only contribute to the myopic trend of ignoring the guts of the issue, abortion reduction by addressing causes, like economic hardship and unwanted pregnancy conditions. It's overdue for a pro-life change of direction. And careful calculation in our fortune teller context gives us reason to bet on Obama's policies if we are really pro-life."

And you'd likely continue similarly as follows, "For we the really full-orbed pro-lifers aren't fixated on the legal issue, the pie in the sky. We are nuts and bolts, boots on the ground voters, fully equipped with an aresenal of weapons able to deliver armchair probability judgements. And these, we suppose will put Obama on the winning ticket. Any sophisticated pro-life voter would bet, bank on, predict with confidence, that abortions will be reduced in an Obama presidency."

And that's the context I go into in order to counter-rebut. I have to provide my own calculations for why I am betting on McCain (and whatever comes after 2012) rather than Obama. And thus, I'm caught in the fog of probability calculations from our fortune teller context. I have to enter the foray of forecasting the future. Thus, the whole discussion becomes more and more nuanced and difficult to manage. Even unbearable boring to the morally inscensed anti-Rupublican, anti-Bush, anti-Iraq, and anti-old school conservatism. (Ah, ah, don't jump to conclusions: I"m not supporting this litany of bad buys and bad ideas; I don't need to, it's not in the logical space of this pro-life argument this election.)

I would and do still, however, maintain in the face of all the buzz, that betting on Obama to reduce abortion is a bad bet. How will making abortions easier, more affordable, and more acceptable contribute to their reduction? How will using morning after pills reduce abortions? How will education allowing unwise and entirely unprepared almost-adults the permission to have sex -so long as its safe- contribute to preventing contexts where unwanted pregnancies occur? How does a sophisticated and wise air of agnosticism on whether the right to life does or doesn't apply to the unborn, the cloned embryos, or the botched abortion victims ... how does this agnosticism contribute to caution in having an abortion, or motivation to adopt? And I could go on. But, I think, this CONTEXT OF DEBATE is based on a serious MORAL BLUNDER.

And the mistake I made was not recognizing this blunder behind the scenes. Okay. Big deal. What gives?

A TALE OF TWO INJUSTICES

The injustice of abortion, for a prolifer, is not exhausted by the numbers in the death toll.
There is a tale of two injustices to tell. And below I will tell it. First, I will comment on the first injustice of the two, namely, the number of abortions and their so-called reduction levels given an Obama or McCain presidency.

True enough, pro-lifers want to overturn RVW because it reduces abortions. No one attempts to argue that overturning it would increase abortions. But if reduction is the key, the question is what's the most efficient means? And then we get back to our fortune teller context where we have nothing to rely on but armchair probability judgments. We don't even have the good fortune of massively compiled and thoroughly researched statistics on Obama or McCain presidencies of 2008-2012; unfortunately, it's one thing Obama can't fund, even though he has enough dough to go around. So, we have gut instincts, nothing more, to help us determine the likelihood of conditions favoring reduction of the death toll, conditions that depend upon a thousand contingencies of the ever future future.

It is certainly, indubitably and INJUSTICE that innocents are killed. Appalling, disgusting, and morally repugnant, that the innocents are the most helpless, defenseless and most full of potential and promise of any class of humans on this good globe of God's and us, His stewards. And all efforts, so long as they don't employ evil, should be pursued to reduce the number of human beings destroyed for mostly frivolous reasons --like not wanting the child one didn't want to be pregnant with, or the protection of one's precious quality of life, remember, my pro-life friends, the number of abortion for the gut-wrenching reasons are few, very few and far between. (One easily accessible example of a means to reduce that is intrinsically evil is Obama's plan to use morning after pills as a means of reducing abortion).

Let me digress for one moment. I want to address a background issue. After this I'll return to the tale of two injustices.

Even on a McCain presidency it's not as if the efforts of millions of pro-lifers, pro-lifer organizations and Christian churches or other religious groups, will be prevented from addressing the very causes we are told Obama will address. His isn't the only means or instrument to addressing these causes. And be addressed they must. These things can be done and done well, Obama or no. But, and I risk digression, to rely on Obama and the government as the number one instrument to supply both the means and their execution is to presuppose a philosophy of government that is itself questionable. In fact, to presuppose this might be to presuppose a philosophy of government inimical to the fundamental rights our government was set up to protect.

Okay, end digression. I was talking about the tale of two injustices, the first being the death toll on innocent lives, embryos and fetuses, especially.

The injustice that gets lost in this fog of probability calculation is the IN JUSTICE OF TEH EXISTENCE of the Roe v. Wade precedent/de facto law. That law is NOT JUST just by its mere existence, regardless of the death toll (which is a horrendous evil and injustice of unbearable, intolerable degree). The existence of this de facto law is morally wrong IN AND OF ITSELF, that is, its existence is a moral blight. No calculation of the death toll is necessary. It's a different injustice.

In this light the slavery parallel shines clear. For a candidate that leaves the law of owning people yet fights with government programs and tax dollars to make conditions better for slaves while tirelessly addressing the root causes of the slave owner's desire to own human beings as property is a candidate that leaves unaddressed an intrinsic moral blight: the law that says human beings of this one type are ownable as property of another. Such a candidate is either morally incompetant or somehow morally distorted to look past the injustice in the very existence of the pro-slavery law.

But, the parallel here isn't exact, I'm sorry to inform you pro-life Obama fans. Let's make it parallel. This candidate not only leaves unaddressed the intrinsically evil law, but entrenches it deeper into the legal system, surrounding it with anti-missile defenses and an army of propagandists (the cronies defending his decision in the Illinois debacle come to mind, let alone the toady media talking heads) to direct attention away from it toward 'addressing the root causes of slavery', for the sake of reducing the number of owned human beings.

So, the pro-life Obama friends now must employ the moral scale. Only this time it's not future reductions given Obama vs. future reductions given McCain. No. Now there is a different set on the scale. Potential abortion reduction (far from established without a crystal ball and in light of my and others' arguments to the contrary) on one side of the scale. On the other side, the protection, entrenching, and outright promise to advance the sustained existence of an intrinsically evil law. Are you willing to pay the cost of entrenching an intrinsic injustice for the benefit of possibly reducing abortions through government means, which are by far not the only means, nor necessarily the most effective, nor necessarily those based on the best theory of government and its role in human affairs?

I have to raise this alarm because I myself was lost in the utilitarian calculation game of abortion reduction given this or that future scenario (Barack or John, with this or that balance of Dem/GOP in the House or Senate, with this or that bill in the offing, with this or that set of judges given this or that possible consideration of Roe or anything in the neighbor, etc., etc.)

But reduction chances going up, down, or remaining the same does NOT EXHAUST THE INJUSTICE of the abortion phenomenon in America (or mutatis mutandis in the world)

I challenge you, the pro-life Obama crew, to check up on your assumptions. Do you presuppose that the injustice of the abortion phenomenon is NOTHING BUT a function of how many innocent lives are lost? Does this cause you to look at overturning Roe as only valuable insofar as it reduces the abortion death toll? Is it your, perhaps unchecked assumption, the very one that bled into my responses, the BIG MISTAKE in many of my responses and replies? I unwittingly began to think that the only injustice in this sad state of affairs, in this grand land, was completely exhausted by the death toll numbers rather than the very nature of things: esp., of that intrinsically unjust de facto law.

Obama will not only fail to address this injustice, enshrined in our quasi legal supreme court precedent. He will attempt to buttress it, protect it, cherish it, and further its scope. He would happily add a CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT to make sure all women have rights that include abortion (which entails doctors, clinics, funding, etc., to make it happen).

And this brings us pro-lifers back to our roots. We need to address the causes of our misdirected defense of these innocent victims that are unquestionably fully included in our human community and come born with rights given by God.

That intrinsically wrong de facto law was, back then, and still is, based upon an absurd grounding. It was grounded in a woman's right to privacy. This is pure bosh. What then is it based on? What will pro-choicers be forced to say?

And when the discussion turns here, those that are not pro-life, who do not believe all human life has the fundamental rights of personhood, chiefly the right to live, will have to confront the false beliefs that ground the pro-choice agenda. Beliefs that neither rationally support nor logically entail unjust laws or the permission of intentional killing.

Like I've said rather sketchily before:IF TOMORROW EVERYONE BELIEVED that abortion (and I hasten to add embryo destruction) is horrendously evil, then REDUCTION WOULD OCCUR in massive quantity and the Roe v Wade would be overturned and states would outlaw abortion. Further, there would be many more motivated to address the causes of abortion, governmental assistance aside. Churches would not be full of pro-lifers that think its an unfortunate given, but ones motivated by the absolute horror of abortion (watching the videos make it unavoidably, painfully, obvious), and thus willing to take action, out of the only true and just motive for all good, love of others and of God.

Belief coupled with heart's desires is the surest motor of action. And ultimately, aside from who gets elected, pro-lifers must seek to change not just consequences, not just material causes of abortion, but ultimately the hearts of those that seek, endorse, and uphold the actions and right of abortion.

At the eleventh hour,
with a glimmer of hope,
if not for this election, for the days and weeks and years following,
for the lives of all victims of abortion and embryo research,
for the lives of all those suffering and forced into desperation towards abortion,
especially the mother's involved,
let us pray to the Lord.
Lord have Mercy."

Halloween 2008

Well, in spite of class and a butt load of Army stuff for Sam, we managed to do Halloween this year. I figured I could have skipped the whole thing since Nathaniel is still so young, but we were nice parents.

We went to the local "pumpkin patch" on Tuesday. I was dressed up as the Great Pumpkin for our youth event (where the kids go on a scavenger hunt looking for the Great Pumpkin) so Sam and Nathaniel came along. It was so ghetto! I'm used to actually going into the patch where the pumpkins grow and picking the pumpkin (along with a hay ride and apple cider). Here, the pumpkins were sitting in rows and there were a whole bunch of really ghetto carnival rides. We spent way too much money on a pumpkin (which we have yet to carve) and worried for Nathaniel's safety on a couple of the rides. Nathaniel had a blast though.

Last night we went trick or treating. It took Nathaniel probably 2 houses to figure out what to do and then he was pushing the bigger kids aside to knock on the door. It was so funny because sometimes he would just say, "Candy!" instead of Trick or treat. He got enough candy to last through potty training and had a really good time. We were lame and had him wear his Batman pajamas as his costume. It worked!

Of course, when we got home our next door neighbors were having a huge party that quickly got out of hand. Everyone was really drunk and people ended up banging on our front door (since our doors are about three feet across from each other) and were shouting in the hallway. Not to mention the music blaring...The police showed up twice! Things finally calmed down around midnight, which didn't help since we had to be up at the butt crack of dawn this morning. I also have a quiz in an hour...ugh!

That's about it. I think we are going to carve our pumpkin tonight. Yup, let's just extend the holiday a bit...