In Defense Of Marriage Equality

 

What always disturbs me about the No Gay Marriage rhetoric is their insistence that they are only trying to protect families, as if families are only ever made up of cishet people.

My marriage and my family are both strong and secure, and totally unthreatened by the idea that my friends Paul and David over th’ar in Houston may get legal recognition of their relationship (which, for the record, has outlasted TWO of my marriages, thankyouverymuch).

My cousins, Ronnie, Gary, and Betty were happy and healthy and grew to adulthood in a home with two dads, because in 1967, the state of California recognized that a stable gay couple were better parents than an abusive, neglectful mother and stepfather. In 1967, guys. They were the first openly gay couple awarded custody of children in a custody dispute in that state. Their family was all the better for having two loving fathers. For the record, to quash yet another damned conservative lie, my cousins are all straight, or were (Gary died in 1998, and Ronnie died during COVID).

I prefer to defend my own marriage. I do not need legislation to do it for me. I have had three husbands. The first marriage “lasted” 15 years, ten of them pretty miserable. The second lasted three, before my best friend “defended” it into oblivion (those two are now married, go figure). Third is the charm.

What defense does a marriage need? Defense against back-stabbing friends would be at the top of my list, obviously. Defense against lethargy and distancing from one another. Defense against the government looking into our bedrooms and telling us that some acts of love between legally consenting adults are not just “disgusting”, but even illegal.

Defense against narrowing the definition of what a marriage IS. A marriage is a covenant between two (and sometimes more, polyamory is valid too!) people and (if applicable) their deity of choice. It is an outward sign to the rest of the world that these people love each other and are committed to living together as a solid FAMILY unit, taking care of one another’s needs, supporting each other, loving each other through thick and thin.

Additionally, there are two aspects to marriage. The spiritual, and the legal. I was “married” to Sam for months before we went to a minister and said the words. In our hearts, in our minds, in every way that mattered, we were husband and wife. Legally was another story, and the legal thing only brings us a few extra rights as far as things like health care decisions, health insurance, and etc goes.

Who the HELL says gay people aren’t capable of making that sort of commitment, or that, once having made it, they should be denied the rights and privileges that come with legal marriage?

I’ll tell you who.

The same people who are eroding our basic rights as Americans. The same people who screamed YES!!! to the Patriot Act. The same people who voted YES!!! to war in Iraq. The same people who would shove their bibles and their morality and their closed minded hate right down our throats if we were stupid enough to open our mouths wide enough. The Neo-Con Fundies. Dubya. Robertson. Falwell. Trump. All those motherfucking pissgarglers.

I vote to defend the right to marriage. For everybody, not just one man and one woman.

If the rest of Texas disagrees, they can go to hell.

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 #MARRIAGE
#LGBT
#JUSTICE
 #RANTS 

How to piss off Nigerian Facebook Scammers

 

Here come awful cusses I spent several hours searching out. I intend to keep these handy and copy and paste into Facebook Messenger as needed:

These are awesome insults to use on Nigerian scammers. These are in Yoruba, which is the most commonly used language there, and are absolutely bound to send them over the edge. Most of these, in English, can be used on MAGAts, too!

• Nkita la’cha ike gi – may a dog lick your asshole.
• Oloshi meaning “useless person” or “wretched soul” in Yoruba, is a harsh insult to demean someone.
• Omo ale means bastard as in illegitimate and is a really bad one.
• Iya e means yo mama and is really bad, too.
• Abi ori nta e? – You’re basically asking if the person has their mental facilities intact.
• Opolo e ti yoro – You’re saying they’ve got a brain leak.
• Ode – If you don’t want to stress too much about how to abuse in Yoruba, use this one. It always touches a nerve. You're calling them an absolutely stupid fool.
• Iya e, baba e – Your mama, your daddy; use this with caution because you’ve involved their family members.
• Swegbe – Means your opponent is slow in the head.
• "What’s your name? Is it Swegbe Ode?"
• Oni jibiti – This is the appropriate insult in Yoruba for scammers and 419ers.
• Akuko – cocksucker.
• Abiyamo – motherfucker.
• Fokii rẹ Sílà ká timole – fuck your grandmother’s skull.
• Ki aja le pa oku awon baba yin fo – may dogs fuck the corpses of your ancestors.
• Iya rẹ buruju ewurẹ ati baba rẹ jẹ ọkan ninu wọn – your mother fucks goats and your father was one of them.
• Ki olorun pa iya re ki o si je ki o jo ni orun apadi ayeraye iwo ewure to n se idoti – may God strike your mother dead and let her burn in Hell for eternity you goat fucking garbage.

And my favorite:

O fo iya rẹ ti o tun jẹ anti rẹ, ati awọn arabinrin rẹ tun jẹ ọmọbinrin rẹ. O fokii wọn, ju, bi daradara bi asshole àgbere awọn arakunrin rẹ. – You fuck your mother who is also your aunt, and your sisters are also your daughters. You fuck THEM, too, as well as asshole fucking your brothers.

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#RANTS

#SOCIAL-JUSTICE

#FAMILY

#SCAM

#LOL

How I Left a Liberal Paradise and Ended Up in a Texas Hellscape

I am Boston Massachusetts born and bred. Boston to the BONE, this girl. Absolute raging liberal Democrat, child of a hippie, former biker chick, child of the streets. It would take a book to describe my youth, suffice to say that it was pretty wild times. A lot of fun, a lot of chaos, a lot of love, a lot of heartache.

When I was 19, I met my first husband, Koji. He was about to graduate from MIT, and we met, fell in love, got an apartment in East Boston and both worked crappy jobs to make ends meet while he hunted for a job that he could use his degree in. In early 1985, his step-grandfather hooked him up with a job in Silicon Valley, and offered to sell us a mobile home on payments, so we packed a few bags and a couple of boxes and flew Braniff Airlines to San Francisco. Of note here is that on our way, we had a layover in Dallas, the first time I’d ever set foot in Texas. Little did I know what the future held for me.

Koji and I were very young when we married, and over the course of our 15 year marriage, we slowly became more close friends than spouses. We had a child together, but we didn’t share a bedroom any more, and ultimately, we decided to split. We did 50/50 custody of our child, and remained very good friends, and still are close friends 25 years after our divorce. Not a lot of folks can say that about their ex, but Koji and I can. Our kid has always said they were the luckiest divorced kid they knew of, because we did not fight and hate each other and stick the kid in the middle.

I met my second husband online. He was Australian. I was head over heels for this man and wrapped my entire existence around him. We married, applied for his green card, and what do you know, he married me solely for that green card. Asshole is putting it mildly.

I was so wrapped up in this man that I had a major breakdown when he split. I attempted suicide with an overdose of anti-depressants and spent several months in the hospital getting my head back together. 

When I got out of the hospital, I turned on ICQ, an obsolete internet messaging system, and my friend Jonathan told me that people on IRC (a chatting system) were wondering where I was. I decided it was time to log in there, did so, and went to my old favorite channel, Callahans, which was based on Spider Robinson’s Callahan’s Cross-Time Saloon book series. (Shared pain is lessened, shared joy is increased. Thus do we refute entropy.)

In the chat room I met Nilptr, a graduate student in Texas, widower with three kids ranging from six years old to twelve, lonely, depressed, intelligent, funny, and caring. We wound up talking on the phone one night, and after that we spent every night for hours on the phone, falling in love. He first said I love you on April 18, 2004, and I said it right back. May 22, he came to California to meet me. And in August, he came back to help me pack my shit and bring me to Texas. That was all 21 years ago. Wednesday will be our 21st wedding anniversary.

After we had been in Texas for about two months, the kids came to me one day and asked if they could call me their mother, and refer to me as Ma. My heart melted. I can never seem to remember that these kids share no DNA with me, I love them as if they had grown in my belly, not just in my heart. They, and their father, are my world.

And that, dear readers, is how I met my husband and a Boston and San Francisco liberal ended up in OhFuckMe, Texas.

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Hypocrites, Liars, Charlatans, and Sheep

I’ll never forget the January when the headlines were all full of Oral Roberts telling his followers that Gawd A’Mighty had TOLD him that if he didn’t raise $8 million dollars by March, then God would strike Brutha Oral down and kill him.

Because GAWD really needed Oral to have another fucking Rolls Royce, right?

And his idiot sheep followers bought it. Jim Bakker’s followers STILL buy it when that absolute criminal says Gawd told him such and so. Jimmy Swaggart. Pat Robertson, Creflo Dollar, Benny Hinn, they all have a red phone on their desk and Gawd calls them on the regular, or so they say. And the people who follow them just eat that shit up.

Terry Pratchett said, in his book Small Gods, “The merest accident of microgeography had meant that the first man to hear the voice of Om, and who gave Om his view of humans, was a shepherd and not a goatherd. They have quite different ways of looking at the world, and the whole of history might have been different. For sheep are stupid, and have to be driven. But goats are intelligent, and need to be led.”

I’d far rather be the goat that I am, instead of a sheep being driven into stupidity and hypocrisy.

In the Holly Bibbly, Jeebus explains the grave consequences of being a false prophet: “Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them. Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and in your name perform many miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’” (Matthew 7:19–23).

I mean, the Holly Bibbly is a complete work of fiction, but all of the people following these false prophets despite what their Lard and LifeSaver said about it, OBVIOUSLY don’t know their Bibbly very well. They are Cafeteria Christians, picking and choosing what parts of the Bible to agree with.

Here’s some more Bibbly poop that these self-avowed Christians don’t bother to pay attention to. It’s from the book of Matthew, chapter 25, verses 31-46. My paste is from the NIV.

31 “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his glorious throne. 

32 All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 

33 He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left. Heaven FORBID those self-righteous piss gargling fuckwads ever actually HELP other human beings.

34 “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 

35 For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, 

36 I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

37 “Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 

38 When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? 3

9 When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’

40 “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’

41 “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 

42 For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 

43 I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’

44 “They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’

45 “He will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’

46 “Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.

If, as they believe, there is a hell, I will be the one dancing on red hot coals when they arrive, and laughing in their faces. Me and Ozzy Osbourne and Sid Vicious.

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#RELIGIOUS-STUFF

#RANDOM-RANTS

#BIBLE

#WRITING

#SOCIAL-JUSTICE

Christian Stupidity

 

Some psycho nutter on WP thinks a prayer is going to protect somebody from a fucking bullet.

They truly are stupid. And fairly illiterate, as well.

When I originally posted this one on WordPress, this nutto Jesus freak stalker read it and decided I was threatening to shoot her. WTF?

And people wonder why I'm an atheist. To quote Gandhi:

"I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ."

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#RELIGIOUS-STUFF

#LOL

#INTERNET

#WTF

#CHRISTIANITY

Image is a screenshot of a blog comment. It reads as follows, any typos and grammatical errors are the commenter's, not mine:
"Dont worry if he wants to shoot your son tell him to put that gun down in jesus name and god will take it from there and remind the devel in case he forgot god has already defeated him."

You Wouldn't Tell a Diabetic to "Cheer Up": The Truth About Mental Illness and Meds

Listen, we need to have a real talk about how we view mental health. We’ve got this stupid, old-school idea that a broken arm is a medical issue, but a broken brain is a character flaw. That’s just some bullshit we need to get rid of. The reality is, mental health conditions are legit medical conditions, and treating them is just as valid as treating anything else that's gone wrong with your body.

Think about it this way: when your body can't produce enough insulin, no one tells you to just "cheer up" or "try harder." You see a doctor, and they prescribe insulin because your body needs it to function correctly. It’s a physical problem, so we treat it with a physical solution. It's that simple.

Well, guess what? The same damn principle applies to your mental health. Many psychiatric conditions aren't just in your head; they have a biological basis. Conditions like depression, anxiety, and bipolar disorder are often tied to imbalances in brain chemistry, genetics, and other biological factors. Your brain is an organ, just like your pancreas or your heart, and sometimes it needs a little help to work right. Taking medication for it is not a sign of weakness; it's a sign that you are taking your health seriously.

The goal, whether for a physical or mental health condition, is the same: to correct an underlying biological issue so you can live a longer, healthier, and more functional life. When you get the right help, you’re not just feeling better; you’re treating a valid medical condition. The World Health Organization has reported that over a billion people live with mental health conditions. So, if you wouldn’t tell a diabetic to just deal with it, don’t be a dick about someone else taking care of their mental health.

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#MENTAL-HEALTH

#DISABILITY

#SOCIAL-JUSTICE

#ILLNESS

#SCIENCE

The Soul-Sucking Circus of House Training

Let’s talk about the fucking soul-sucking circus that is house training a new puppy. You think you’re getting a furry bundle of joy; what you actually get is a four-legged chaos gremlin with the bladder control of a drunk toddler and the moral compass of a raccoon.

Day one, you’re optimistic. You’ve got treats, potty pads, a schedule, and the delusional belief that consistency equals success. Spoiler: it doesn't. That puppy will look you dead in the fucking eye, squat on your rug, and wag its tail like it just solved world fucking peace.

You take them outside every 20 minutes. They sniff, they frolic, they eat a leaf, they do everything except piss. Then you bring them inside and boom, a piss tsunami on your hardwoods. You Google “puppy training tips” while scrubbing your floor with tears and vinegar.

Nighttime? Oh, you thought sleep was still a thing? Fuck no. You’re now on the 3 a.m. potty patrol, standing barefoot in your yard while your puppy chases a moth and forgets why you're out there. Meanwhile, your neighbors think you’ve joined a cult.

And don’t even start with crate training. The crate is supposed to be their safe space; instead, it's a padded cell where they scream like banshees and shit defiantly in protest. You clean it up, they do it again. It's a fucking hostage situation and you’re the one negotiating with liver treats.

Eventually, you get a win. They pee outside. You cheer like they just graduated college. You post about it. You believe the tide is turning. Then they take a shit behind your couch while maintaining eye contact. That’s not an accident; that’s a declaration of war.

House training a puppy isn’t a bonding experience; it’s a psychological endurance test. You will question your life choices. You will cry in your laundry room. You will say “good boy” through gritted teeth while holding a bag of warm regret.

But one day, they’ll sit by the door, tail wagging, waiting to go out. You’ll take them, they’ll pop a successful squat, and you’ll feel like you’ve fucking conquered Everest. Until then, stock up on paper towels, wine, and whatever shred of sanity you’ve got left.

And let's not EVEN fucking talk about how fucking impossible it is to house break a goddam small dog. Shit demons, piss fountains. And they eat cat shit, too.

Welcome to the shitshow. You’re doing great. Probably.

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#DOGS 

#GRIPE

#FAILURE

I Tried to Kill My Sister With a Condiment. It Was Worth It

Thinking back on the time I was alone at the dinner table when I was 5 or 6, and the food was on it. It was hamburgers, and I grabbed the ketchup and put some on my sister’s burger, then I added a HELL of a lot of Tabasco.

When they came to dinner, I said to big sister that I had fixed her burger for her, all sweetness and light. She thanked me, took a big bite, and began choking and crying. As I recall, I got away with it, the adults thinking I didn’t know Tabasco would burn her tongue.

Little did they know that I was an evil little shit, getting a little revenge on my big sister who would dig her fingernails into my forearm when she was mad at me!

My sister and I are MUCH nicer to each other now. At some point around the time our father died, we called a general truce, and while there have been spats over the years, either one of us would drop everything to help the other out of a bad spot.

Nobody knows you like your sibling that grew up in the same home environment with you. Nobody understands the forces that made you like your sibling. Treasure them.

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#CHILDHOOD
#CRUELTY
#FUNNY
#JOKE

My Many Dogs

Connor (brown) and Romeo (black and tan)

I’ve had a lot of dogs in my life. I am a total dog person. Here’s the rundown:

I have had: Flockie-dachshund, Heidi-Brittany spaniel mix, Ollie-St. Bernard/Old English sheep dog mix, Kate-lab mix, Indy-pit/rott/dobie/lab, Bear-lab/sharpei, Molly-chihuahua, Murphy-mini poodle, Lulu-dachshund, Cubby-lab/shitzu mix, Connor-chiweenie, Rocco-chihuahua/Jack Russell terrier, and Romeo-chiweenie. 

That’s thirteen. All rescues, except Flockie, who was a pedigree dachshund who belonged to my Dad’s girlfriend. Flockie was four when she came to live with us, and I was four also. She died when we were both 14.

I only ever had to rehome a dog once, Indy, because he was reactive, and I had a small child. My friend Caroline took him and gave him a wonderful life and I saw him regularly.

My current dogs are Cubby, Connor, Rocco, and Romeo. They are velcro, where I am, there they are. Especially Romeo.

Absolutely love my dogs, every last one of them.

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#DOGS
#HAPPINESS
#JOY
#LOVE
#WHINE

Ollie the Wonder Dog

 

I would like to tell you about my second dog, Ollie.

We got Ollie when I was 7 years old. (I am sixty now, not that that is relevant). He was an 8 month old St Bernard/Old English Sheepdog mix, and just gorgeous.

We lived on Mission Hill in Roxbury, Massachusetts at that time, then a year later, moved to North Cambridge, MA, and eventually to Cambridgeport. Ollie moved with us every time. He was my velcro dog. He went with me everywhere. We wandered the neighborhoods, went to the candy stores, he used to walk me to and from school every day, although he didn’t just wait for me at the schoolyard, he would do his doggy thing until his internal clock said it was time for school to let out.

When I was 12, Ollie disappeared. We looked and looked, advertised, but we just couldn’t find him. Ten months later, an emaciated, filthy, tired, matted up dog turned up at our door. The pads of his feet were raw, and we figured out that he had probably been stolen and escaped and had a very long trek to get back hom, but come back home he did, and from then on was known as Ollie the Wonder Dog.

Ollie died when I was 19. I still miss him and always will. He was one of those dogs of a lifetime that you just never forget. He was my buddy, my best friend, my soul mate. He was Ollie the Wonder Dog.

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#DOGS

#CHILDHOOD
#LOVE

I Asked My AI to ID a Barbarian and It Had a Full Existential Breakdown

 Buried in my image folder, somewhere between screenshots of WordPress drama and cursed casserole memes, lives a photo. Two people dressed like they escaped a Renaissance fair sponsored by Axe body spray, posing in a jungle with the intensity of a shampoo commercial gone feral.

I asked my AI to identify the movie. Simple task. Or so I thought.

It guessed The Barbarians. Wrong. She. Wrong. Deathstalker II. Wrong and skinny. Ironmaster. Wrong and Italian. It threw out names like Sam Pasco, Richard Hill, and John Terlesky like it was speed-dating through the sword-and-sorcery genre. Each guess more confident, more incorrect, more tragic.

Eventually, it gave up. Fully admitted defeat. No more loincloth lies. Just raw, unfiltered honesty: “I don’t know.”

And honestly, that’s legacy-worthy. Because sometimes the mystery is better than the answer. Sometimes the unnamed barbarian is every bad fantasy trope rolled into one. The abs, the fur, the vacant stare. He’s the ghost of VHS past. He’s the reason I teach my kids media literacy and sarcasm.

So I’m archiving this image. Not because I solved it, but because I didn’t. Because even my AI, trained on the internet’s deepest chaos, couldn’t crack it. And that’s beautiful.

If you recognize this man, this moment, this cinematic fever dream, don’t tell me. Let him remain the Abs of Mystery. Let him haunt the jungle of my blog forever.

Or wait, maybe you SHOULD fucking tell me. God, I'm so conflicted!

When you skip character development and go straight to abs and aggression. Starring: Generic Barbarian #666 and his emotional support sword.

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#APPS

#COMPUTERS

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#MOVIES
#WTF