Oh, pooh.

I started reading The Complete Idiot's Guide to Music Composition yesterday (I finished The Year of Living Biblically in less than two days) but the author kept reiterating that it's important to have a good grasp of musical theory. I'm pretty good when it comes to playing or singing music, but when it comes to terms I may or may not have come across in my performances, or the names of scales or chords, overall, my musical education is spotty, at best.

So, I've decided that, before I read The Complete Idiot's Guide to Music Composition, I need to buy and read The Complete Idiot's Guide to Music Theory.

So, instead of that book, I'm going to be reading the Buffy RPG option manuals (Slayer's Handbook, Monster Smackdown, and the Angel RPG corebook) which I ordered through the Haven and got this evening. I read the first chapter of Monster Smackdown while I was at the Haven earlier, but I haven't decided whether to read straight through, or go on to the first chapter of the Slayer's Handbook, then go on the the Angel RPG book, and keep rotating until they're all finished. I also ordered The Magic Box, but it's on back-order, so it won't come in for another few weeks.

They're having lasagna for dinner downstairs, but I ate Five Guys at the Haven, which kinda makes me sad, since I love lasagna. But then again, I'm not sure I could handle all the extra cheese my dad puts on his lasagna right now anyway. There should be leftovers though, so I'll probably take some to work for lunch tomorrow.

A mini-rant/essay

While I've been reading A. J. Jacobs's The Year of Living Biblically, I've come across a lot of really good quotes that I wish I had written down at the time so that I could use them as e-mail signatures and stuff.

There are likewise a few things that have rubbed me the wrong way. For instance, this particular bit from Month Nine: May. He was talking to a pastor from Jerry Falwell's church down south named Tom:

"Yes, homosexuality is an abomination," says Tom. "But I'm a sinner too. We're all sinners. You just have to love them."

This is a pretty mild stance--the hate-the-sin, not-the-sinner idea. I'm guessing he
toned the rhetoric down for his Northeastern Jewish audience of one. But, still, I find this stance intolerant in its own way. It's like saying that we should love Jesse Jackson, except for the fact that he's black.

This, to me, is flawed logic. Jacobs is equating a person's race to his chosen sexual orientation, which is a broken comparison.

People are born with certain racial traits--for instance, I have very light skin, high cheekbones, a somewhat-distinctive facial structure, and other physical traits which show that I come from a mostly-Dutch (that's Netherlands Dutch, not Pennsylvania Dutch, which is actually German anyway) heritage--the other half of me is kind of a hodge-podge. This collection of physical traits that mark a person's heritage are a given--they're born that way and only plastic surgery (which I won't get into a rant about now . . . maybe later) can change them.

Homosexuality, on the other hand, is completely different. It's all behavior to me. A person chooses to only have romantic relationships with someone of their own gender--whether they're physically attracted to the same gender or not, the relationship is not forced upon them, and I just do not (and in some ways cannot) believe that they are born to be homosexual. That's not to say that I scorn people who have same-sex relationships--one of the girls at my work is a lesbian, and she's totally cool as a person--I just don't believe in their lifestyle choices.

I'm not going to try to change their minds for them, but I'm also not going to start looking at women as potential romantic partners, and I'm certainly not going to teach my future children that it's okay to have sex with their own gender either. I will, however, teach them to befriend all the people who will let them, and love all of those friends equally, whether they agree with their lifestyle choices or not.

On the scale of complete and utter bigotry versus extreme over-tolerance, I'd say this viewpoint is closer to the middle, and slightly to the tolerance side. "Intolerant" is just too strong a word for the "hate-the-sin, not-the-sinner" idea. A person's chosen lifestyle does not equal their identity; it's just the way they choose to behave.

R. I. P. Oreo

Today, Oreo, my brother's panda hamster, died. She's had a tumor of some sort in her leg area for months, and there just hasn't been money available to take her to the vet and find out what it was. At first, they thought she'd just been stung by a wasp or something, but it didn't go away, and eventually got so big she couldn't even crawl through the tunnel off-shoots on her cage.

As I type this, Jason and the others have found a box to put her in, and they're working on getting her in there; they'll probably bury her out back next to O'Malley.

On a not-so-morbid note: Kayla's uncle Stephen (or Steven) has left the house to go back to her other uncle, Peter's, house until New Year's, when he and his mother (Kayla's maternal grandmother) will be going back home to Alabama.

Yesterday, I took Anna to Miyako for a late lunch/early dinner. It was yummy. Anna got the steak and shrimp combo, and I got the steak and chicken combo. We both also got fried rice. I love the soup and salad they serve before the hibachi chef comes out too--Anna gave me her mushrooms from the soup, but even just the broth is to die for.

In the next week or so, I'm going to take Kimba to Outback one evening, and Kayla to Ruby Tuesday.

What spurred this whole "Take each family member to a nice restaurant" thing? Mostly, I was craving a bloomin' onion, but I didn't want to take all of them to Outback, since I also wanted to go to places like Ruby Tuesday, Miyako and Brewer's Alley. So I decided that this month, I'm going to take Kimba, Anna and Kayla for individual meals, and then next month (or next month, going into the month after) I'll take Dad, Mom and Jason. I haven't decided yet whether to take Mom and Dad at the same time, or individually like everybody else though.

Anyway, after our lunch/dinner, Anna and I walked around the mall (we'd gone to the Miyako at FSK instead of Patrick Street, since Kayla, Jason and Stephen asked us to drop them off at the good theater on our way to the restaurant) and I got my shoes for her wedding. We also stopped by the calendar kiosk outside of Barnes & Noble, since I needed a 2009 calendar to keep track of things at work, and I decided to get a calendar for everyone else too. I bought one called "Solitudes" for work, which is basically scenery--pretty, but not distracting.

I got Anna a Crossword-a-Day tear-off desk calendar, and Jason got a Fold-a-Day paper airplane calendar. Kimba was given an Audrey Hepburn theme, Mom got Magic Eye, and Kayla got Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I also got two other calendars: M.C. Escher and Dragons. I gave Stephen a choice as to which one he wanted; he chose the Escher calendar, so I gave the dragons to Dad.

I read What Would MacGyver Do? yesterday--it was hilarious, ingenious, and a quick read. One of the people who contributed a story to it actually wrote the book I'm currently reading: The Year of Living Biblically: One Man's Humble Quest to Follow the Bible--as Literally as Possible.

In the story, he wrote about his first book, The Know-It-All, a memoir about reading the Encyclopedia Britannica from A-Z, and how he was petrified of being quizzed at signings. So, he tried to cram-study for weeks, but then realized that he could "MacGyver" a solution--if he didn't know the exact answer to a specific question, he'd give an answer that was related to the subject, but interesting enough so that the questioner didn't realize he hadn't answerd their original question. I've gotten through Month Two of his book, and it's fascinating so far--funny at times, serious and introspective in others.

When I first heard of the book, I thought I'd hate it, then Gene told me a bit about it, and it sounded at least fun. Now I'm reading it, and it's so much more than that--the guy really is at least trying to live a better life by following the Bible. He hasn't changed much yet, but he's already noticed some changes he's had that are more than the obvious physical ones. Like he's noticed that he (or rather, his biblical alter-ego "Jacob") is more careful about what he says, and is somewhat repulsed by certain things he wouldn't have thought twice about before.

He doesn't see "Jacob" as himself yet, but I think his two "personalities" might merge by the end of the year. Not sure yet if I'm going to read another month's worth tonight or not, but I'll definitely pick it up again tomorrow. I want to finish at least this book, if not this one and the Complete Idiot's Guide to Music Composition by 11:59:59 p.m. on New Year's Eve.

Christmas

Christmas, overall, was good.

Kayla's uncle Steven (or is it Stephen?) is visiting Maryland, so he's spent Christmas Eve and Day with us so far. After we opened gifts yesterday morning, we went to Grandma's house for the usual gift opening there, and--something new--Christmas Brunch. I guess they decided not to deal with the hassel of a full-on sit-down Christmas dinner.

Mom, Dad and I left earlier than everyone else, and I spent the extra time between our getting home and dinner time finishing Dragons of Winter Night and reading the book Grandma wrote about herself. There was much distraction--I kept getting fascinated by Jason's Erector set. I've also decided that I'm not going to read Dragons of Spring Dawning, etc, unless I have nothing else more interesting or new to read.

Dinner was breakfast, since the brunch wasn't all that. Then, we all played Halo--well, Dad, Anna, Tim, Kayla, Stephen and I did anyway--Kimba and Mom don't do video games, and Jason's grounded until tomorrow. Around eleven, I decided to stop and take a shower before heading upstairs to relax a bit before bedtime.

Gifts I Gave (and the people I gave them to):

• Jason: Gryffindor silk tie and lambswool scarf set
• Kayla: Guitar Hero Aerosmith for PS2
• Anna: An authentic replica of Lucius Malfoy's walking stick/wand
• Kimba: A "teaching bag" (as she calls it) with her name on it, and Travel Scrabble
• Dad: A digital photo frame, with 13 pictures of the family and special occasions (such as senior class pics, Mom & Dad's wedding, and graduations)
• Mom: Two pair of jeans in size 10Long, since she fits my size jeans now

Gifts I Received (I can never remember who gave me what, but anything with a * is something that was on my list):

• Electronic Phase 10
• Sudoku the board game
• The Story of My Life by Grandma S. (the book about her that I talked about earlier)
• A book of wide-staff musical manuscript paper*
• What Would MacGyver Do?
• The Year of Living Biblically
• The Complete Idiot's Guide to Musical Composition*

Hilarious, Aunt Julie!

Go read the first few paragraphs of my Aunt Julie's blog post about wrapping paper. You won't be sorry!

I remembered some!

Last night's dream was rather interesting. I don't remember enough of it to write a story or anything, but I do remember some fun details.

I was back in that place that looks suspiciously like Scottsdale, only there were hills and bunches of staircases, and I think I was there for some sort of convention or something. I was in my roller skates, just going around the neighborhood with someone who I think was actually my Grandpa S, and someone else--I can't remember who, but they were around my age, I think.

We got to this place where three staircases met--or maybe it was two staircases, and the hill I'd just gone up--and one of the staircases was so steep, I couldn't even see half of each riser from the top. So I turned to the other staircase, which wasn't much better, and walked my skates down.

We finally found someone else from the convention thing, and he said that it was time for whatever meeting we were going to (we'd been out and about just to kill time until it started), so I asked "Grandpa" to have someone bring me my shoes, since I was kind of leery about going all the way back the way we'd come in my skates.

When I got to the place for the meeting, the other two were already there, so I just sat down in the back with them to listen. Shortly after that, I woke up.

I keep thinking . . .

. . . that my dreams would make great stories--if I could remember more than a few interesting details, that is. Especially the last few nights, since I'm pretty sure that at least last night's dream had *shock* a plot! If only I could remember a whole dream long enough to write it down, or at least jot a few notes for an outline. Then maybe I'd have a bestseller--or at least a published novel or something.

Yoinked from Aunt Julie's Blog (I'm waaaaaaaaaaay behind.)

Happy Birthday, Heather! (And various wedding-like details.)

Today is Heather's birthday! Yay, Heather!

Now, on to our not-so-regularly scheduled blog entry:

Sunday, Anna, Kimba and I went to David's Bridal so that Kimba and I (and Liz F.) could try on bridesmaid dresses. We decided on this dress, with a bolero jacket, in apple for me and Liz and black for Kimba (since she's the maid of honor, and Anna wanted different colors--her bridal colors are black and apple). The jacket only comes in white, since that style's technically a bridal style, but we liked it, since it's an outdoor winter wedding anyway.

Luckily, we were able to pay for and order the dresses in our sizes on Sunday, because the lady who helped us said that delivery time was looking like the end of January. Considering the wedding is February 16th, we'd've been cutting it kinda close if we hadn't bought them there and then. We'll have to go back for first and second fittings--one to have the alterations lady pin them and such, and one to make sure the altered gowns actually fit right.

As an aside, I never really understood the need for more than one bridesmaid--I mean, all the extra ones do is just stand there in their dresses and look pretty, right? The maid of honor at least has some sort of "job" to do during the ceremony. I can understand wanting to appease certain female family members and/or friends, but it's not their wedding anyway.

If/when I ever get married, I'm going to have one bridesmaid, my groom will have one best man, and we will invite our immediate family, specific family members who we are closest to, and our bestest best friends. Everyone else will get announcements only, and possibly invitations to the reception. I'm talking super-duper-small wedding.

Anyway, back on course.

We also got to see Anna in her wedding dress while we were in the shop, since she had just made her final payment on it and had to get the alterations pinned. I'm not going to link to a picture of the dress today, since there's no telling who actually reads this blog, and it's "bad" for certain people to see the dress before the wedding, after all.

Pay day (and the company Christmas party) is tomorrow. Yay! I can finish my Christmas shopping! And start paying off my Discover card (which is how I paid for that gown).

Christmas Questions (Yoinked from Heather's LJ)

1. Wrapping paper or gift bags? Wrapping paper--gift bags are just lazy (unless you don't have an appropriate sized box to put a gift in, then a bag is okay), and the holidays are about taking the effort and time to show a person you care.
2. Real tree or Artificial? Ours is artificial, but we've had a real one before--I get headaches if a real tree is in a small, enclosed house though.
3. When do you put up the tree? Usually Thanksgiving day, either during or after the Macy's parade.
4. Do you like eggnog? Yup, but recently I haven't been able to drink it without it cut in half with milk.
5. Favorite gift received as a child? Of the few I can remember, I'd have to say my favorite was the journal my grandma gave me when I was five--it was the first of many.
6. Hardest person to buy for? My dad--he tells us some things that he wants, but we can't always afford them even if we really want to get them for him, so I usually end up getting him things that aren't really what I want to get for him.
7. Easiest person to buy for? Anna--all I have to do is walk in the mall, or look in a catalogue, and I see so many things that are just "Totally Anna."
8. Do you have a nativity scene? Yes. My mom made one out of plastic canvas years ago, and I got a glass one for Christmas a few years back myself.
9. Mail or email Christmas cards? Neither--I've never been a Christmas card sender. But if I was, I'd mail them.
10. Worst Christmas gift you ever received? Don't remember.
11. Favorite Christmas Movie? The Patrick Stewart version of A Christmas Carol
12. When do you start shopping? As soon as I can. I even bought a gift for Anna way back in September once. But I usually keep it to the last 2-3 paychecks before the actual holiday--around Thanksgiving.
13. Have you ever recycled a Christmas present? Not that I remember.
14. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas? Dinner in general--Gourmette (cook stuff on the table, bite by bite) specifically.
15. Lights on the tree? Of course, no lights on the tree is just stupid--you can't see the ornaments well without them.
16. Favorite Christmas song? O Holy Night
17. Travel at Christmas or stay home? Stay home, since my immediate family is all in the area anyway.
18. Can you name all of Santa's reindeer's? Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner, Blitzen, Rudolph.
19. Angel on the tree top or a star? Neither--we have a spire-type thing.
20. Open the presents Christmas Eve or morning? Christmas morning usually, unless someone's bought us pajamas and wants us to wear them to bed on Christmas Eve, or there's a gift that's specifically meant to be opened on Christmas Eve.
21. Most annoying thing about this time of the year? The commercialism--I especially hate the song "Santa Baby."
22. Favorite ornament theme or color? Silver and blue bulbs and beads, white lights, and the tree topper spire thing.
23. Favorite for Christmas dinner? Gourmette.
24. What do you want for Christmas this year? A few For Dummies books, some wide-staff musical manuscript paper, and a new laptop.
25. Who do I tag? Anyone who feels like filling this out!

Ending Thought:"Whose life is better because you woke up today?" Dunno.

Random Stuff

Not much to tell--life's going on as usual here in good ol' Fredneck, USA.

Last Friday, one of the guys at the Haven showed me the player's handbook for an RPG called Paranoia. It's really kooky, and looks totally interesting. I'll probably play once they get a game going, since he said that they're most likely going to be playing on Tuesday evenings and I've got those free.

I've done most of my Christmas shopping as of Saturday. Just have to get a gift for Dad, which will have to wait until next Friday, as I am out of money again.

I had an interesting dream last night, which was actually interrupted by the alarm clock--that hasn't happened in a while, since I usually end up trying to stay asleep for at least an hour before the alarm goes off. I don't remember most of the dream, but I know it was set somewhere which looked suspiciously like Scottsdale, AZ.

Four-Day Weekend

I started my Christmas shopping on either Tuesday or Wednesday evening. I'm not typing what I got in here though, since I know at least one person whose gift I bought actually reads this blog.

Thursday was okay. Dinner preparation was mostly hitch-less. I had to get Anna to help me slice the cabbage, because there's no way I would have been able to get it that thin--I'm more of a thick-slice gal.

Grandma, Aunt Tammy, Aunt Peggy, Uncle Dan, Michael and Katrina came over for dinner. We were supposed to have missionaries over too (we were the ones who'd actually signed up on their dinner calendar for Thanksgiving dinner), but apparently they had three other invitations not on the calendar. They didn't show up at all--not even for dessert.

I was feeling kind of ill during dinner, which was kind of aggravated by not having any real support for my upper back/head while I sat at the table (I had a folding chair). The result was not fun, or pretty. But at least it didn't get on the floor. I was not allowed to have pie until Friday. :(

After dinner, Aunt Barbara dropped off C.J. and Danielle, and we watched Get Smart, then when the younger kids went to bed (and Kimba left) the rest of us watched Wall-E. Both were good movies.

Friday was pretty much a lazy day all around.

Saturday, I alternated reading with updating my iPod with new music. My current iTunes library has 2,536 audio files on it, and my external hard drive (and some other CDs) has even more files which I haven't transferred over because I'm not going to be listening to them anytime really soon. I just barely got started with the updating on Saturday before I decided to let it go for the night.

Sunday, I finished the iPod update, including three songs which I bought from iTunes because Kayla hadn't downloaded them when she used my iTunes and I wanted them. I got "Truly Madly Deeply" by Savage Garden, "Rev 22:20" by Puscifier, and "Not Ready to Make Nice" by the Dixie Chicks. Including those three songs, I have over 1,000 audio files (I'd say "songs," but I've also got Dutch language stuff) on my iPod.

It took the better part of the day (at least eight hours) to pick out the songs I wanted on the iPod, but I managed to fill all but about twelve megabites of my 4-gig iPod Nano. A lot of the songs on there were old when I was in school, so they're practically ancient songs now (like the Beach Boys songs). Some are relatively new, like the Hannah Montana stuff.