I am part of a blogging force of extraordinary magnitude. Got that?

So don’t mess with me. Or my family.

Translation: I’m doing some blogging over at JunkYard Blog while See-Dub takes care of some stuff, you know, with the family. So be sure to check it out.

Bumper sticker seen this morning: that quote of Gandhi’s that says (unsourced at the Wiki), “I like your Christ. I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.”

Bumper sticker seen about two minutes afterward: “An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.”

Guess who said it?

But Gandhi wasn’t the first to repudiate “an eye for an eye.” Wait, if I think hard, I might get it.

Right, okay, Gandhi already stipulated that he admired Christ; it was his followers he had trouble with. Well, tell me something: Why is it that the people in our country today most strident against any form of religion even in public view, much less in the government, are some of the very people most strident in their demands for our government to act as Jesus said it would be best for individuals to act in their daily lives? You cannot remain an effective government if you allow individuals to tyrannize over other individuals, nor other governments to tyrannize over your own. Or, in select cases, over still other governments. It is simply not a feasible plan for the ordering of the globe.

Why are the biggest anti-religionists also frequently the biggest fans of complete nonviolence, no matter the harm it causes to people in either their own country or others?

Update: More tales of taking Jesus out of context:

Q: Is it morally meaningful for people who have no guilt to apologize to people who are not victims?”

A: No.

Kristin Bell has finally been photographed, sans Veronica Mars, wearing something cute for a change

Bonus Fug Girls: Celebrity children do grow up. And get fugged. I always think of Demi Moore and Bruce Willis’s kids as, well, little kids.

And I eat a lot of these:

You Are a Ham Sandwich

You are quiet, understated, and a great comfort to all of your friends. Over time, you have proven yourself as loyal and steadfast. And you are by no means boring. You do well in any situation – from fancy to laid back. Your best friend: The Turkey Sandwich Your mortal enemy: The Grilled Cheese Sandwich

My “best friend,” the turkey sandwich, is Venomous Kate’s “mortal enemy.” So look out, Kate, I’m comin’ in and bringin’ a few friends, if you know what I mean.

Here’s a little nibble for discussion. In Tolkien, everything good flows from (or to) the West. Mankind’s doomed Atlantis, Numenor, was there. Elvenhome, Valinor, remains there. One associates West, in Tolkien, with the home of the gods, as Valar and Maiar dwelt and visited there.

In Lewis, everything good flows from (or to) the East. The castle of Cair Paravel sits on the eastern seashore looking to the sunrise. Anybody who seeks Aslan’s Country sails east, as it is always from the East that the great Lion appears. One associates East, in Lewis, with the home of God.

Tolkien wrote his works slowly, with many revisions and much “niggling.” Lewis wrote his quickly and shipped them off to press. Tolkien was dismayed by his own tendency to procrastinate by playing solitaire. Lewis was the social center of their group of friends, always with a quip, anecdote, or new writing to read to the group. Tolkien was quieter and more serious–in fact disliked Lewis’s Narnia stories for their tendency to what he considered hodgepodge and inconsistency.

I submit the difference between their personalities is very strongly observed in the directional preferences of each. Tolkien looked forward to sunset, to rest, while Lewis preferred sunrise as renewal. Tolkien tended towards depressive, while Lewis may have been more continuously on the “up.”

It may be a minor point but is worth looking at–and could even partially explain the cooling of their friendship in later years. There’s only so long that “down”-westward-rest can tolerate “up”-eastward-new day dawning.

I crossed three of them today. I’m pretty beat, but home again to all the same clutter I left a month ago. Woo. Yay.

Why the devil have we been taking our shoes off all these years, then?

Update: And then there are the days when I wonder why terrorists haven’t simply started buying up flight attendants by the dozen. It seems to be a fertile field:

LEXINGTON, Ky. – A flight attendant appeared in court Monday to answer charges she was drinking alcohol on the job and told a captain “You’re dead” as she was removed from the plane.

All things considered I’d rather have them threatening the captain and getting themselves tossed off the plane rather than throwing their weight around to toss off the passengers.

H/t: “Unsupported Content Type” Ace.

…was yummy and a good way to use up summer garden produce. Of course, with two steaming pots on the stove, it helps if you have air conditioning, unlike my mother’s Midwestern kitchen, which this time of year feels like the tenth circle of hell, only sweatier. But it was worth it.

Zucchini Pomodoro

Four small-to-medium zucchini, chopped
Two small-to-medium onions, chopped
Two cloves of garlic, minced
Five medium-to-large tomatoes, preferably fresh from the garden, peeled, cored, and chopped
Two big handfuls of chopped flat-leaf parsley, basil, and purple-ruffle basil, proportions to taste
Olive oil, salt, and pepper
Optional: Boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into medallions, or Italian sausages, sliced
A pound or so of spaghetti, thin spaghetti, or linguine according to preference
Parmesan cheese, grated

Heat olive oil in large skillet over medium-high heat. Add garlic to the pan, and when it begins to sizzle, add onions and stir well. Add zucchini and stir-fry till crisp-tender, five to ten minutes. Season with salt and pepper. Pour veggies from skillet into bowl and set aside. Add a little more oil to the pan and pour in all your chopped tomatoes. Raise heat to high and bring to a boil. Let boil until juice reduces to the thickness you prefer, probably a minimum of twenty minutes. While tomatoes are boiling, add medium handful of herbs to both the tomato mixture and the zucchini mixture in the bowl. Stir both.

Heat water for pasta; saute chicken medallions in a little olive oil till lightly browned, or fry sausage rounds. Set meat aside.

When tomatoes have reduced to your preference, add zucchini mixture back in and stir. Cook till zucchinis are heated through. Turn off heat and stir in remaining fresh herbs. Set aside.

When pasta water is boiling, add pasta with salt and return to boil. Cook ten minutes; drain. Serve sauce over a bed of pasta with meat at the side. Sprinkle with parmesan.

If you prefer meatballs to chicken or sausage and don’t have a good recipe, my mother has a tasty one I can post.

Christa McAuliffe’s backup, teacher-turned-astronaut Barbara Morgan, blasted off aboard Endeavour this evening at 6:36 p.m. EDT. Extra cool: She is now a fully trained astronaut rather than a teacher and will help operate the robot arm for cargo transfer during the mission.

I couldn’t help wishing they had mothballed the shuttles after Columbia disintegrated, but it isn’t the American way to retire what we think we can fix. Space travelers and test pilots all sign up to take their chances with technology and God. Godspeed to the seven-person crew of Endeavour.

“Who would bother” with those who have left Islam and become rallying points for others who do so or wish to?

The attackers, “not of Dutch origin,” of Ehsan Jami, a Dutch politician who leads a group for those who have left the faith, that’s who. Jami has been attacked three times. He’s 22.

According to the Dutch news agency ANP, Mr Jami recently described the Prophet Muhammad in an interview as a “terrible man”.

The Committee for Ex-Muslims, which Mr Jami leads, aims to support former Muslims and lift taboos on domestic violence and violation of rights within Muslim communities. Similar organisations exist in Britain, Germany and Scandinavia.

H/t thelmajoy, who has also taken to fishing in Allah’s Barrel.

Slow blog because I’m on vacation, although not entirely–I brought an editing project with me because it’s freelance and I can’t exactly say, sorry, that project won’t get done until a month after I get back.

Here’s a sentence pulled from the current MS, a compilation of excerpts of the writings of women travelers up to the Victorian era (I’m not editing the excerpts, just the biographical information connecting and surrouding them. This one’s from an excerpt):

“Between Jalapa and Perote, and still more between Vera Cruz and Jalapa, the astonishing prodigality and unutterable magnificence of the tropical vegetation [are] perfectly overpowering!”

Find me another clause with that many words over three syllables that doesn’t need to be simplified. Listen to the way the syllables bounce around your brain as you read it. Pretty cool.

Update: Here’s a little portion of the biographical matter:

Matters with Chazal, Flora’s husband, had never been settled. She had not been able to get a divorce from him, in part because of a prolonged battle over child custody, and Flora had been campaigning for a change in the divorce laws. Shortly after Flora returned to France, her husband shot her in the back. The divorce was granted.

Crying over politics: When you have to show how much you care and are too dumb or too gutless to meet opposing viewpoints in argument.

H/t Allah’s House of Fish in a Barrel, because I’m on vacation, and who doesn’t like to fish on vacation?

Well, I don’t, actually, but why let that spoil a perfectly good piece of imagery?

Ace is sharing the toys.