Loosely Speaking

By Ciel - About Me - E-mail this page - Add to My Favorites - Add to Blog List - See other blogs in Everything Else

Saturday, July 3, 2010

Hairy legs?

Now what's all this fuss about fuzz? Among the things I don't pay much attention to are the ups and downs of fashion and style. So the other day was the first I heard of what seems to be a burning cultural question nowadays: Must a woman shave her legs and armpits to be acceptible in society? What does the world--by which, of course, I mean Western society-- believe of a woman with hair on her legs? Or armpits with little natural tufts of hair? I can't help thinking that this is one of the areas... Sign in to see full entry.

Wednesday, June 23, 2010

Like majroj today... shaking my head...

So.. in casual, unguarded moments, in what should have been off-the-record disclaimed, but was not, trash was talked, frustration aired, exasperation expressed... personal opinions opined aloud, and clever dicks made clever quips... And thus another general falls from grace, this one the one who it seems could talk to our allies where others have miserably failed. I shake my head because I don't know the whole story, not a one of us out here has but indignant emotional bits of drama and facts... Sign in to see full entry.

Wednesday, May 19, 2010

thinking of Afghanistan...

As I have done further research on Afghanistan because a friend of mine is there, besides our own Souljacker here on Blogit, I am much more deeply appreciative that everyone out there is a hero. The more I find out of how things really are, the more evident it is that we have some of the very best trained and equipped military on the ground... that the US and NATO presence is more appreciated by locals than the news tends to report. That despite the great frustations and failures to bring change... Sign in to see full entry.

Friday, May 7, 2010

Responding to Naut's comment:

Wow, that is a lot of words, a lot of stuff it takes someone with more than a BA in Anthro and almost(within a couple of credit hours) in earth science 30 years ago to really grasp. What I observe is that the sea ice is melting, which does not affect sea levels, and that land-covering icepack is melting, which does. All the ice melt desalinizes the northern waters. These waters, lightened by the desalinization, become slower to sink to the ocean floor, there at the northern extremity of the... Sign in to see full entry.

Thursday, May 6, 2010

Waking up, smelling the coffee...

Suddenly it's Thursday... Sunshine is coming through the curtains, and someone promised me something approaching warmth in the weather today. Warmth in the 60s Farenheit. Long, slow spring this year. I have a couple of friends who live north of the border who are maybe dealing with snow again this morning and looking knowingly at each other, casting my way a raised eye-brow, that look of 'some people just can't see Truth even when they are shoveling off their doorstep.' These two don't believe... Sign in to see full entry.

Wednesday, April 7, 2010

A response to Naut and others regarding Jerusalem

No matter how well Israel manages Jerusalem, there will always be the full range of the opposed, from the political detractors who are essentially simply anti-semitic to the all-out extremists who have sworn on the blood of their parents and children not to cease their efforts until Israel is driven into the sea. Israel has its extremists, too, without a doubt, but it is essentially a civil society which the cultural ideal of tolerance makes possible. Patience, compromise and good-faith are the... Sign in to see full entry.

Monday, March 29, 2010

Darwin Awards nominee

Imagine a kid on a bus tour who is someday, a likely winner of this anti-prestigious award. Because he is over 18, this hypothetical young fellow, he fancies himself a Man, and expects the rest of the world to respect that, to give over the honors and kowtows he feels entitled to by having survived this long. He is a petulant emotional bully to his father who was also along on the trip, and a wonder of cynical 'wisdom' as only a benighted adolescent can be. Also typically of the type, he never... Sign in to see full entry.

Monday, March 15, 2010

This one's for Pat

Pioneer Cafe, Montana Morning Ladies of a certain age, girls no more except in the heart: What Life has given you have taken despite the dreams you had, despite intentions and resistance; Age acquiring resilience for survival's sake when life is hard or dull beyond endurance. Power in the circle around the cafe table every morning every day except Sundays, maybe: Ladies, old and aging socializing despite, because of Life; finding, making, sharing power 'round this table... and resilience,... Sign in to see full entry.

Wednesday, March 10, 2010

Disasters... not all that natural...

The earthquakes in Haiti, Chile and Turkey... Hurricane K in New Orleans... Dense fogs and driving rains and 70-car pile-ups... Nature does what it does. It isn't doing anything new. The disasters are not of nature but of our own unreadiness for the predictable, the inevitable. Where are the common sense and foresight to be prepared? What if the billions of recovery dollars going to Haiti now had gone years ago, to break the poverty there, and to build properly, to preserve human life and... Sign in to see full entry.

Tuesday, February 23, 2010

peaceWorks

A few years ago, there was an organization started locally to promote peace. It lasted a while with its founder, but she left the area and put it in the hands of her second, who strove to keep it going. I connected with her and this fledgling effort at about the time she, working pretty much alone, was close to burn-out. That was 1988. We worked together on it, held some public meetings, wrote up a flyer, started a newsletter and did a few consciousness-raising projects around the state. The... Sign in to see full entry.

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