Recently in rants Category

There is no shame in not driving the speed limit up the hill. You might not be comfy driving 55 in the mountains, we get that. Your car might not be CAPABLE of doing it, we get that too. It's cool; we still love you - that's why CalTrans made the turnouts and passing lanes.

HOWEVER....IF you are in this crowd, and you drive past the turnouts going 30 miles per hour with 15 cars behind you, and then speed up when we finally hit the passing lane so not everyone can get around you, that means you SUCK. You are a rude asshole who needs to DIAF. YOU are the asshat who causes accidents when people try to go around you because they are so damn frustrated that you refuse to do the polite thing and turn out. You aren't helping people to be more safe, you are being a jerk, and you need to get the fuck off our roads.

Love,
Your friends and neighbours who also have to share the road.
XOXOXOX

I have done it to myself again...I started drinking coffee at work again. I do this every couple of years when life starts to pile up on me at the office. I drink for a few months, then I realise how horrible it is for me, and quit all over again. It's a vicious cycle.

I am having one of those days at work today where I really want to throw my new established Dessie Coffee Cup through my monitor. Nothing's going right, servers don't want to keep doing their job, and I have had to pee for an hour and haven't had time. Sigh.

I talked about this in an earlier entry, the woman whose husband died in Afghanistan and the VA wouldn't allow a pentagram on his memorial. Turns out the Nevada Attourney General decided that the VA had no right to decide what goes on a State Memorial and said it was ok. Doesn't have any effect on National Cemeteries, but its a step in the right direction.

I have been thinking a lot about this since an incident at my wedding. For the six of you (yes, there are six now wheee!) that read this blog and don't already know, I am pagan, and so is Mister Dessie. When we started working on our wedding, we wanted to design something that wouldn't make the nice Christians coming to the wedding uncomfortable, but also stayed true to our beliefs. Overall, I think we did a decent job of it. The only thing that was overtly pagan there was a plate with a pentacle on the altar that was intended to hold the rings. No one was to see it but us.

Anyway, to make a long story short, a family friend saw said said pentacle, and freaked out entirely. We also had my father making cracks to friends about us sacrificing babies to Satan. Clearly, sacrificing infants to Satan is not part of my religious MO, and is not currently planned for addition. I hate crying babies, so it just wouldn't work out! :-P

Then, I look at stories like that of Roberta Stewart, who has been fighting with the Department of Veterans Affairs to get a plaque added to a local memorial for a husband with the symbol of his religion, a pentagram. Even atheists have a symbol approved by the VA, but not the pentagram.

I can kind of understand the way of thinking that generates these attitudes. Even though I know the true meaning of the pentagram as used by American Pagans, I still get a gut reaction of dread when I see one - and I wear one! At some level, mistrust of pagan religions is instilled into us at a very young age.

Part of this I blame on TV and movies. How many TV shows have you seen about a gruesome Satanist murder where the pentagram was painted on the wall in blood or some such, even tho such things rarely ever happen? Even the Haunted Mansion in Disneyland had a pentacle on the wall in one of their "scary witch" type rooms (I am glad to say that the last time I went that said pentagram was no longer present, so they are catching on over at good ole Disney).

The whole thing made me think about what we teach our children about other schools of thought. Are we doing a good job of teaching our kids that different schools of thought are okay? Or are we teaching them to think badly of someone because of a symbol? Obviously, we are missing something if the symbol of one of the fastest growing religions in the country makes people think of Satan.

Not that I have any good answers, but it was something I was thinking.

So, today, I went to the wedding place to show my sister, Shiloh, the venue. We walk in, I start showing her around, and then it hits me. All the vines are missing. Yes, the beautiful vines through the ceiling, the whole reason we fell in love with the place - GONE.

We went from:

to:

This ENTIRELY ruins my whole décor plan which was centered around the vines. Hell, my bouquet was all vines! I went over to the office to ask WTF, and they were all, well, we are gonna add come chandeliers. Well GREAT, THANKS. HOW ABOUT PUTTING BACK WHAT I FUCKING PAID FOR?!

We have a call in to the wedding planner demanding a meeting, for all the good it will do. I cried all the way home. Now, I have to come up with an actual décor plan and some centerpieces to counteract how mediocre the room is now. *sob*.

I am just glad we went over there before the rehearsal. It would have been truly terrible to find this with only 2 days before the wedding and no time to fix it. Well, as much as we can anyway. :(