Sandy Hook and Stupid People

So, this garbage comes skittering across my Facebook newsfeed yesterday.  A story about how Sandy Hook was staged by President Obama in order to inspire a gigantic gun grab by our government.  I'd hoped that the person posting it had done so to show just how stupid some Americans (and a few Irish, I'm told) can be.

Sadly, that wasn't the case.  In fact, it was a case of "Oh, my GOSH, has anyone researched this?  Is this TRUE?"

I went to school with the Cottle and Parker families.  I attended the same high school as little Emilie Parker's parents, and I attended at the same time as her aunts and uncles.  They are not actors.  They are not employees of the United States Government, pretending, for pay or otherwise, to be bereaved parents for the purpose of inspiring a gigantic gun grab by Obama and his evil henchmen.

Holy cow, seriously?  Is there anyone out there THAT crazy?  Anyone out there so stupid and out of touch that their first thought upon witnessing a slaughter like this is to say "It's a plot, it's a CONSPIRACY by that FASCIST COMMIE (the words are interchangeable in the nutjob crowd) to steal our guns!"

If you're that stupid, that crazy, you're EXACTLY who shouldn't have guns.  Seriously.

Be reasonable.  Be smart.  Understand that the Cottle and Parker families aren't sleepers, hanging out in Ogden, Utah for decades, blending in, pretending to be regular, decent folks.  They haven't been passing as "normal," waiting for the call from the evil feds to put on their mourning clothes and turn on the waterworks in their REAL avocation as super-secret actors and actresses in some grand, gun-grabbing production.

Are you familiar with the concept of Occam's Razor?  Sometimes called the Principle of Parsimony?  You might know it better as KISS, or "Keep It Simple, Stupid?"  In a nutshell, it tells us that, all things being equal, the simplest, least twisty explanation tends to be the correct one.  Which is more likely?  Which makes more sense?  That one deranged, screwed up kid who had access to weapons he never should have had access to went nuts and blasted apart a classroom, or that a great, complicated, covert plan has been in place for years, involving men and women pretending to be parents and families for the purpose of pulling one over on us all so that our President can take away our guns?

If you went with the latter, get thee to a shrink.  Quickly.

Here's a story from my old home's local newspaper.  That would be the newspaper published in the same town the Cottles and Parkers are from.  The town that's home to the high school we all attended:

Conspiracy theories claim Newtown shootings were a hoax

For goodness' sake.  Have a brain, huh?  I know most of you do, but if you buy into this crap, what's wrong with you?  The little girl wasn't magically alive again days later--that was her little sister!  The attack wasn't announced days in advance, that's just how the web organizes news stories after a few days!  Come on!

Come on.

Read this.  And then read this

And then cry.  Hurt for these people.  And stop trying to turn it into something crazy and idiotic that makes you mad instead of sad.  Stop trying to make it something fake so you don't have to deal with the reality of 20 little children blown to bits.  Stop clinging to lies and wild fantasies and face reality.  This wasn't a sham, it wasn't an act, it wasn't some grand conspiracy.

It was murder.  And your stupid, near-schizophrenic delusions may make you feel better, but they make the rest of us want to PUKE.

I was going to include a photo of sweet Emilie or handsome Noah, but that doesn't seem appropriate somehow.  If you're one of the conspiracy kooks, YOU should go find pictures of them.  And look.  Hard.

Merry Christmas, Cardinals and Jays (and Mockingbirds, Squirrels, Nuthatches, Chickadees, and Juncos)!

Just a quick, mostly unserious note--just went out and filled the bird feeders, filled the squirrel feeder with dried corn cobs, put up some suet for the wood peckers, and all around made the yard happier for the birdies.  I try to remember, but I often space the feeders and the poor birds hang out on the fence, glaring at me. 

We bought the dog a new toy, a sweater, a sucker made of biscuit iced with peanut butter (the stick is rawhide, which we usually avoid, but hey, it's Christmas), some chew bones, and a bag of his fancy Castor and Pollux food. 

When I was a kid, we had these plaster molds for nativity figures.  Every year, we would make more figures and paint them.  They're missing now, those artistic endeavors, so I can only assume my mom tossed them at some point.  But I loved that--I loved it, and now I wish we'd done it with my boy.  I just suggested it, but didn't get much enthusiasm.  Looking around the internet, I see there's not much available, anyway.  These weren't cartoon-cute figures with little boy and little girl angels or cherubic Native American wise men/children.  They were the classic European-style figures, very serious.  Barnyard figures, Mary, Joseph, baby Jesus, wise men, and a couple shepherds, plus the angel with the banner.  We did this every year, and I had forgotten until today how much I loved it.

One quick, more serious thing--I caught a story on AP today about how money and toys are pouring into Newtown.  I understand that we, as Americans, have a habit of throwing money and gifts at things because we don't know how to do anything else and we want to communicate our sorrow and solidarity.  But the folks in Newtown are, by and large, fairly well off.  These folks aren't poor in that sense.  So maybe a better show of support and empathy is contacting our President and our Legislators and letting them know that this needs to stop.  That we need to never, ever mark another year with another tragedy.  Not by putting "armed guards" in public schools (didn't work at Columbine, no reason to believe it would work anywhere else), but by getting guns out of the hands of criminals and the unbalanced and putting a permanent end to the sale of assault rifles and high capacity clips.

Doing something about the pervasive culture of violence might help a bit, too.

Oh, and no paneling today, but a thought--why put a mirror directly across from the toilet in the bathroom?  And then not put any magazines or books for folks to read?  So all they have to do is stare at their own faces while they use the toilet?  Seems mean.

Just Plain Mean

So, I was reading through news stories on AOL (no, not my sole--or even predominant--news source, but I like to flip through on my way to my email) and came across an "Athletes who've let themselves go," story.  Normally, I'd skip that, but the photo was, I was pretty sure, Tonya Harding.  Curious to see if I was right, I opened the page.

To a pile of puke.

You know, what IS it about us that makes holding people up to public ridicule, especially about their weight and appearance, seem like a fine, fun idea?  Why is that okay? Cool, even?  This was particularly mean, because it had a "ha, ha, ha, see how the mighty have fallen" quality, with snide little zingers accompanying each photo.  I'm not glad that Shaq has gained weight, I don't gloat because Tonya Harding is heavier than she was when she was a YOUNG PROFESSIONAL ATHLETE.  If you are glad, if you do gloat? 

Well, you're maybe not very nice.  In fact, you seem to kinda suck.

We were going to head to Ketchup again tonight, see the fireworks from a better vantage and give the fries and shakes a whirl, but it may be too cold and miserable.  We've got rain, and, worse, we've got high wind warnings out--60 mph gusts, they're saying.  My money's on no fireworks with winds like that, and even if there are fireworks, I can't have the camera out in the rain (and I'm not going to try to rubber-band-and-ziploc the camera) and I'm not about to get soaking wet in a frigid windstorm.

So tonight's probaby off.

Just got done watching the NRA's ridiculous, sickening response to Sandy Hook.  More guns.  Oh, gosh, didn't see that coming.  They suggest armed guards in schools.  Okay, let's do that--never mind that there were armed guards at Columbine and it didn't help a bit.  Let's run with it anyway.  Now, remember, that's not just paycheck.  That's rigorous, ongoing training--ask any cop or soldier if you can train for a few hours and then be "trained" and ready to roll indefinitely.  Of course not, it takes ongoing training.  That's wowser-pricy.  Thankfully, I have NO doubt that the NRA will step up and pay for every one of these guards at every public school in the nation.   They can foot the bill with membership dues!  That said, an armed guard in every school won't stop this.  The shooter in Newtown had done his damage in minutes.  Barring the spectacularly unlikely luck of the shooter and guard being in the same part of the school AND the guard just happening to have his weapon at the ready when it starts, that guard isn't going to prevent a thing.  He's either going to get shot before he clears holster or the murder's going to be done before he can even reach that part of the school.  Look at Ft. Hood, for goodness' sake!  Even the Army Police who finally took that shooter down (after he'd shot 45 people, 13 fatally)?  One of them was shot and disarmed before the partner was able to get the shot and put a stop to things.  And those are active duty American soldiers.

Enough of that garbage.  It's disappointing, but not at all surprising.  It's who we are, apparently--20 children shot down, and not only did we rush the shops to buy MORE guns and MORE ammo, we didn't even pause in our killing of each other.  Think about that--we didn't even pause for one day in our murdering each other.  I weep for my country.

Hit the liquor store tonight, grabbed a bottle of "Shambord."  That's an American-made imitation Chambord. Less than half the price, and since we're just using it for cooking anyway, it seems stupid to blow that much cash.  Tastes very similar, same alcohol content, so we'll see.  Hubby grabbed a bottle of Basil Hayden's.  If it's good enough for Francis Wolcott, it's good enough for him, right?

Dropped way too much cash shopping these past two days.  I'm feeling myself nearing the panic-attack stage.  Hubby got an award from work, and he says we're fine, but it's in my nature to worry.

All my crying about my Mom in the past few days, and I chewed her out on the phone today.  She called, let it ring five times, then hung up.  No message.  Called back, let it ring five time, then hung up.  Again, no message.  Then called back AGAIN.  This is something she has been doing for decades, and the only way to slow her down for a while is to yell.  Anything less and she just ramps up until she's doing it two or three times a day.  So I yelled at her. 

It's okay, I told her I'd call her back after I woke up (she was doing this as I was trying to nap).  I did that, and it was a good call.

Grabbed a bunch of cheeses for crackers--Butterkase, Muenster, smoked gouda, and cave-aged gruyere.  We really like cheese. 

Our Christmas tree is STILL devouring water like there's no tomorrow.  Never had a tree that kept drinking for weeks. 


Oh, and hey, the world didn't end, so have some paneling!

Nowhere near the worst paneling out there, but a pretty intense pattern, no?