Looks like Emily has gotten her $200 designer knickers in a twist. Don't know what she's got to be so pissy about. Judging by some of the things she's said about me to the other Cotillion girls, she oughta be ashamed. But she's got it in her head that I'm all jealous of her fabulousness. Really chicky, get over yourself. You're a groupie from Detroit who has suddenly gone pious. Prior to 2000, the only ones who ever heard you say the words "OH God" were the roadies from your brother's band. So really - we're not all that different, are we?

In case you're wondering, the love affair is over between me & the Princess. I got an email last week from a reader who has been in contact with her via messenger. Just to give you an idea of what a sincere gal she is - her grandfather is alive and well. I suppose that's a good thing. But Em and I were supposed to get together a few months ago - I even rented her a hotel room here in Toronto - and she calls me up at the last minute with a sob story about how her grandfather died. I should have taken a hint. Old Pops is fine, thankyouverymuch, and she apparently had dinner with him last Sunday. So she's a liar. I emailed her, and called her to the mat over it. I was hurt. Maybe I said some things. But who friggin lies and tells you someone is dead?

Oh, and Beth? Thanks. At least I know who my real friends are.

I saw this on the news last night, and it just isn't sitting right with me. I can't quite put my finger on it, but something's fishy.

Facing execution, confessed al-Qaeda fighter Zacarias Moussaoui stunned a Virginia courtroom yesterday with the chilling claim that he and shoe-bomber Richard Reid were supposed to dive a hijacked jetliner into the White House on Sept. 11, 2001.

Defying his defence attorneys who desperately tried to prevent him from talking himself onto death row, Mr. Moussaoui claimed advance knowledge of the deadly scheme to simultaneously send fuel-laden passenger jets crashing into buildings in New York and Washington.

I get the part where he says he lied to the authorities prior to 9/11 in order to keep the plan from being derailed. That makes sense. But the part where he was supposed to be a fifth kamikaze, along with Richard Reid? I don't buy it. It's too tidy. Someone is setting this up. What were the chances that Moussaoui - famed for being the only one in the world on trial for 9/11 - would name the other world famous would-be terrorist (who is a bit of an idiot) as his co-pilot? Reid looks a few virgins short of Paradise, if you know what I mean, and I can't see anyone entrusting him with such a monumental task of bombing the White House. And what of Flight 93? I thought that was destined for the White House? Were there two? Or was 93 supposed to go elsewhere, like the Capitol? None of this is making sense. Great headlines, but little sense.

Moussaoui is covering something, I know it. I just don't know what.

Morrissey snubs Canada to protest against seal hunt

Oh dear. Whatever will we do?

"I fully realize that the absence of any Morrissey concerts in Canada is unlikely to bring the Canadian economy to its knees..." he said.

Yeah, no kidding. File this story under Shut Up and Sing!

Original Post: 12:17pm March 21, 2006

I'm not wild about unions, and I happen to think the strike by college professors in Ontario is a waste of taxpayer money & tuition. I have very little sympathy for these pampered elites at the best of times, but this is just too much.

The London Free Press reports on an "accident" that could have been completely avoided, and tries to pull as many heartstrings as possible.

After a confrontation with a motorist, the striking accounting teacher fell off the hood of a car and slammed his head on the pavement, witnesses said.

"The car just kept going and the poor man slipped and was injured," said Hill, a teacher at the college. "We were holding his hand, covering him up with blankets. We were just talking to him, reassuring him."

Okay, taken at face value, this section from the top of the article makes it sound like the teacher, Mr. John Stammers, was hit by an angry motorist. But read on...

Strikers have had the "odd brush" with motorists but nothing like yesterday's incident, she said.

Stammers apparently touched the man's 2001 Toyota Corolla as it tried to pass by, said Jiantee Jagessar, a teacher who witnessed the exchange. That's when the fight began, she said.

The driver got out of the car and the men began bickering, she said.

"I didn't expect it to escalate to that extent," she said.

She saw Stammers climb on the Corolla.

"The guy accelerated and John fell off the hood," she said.

If this guy dies from his injuries, I am nominating him for a Darwin Award.

UPDATE

It's official. John Stammers is now a nominee for this year's Darwin Awards:

A 62-year-old college teacher who was involved in a collision on a picket line outside a Toronto college has died in hospital.

John Stammers, a professor of accounting at Centennial College, was critically injured after being struck by a car while on picket duty on March 20.

Police said no charges are pending in the accident since they don't believe the driver committed a criminal offence.

The article didn't point out that Stammers brought about his own death by being an idiot.

So funny I nearly peed.

Thanks to the ladies of the Cotillion for finding this. Only trouble: I was in the middle of a meeting this afternoon, surreptitiously checking my email, and trying to keep a straight face and not snort!

Today is Eat A Tasty Animal for PETA Day. The wingnuts of the "animals are people, too!" brigade want us all to give up meat today. Yeah, like that's likely to happen. So, to make up for all the morons who didn't eat meat today, we the Bloggeratti had a MeatOut day on Satuday at the Meatriarchy's house. The meat man himself cooked us up pulled pork, barbecued chicken, three or four different kinds of sausage, and the most wonderful meat-o-riffic chili ever. His cornbread is to die for, so if you are a cornbread fan, click over to his site where he provides the link to the recipe.

The usual cool kids were there: Greg Staples, Kathy Shaidle, Damian Penny... heck, we even threw in a vegetarian for good measure. Although, I admit, when I heard there was a vegetarian in the house, I thought he was going to be a human sacrifice. Alas, he lived.

Our fabulous host was so busy, and the table so crowded, that he never even joined us for the meal. Now that's Southern hospitality! He made us very comfortable, kept the music low enough for talking, the chili hot enough for sweating, and enough food to have us rolling out the door at the end of the night. Four different barbecue dipping sauces provided a choice for everyone - no matter what your palate.

I think I know someone who is getting a VIP invite to this year's VRWChristmas party...

My little Irish-Mexican Bug is a whopping one year old today! This picture was taken at Christmas, when he was wearing his reindeer suit. The hood has antlers on it, but his ears are so enormous that it wouldn't stay up!

So happy St. Patrick's Day everyone, and Happy Birthday, litte Bug! you are a constant source of laughter in my life. I may have wanted a Great Dane or a Doberman, and I "settled" for you (the exact opposite of those other dogs), but damn I'm glad I did! You are the funniest little jumping bean I've ever seen.

I just wish you'd stay still long enough for me to get better pictures of you.

Rosie Dimanno is on the front page of the Toronto Star today making our soldiers out to be bastards.

She is now, because of an unidentified Canadian soldier, a widow in Afghanistan, and there's no worse fate for a woman in this country.

"I don't have a husband! I have nobody to protect me! What am I to do?

"You say sorry? What does sorry mean to me? Will sorry feed my children?"

The father, Nazrat Ali, was shot and killed for coming too close to a checkpoint (without authorization to do so) in his taxi. I believe many of the details are still unclear at this time, but that doesn't stop Dimanno from all but weeping alongside the devastated widow and screaming for the head of the soldier that shot Ali.

Nasrat Ali, a poor Shiite who barely eked out an existence making tin pots and pans, had just been buried after his corpse was ritualistically washed by relatives. More than 1,000 mourners had attended the funeral at Amam Bargah mosque — the imam counselled against violence and retribution.Nasrat Ali's photograph, photocopied, has been posted throughout the mosque compound — a handsome man, clean-shaven in what looks like it might have been an official ID, perhaps something from a passport.

"Look, no beard," a relative points out. "Not Taliban, not Al Qaeda. Just Afghan."

Whether justifiable or not, a Canadian soldier has taken the life of what was palpably an innocent civilian, an Afghan who had returned to his country only three years ago after living for nearly two decades in neighbouring Iran. As Shiite exiles, the Ali family fled Soviet occupation, warlords, the Taliban, finally coming home after the U.S.-led coalition put a Pashtun leader in the presidential palace.

They thought it was safe now.

They were tragically wrong.

Oh come on! Yes, any loss of life is a tragedy, whether it's a Canadian life or an Afghani life. But Afghanistan is a war zone. People die every day. There are dozens of casualties every week - people who were in the wrong place at the wrong time. Things are no different in any war zone anywhere, ever. This is not front page news, even during a slow week. Dimanno's tone suggests she's sorry that the Canadian soldiers didn't torture him first, because then that would be a real story! Give us some Canadian Abu Graihb! We want our soldiers to be evil so that we have an excuse to hate them!

Ms. Dimanno, and the editors of the Toronto Star: Do you think our troops are evil? Do you want us to think that?

The regular readers of the Toronto Star are just the kind of weak, mush-minded people who would be sitting there nodding their heads and saying we shouldn't be fighting "George Bush's war" because we are "peacekeepers". If they had their way, we'd just wait until the terrorists took over Canada, and then they'd send our military out to plant flowers in the Al-Qaeda leaders' gardens.

Get ready for another two years of this drivel, till Dimanno can go back to reporting on Olympic Games. She was good at that.

So the porn star had dinner with the President again last night. It cost her $5000. Sheesh, George - what do you offer for that price?

Ya know I love ya Georgie, but really! Who's the bigger whore?!

Lolita (the laptop) and I are sitting in Starbucks. I asked my boss for the day off to relax and chill by myself for a while. But I am Wendy - physically and emotionally incapable of enjoying any relaxing me time. So I booked a doctor's appointment for this morning. Just got out. After more than 20 years of symptoms, after more than 20 years of not knowing what the next moment would be like, I have finally taken the leap to pharmacology. I am hoping the path to freedom lies in something called Effexor.

Today is a bad sinus day for me. I woke up all sneezy and congested. It might be that I sucked a bit of cat into the ol' filter while I was asleep. It happens sometimes. Unfortunately, if the allergen gets stuck on my right side (which it is today), it will affect me all day. The whole right side of my face will swell up, and my eye will nearly close. It hardly affects the left at all. Is this just because I'm RightGirl? No. It is because there is scar tissue in my right nasal passage that keeps it from working properly. It's minor, but on a stuffed-up day it is pure hell. The scar tissue is from a tube being inserted and later ripped from my right nostril. I don't remember much about it, except that I woke up with blood on my face. Well, maybe "woke up" isn't the right term. Perhaps "came back from the dead" would be a more descriptive turn of phrase.

When I was 17, River Phoenix and I had the honor of dying on the same day. How cozy. About twelve hours after he stopped writhing on the street in front of the Viper Room, I stopped breathing. I ceased to be. I was expired. Very much an ex-Wendy. (Before you roll your eyes, no, the two events were not related. I liked River Phoenix, but not that much.) Earlier in the evening of that chilly Halloween, I sat alone in my room, methodically swallowing 80 over-the-counter sleep aids. Over and over I refilled my water glass from the pitcher I had thought to bring into the room. Clever Wendy. Soon the pitcher was empty. The four little plastic bottles were empty. I was sloshing. I had to pee! So I staggared from my room to the bathroom across the hall. My dad figured I was drunk (Ours was a household in which that was pretty normal. The 53 year old and the 17 year old often drank together. It made the life we led without my mother that much easier to bear. He figured that if he didn't bug me about my drinking, I wouldn't bug him about his.). I peed. And then I tried to stand back up. Dad came running when he heard the crash.

There was some yelling - "What did you drink!" He didn't believe me when I said water. "Stand up!" I can't. I couldn't. I was dead below the waist. You coulda stuck a fork in me. My arms turned red. Cooked lobster red. Thirteen years later I still don't know what that quirky side effect was all about. I wasn't exactly in a position to ask. "Stand up!" He hauled me up under my arms, I wobbled and shook, and went right back down again. My legs don't work, Dad. They're asleep. I'm going to sleep. *Ping!* The light went on in his head. After all, wasn't his grandmother the one who took a pitcher of martinis out to the garage 50 years before, and started up the car? He called an ambulance.

Hospital #1 was near our apartment. I died on their ER table. Just for a little while. They used those sadistic waffle irons that their oh-so-fond of to break one of my ribs. Oh, and to bring me back from the dead. They stuck a tube up my nose and down my throat, injected it with charcoal, and let me puke till I was empty. "How many did she take? We need to count them!!" WTF? Like, someone from the public health system is actually going to take the time to go through my murky black vomit with tweezers to make sure they got 'em all? Bizarre. In a cruel twist of fate, a seven year old boy died on the table next to mine. His mother had been drinking before she got behind the wheel. He died. I lived. She got arrested. I have a scar in my nose. What a fucking waste.

The hospital, while willing to inspect my vomit, didn't want to take responsibility for my care because I was under 18. They stuck me in another ambulance and shipped me downtown to the children's hospital. I was stoned out of my mind, but I remember being able to see out the back window of the ambulance. "Is it snowing? On Halloween?" The attendant confirmed it, and I went back to sleep. After a week, I was sent home as if nothing had happened. No referrals, no meds, let's not speak of it again.

While that was the only time I have been dead, it wasn't even the worst day my mind and I have ever had. There have been panic attacks, sharks surrounding my bed daring me to get up, all-encompassing depression, another brief hospital stay (they put me on Zoloft, but took me off of it when I told them I was enjoying it. fuckers), a cognative behavioral therapist, a hypnotherapist, psychologists and psychiatrists since I was 8 years old, insomnia, too much sleep, eating too much, not eating enough, a road trip across America because I was having a bad day, a couple of social workers, endless tears and screaming and mood swings, many lost jobs, an expulsion from highschool... and now Effexor.

I'll keep you posted.

I believe I was standing at the edge of the spiral as Claude Allen was tumbling down. I may have waved as he went by. I had no idea at the time that it was, in fact, a spiral.

The day before CPAC officially started, those of us with "Diamond" tickets were invited to a briefing, which I wrote about here. Claude Allen spoke of domestic policy just before Karl Rove took the floor. In fact, Allen spoke far longer than he should have. Despite the gesticulations of Rove's assistant, and a whisper in the ear from one of the CPAC organizers, Allen would not yield to Rove. On and on he talked, ignoring the fact that Rove was running on a very tight schedule (when he finally took the floor, he respectfully asked us to sit back down and end the applause, because as much as he appreciated it, he really had to run, so let's get the show on the road!).

A couple of weeks later, Allen resigned. I remarked to my husband that perhaps he was in the doghouse for behavior like that displayed at CPAC. Allen was arrested on Thursday for defrauding Target stores.

The President is quoted:

If the allegations are true, something went wrong in Claude Allen's life, and that is really sad.

I agree. There is much merrymaking that can be done over a Winona Ryder-esque story like this one, but I will refrain. I will refrain because I stood by the side of the road while Mr. Allen spiralled by. I can't say the same for Ms. Ryder.

I have joined the digital age. My high blood pressure could no longer withstand CBC Newsworld, or CNN. My saving grace, Global National with Kevin Newman, has changed timeslots, and finishes before I even get home from work.

So today, we got the digital box. We got Fox News. Bliss. Now only the news itself can make that vein in my forehead pulsate - not the way the news is delivered. Suddenly, my life has a sense of fairness and balance. And my husband breathes a sigh of relief.

It's been two years since martyrs for Islam killed over 190 people on their way to work on a idle Thursday morning. At the time of the occurence, the civilized world was still reeling from the Bali bombings, which came just 15 months after the mass murder where the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center once stood in New York. I was living in Scotland at the time, and was getting ready for work, the television tuned to BBC News 24 (the Beeb version of CNN). By the time I got to work that morning, my eyes were rimmed red, and I had once more strengthened my resolve that Islam must be stopped. The polite world was faced with an enemy that it had no idea how to deal with, and I hoped that soon the world would see that the only way was to expel them, destroy them. Before they destroyed us.

Since March 11, 2004, Britain has been hit. July 7th, 2005 was the date when four British Muslims detonated backpacks of explosives on the London Underground and a city bus, killing more than 50 people. And still I wait for the world to wake up and admit the threat. I wait.

Recently, at least 45 people have been killed in riots over cartoons. Cartoons. Over the centuries, wars have begun over many things, but to think that so much destruction has been due to a few editorial cartoons. Politicians around the globe have called for appeasement to the overly-sensitive, highly volatile Muslims, who have been bombing, torching, and destroying property in the name of their obviously very thin-skinned god. "Journalists" and "news" outlets (highly deserving of the sneer quotes) have been too afraid to publish the 'toons, and instead are hiding behind a shield of "respect" for Islam - a religion that respects no one - not even its own followers. In Canada, a lone cry was heard in the wilderness. Above the nervous chattering teeth, the voice of Ezra Levant of the Western Standard led the call to defend freedom of speech. Our own Foreign Affairs Minister, Peter MacKay, decried Ezra's right as a publisher, and apologized to the Muslim community. Weak-kneed should not be part of his job criteria.

Today, around 150 people in Toronto stood behind Ezra, stood behind Denmark, and stood behind the right of free speech in democracies around the world. As we stood outside the Danish Consulate, my husband was draped in the flag of Denmark, and I waved my friend's copy of the Western Standard which featured the cartoons. A Coptic Christian who had escaped Egypt came up to me, and begged me for the issue. He said it was so important that people see it, and know that they are free. I turned to my friend - the wonderful MustControlFistOfDeath - who simply nodded, and I handed the magazine to this very brave man.

There will be a rally in support of Denmark tomorrow, Saturday March 11th, here in Toronto. 12pm-1:30pm outside the Danish Consulate, 151 Bloor West.

Whether you are for or against the publishing of the cartoons, if you believe in freedom of speech, please come out and join us.

Anyone who wants further information can contact the organizers at standfordenmark@gmail.com

I have met some truly awesome people thanks to this blog. I have hosted a VRWChristmas party with people who I am in thrall to, and woke up the next morning thinking it must have been a dream, because how could they all have shown up just for me?

I've made some great real-life friends that I see regularly, too. The blog has ceased to be anonymous, and has become the center of a social world which I am so lucky to inhabit.

But every once in a while, I feel as if I'm writing for them, instead of for me. Would so-and-so like this story? Ooh, I'll write about this topic because I know it interests her. Did he read that? What does he think? It really came home to me today, when I'm Not Paranoid commented on my Women's Day post. I thought to myself "I've had lunch with that man, and he's reading a post about my vagina!"

Then I realized that I don't care. I started this blog for me, not for anyone else. I wrote better when I had 7 readers a day than now when I have hundreds. I'm not going to temper myself to please my readers - both anonymous and friendly. If the day comes that I am at a social engagement with my readers (and it happens very regularly these days) and I can no longer meet someone's eye because of something I've written, then I'll know it's time to quit

the friend, not the blog.

I am going to go on blogging as if no one were watching me.

I've been struggling with this essay for a couple of weeks now. It's very personal, very long, and I have yet to reach a conclusion on what direction to take. It really is all about being stuck in the middle. So here goes...

It's International Women's Day. For the record:

1909

In accordance with a declaration by the Socialist Party of America, the first National Woman's Day was observed across the United States on 28 February. Women continued to celebrate it on the last Sunday of that month through 1913.

The Socialist Party! That pretty much sets the tone right there... So without further ado, let's talk about sex.

I am at an age of transition now, leaving my roaring twenties and hitting the Great Depression of my thirties. I often write on this blog about what I was, what I did, where I've been. My life is all past-tense. Where am I going, and how does my sexuality fit into that? David Warren wrote this week in an article entitled Modesty:

Am I perhaps a little odd in finding modestly-dressed women attractive? It is hard to tell how odd, for men seldom discuss such things among ourselves. In moments, I’ve suspected this is our best-kept secret -- that we don’t actually like women to be dressed or to behave as tarts. (Not just the clothing, but the vocabulary and demeanour.)

This stirred a lot of emotions and questions in me. I know that as a married woman of thirty, I can no longer count on playing Scarlett O'Hara anymore as a means of dealing with the opposite sex. I do not want to grow into one of those women that people laugh at, as they try too hard to hold onto the raw sexuality of youth. I used my sex in exactly the way that Warren decries in his article, and it worked for me. So where does that leave me? Am I dead? I hope not! I refuse to think that just because I hit a certain stage of my life, I should be relegated to the sidelines while the young whippersnappers have their day. I enjoy the company of men - smart, good-looking, funny, real men. I enjoy being led into temptation, even if I never reach the destination. I have always been a flirt (ask my husband!), and probably always will be. I admit, I have traded my leather corset for a silk blouse, and my dog collar for pearls, but those are just outward accessories. I am still the same Wendy inside: running round with the boys, drinking, telling bawdy stories, and making you wonder if I'm sleeping with your husbands (the answer, by the way, is...).

My... um... vivaciousness (for lack of a better word) leaves me in a political quandry. The radical feminists of the left want species that is androgynous, where the men are women and the women are men (and the cowboys are gay). Am I as good as a man? Certainly. But as good as does not equal the same as. I can breastfeed and he can parallel park. He can do the heavy lifting, but I have the better eye for where he should put the sofa. I can express thoughts and feelings better than he can, but he doesn't let emotions cloud his judgement on important decisions. Men and women compliment each other. Am I as good as a man? Yes. But can I be as bad as one? Absolutely. Whether your belief lies with creationism, science, or the not-so-happy medium of intelligent design, there is no way you can argue that if we were all meant to be exactly the same and perform the exact same tasks, neither God nor science would have bothered to create two of us.

Yet on the right side of the political stratosphere, where I spend most of my time, things really aren't that much better for a girl like me. I read an article yesterday that called me a parasite because I do not have children, nor do I wish to have any. That is, unfortunately, a pretty common Christian response. People like the author of the article spout off about how I will oneday be sucking from the teat of social security that her precious children will be providing for me, since I will be too foolish to save for my own retirement. Wow. She makes a lot of arrogant assumptions, doesn't she? You fool - you really don't want me having babies just because I can. I admit, I do have all the obvious traits of a DINK (double income, no kids): career focussed, love to travel, like having nice things to play with. But before classifying me as a parasite, why don't you ask me why I won't be fulfilling the task of motherhood? I will tell you why: I would probably kill my babies. Violent, unhappy, emotional people do not make good parents. If I'm having a bad day, I can walk out of the house and leave the dog and cats to their own devices, but it's illegal and immoral to do it to a screeching toddler. I would go Susan Smith all over my kids. I would snap, and before I realized what was happening, they would be injured or worse. So out of a sense of responsibility to my hypothetical kids, I have chosen not to have them. Consider it my one great act of love and respect for them.

So that uppity broad (who knows what's best for parasites like me) is calling me names, and I've got Mark Steyn telling me that if I don't reproduce, Arabs will take over the world. Hey, that's an awful lot of responsibility! If my uterus doesn't hurry up and squeeze something out, I will die alone and penniless in a world dominated by Arabs.

The fanatical obsession with abortion on both sides is out of control. If you are a pro-choice feminist, you can argue all you like for safe and legal abortions, but it still shouldn't be so prevalent. They are (ab)using it as a form of birth control, and expecting others to pay for it. And if they carry a baby to term, they still expect others to pay for it (the father suddenly has a responsibility, where he previously didn't have a right, and don't get me started on welfare!!). Are there others out there - like me - who actually believe that "legal and rare" is not the worst case scenario, and that it is in fact a win-win situation?

Basically, I am asking the feminists to get their vaginas out of my face, and for the pro-lifers to put their dead-fetus dolls away. For the love of all you hold dear, both of you, stop making every election about abortion! There is more to running a country than poon-tang (unless you are Clinton).

If I'm on the left, I'm supposed to have lots of sex and abortions. If I'm on the right, I'm supposed to have lots of married sex and babies (to make up for all those abortions). Wow. Feminism has really helped, hasn't it? How many decades of "Equal Rights Now!!", and it all still comes down to my pussy. And it has left me more confliced than ever. The hard party lines on both sides of the divide serve to show me that I have no home on either side. I am neither a man-hater nor a baby machine. The very thing I love most about myself - my sexuality - is the thing that both sides will use to tear me apart.

To the mothers of the right, I wish you well in your child-rearing. I hope you want and love every child that you bear, and I commend you for taking on such a huge, difficult and important job. Now please keep your baby pictures to yourselves. Those of us without the mothering gene (not to be confused with those who want babies but can't have them) are not interested. Nothing personal, but people like me just don't feel it.

And to the feminists, thank you for giving me the right to vote: I have used it to vote against you. Thank you for raising my salary: I use the money to tithe at my church, save for my own retirement, and support political causes that are markedly different from yours. Now that I can vote and spend, I will handle all the rest of the decisions on my own, thanks. You may go now.

It's International Women's Day: Go read Kate O'Beine's Women Who Make the World Worse. It'll make you think.

...for these poor, disaffected Muslim youth. Really. I weep.

I popped over to the BBC website for my daily ulcer of outrage, and - like the Daily Kos - they rarely disappoint. They are currently running a feature on the poor misbegats of Islam.

Shamsul Gani sits in his home, in the northern English city of Leeds, a proud father cradling his six-month-old son.

I ask him about the three young men from Leeds who carried out the London bombings last year.

"You'd have left your house keys with them and gone away for a year," he told me.

For many people, what motivated the bombers is still a mystery.

But Shamsul grew up with the three - all British Muslims from Pakistani families. (The fourth was a Caribbean convert to Islam.)

Shamsul admires the courage of Mohammad Sidique Khan, the leader of the group, even though he condemns what he did.

That "condemnation" sounds like more of an afterthought on the part of the writer, than the "condemnation" we're supposed to be hearing from moderates all over the world. (My hand to my ear, head cocked to one side, listening: I fail to hear the moderate condemnation.)

"France has betrayed the young people of the suburbs. When you're called Ali you can't get a job. The French don't accept Islam. Politicians promise us mosques and so on, but at the same time they smear us and call us terrorists."

I wonder if it's because the Ali's and the Muhammed's and the Nasser's of France are rioting, raping, and snubbing their nose at French culture? But then again, that's unfair of me to jump to such a conclusion. After all, I'm sure these kids and their families have tried very hard to integrate into European society. Surely it can't be any fault of their own that no one wants anything to do with them...

In a related article, the Beeb gathers quotes from the aforementioned outcasts of society.

From Amran Majid: When was the last time Muslims were shown in a positive light on the BBC or another channel?

Well Amran, probably not July 7th. But that's just a guess.

From Shahed Alam: So, how do we make sure these people do not get captured by extremists?

The first thing would be to treat everyone as individuals. We cannot blame all Muslims in this country for what a minority think.

Shahed - do the majority instead feel like Shamsul Gani, quoted above, who "condemns" the July 7th bombings, but who "admires the courage of Mohammad Sidique Khan"?

In other news, a bomb went off at a Hindu holy site in India, killing at least 15 people. My prayers are with the poor, desperate people who felt driven to such an atrocity by an uncaring, un-understanding society... yeah, right.

Update 9:08pm: I totally forgot to mention all the other great things Muslims do that shouldn't be equated with terrorism.

St. Patrick's Day is coming. Check out the goodies from The People's Cube shop.

My liver has shrivelled into a raisin. The girls of The Cotillion had a party last night. Strange, I never thought I could have so much fun with my "imaginary" friends. Merri wandered in and out of the conversation with her husband, so we had a male chaperone. Beth D kept hitting the nudge button on Messenger, which tickled, and caused me to make rather a fool of myself in a side conversation with Stephen Taylor, who is rather kinky in his chatting preferences - "TALK POLICY TO ME!!!". Stud.

At some point I think we scared Zendo Deb away. Even armed she couldn't keep the peace with all of us going wild.

It took Jane half the night to figure out the secret password to get into the party, but once she was there we got her all liquored up in short order. We probably shouldn't have put her hand in that glass of warm water, though.

EM Zanotti was in her undisclosed location, getting Miguel the poolboy to bring her refills. She was kind enough to do some quick research into whether or not the swearing I did last night online counted toward my Lent promise. According to her reliable source, who took pity on me: No.

Beth, Feisty and I had filthy conversations about sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll, while I kept ducking in and out to get a bit on the side. Gotta say I'm digging that Feisty chick.

Romeocat was there for a while, but that's kind of a blur. I'm sure there were others, too, but I was a little too inebriated to keep track. Just think of how much trouble we could get into if we were all actually in the same room!

Vegas in October girls, remember - mark your calendars!!

Tonight's soundtrack:

Margaritaville (obviously) - Jimmy Buffett
Doin' Fine - Barney Bentall
America, Fuck Yeah - Matt & Trey
Fake Friends - Joan Jett & the Blackhearts
Shut Up and Drive - Jodee Messina
Seek & Destroy (WTC version) - Metallica & George Bush
The Letter - The Box Tops
Sweet Caroline - Neil Diamond
Elvis & I - Dennis Leary
All of Me - Frank Sinatra
Hymne a l'amour - Edith Piaf
Family Man - Black Flag
Cleanin Out My Closet - Eminem
Devil in Disguise - Elvis Presley
Mercy Seat - Nick Cave
American English - Idlewild
Devil Woman - Marty Robbins
Jackson - Resse Witherspoon & Joaquin Phoenix
Drink Before the War - Sinead O'Connor

The screen capture below is of a story about a mother reading a victim impact statement to a courtroom after her children died in a firebombing. Look at the right side of the page, where the Sun felt it appropriate to place Calgary Flames advertising that says: Kids! Be Hot Like the Flames!



The photo is a link back to the story, but don't be surprised if they catch on and change the ad layout at some point. At least, I hope they do!

I have nothing to say today. Blogging will resume either late tonight or tomorrow.

Stay tuned for tomorrow night's return of Saturday Night Drunk Blogging - Lent Edition (where we give up sobriety for a few hours). If you want to join the Cotillion girls on Messenger, it's rightgirlontheright@hotmail.com

I reserve the right to ignore you if you are a twit.

Cpl. Paul Davis was killed in a road accident while on routine patrol. These things happen, even to Canadian soldiers. When they happen, they are sad, but our Canadian press makes it out to be our country's fault for sending these boys off to do battle in the fisrt place, instead of keeping them emasculated with the UN. In this case, they couldn't find anyone willing to vilify Cpl. Davis. Instead, they only found messages of support.

Personally, I honor heroes, not eunuchs. So this one is for a hero, from his father:

"He had the sense of duty of comradeship with the people he'd been training with, and felt he wanted to go with them," Jim Davis told CTV Atlantic in an interview from his home in Bridgewater, N.S. on Thursday.

Cpl. Davis, a married father of two, was on a routine patrol when the LAV-III (light-armoured vehicle) ran off the road and flipped over. Six other soldiers and a local Afghan interpreter were injured in the accident.

"My prayers are with the other parents of those boys who are struggling with their lives right now," said Jim Davis.

"I would also like you to know that I am an extremely proud dad. I'm very proud of my son Paul. I believed in what he was doing 100 per cent and to his friends in Afghanistan, if they're listening to me, I want them to know I'm 100 per cent behind all of them."

Davis said his son was a strong believer in what troops are doing in Afghanistan, and said he worries that a mounting death toll will shake Canada's resolve to continue its mission there.

"I fear a huge debate on why we're in Afghanistan would endanger the lives of our soldiers because it entices or encourages the insurgents to keep up the battle," he said. [emphasis mine]

The CBC brings us this quote from Capt. Jay Adair, the second-in-command of Bravo Company:

"Until someone's been on an Afghan road, they won't know what it's like," Adair said.

"I don't think there is the level of skill among Afghan drivers that there is among Canadian drivers. The roads are certainly not in as good of shape as Canadian roads. I'm not aware of very many rules on Afghan roads."

Which is why it's always so exciting when Afghanis come to our cities to become taxi drivers (it was a taxi driver that killed Cpl. Davis).

God bless Cpl. Paul Davis. You did your country proud, and you are in our thoughts tonight.

We've made some recent additions to the Cotillion blogroll, and one of them is Feisty Republican Whore.

When I was down in Washington, partying will all the cool kids, someone remarked just how un-conservative we conservatives really were. It's true, you know. Pearls can be deceiving. We conservative gals don't need Eve Ensler to remind us we're women. We have a much better tool, as it were: Men.

Go check out the whore. The first visit is free.

The Senate on Thursday voted overwhelmingly to renew the USA Patriot Act, after months of pitched debate over legislation that supporters said struck a better balance between privacy rights and the government's power to hunt down terrorists.

The 89-10 vote marked a bright spot in President Bush's troubled second term as his approval ratings dipped over the war in Iraq and his administration's response to Hurricane Katrina. Renewing the act, congressional Republicans said, was key to preventing more terror attacks in the United States.

A Montreal school board went too far in imposing a blanket ban on the wearing of Sikh ceremonial daggers by students, says the Supreme Court of Canada.

In an 8-0 judgment Thursday, the court overturned a decision that barred teenager Gurbaj Singh Multani from wearing the dagger, known as a kirpan, to class.

Okay, so religious freedom allows me to wear a cross to school, the Jewish kid to wear a yarmulke, the Muslim girl to wear hijab. What do those three things have in common? They're not weapons!

Let's say some little Sikh kid gets beat up by an older, larger classmate. Not necessarily for cultural reasons, but just because he's easy pickings. Said bully gets hold of the dagger. What do you see happening? Do you think the bully will respect it because it is a religious symbol? Or do you rather think he will take somebody's eye out with it? A kid should not be bringing a weapon to school. Period. When I was in school, we had an American kid in my class. Should he have been able to bring a gun to school, because it is part of the culture of his homeland that he has the right to bear arms (okay, maybe not at age ten, but certainly in late highschool/early college)?

I have mentioned before that my husband is Scottish. On several occasions while living in Scotland, he had to rent a kilt and all the fixings and trappings that go with it. One of those trappings is a dagger that rests in the sock. The tux rental company provides a fake. The outfit would not be complete without it - but there was no need to have a real one. Wouldn't that have been a better judgement to make in this case?

Once again, Canada's high-flown multicultural ideals are on the path to getting someone killed. Hooray for inclusiveness.

That was the rallying cry after Hurricane Katrina. I wonder if the Democratic left was using that screed in order to cover up a few uncaring sins of their own?

Right Wing News has compiled a list (with the help of their readers) of the 25 greatest moments in American history. It's incredible that a country so young (compared to Europe) can have so many great achievements behind it.

My morning routine alone produced two expletives at a cost of $1 per. It's going to be an expensive 40 days. On the upside, my church will be able to upgrade considerably in the coming year.