… the child has found his thumb!

With Fathers 4 Justice so much in the news at the moment, I found these two articles from the Guardian very interesting:

Partners Condemn Protest Fathers
Protesting ‘stops Batman seeing baby daughter’

Welcome to the new super speedy Pewari’s Prattle… yes we have got ADSL at last – yay!

This is Li’l Bhaji’s new seat – it’s called a bumbo. Do you remember those rubber faces that you could mold into lots of funny shapes? It’s made out of a similar material and you just sort of wedge the baby in and it keeps them upright! Makes him look horribly grownup, but he seems to like it…

I’m having withdrawal symptoms so have got the old Buffy DVDs out of mothballs and started rewatching from the beginning again. God the actors look young! It’s also slightly embarrassing how I can quote just about every line of dialogue in the first two episodes…

I love rewatching things. My mum could never understand why I wanted to watch or read things over and over, but there’s something comforting about spending an evening with an old friend. You know the plot, it’s easy watching/reading so you can focus on the irrelevant details, the subtle interaction between characters, you get different nuances every time.

So what are your seminal television shows? The ones you can’t resist watching over and over – either via DVD/Video or always tuning in to the reruns on TV? Please make me feel like I’m not the only sad afficionado out here!

Li’l Bhaji has started being a bit more mobile: he can move in a 360 degree circle with a rather complex movement involving holding his legs vertically, flinging them up over to one side then arching his back, shuffling around by an inch or two, then repeating as necessary until he gets the view he wants. As a result, I’m getting a little more twitchy about him being able to reach toys with small parts.

Got the baby jail out and it’s completely dwarfed the living room. However, Akra Jr has taken a shine to it, and spent most of the day in there with various of his stuffed toys and dinosaurs. He even ate his afternoon snack in there.

Problem solved, I’ll lock Akra Jr in there with all his small toys, and Li’l Bhaji can have the run of the house…

Do I … don’t I….?

I’m fed up.

I’m fed up with the holier than thou attitude that unless you follow the exact brand of spirituality that I do then you’re not a “proper” adherent… worse, you’re shallow, ignorant, naive or just plain stupid. You’re along for the ride, following a bandwagon.

Have I had a run in with a street evangelist? No.

Have I got fed up with the latest violence done in the name of fundamentalism? No.

I’m fed up with pagans.

Paganism. One of the most diverse and personal faiths I know of. Pinning down broad brushstrokes of belief across the whole community is extremely hard – yet why do I find just as much (if not more) intolerance here than in any other religion?

It does not make you a “better” pagan if you have elaborate rituals monthly, nor if your Book of Shadows is thicker than anyone elses, nor if you’re a tenth generation family witch rather than a “fluff bunny” Wiccan.

Just as a “better” christian is not one who prays for hours, attends bible group daily and takes every opportunity to spread the good news.

Intolerant, bigotted fundamentalist beliefs are as abhorant to me no matter what religion they originate in.

WHY do they expect everyone to find truth and spirituality in exactly the same way they did? WHY do they expect a newcomer to have as much depth of spirituality, wisdom experience as someone who has had a decade or two to explore their beliefs? WHY do they not see the hypocrisy when they’ve spent so long complaining about the world’s intolerance towards pagans? WHY does their faith seem to hinge around proving to themselves that they are more spiritual than everyone else?

For the record, some of the most spiritual people I know of any faith actually have a fairly simplistic belief system. It’s just they’ve let their beliefs sink to their soul, it’s in their hearts, it shines through their eyes. My beliefs tend to be more at the intellectual level, because that’s how I’ve been made – to constantly question and re-evaluate. All of us approach these things in our own individual way.

Some people should really know better.

Is it possible to be in love with a kitchen gadget? Or am I just very very sad?

I practically drool over the Lakeland catalogue at the best of times, but my new potato ricer is fantastic – really don’t know how I lived without it before.

For my Brit readers who haven’t got a clue what I’m talking about, a potato ricer is a bit like a giant garlic press – you bung the cooked potato in at the top, press down and out comes perfectly mashed potato with no effort and more importantly no lumps.

For my US readers who haven’t a clue why I’d be so excited about a potato ricer, we in the UK grew up with potato mashers – a sort of mini ski-pole thing with which you stamp the potato into submission. In practise, you always miss bits resulting in lumpy mash, or your arm drops off with the effort after about 5 minutes or so.

It makes me wonder about all the other really simple ideas for kitchen gadgets that someone somewhere takes for granted, and I still haven’t heard about. Time to go back to browsing through the catalogue…