I am a Christian.  No, not the Tim Tebow kind.  I don’t strike the overly publicized prayer pose when I score a new pair of sale shoes at Nordstrom.  I’m just your everyday, run of the mill Methodist who wears nothing on my sleeve but the occasional well-tailored jacket.  Among other things, I embrace altruism, criticism, patriotism, and thanks to years of partnered cohabitation, Judaism.  Yes, we are a culturally and religiously blended family.  Last year I wrote about our combined efforts in trimming the best Christmas tree ever, but this year I think it only fitting to wish my Jewish friends the happiest of Hanukkah celebrations over the next eight days.

On Christmas Day, we eat Chinese, but tonight we will sit down to lamb shanks with pears and pistachios, butternut squash latkes with sage and pine nut yogurt, and a pea spaetzle with mint, chives, and tomatoes.  And who will cook this culinary extravaganza?  The Christian, the one who historically ate ham at every religious holiday.  Yes, in the beginning, God (and my mother-in-law) begat a steep learning curve.

My favorite holiday Hanukkah meal was prepared a few years ago by me and my good friend, Chele.  I use the terms “holiday” and “prepared” lightly as Chele was raised Catholic, is now an agnostic, and tends to multiply everything by large whole numbers when converting in the kitchen…which explains my near alcohol poisoning this summer.  Anyway, under the strict supervision (and bottomless wine glass) of the household Hanukkah expert, the runaway former Southern Baptist and the fallen Catholic put together a brisket and fried potato pancakes (it’s all about the oil, and that’s where the Southern part came in handy) that would make you wanna slap your mamma (ok, that, too).  Before we sat down, though, and before the sun set, Randi, put aside her wine glass and picked up a match to light the shamash, the attendant candle that lights the other candles in the menorah.  She recited the blessing over the candles while lighting them.  The blessing is in Hebrew, but you don’t have to be Jewish, or religious for that matter, to appreciate the beauty in the message.  Count your multitudinous gifts and be thankful for each and every one.

I look around the holiday table each year and offer my gratitude for the many miracles reflected in the faces in front of me, and in the faces foremost in my memory.  I am constantly amazed at those who love me not only for what I am humanly allotted, but for eight times more than the expected.  I am truly blessed.  In return, I can only offer you my expressions of thankfulness and my vow to watch over you, to be your advocate, your shamash…so that I might give back some of the abundant light you bring into my life.

Happy Hanukkah!

As regular readers of the ‘Schmootz blog can attest, I don’t write about myself very often…at least outside of my political ponderings or entertainment selections that I deem personally worthy (or unworthy) of a viewer’s time.  I tend to observe the world from thirty thousand feet looking down, instead of from ground level looking up and out.  I know, it’s safer that way, and I don’t pretend it as anything else.  I’m not above a few Freudian defense mechanisms of my own.  Lately, though, I have been writing from the deep, personal trenches, and whether the results will ever see the light of day, it remains to be seen.  What I do know is that this reflective experience, coupled with a few curves life has thrown at my family as of late, has compelled me to reflect upon my good fortunes and to appreciate more the plentitude of which I am graced.

In a couple of days, I’ll sit down to the American holiday of Thanksgiving, where pepper spray seems to be this year’s condiment of choice.  As I occupy my thoughts, I surmise that I am certainly not one of the richest of Americans when comparing bank accounts, though let me say here, I am extremely relieved and much obliged that I have a good job that provides an ample surplus for my actual needs.  Where I do find an obscene abundance of wealth, however, is in the indices where monetary estimations are difficult to apply.  It is here that I find myself in the fortunate 1% of love, family, and friends.  As a result, I feel that I should be liberally taxed to expound upon my thankfulness in proportion to my earnings.

My partner and I, though legally unwed and filing separately, have been together for quite a few years.  I believe in a Kardashian matrimonial timeline, we have been in power-of-attorney bliss something synonymous to the Pleistocene era.  I often refer to her as my better three-quarters because I believe a realistic relationship it is never 50-50.  Just like the Dow Jones, there are emotional ups and downs, mostly due to speculation, but there has never been an extended period that I didn’t receive a special dividend like hearing the garage door go up after a long day and knowing she will walk through the door at any minute; like waking in the middle of the night to a head on my shoulder and an arm across my chest; like her mother’s difficult chicken soup recipe when I have a cold (the only time she ever cooks); like that extra vote of confidence to push me over the top and that honest shot of humility to pull me back from the edge.  For that, I am eternally thankful.

Over the years, I have made quite the capital gain in friends, and I can honestly say that  we anxiously rely on common shares of each other’s company.  From technical advice, to new grilling techniques, to obscure pop culture trivia, our investments in these mutual corporations of real personhoods have certainly paid off.  What might have started from some obscure individual fund, now matures as virtual writing advice over mutual morning coffee or hours long Skype exchanges half the world away.  There is a saying that you can pick your friends, but you can’t pick your family.  As far as I’m concerned, no statement has ever been more true, but speculation has served me quite well over the years, and I have a few friends who are more of a family asset and thankfully come with a lifetime guarantee…one in particular, an inheritance over several lifetimes.

So, yes, I am a one-percenter.  I am blessed with a wealth of intangible assets that have been created by a loving work effort yet defy physical measurement.  I say tax me more so that that there is such a thing as an equal share of a grateful, giving heart.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone…it is my sincere hope that you add goodwill and kindness to your balance sheet.

What the hell happened to Thanksgiving?  You know, that once famous holiday located nicely on the calendar between All Hallow’s Eve and the Christian celebration of retail tidings of great cheer.  I went shopping yesterday, and what to my confused and wandering eyes should appear, but a miniature sleigh, and eight tiny reindeer.  Towering, fake evergreens are spruced up with twinkling white lights, and beneath, varying sizes of wrapped packages, and boxes with bows.  Huh?  What?  It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas is being forced down our throats.

I love Thanksgiving.  I remember as a child the satisfaction of outlining my hand with a pencil…and with a few colors of broken crayons, a little glue, a piece of brown construction paper, and a little imagination, a beautiful turkey appeared.   My kid creation was proudly placed upon the refrigerator door, a familial place of honor underneath that slightly chipped magnet shaped like an ear of corn.  I remember waiting anxiously for my father, my uncle, and my male cousins to return from the morning’s hunt.  Not because I had any real desire to see Bambi’s dad strapped to the hood of the truck, but because their arrival from over the river and back through my grandmother’s vast woods signaled the countdown to sit down, a time when we gathered around the large, dining room table, held hands, told the story about the first Thanksgiving, and expounded upon the givings we were most thankful.   At this innocent point in my life, I was thankful most that God created Goo Goo Clusters.  As you can imagine, it didn’t take that many years, for me to realize the symbolism over substance of these choreographed family dinners and the fact the Pilgrims exchanged small pox with native Americans more than they did turkey and stuffing.  That being said, the exercise of being thankful, never lost its significance for me.

These are tough, weary times in which we now live.  And though our retail giants would like us to believe that to lighten the mood we need a little Christmas right this very minute, I don’t believe that for a second.  True, at times I, too, feel Mame’d from this greatly depressing recession, but what I need more right now than skinny Elvis singing about a blue Christmas, is a little congealed-and-compressed, canned cranberry sauce (found somewhere between the 75% off candy corn and the caned peppermint sticks), and a swift kick in the ass.   I need that historic Macy’s paraded reminder to be extraordinarily thankful…for my family, my friends, my health, and a myriad of life’s other small, but priceless, gratuities.

People, let our voices be heard.  We don’t need eight weeks of Hallmark hooey.  Occupy Thanksgiving and keep this significant day of reflection from becoming roadkill on the corporate causeway.  Raise your hands in thankful solidarity and peacefully protest…and then draw a turkey around them.

Ok, first I thought, what shoes will I wear?!  I mean, come on…the book is called Changing Shoes, right?  As long as you can change your shoes, you can change your life.  My catalogue of pumps, platforms, and peep-toes began to race through my mind.  And then I thought, what car will I drive?  I can’t show up in that little red thing of mine and ask her to fold herself up and get in, it’s Tina Sloan.  And what if she has “people”?  Ok, I’ll take the SUV…not great for maneuvering downtown streets, but greater seating capacity and more comfort.

As luck would have it, Tina arrives to the first snow storm of the year, a twelve inch blanket of nature’s frozen beauty.  Yeah, it’s beautiful, but it sure puts a crimp in the shoe choice.  Out are the black, suede peep-toe, 4-in heels…in are the motorcycle styled Uggs.  Ugh!  Luckily, I have read Tina’s book and I followed her advice.  Being confronted with some act of an inconvenient god, I just changed my shoes.  Sure the ugly Australian brogans are the appropriate pick for an unplowed parking lot, but knee high, new-copper-penny-colored, crocodile-embossed, boots are more applicable to Driving Miss Tina.  I simply made the modification in the car.

I arrive early to the hotel, as any daughter of a Junior Leaguer and graduate of the Miss Pittypat Southern school of manners would.  Yes, you can take the girl out of the South, but you never quite take the Southern out of the girl.  I circled the block a couple of times, and giving further credence to the idiom, third times a charm, standing on the sidewalk outside the historic hotel is a strikingly beautiful blond woman dressed in winter white, a pale, lime green jacket, a cream-colored scarf with just the hint of sparkle, and off-white ballet flats…yes, Tina, I noticed.  With a wave of acknowledgement, and a graceful climb into the steroidal kin of the family station wagon, our journey begins.  Cue the Hans Zimmer soundtrack, I’m driving Miss Tina.

It’s rush hour, so I avoid the freeways and cut a determined transversal through the heart of the city by way of the financial district and Capital Hill, honking in solidarity to the #OccupyDenver sidewalk encampment and the 99%ers.  Most assuredly, I am an excellent driver, and display my tour guide skills Liberally.

Let me just say at this point in the conversation, Tina Sloan is an absolute pleasure, and it gets better from here.  She is kind, funny, gracious, giving…and patient.  Southerners should come with a warning label, “CAUTION: If you ask a storyteller a question, you will get an answer…a long one.”  As a result the forty-five minutes of drive time into the suburbs were filled with personal stories of parents, family, significant others, home towns, education, Twitter, and politics…just like new old friends.

Arriving early at the book store, we have plenty of time to grab a bite to eat after checking in.  Now, it must be coupon night in suburbia, because all the places nearby where we could grab a nice bite and a good glass of red (for me) are packed.  When I offered a few more places, or as I nodded to the bright yellow sign above our heads, the unlikelihood of a burger, be still my heart when Tina said she loves burgers.  Fatburger it is!  Inside we walked, ordered two Fatspecials and noshed like girlfriends over greasy protein and Game 6 of the World Series over our heads.  Now, for all you Venice fans out there, I got a bit of scoop on Season 3, but what happens in Fatburger stays in Fatburger.  Plus, though I may relish the fantasy of it, I’m not willing to risk the reality that Crystal Chappell might cut me.

After introducing Tina to my better three-quarters, we dashed through the snow over to the bookstore across the way.  Indie bookstores are usually quite small and intimate, but these are the suburbs, so the combined square feet is comparable in size to that of a WalMart.  Never fear, Tina’s personality fills every square inch as she recites for the crowd, raucous re-tellings of the live soap days of yesterday.

Looking around the room, I am observing who is sitting around me.  The ages range from near 20 to near 70.  They are Tina’s Twitter friends, actual friends, and all friends in between.  They are breast cancer fighters, domestic abuse survivors, and yes, even lesbian survivors.  One young man in a wheelchair announced to Tina that he was very jealous when “Lillian” kissed “Buzz”.  These are the people who were touched every day by the social significance of Guiding Light and the other daytime dramas that have been snuffed out to game shows, weight loss shows, and cooking shows.  These are the people Tina speaks to in her book signings using the example of “Lillian’s” yearly regression to behind the scenes, culminating in a Christmas episode where the character is relegated to a position behind the tree.  After the obligatory wallowing in a bag of M&Ms, Tina announces, “Hey, I’m in the room!  I’m tired of being invisible.”

She changed her shoes that day, letting us all know that we don’t have to walk around in the orthopedic, white nurse shoes life gives us.  We can don pink hiking boots and conquer Mount Kilimanjaro.   We can put down the bag of M&Ms, and put on those Chanel pumps, the ones reserved for relationships and romance.  We can put on our comfortable shoes, #Occupy(anywhere), and stand up for our Constitutional rights.  Or, we can put on those running shoes, and race for the cure.  Don’t like where you are standing?  Change your shoes.

Thank you, Ms Sloan.  Though I may have been the one driving Miss Tina, it was I who was taken on a journey…what a ride.

Birthdays.  I have reached a point in my life that I sometimes forget my birthday.  No, it is not senility, though I imagine some would beg to differ.  It’s just that I have had so many.  And before you begin to wonder just how old I am, I am not referring to the collective anniversaries of that traumatic trip down the birth canal that scared me so badly I didn’t speak for a year and a half.  (Thank you, Gracie Allen.)  I am referring to all those other times I have been born.  Those times when life was breathed into me instead of those first few gasps of instinctual inhalations.

I remember my awakening to prejudice and discrimination and making a conscious decision to eradicate those sequences from my DNA.  It was a long, hot, lazy summer day in the northern reaches of Atlanta.  It was June 14th, Flag Day, the displays of polyester red, white, and blue hung limp in the stale, humid air.  I remember it was unusually hot for June.  Having quickly exhausted our supply of ice cold and freshly squeezed lemonade, my parents decided the only thing to break this heat was a day at the swim club.  Now, the swim club was really just a bogus beach built around a lake, but that was no ordinary lake; it was bottomless.  As a kid, I hung on every word of the tall tales told about that lake.  From tragic to sinister, the message was always the same…”and they never found the bottom”.  Whether true or not, that was one deep, cold, lake.  Headers off the high dive were met with layer after layer of chilled exhilaration.   On a steaming day like this, you can imagine my anticipation for immersing myself in that water.

Upon pulling up, I noticed an African-American family getting out of their car.   A girl about my age was climbing through the window of the way, way back of a station wagon…I always wanted a station wagon with a way, way back.  The family was waiting patiently in line in front of us, the girl and I exchanging “hey’s” and giggles.  When they reached the window, they were asked for their membership card before they could enter.  Membership card?  We were never asked for one of those.  But wait, we don’t have one either, hey, Dad, we don’t have one.  Where are they going?  Wait!  Frustrated at my elevated persistence, my father snapped at me exactly where they were going…and why.  It was at that moment that I realized though we live most of our lives in various shades of gray, this time, life was very black and white.  I took a deep and cleansing breath, and I defied my father’s order to get inside.  If not my new almost friend from the way, way back, then not me either.  It was a very long, hot, but personally motivating summer day…in the parking lot of the swim club.

Though I have never marked this day with any celebratory hoopla or even used this awakening as an excuse for chocolate cake, every June 14th, way way back in my memories, I think of my almost friend and the birth mark I received as a result of our meeting.  It is just one of the many longevity stains that make up who I am, each renewal a new layer, a new growth ring in this tree of my so-called survival.  Birth happens, over and over and over again as life cannot be lived by abstinence only.

Honestly, though, I have been in rapture of late, and that is why I have been distracted from commenting on life’s little happenings.  In the non-biblical sense, I have been carried away with a project that began out of the insistence of a good friend.  I was asked to consider writing a short story that could be self-published as an experiment for a possible business venture.  After a couple of conversations, I agreed.  The problem is that once I got started, I couldn’t stop.  What began as a request for a few pages, turned into a few hundred.  There is only a small pun intended when I say it’s like the proverbial hole in the dike.  I can plug the creative flow with work and family distractions, sure, but I find the personal pressure to put pen to paper is just too forceful to be stoppered.  As a result, I have a book.  Well, almost.  I have a couple more chapters to wrap it up.

What will I do with it?  Who knows?  All I know is that I have been on an emotional journey with characters that are part of me and part of my imagination.  It’s up to the reader to decide which part is which…that is, if it ever sees the light of day outside my hard drive.   I may just write a short story about a moment in time and keep this personal catharsis to myself.

In other news, this is the ‘Schmootz on:

The death of daytime soap programming – Let’s face it, the soap bubble has lost its luster.  The daytime serial, like the dinosaur, has met its meteor in the form of fewer stay at home moms and reality TV.  I agree with Oprah, and who doesn’t, that the American soap opera is an institution…but one whose time has come.  Dwindling ratings make it easy for networks to choke the lifetime out of a genre so dependent on the advertising sales of laundry detergent and toilet paper.  No amount of gimmicks or gay pairing pandering will ever sale enough Pampers to pay for this many actors, sets, and writers, and still make a profit.  Especially when it cost about a buck fifty to put on another inane talk show.  (Sorry, Oprah.)  So, I’m telling all my children that you only have that one life to live, and like sand through the hour glass, the days are numbered.

NBC’s The Voice – I started out a fan after the first few episodes, but after last week’s third round of head to head competition I was left shaking my head.  The song choices were puzzling, and the performers had more pitch problems than the Chicago Cubs.  I’ll try to stick it out until the live shows, because I like the premise, but if it doesn’t get better, I’ll be as surprised as the look on Reba’s face if I stick around much longer.

HBO’s Game of Thrones – It’s so bad, it’s good.  From murdering, incestuous brother-sister relationships to breast feeding nine year olds, to a dagger through any orifice, this drama is so wrong in so many ways…so much so that it keeps me coming back for more.  I find myself flinching at the gore, excited by the sex, and laughing at the humor of a whore-mongering imp, who just happens to be a little person.  HBO just has a way of making the wrong, just so right.

NFL Lockout – What can you say about a fight between billionaires and millionaires that would make the average Jane sympathetic to either side?  This is a time in our country when so many of us feel lucky just to have a job.  So to hear the word “fairness” fumbled around by those with two or more commas in their salaries, seems like a personal foul.  I understand the health concerns of the players and their desire for a secure future, but I also understand the average Bronco, Cowboy, and Ravens fan’s difficulty to process why a player can’t manage an adequate healthcare policy with a league minimum of a few hundred thousand dollars.  And as for the billionaires?  Don’t get me started.  The bottom line here is just find some common ground…any common ground…and get on with it.  No matter what happens the real loser is the ticket holder.  The owners won’t take the loss, they will drop back and pass the accounting on to the backs of the common fan.  If the NFL isn’t careful, America might begin to drop this organized Sunday religion, too.

Focus on the Family Concedes Gay Marriage (Well, almost) – Yep, as a real sign that the world could be coming to an end, one of the more realistically focused of The Family stated that after millions and millions and millions of dollars and hundreds of resulting Family jobs later, the high altitude haters are focusing their energies elsewhere.  Though back-peddling a bit now, he admitted the latest polls continue to show overwhelming American support for same-sex rights, including marriage.  Now, it would be folly to expect The Family to change their positions on gay bullying (for it) or sexual reprogramming (for it), but for now they are going to take my advice and focus more on their own damn family…for at least a day or so.

Now, back to the book.  Hell, if Snooki can do it…

I was catching up this weekend with my friend and rocker, Jeryl Orsino, and she brought up in conversation the 2011 “end times” prediction.  Being the astute and in-the-know blogger that I am, I replied, “Huh, what?”  Jeryl went on to explain that a Christian group in Florida is predicting the end of the world to be May 21, 2011.  Well, hell, considering that’s a couple of weeks away, I thought I would take a look.

For those of you (like me) now pondering the worth of purchasing those extended service agreements, here is the 411.  Christian radio host and President of the Family Radio Christian network, Harold Camping, is predicting, with certainty, that pious and worthy followers of Jesus Christ will be taken into the heavens on May 21, 2011, and the end of the world as we know it (thank you, REM) will be October 21, 2011.  Good news for those who recently purchased those six month extended warranties.

According to Camping, “I know it’s absolutely true, because the Bible is always absolutely true.”  But humans make mistakes, right?  This must explain Mr. Camping’s first attempt at end-point prophecy.  He published a book in 1992 entitled 1994 where he predicted the coming of Christ and eminent end to world as September 4, 1994.  On September 5, 1994, Harold Camping admitted he must have made a mathematical error.  A civil engineer by trade, Camping used modern mathematical equations to interpret God’s intentions in numerical symbolism recorded in scripture over thousands of years.  Hey, if those Mars rover scientists can forget to convert to metric, surely we can forgive a Baptist, radio talk show host a decimal point or two.  Apparently, Camping’s new and improved, rapture 2.0, must be using a conversion factor.

As a Christian and a scientist, I am wary of those who proselytize with an extremely literal approach to the Bible.  We have to considering the distinct possibility that the earth is more than a few thousand years old and was not created in six, 24 hour periods.  The modern world agrees that women are not property and should not be traded, sold, or beaten.  Who would argue that it is good 21st Century practice to dash the young children of our enemies against rocks?  Though with the growing Islamophobia in this country, this practice may be making a comeback.

And come on, enough of us have seen Shark Week to know Jonah probably didn’t take up residence in the belly of a whale and live to tell the tale.  Not to mention, a majority of people now believe it is just fine to consume shell fish AND have a gay friend design their man cave or a lesbian fix their plumbing.  Therefore, isn’t it a much more logical approach to believe the Bible contains the word of God, but also the word of humans, who were limited by the culture in which they were writing?

As for Mr. Camping and his predictions, I have to take this nouveau-Nostradamus with a pillar of salt.  To him, the ancient number 5 equals “atonement”, the ancient number 10 equals “completeness”, and the ancient number 17 equals “heaven”.  To me, in my not so ancient youth, the number 3 meant “ecstasy”, and I can honestly say I was in heaven…with a little rapture on the side.

Many times over the years, I discovered religious elders like him to be too heavenly minded to do us any earthly good.  Preying, sir, is not pious.  Just one more reason I detest camping.

Party, my house, May 22, 2011.  Bring shellfish.

I am interrupting my Cinco de Mayo celebration to wish my friend, Chele, a very happy birthday.  I would mail her a big old gift, but alas, she is off in Chicago managing (as best she can) that petulant purveyor of plastic crap, Ms. Dixie Longate, and her one-woman show, Dixie’s Tupperware Party.  So, I will just have to put down the margarita and type…I will, however, imbibe at the occasional comma, and since it’s me writing, the semicolon.

Chele is one of those people who come into your life and you say, how the hell did THAT happen?  I’m not being negative as she says pretty much the same thing on a regular bases, though more in the terms, “I can’t believe you like me.”   On the surface you wouldn’t necessarily say we have all that in common.  She’s a short-spoken upstate New Yorker: I’m a Southerner with all the long comparative colloquialisms.  Chele is tall; I am sho…not tall.  I’m a bit of a shoe whore, and Chele solicits sneakers…the clean ones are for evening.  Chele is calm, cool, and collected in a crisis; I am a fucking hot head, four-letter throwing, wild-eyed psycho.  So you get the picture.

Chele and I met about a decade ago at a Starbucks in the theater district near her office in New York City.  We had been introduced initially online with a group of like-minded individuals who soon realized the power of fan groups is really lost on a pandering network, so why not harness the power (and the profits) for charity instead of character emblazoned chotchkies that become wastebasket fodder.   About $70,000 later, it’s probably one of the things I’m most proud, but I digress (it’s the margarita…count the number of semicolons already).

Starbucks, oh yeah.  It was raining, so the place was packed with locals who were waiting it out and tourists who couldn’t get a cab, but were afraid to ride the subway.  How the hell was I supposed to find someone in this coffee establishment, percolating with people, who I had never met?  Luckily, she found me.  You see, Chele is an observer of life, and though she is not all that fond of people, she has this uncanny knack of knowing what they will do.  She knew me immediately; thus began a friendship of what can best be described as loving and personal exchange.  For example, I was in the delivery room when she pushed out her first pair of heels.  So proud.  And, I used to apply the slightest of derogatory terminology when she did the Sci-Fi geek speak, but now, thanks to Chele’s tutelage, I am an avid Battlestar Galactica, Caprica, Warehouse 13, and Barely Human fan.  There are more, but I am not admitting to them here.

I owe Chele quite a bit.  She is the one who encouraged me to write in the first place.  She is my blank wall to the world that I bounce things off to see what sticks.  She is the one who taught Randi and me to aptly apply the Wonder Woman bracelets to deflect those verbal bullets sometimes fired in mutual moments of stubbornness.  (Jesus Christ, more Sci-Fi, ok, comics, but I’m not going there!)  She is my “out of the box” entertainment hook-up, my psychologist, my two degrees of separation from fabulous people, and she is family.

So, Chele, let me just say this; yes, you can wear those white sneakers to dinner now that Easter has passed…and the ‘Schmootzs love you.

Happy birthday!  Cheers!

I made the comment this weekend that if I was asked one more time about my thoughts regarding LA Laker, Kobe Bryant’s, recent gay-derogatory comments, I would start a ‘Schmootz column entitled, “Poll a Lesbian”.  I say this in jest only in part, and here’s why.  Gustavo Arellano, staff writer for the OC Weekly and contributing editor to the LA Times, writes a very informative, and at times very humorous column/blog entitled, “Ask a Mexican”, where he addresses questions of stereotypes, immigration, civil liberties, etc.  As a huge proponent of education is power and that knowledge promotes change, I thought, why not answer publicly questions that pertain to the LGBT community.  After all, now that television networks are canceling all the daytime soap operas, where will middle America get their information about the socially marginalized?

As an occasional feature, I will approach topics and questions of an LGBT (or personal) nature that have been asked of me either through my capacity as a blogger, or at work or home.  Now, the answers will just be my opinions, and before you start asking for credentials, I will refrain from the trite platitude of the toaster oven.  I have a PhD in life just like all the rest of you.  Point of view promotes discussion, and that’s exactly what I’m hoping for here.

So, first, let me now answer that burning co-worker question regarding Kobe Bryant and get it over with.  No, I don’t think that Kobe Bryant is a homophobe, nor do I think his comments were homophobic.  He is more an insensitive asshat, but what is new about that?  Unfortunately, our 24/7 news cycle likes to sensationalize a controversial story to the point of desensitizing, and I fear that here.  Time and time again, I have written that words matter.  Homophobe is an extremely powerful word and should be reserved for the vile and deserving among us.  By calling a referee, of unknown sexual orientation, a “fucking faggot” makes an angry and impetuous Kobe Bryant a fucking jerk, but not a homophobe in my opinion.  Conversely, that someone who verbally terrorizes a gay youth to the point that kid thinks his first name IS faggot, IS homophobic.   There is a difference.

Just this morning a fracking BITCH cut me off on my morning commute causing me to spill my coffee and drop my call!  Now, am I a woma-phobe? LMAO…hardly.

I promised myself that I wouldn’t do it, but I did.  I made a pact with me, all in the name of preserving my somewhat stable mental health, that I would NEVER again look at the results of the average American taking the citizenship test.  I failed, not because I am some kind of masochist, but because I am an eternal optimist when it comes to my fellow man…and woman.

Newsweek conducted a poll of 1,000 citizens of the United States, yes, REAL citizens, and asked them to take a mock citizenship test.  Now, the REAL citizenship test is much more involved, but this was a good attempt to give the participants an idea of what REAL Americans should know about our history and our government.  After looking at some of the answers, I am more convinced than ever that we live in an idiocracy!

Ok, because I am a glutton for punishment, let’s go over some of the answers.  A whopping 73% couldn’t answer correctly why we fought the cold war.  The answer is Communism, and it seems somewhat ludicrous in light of our now pandering relationship with China.  I would like to know, though, if anyone answered “global warming” to the “why we fought the cold war” question.

When was the Declaration of Independence adopted?  Well, 33% of those polled didn’t know it was July 4, 1776, but more disturbing, 6% of a thousand US citizens couldn’t circle Independence Day on a calendar…though they did enjoy the movie.

Sadly, 81% could not name a power of the Federal government.  Though I can see where some of my brothers and sisters would answer, “x-ray vision into our personal lives”, that is not a super power of the Fed.  There are several answers, print money, make treaties, declare war, etc.  I’m not too surprised the majority of people missed that whole declare war thing…seems like we are always zoning off to war without declaring much of anything.

Seventy (70) percent of REAL Americans don’t know the Constitution is the supreme law of the land.  And not surprising, 63% have no idea how many Supreme Court justices are on the bench interpreting it.  That’s a Citizens United decision of a more frightening sort.

On a positive note, however, because as I said, I am an optimist of my fellow American, 71% of the people do know that Joe Biden is our Vice President.  One can only surmise that he could have reached the 90th percentile mark had he shot one of his friends in the face.

I can think of a couple of reasons why Europeans and other world countries continue to kick our collective asses on history and government tests such as this.  One, Schoolhouse Rock is no longer a Saturday morning viewing staple between mind-numbing adolescent programming, and two, I will suggest, is the overwhelming have/have not disparity in the American school system that is not seen in most other industrialized nations.  A state budget balanced on the backs of our nation’s children is not the answer to closing this learning chasm.  As a science professional, I would like to impress upon our politicians that there is a whole other decidedly deciduous forest out there…if they will only look farther then their own privileged family trees.

Yes, I am a Left-leaner, a Liberal, a socialist, a pinko commie (though most Americans don’t know what that is), or possibly a Progressive…you apply the moniker, I don’t care.  What I do care about is this land that I love, our hesitance to have an honest discussion about funding our future, and the path we are Jay-walking down as a nation.