Porquetty Choppe-Chop

Such a dear little sweet little fragment of dogge. I'm sitting here with Porque on my lap and she is easily encompassed with two of my not-very-large hands. Sweet little, good little dog. It is so much a part of life that she sits on my lap that today while I was away from home for several hours felt weird.

Poor Muslims. They can't have dogs. Maybe that's why so many are so angry. Each terrorist needs a small dog on his lap, nice and quiet and sweet. A warm little friend. Brings down the blood pressure. I would advocate sending Chihuahuas For Peace to the Middle East except that the precious little dogs might all get decapitated for nothing.

Plus and Minus

Plus:
Beautiful warm, breezy weather recently. Not too hot, just lovely.
Minus:
Evil mosquitoes who descend on me in buzzing clouds every time I step out into my yard. I saw in the paper that over in Portsmouth some gov't entity is going to spray for mosquitoes. Forget Portsmouth. Try my house.

Once in a blue moon something encouraging happens. Like today.

I know that some of you are aware that I've been fighting a little war with Food Lion over the issue of will they or will they not continue to provide shopping carts. The manager of the Food Lion at 2400 Colley has firmly declared that as long as he's manager, there will be no more carts provided for customers because customers steal them. As of a week ago Saturday the store was down to 17 carts, some of which are inoperable. The only way to shop there was to wait in the parking lot for a cart to come out of the store and then take it back in with you. Well, for me that was the last straw.

I don't have to shop there but I do it in order to support an establishment needed by so many people in the area who have no transportation. In spite of numerous wacko incidents there, in spite of having to wait in line behind people whom Harris Teeter refuses to serve because of their dependence on various forms of entitlement paper, I shop there week after week....but that thing about only 17 carts left was too much.

As a retired person it has been my mission to become a nice little old lady, to give up my bad old ways from the bad old days when I could write a white-hot letter and enjoy the job, could ream a new personal oriface for someone in need of one and not even break a sweat. That, I mean to tell you, is over. Haven't done anything like that since 2003. I even repented. But there was this problem at Food Lion. And I had had it. So back to the salt mine.

I wrote a letter. Then I went through all kinds of remorse. I shouldn't have done it. I should have just made up my mind to accept the fact that the store needed by so many was going to have to go out of business due to idiotic management. So guilty. Oy. At whom did I aim the letter? Food Lion Corporate Headquarters.

OK. Then today I needed to do my usual Friday run for weekend snacks. I decided to go back to Food Lion one more time. Oh, dear. No more carts than there were before. I had to carry around one of those little arm baskets, and it had just one handle. I got my chips, etc, paid, and then in a last ditch thing inspired by an overactive conscience, I asked the checkout girl, "Is the manager here?" I thought that if this was going to be my last time in the store, I wanted to say that to a live person. I'd written a letter, but I should have first have spoken to the recalcitrant manager for myself, eyeball to eyeball. I should not have accepted the word of his underlings.

The girl had a very odd look on her face but said, "The manager is on...um...extended vacation, but the assistant is back in the chips aisle. He's the guy with the bald head."

Lacking a cart, I took my groceries in hand and went on an assistant manager hunt. Finally found him heading away from me and I carolled out, "Yoohoo! Mr. Assistant Manager!"

We shook hands and made nice and then I began to get to my issue. Suddenly, but politely he raised his hand to stop me, "Ma'am. Someone wrote a letter to corporate headquarters and they have ordered 60 new carts for this store whether the manager wants them or not. The new carts were supposed to be here today but they'll surely be here soon and that should take care of the problem."

"Someone wrote a letter to ....." HAHAHAHAHAHAHHA!!!!Moral of the story; you may be a little old lady, you may consider yourself sidelined by life, you may not have any of your old gusto but.....

60 new carts. Oh, yes.

I'm encouraged. On behalf of the community, of course. I'm not going to let this seduce me back into my old bad ways. No, no. That is absolutely my last and final white-hot letter. And I guess I can repent again. Now it's absolutely official. I am going to be a nice little old lady. ;D

Entertainment

Last night I watched part of a show called Jackass. A man ran himself into low-situated road signs, go up, did it again, again, again. Shockingly I found that funny. If nothing else points the way, this alone shows that I'm headed down the slippery slope into dementia. A few years ago I would have scorned stuff of this caliber. Makes me wonder if there's anything left that I would still scorn. I read book reviews about 'literary works' which I wouldn't touch with a lawn rake. Not that long in my past, that's all I would read, worthwhile tomes. Now the thought that a book may be worthwhile automatically puts it on the don't-read list. I have become a moron. I was supposed to be pretty smart there at one point, but that was then and this is now.

More Education

I got up today still curious and read some more Islamic sites. Oy. Most sites say that the only way a Muslim may keep a dog is if that dog is necessary for farming or for hunting and then the dog may not stay in the house and if the dog licks you, you must wash yourself numerous times because a dog is even farther down on the no respect list than are pigs. Muslims, however may keep a cat for a pet. It is common about the time of Ramadan that Muslims want to clean up their act and many of them who have slipped and got a puppy for the kids will take the dog to the pound to be put to sleep. In fact this is so common that even very strict Imams have said that this is a scandal that makes for bad public relations re. Islam in the West, that animals must be treated well, i.e. get the dog a home with a Christian.

Gradually the light dawns. When I went to bed last night I was so confused about this religion. Why there are so many converts. Now I think I understand. This is Religion For Dummies. Every last speck of life is prescribed and frequently proscribed as well. It isa narrow, narrow life with no choices at all. If you just follow the umpteen, detailed rules, you will get to heaven. Every single thing relating to food, every single social situation, all matters relating to how both men and women must spend their working time, all family relations, every last fragment of possibility having to do with leisure time, all aspects of education for both sexes, exactly how to perform each necessary religious duty, it's all there with no room for doubt. For those who learn all of this but who still manage to have questions, there are the Imams who exist simply to lay down the law.

The world is full of people who find it too hard to BE something although they are willing to do anything they are told to do. Islam is for them. Christianity tells you what to BE and you must work out for yourself how to go about becoming that person. Islam is easy. Christianity is hard. Islam is for those who like to be told what to do, who like to follow orders, who do not want to discover, to explore, to struggle.

One Imam site complained that in the eyes of the non-Islamic world, this is a religion of those who have not been educated very well and/or who have a pretty low IQ...and he agreed. He said that this is pretty much true, with exceptions who have kind of a hard time living the life and frequently run afoul of Islamic law. What you almost never see in sites where Muslims ask an Imam for advice is this question..."Why?" Where asked, sometimes there is an answer rooted in middle eastern history and culture, but usually not. Usually the answer is just that Allah knows best.

Westernized Arabs get pretty good at invoking all the Muslim excuses for doing things they aren't allowed to do, like "necessity". Some Muslims are ashamed of the hadiths and say that the religion should consist only of whatever is found in the Koran but that won't work. Only in the hadiths do they find HOW to practice the religion. Some highly educated Muslims try to live by their understanding of the "spirit" of Islamic law but that doesn't work either because the hard-liners hate these people at least as much as they hate Christians.

Educational Experience

I have spent an educational day. With all this hoohaw over angry Muslims making the Pope apologize, I decided to read their sacred writings. I read the Koran a while ago but most of Islamic practice is based on 'hadiths', which are words of various important Muslims from long ago. This is where they get the pray five times/day thing and the Ramadan thing etc. So today I sat down determined to read these hadiths, at least the most famous ones.

1)One of them described Muhammed as the most beautiful human ever born and then went into detail among which it said that his nose was so long that he nearly got it wet every time he drank anything, his shoulder joints stuck out but his hands and feet were 'chubby'.

2) Another one told about travels in the life of Muhammed including an episode where he was under the protection of some fellow who was responsible to get him from point A to point B and that involved being away from a food source for a few days. So this man amazingly breast fed him.

3) Then there was an interminably long one explaining 'temporary marriage' which is confusingly similar to prostitution. Muhammed warmly recommended it to his followers, told them to be sure they didn't come up to the end of their lives having missed it. "You should enjoy them, and they should get their payment. It is a rental." This, unlike plain old fornication, does not get you stoned to death because the woman is compensated. Permanent marriage is also a money transaction since the husband must provide a dowry up front.

4) Lots of them explain what happens before, during, and after death for all kinds of people. When you're just about to go, the devils line up on one side of you and the angels line up on the other side. The devils are very excited and they are all black with hair down to the ground and fire coming out of their eyes and they're waving around whips made of fire. At the last second, you can see them, which inspires some people to make a split second conversion right at the end. Of course the angels don't seem very appealing either, "With bodies like insects and very thin from so much worshipping." Everyone is resurrected and Muhammed's mother, at the time of her death, was too shy to die because everyone is resurrected naked, so she got a one-person exemption from that. Muhammed gave her his shirt to wear in the resurrection.

5)The Imams are kind of like Islamic Popes, supposedly every word they speak is straight from God and they can't sin. An Imam will be the last person on earth left standing because God always has one available in case someone needs guidance. Imams know all, they even know when they're going to die and how it's going to happen. You must accord an Imam the respect you'd show to God. On one occasion someone disrespected an Imam and Muhammed made that person's entire village line up while someone came down the line dousing their mustaches with the liquid from a camel's stomach.

6) Hadiths about marriage explain why it is not necessary to marry a female slave. Also, they make it clear that a young woman can be married if her father consents whether she consents or not. To divorce a woman, a man says to her, "I divorce you," three times. If he's unable to talk for some reason, he may communicate his intentions with an appropriate gesture, but that wasn't specified. A woman can't divorce a man. A man can have up to four wives at one time as long as he's able to support them up to the level of her family back home. So much is said about prohibiting a man from marrying his mother that I wondered if that was a problem at one time in that part of the world.

Anyway, you can read it for yourself by going to this site... http://www.shiacode.com/

Two hours later...I seem to have kept on reading this material. In fact I branched out and read a lot of sites by people who converted to Islam. Then I read an enormous site by Islamic authorities who answer questions from Muslims all over the world about what can and cannot be done by a Muslim.

1) A Muslim woman may not pluck her eyebrows, can't cut the hair on her head, but she must remove all body hair.
2) Muslim women must stay indoors. May only go outside if there is actual necessity, not for fun or to go visit friends, etc.
3) It is encouraged, recommended that Muslim extended families live together. A man only HAS to leave his childhood home after marriage if he is wealthy and his wife insists that he provide her with her own home. If he isn't rich, is merely middle class, he's got to provide his wife a private bedroom and bathroom separate from the rooms the rest of the family ever use. If he's poor, he only has to provide a private bedroom. So a woman marrying a man who isn't rich can expect to spend her life with her mother-in-law if that's what her husband wants.
4) A Muslim woman is not supposed to look at or to speak to men other than her husband. If she has to talk to a man other than her husband, she's supposed to use a loud, harsh voice and only speak what has to be said for business reasons, meanwhile keeping her eyes on the floor.
5) Muslim female education is mostly about the Koran. If a girl wants to be educated beyond this religious instruction, she first needs to spend at least three years in strictly religious training to protect her from non-Islamic influences she'd meet outside the home. Girls who do go to school should be taken there by a father or brother and then picked up by these family members, no riding public transportation or driving themselves. There are some well educated Muslim women, but these women should be able to prove necessity. For example if a woman has no men in the family to take care of her and no prospect of marriage, she can say that she's got to get an education so she can support herself.
6) Muslims are not only forbidden alcohol, no dancing, no kind of Western entertainment, they may not listen to music at all. On the question and answer site, a man asked if it would be OK for him to listen to tapes of someone reading the Koran if there was a musical background to the voice and the answer was that NO, he couldn't.

The more I read, the more I do not understand those who convert to Islam. People raised in that culture may not know anything else. However, to voluntarily go from a life of freedom to a narrow little tunnel through life, why would anyone choose that? The interesting thing is that there are lots and lots of converts. I read quite a few sites where people recounted their conversion experience, how they did it in spite of being shunned by family and former friends.

Fed Up

Pre-9/11 I guess I didn't spend much time thinking about Islam but since then, I've given it some thought. I read the Koran as well as numerous texts which purport to explain the teachings of this religion. Those who say that Islam is a peaceful religion are misinformed. All you have to do is to read the Koran. It's very clear. Followers of Mohammed are told to kill anyone who does not share their belief. Muslims will tell you that the real meaning of jihad is an internal struggle in the soul of the believer, a fight between one's good and bad impulses. That may be one interpretation of the word, but it's primary meaning is a real killing-people kind of war where Muslims kill unbelievers. In spite of the fact that I've read their religious texts and in spite of the fact that I understand the clear meaning of these texts, I have tried to maintain a benign attitude toward Muslims. I've told myself that they surely can't believe every detail of their religion.

Well, then this thing came up where all around the world Muslims are ranting and raving about how the Pope has to be executed and suddenly, I'm through pretending that Islam is OK. It's not. Overnight I got fed up. I don't think the Pope should apologize. He was absolutely right. This morning I read in the paper that a nun was nurdered and many churches were damaged. The Pope could only do his usual Sunday prayers under heavy guard. All around the world everyone is scared to death to do or say anything likely to annoy a Muslim. Why? Because theirs is definitely a violent religion. They really, no kidding believe they should kill everyone who disagrees with them. While I have always believed that anyone has a right to believe anything he/she wants to believe, I'm not sure about that as of today. I don't think anyone does have a right to believe that he/she should kill those who disagree with him/her. To make that OK, you'd have to say, "People have a right to be insane," which, of course, they do but in a padded cell. You know what? When you want to know what people believe, watch how they act. Right now, this world-wide bloodthirsty talk, this bombing churches and shooting at nuns, that is proof. Very violent religion.

A long time ago Salmon Rushdie got in trouble with Muslim clerics over something he wrote and he spent years afraid all the time that someone was going to kill him. Well, I thought that was crazy, but at least it was a family fight. I mean, it was Muslim versus Muslim in a fight over an instance of disrespecting their religion. Since then Muslims have come all the way out of the closet. They don't just kill dissenters within the religion, they've taken on the whole world. Everyone everywhere is scared of them. And that makes me mad.

If a big, mean dog came growling and slavering after you from behind, most people would run. Not me. I had that happen once. A German shephard rushed out after me, barking and threatening my ankles. Rather than run, I turned around and ran at the dog, screaming and swinging my purse around and around. To my sruprise and relief, the dog ran away from me. These Islamic bullies, hoping to scare the world into submission, have got us all running and afraid. I think it's time for the civilized world to turn around and chase the bullies, purse swinging, yelling, determined to believe and say anything we please whether they like it or not. Americans are not persecuting Muslims, not burning Mosques. Muslims are doing that stuff to Christians and Jews. Time for them to get a well-deserved beat down. Enough already.

They've got to accept that not everyone wants to or is going to live like they do, think like they think. It's all well and good to engage in dialogue in order to enlighten all parties to a disagreement. Dialogue, however, is not appropriate in a case where the only violent party to the conflict will not listen to anything but his/her inner sound track repeating, "Kill the Christians. Kill the Jews." We can't have a battle of ideas with people to whom a holy war means blood and bombs.