Back to the Golden Calf

Well I'll be. The Christian right has drilled so far down into the old testament that they've popped out the bottom.

Cindy Jacobs of the 700 club is calling for a prayer intervention to put the global economy under Yahweh's control (apparently he can't do this for himself) centered on the bull statue on Wall Street in New York.

No kidding. They're praying to a statue of a bovine for wealth. LCD Seattle thinks it would be fun to show up in Moses costumes and rebuke them.

Read more if you can stomach it. Prayer Needed for Global Economies

What's in it for Mother Nature? Why I think there are gays

I've been pondering this question for a long time, and I think I've developed a reasonable hypothesis.

Assumption: All aspects of human behaviour are the result of evolutionary process, including social conventions, abstract concepts, and social structures. Nature doesn't keep things around unless they are somehow useful in an evolutionary framework.

Hypothesis: Gays (inclusive) are socially advantageous because they supply a small population of adults who are typically unencumbered by the work of child rearing. At times there are sudden increases to the necessary workload of a social group due to environmental pressures. If all adults were encumbered by child rearing then there would be no additional people to deal with these periodic increases to necessary work without sacrificing the well being of children.

During times of normal activity levels, the population of unencumbered adults are freer to pursue optional activities which advance technology, liberal arts, and other fields of endeavour which are not strictly required for survival and species propagation.

Discuss!

Project 3: Kurta Celtique!

I've wanted to write about my current sewing project, but since it's a birthday present for Lingoman, I have had to wait until today! After two times through the same shirt pattern I felt like I was ready for something new. Lingoman has wanted a kurta that was cut and sized for a North American person for a long time, and his birthday was coming up, and he just gave me a sewing machine: all indicators were pointing in the same direction! Get stitching a Sheumais!

Lingoman, Icon Watcher and I made a trip to Little India to buy cloth. I can't tell you why it didn't set off alarm bells in my head when Auntie Store Clerk didn't want to cut us a length in half-yards. Turns out, when you spend a whopping $2 a yard you get what you pay for.

I started out with the McCalls 4002 caftan pattern because it had the right basic elements and construction method for something like a kurta. I shortened it to knee length by folding the front and back pattern pieces half way between tunic and caftan length. For a more finished look, I borrowed a tab collar piece from a different shirt pattern and added it.

And for that authentic Celtic touch, I added sparkly silver Celtic knotwork trim. Hee hee. The fabric was pretty challenging to work with, and I don't plan on buying that materials quite that delicate in the future, but I'm still reasonably happy with the end product.

Update Lingoman loves it. Yay! Memories!

Happy Birthday Honey! Or Reasons I Love Lingoman

In honor of my fiancé's birthday today, I thought I would take a few minutes to write down some of the reasons why I love him so much. So, in no particular order:

• He cares deeply about issues beyond our daily lives He gets really angry when people are mistreated. It doesn't matter whether or not he knows any of them personally. He cares about the direction human society is going in, even though we don't have any kids. He's keenly interested in minority language revival and all the social justice issues surrounding it. He just cares.
  
  
• He's not scared of the things that scare me I fear adversity. I doubt my own ability to deal with crises in my own life. I'm fearful in new social situations and he helps me with all of those things.
  
  
• My family and friends love him too and he loves them.
  
  
• We share many, but not all interests We can talk about so many things that we are both passionate about, but also share things the other doesn't know and broaden both of our perspectives.
  
  
• He's Canadian which means that we can really get married!
  
  
• He's sexy and a super cuddle bug.
  
  
• He's deeply honest which inspires an abiding trust in me. I know that he would tell me the truth in a crisis. He's already had to more than once.
  
  
• He loves me and that's never happened before. At least not that I could believe.
  
  
• He thinks about his life and changes direction when his inner compass tells him to.
  
  
• He has an inner compass Not everyone does, you know!
  
  
• He's a Gaelic speaker Let's be honest - that should probably be nearer the top of the list! Of course there are the other dozen or so languages, but I'm trying to be concise here.
  
  
• He loves to eat Something we share, much to my cardiologists dismay.
  
  
• We're not threatened by each others religions When we met he self-identified as a Druid, and I as a Wiccan. He's now a Buddhist and I've drifted in a more firmly polytheistic direction. Some people might have tension about that, but we don't

Most importantly, he awakens an ever-deepening love and respect for him in me that is like a campfire, a rose, a waterfall, a sunset and a steaming dish of butter chicken all in one.

I love you, Honey. Happy Birthday.

Project 2: Black Shirt

I finished project number two last Thursday. Having been all the way through this pattern on Big Yella made the second time much easier. I can't believe how primitive pattern instructions are. Hand-drawn diagrams? Why not just make a video of each step and include a DVD? At least they could have color photos.

Anyway, now that I've got this shirt pretty much under control I'm going to make a couple more to round out the winter wardrobe. Yay. (yes, I wear short-sleeved shirts all year round)

The Automatic Screw-Up Button

After about four hours of intense practice on Friday and Saturday I was able to play Fairy Dance cleanly up to tempo. It had even started to sound good. Then I got the recording equipment set up and spent three and a half hours today trying to re-record it. As soon as I pressed the record button, it was back to square one. I'm sure I'm about to make some great breakthrough with this but it doesn't feel like it. Arrrrgh!

Update: I actually did make a huge breakthrough.

Project 1: Big Yellow Shirt

I just finished my first ever garment! It's a McCall's pattern that was rated "easy" so I shudder to think what a difficult one would entail! There are lots of little problems, but I'm still very happy with it. I might even wear it tomorrow!

The Dashing Pink Sergeant

This track presents a new challenge: it's not straight out of a Féis Shiàtail songbook! The previous two tune sets were all pre-packaged with complete instructions by the fine folks at Slighe nan Gaidheal so it was just up to me to bring them to life with plenty of cowbell.

This new tune set is from the Féis Shiàtail 2006 songbook, however it has an issue. The third of the four reels in the group doesn't belong there. It's really a march, and when attempting to play it at reel speed it became an ungainly mess.

So I omitted it. That left me with a different problem: the set was too short! These groups of tunes are carefully crafted to have the right number of measures for the figures in the dance, so I had to find a substitute.

The one I picked was Fairy Dance. It's a great tune, and the name sealed the deal. It also doesn't hurt that my favorite gay fiddler from Cape Breton, Ashley MacIsaac, has an awesomeness-filled recording of it!