I marked on my calendar that saturday I would make a meal plan. Now, it would have been ideal, perhaps, to then head out to the grocery store, and get it all in the house and ready for the week to begin. But I didn’t have time for that, as the weather was exceptionally nice, and I simply just had to go for a walk. Once the sun set, around five o’clock, there was Battlestar Gallactica to see.

Sunday was also out of the question to spend grocery shopping. Not enough time after the prolonged relaxation of the Sabbath.

But Monday, with print-outs of recipes from the meal plan in hand, with high-lighted ingredients I needed to purchase, I headed out to the local (closest, not cheapest) grocery store.  I had plans to cook three meals that night – the first one we’d have for dinner, then the other two would be freezer meals.

2 hick-ups.

1) Corn tortillas don’t seem to exist in Canada.

2) Making enchiladas takes a lot longer than I anticipated. I blame the frozen spinach which NEVER thaws.

I didn’t get to the third recipe I had planned in part because recipe number two took so long, and in part because recipe 1 took so long (30 minute gumbo is A LIE). But I also decided to hang out with a friend at around 9:30 – it was good to catch up at the local Tim Horton’s.

All in all, it was a rather successful night. In the future, if I hadn’t done so much walking over the weekend, I’d probably feel up to going a littler further and hitting up the cheaper grocery store about 15 minutes further down the road.

For three meals, which will serve somewhere between 6 and 8 each, I spent around 70 dollars. So that’s somewhere around $3-$4 a meal. And they’re all Martha Stewart recipes, so you know they’ll be good ;)

At least an hour, chicken gumbo.
Veggie Enchiladas. Black beans and corn and spinach and cheeeese. *excited* Main spice: Cumin.
Tuna casserole with artichoke hearts <3 and red pepper

p.s. I’m a good three days behind on my nanowrimo. Too busy.

…does not make you beautiful.

on my nanowrimo

Groupthink is a type of thought exhibited by group members who try to minimize conflict and reach consensus without critically testing, analyzing, and evaluating ideas. During groupthink, members of the group avoid promoting viewpoints outside the comfort zone of consensus thinking. A variety of motives for this may exist such as a desire to avoid being seen as foolish, or a desire to avoid embarrassing or angering other members of the group. (Wikipedia)

- the practice of approaching problems or issues as matters that are best dealt with by consensus of a group rather than by individuals acting independently; conformity. (Dictionary.com)

I always presumed that groupthink meant that everyone just agreed with everyone else, that the environment was hostile to dissidents, and that people tended to suggest things they already knew would be agreed to.

Focus on the Family suffers from groupthink.

Exhibit A

see Cosondra & Carly’s comments

Exhibit B

see Alexis, and the author.

The issue of whether women should stay at home is a personal one, not an ideal that should be touted as the best way. Whether women should preach is a contentious issue that shouldn’t be glossed over as simply as black and white – so let’s stop patting those who agree with us on the back, with a hearty “Hear! Hear!” and “AMEN!” to remind ourselves that we’ve been right all along and others agree! Let’s acknowledge that sometimes, people disagree, and sometimes, even if we decided how to live, we just don’t know.

The last few days, I’ve written approximately 1667 words a day.

One day I skipped and had to make up with 3334 words.

Last night was the first time I watched the clock. I started at 9:30 and by 10:30 (bedtime) I was rushing, pushing, forcing the story out. But I think it’s fair to say it takes about an hour to write 1667 words.

Oh, btw, I’m writing a novel.

So blog posts may decline (they have already, from what I can tell). But I’m also writing more at work, and have found that FB is more conducive to quick shares. It’s not that I don’t have fun things to show you (like this awesome article on when you should stay home from work or this article on the relationship between our cute-obsession and social misery) or even that I don’t have something to say about how my recent watching of the Resident Evil franchise and my love of I Am Legend has got me thinking the vaccine for the swine flu is going to result in us all becoming the living dead and or dark seekers…

it’s just… I guess I’m busy.

Nevertheless (a word I’ve discovered I use far too often in my prose), here are some fun quotes from an encouraging email I received from the nanowrimo staff.

What do you give? Everything. Your reader is human, like you, and human experience in all its richness is something that we all share. Readers are interested in the way a writer sees things; the unique world-view that makes you the person you are, and makes your novel interesting. Ever met an odd person? Sure. Ever had a weird job? Of course. Ever been to a strange place? Definitely. Ever been frightened, sad, happy, or frustrated? You betcha. These are your nuts and bolts, the constructor set of your novel. All you need to learn is how to put it all together. How to wield the spanners.

…

But the overriding importance is that the 50,000 words don’t have to be good. They don’t even have to be spelled properly, punctuated or even tabulated neatly on the page. It’s not important. Practice is what’s important here, because, like your granny once told you, practice does indeed make perfect. Concert violinists aren’t born that way, and the Beatles didn’t get to be good by a quirk of fate. They all put in their time. And so will you. And a concerted effort to get words on paper is one of the best ways to do it. The lessons learned over the next thirty days will be lessons that you can’t get from a teacher, or a manual, or attending lectures. The only way to write is to write. Writers write. And when they’ve written, they write some more. And the words get better, and sentences form easier, and dialogue starts to snap. It’s a great feeling when it happens. And it will. Go to it.

Mercy is not killing people who deserve to be dead.

When I think about the morons that inhabit this world I wish that I were God so that I could end their moronical lives.

Thus, I think I am devoid of mercy.

(the context, I feel I should explain, is internet commentators – the freedom of speech is sometimes so painful to listen to)

¹ LORD, our Lord,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!
You have set your glory
above the heavens.

² Through the praise of children and infants
you have established a stronghold against your enemies,
to silence the foe and the avenger.

³ When I consider your heavens,
the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars,
which you have set in place,

⁴ what are mere mortals that you are mindful of them,
human beings that you care for them?

⁵ You have made them  a little lower than the heavenly beings
and crowned them with glory and honor.

⁶ You made them rulers over the works of your hands;
you put everything under their  feet:

⁷ all flocks and herds,
and the animals of the wild,

⁸ the birds in the sky,
and the fish in the sea,
all that swim the paths of the seas.

⁹ LORD, our Lord,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!

We are beings of great worth. Only a little lower than God. Most definitely lower, but as the word says, only “a little lower.” That to me suggests that we have such tremendous potential. It also makes sense that we are designed to love one another. God has given us himself, but he also gave us each other – these are the beings worthy of companionship, worthy of spending this one wild and precious life with. These are whom we are to experience and share great love with. All to give the more glory to God, the one who made us, and taught us to love.

Crowned with glory and honour despite being mere mortals. What a gracious God! Who do I perceive as crowed with glory… honoured by God himself? It’s nice to imagine myself in that seat, but it doesn’t really “stick” in my understanding. I don’t feel the aura of glory or feel particularly honoured… although, when I contemplate what Christ did for me, I do shut up (God has done so much for me, why me?).

Ah, my beloved, you and I were created a little lower than God. Yet sometimes I fear talking to you with complete honesty. Sometimes I do not entrust myself to you fully, I hold back, there are walls I do not even know the extent of. Sometimes I find it hard to hope for things to be glorious, knowing there are already so many things we’re dealing with, and there are more we haven’t even scratched the surface of. I want to be honoured, feel glorious with you. I want to be completely transparent, knowing where you are, having nothing to hide.

Reflect on your friends as created in God’s image. How does that perception change your attitude and behaviour toward them?

When I think of humanity as created in God’s image I imagine a great expanse of faces turned upwards reflecting individual pixels of glory. There’s not a face depicted in the reflection, instead it is a beautiful, colourful, glittering sea. Zoom in 1000x into the circle of friends I roll with, and it is still beautiful, but much messier. You see that we’ve got rough edges, we jostle one another and sometimes sparks fly.  If I were to truly keep in mind the understanding that my friends were created in God’s image, I think I would have greater patience, respect, and awe of them. God is looking out for them, his love burns brightly for them, they are his. I need to get in line with that – too often I find myself thinking I’m the only one that cares. How blasphemous.

Go through the relationships in your life. Family…created in God’s image. Or co-workers…created in God’s image. Is it true that those closest to you are the hardest to perceive as created in God’s image?

Those closest to me are the one’s that hurt me the most. In my pain it’s easy to forget about God’s role in each of our lives. It’s easy to forget that we’re both forgiven by God, easy to forget God’s claim on our lives, and that we’re his servants when we get all caught up in our selves…   it’s much easier just to hurt them back, or to withdraw and build walls.

What obstacles keep you from seeing them as a divine image-bearer?

It’s our sin. It’s when they put themselves first, or when I put myself first. When we don’t get our own way. When it’s all about us, you don’t see God, you just see the person, in all their self-serving glory. Pride. Lust. Jealousy. Unrighteous anger…

when they don’t communicate and you feel so powerless to change things

I suppose is also when you forget who we are to ultimately trust and rely on.

A great TIME article about the state of women now compared to forty years ago.

College campuses used to be almost 60-40 male; now the ratio has reversed, and close to half of law and medical degrees go to women, up from fewer than 10% in 1970. Half the Ivy League presidents are women, and two of the three network anchors soon will be; three of the four most recent Secretaries of State have been women. There are more than 145 foundations designed to empower women around the world, in the belief that this is the greatest possible weapon against poverty and disease; there was only one major foundation (the Ms. Foundation) for women in 1972. For the first time, five women have won Nobel Prizes in the same year (for Medicine, Chemistry, Economics and Literature). We just came through an election year in which Hillary Clinton, Sarah Palin, Tina Fey and Katie Couric were lead players, not the supporting cast. And the President of the United States was raised by a single mother and married a lawyer who outranked and outearned him.

I had the best massage of my life yesterday. By a registered massage therapist.

But I think she dislocated my spine from the base of my skull.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOW THE BASE OF MY SKUUUUULLLLL.