I grew up harboring disdain for those who anticipate Christmas by shopping too early, but I have come to respect it as legitimate. Get all your Christmas shopping done before the start of Advent and then you can concentrate on your spiritual preparation in peace.
Among other topics discussed yesterday, we of course got to politics. Someone whose judgment I trust spent a length of time interviewing Romney and almost sold me on him --at least opened my mind. More on that at some point. In the meanwhile, some tasty post-Thanksgiving links.
- The pope's going to restore worshipful music to the holy Mass! Naturally, we must report this delightful news as something dark and hateful, as in Pope to purge the Vatican of modern music. Yes, dears. He's going to send the Swiss Guard on ipod patrol to be sure no one's listening to Bartok or Stravinsky as he works.
- Everyone's been predicting doom for John Howard, but this morning there's a sudden surge in his favor, putting him within striking distance of a win. We don't think highly of polls and predictions in these parts, but hope is nice.
- Good gravy, WaPo has discovered victory in Iraq! Returnees find a capital transformed. Although, to be fair, WaPo supported the war in Iraq back when it first started. Check out the shot across the bow to the Democratic party in the final line. ABC news was running a terrific story on victory in Iraq in its O-dark-hundred news this morning, too. And the Iraqi embassy in Syria is arranging free trips home for refugees.
- A story of Titanic proportion: cruise ship sinking after it struck an iceberg. Everyone's safe. I enjoyed this detail:
Capt. Arnvid Hansen, of the Nordnorge, said the rescue operation went smoothly.
Well of course, piloting a ship named that, he'd have that name, wouldn't he? - I disapprove of sterilization, but some folks challenge my principles. Meet a woman who selflessly takes selfishness to new heights:
Had Toni Vernelli gone ahead with her pregnancy ten years ago...
But the very thought makes her shudder with horror.
Because when Toni terminated her pregnancy, she did so in the firm belief she was helping to save the planet.
- And finally, a lovely column on Why we all need to commit. In which the author first establishes her liberal, non-judgmental, any-sexual-thing goes bona fides, and then looks at the data and finds.
This has made me wonder whether it is a bit of a middle-class luxury to be so reluctant to judge other people's relationships. [snip] What we are really doing, when we say that anything goes, is denigrating commitment.
Read what she says about the difference it makes to a relationship whether you "slide" or "decide" into it. Go on. Git. (Curtsy: ninme, and for the story just above, too.)
