sundries

[rm]

And home Internet is working again!

Need a job? copperbadge set up a networking post in his journal.

I'm out of my horrible NaNo funk and over 10K. Which like 3K behind, but hey. I ight be able to do more tonight after I work on other deadlines.

Am I just hideously old-fashioned for refusing to put up holiday card or wish list things before the day after Thanksgiving? Is everyone else already holiday shopping? Is that why my book is suddenly regularly being ranked better than 2K on Amazon.com? (WHERE IS MY ROYALTY CHECK?)

"When the Berlin Wall fell, dear Frau Schubert, I began dreaming migraines": Berlin poems.

In America I feel we have often made an art form of selling our souls for meager safety. This whole health care situation is no exception.

Looks like New York is the next big gay marriage battleground. I'm not looking forward to this.

Gay parents and our child-centric times. Do I detect a weird moment of judgment and yucky double-standards when the article notes "While girls raised by lesbian mothers seem slightly more likely to have more sexual partners, and boys slightly more likely to have fewer, than those raised by heterosexual mothers, neither sex is more likely to suffer from gender confusion nor to identify themselves as gay"?

Gender expression and high school: "When a principal asks a boy to leave his handbag at home, is the request an attempt to protect a student from harassment or harassment itself?"

Comments

[random-girl.livejournal.com]

Husband and I usually start holiday shopping before Halloween. Many of our friends like Halloween themed items as their Winter holiday presents.

[brewsternorth.livejournal.com]

Am I just hideously old-fashioned for refusing to put up holiday card or wish list things before the day after Thanksgiving?

Not in this Brewster's humble opinion. Then again, the people I sing with are starting on rehearsals for their Christmas repertoire already. But that's more reasonable in view of some of the more challenging work we're singing: it makes sense to have a goodish lead-time.

Agreed with the auuugh about selling our souls for an ounce of safety. I'm trying to be optimistic about the long view, but, grrr all the same.

[msp-hacker.livejournal.com]

I stared holiday shopping in April, and pick up things thoughout the year that I think people might like. But I find it very, very hard to shop for people so I need all the head start I can get.

[bethynyc.livejournal.com]

This year we are starting early, because I will only see the parents at Thanksgiving, so I want to shop for them so they can bring the gifts home in the car. And not open until Christmas!

I also try to use the % off coupons as much as possible, so this year I'm getting a much larger head start.

However, cards only get sent out after Thanksgiving. It really annoyed me to see an ad for either JC PEnny or Macys using holiday themes before Halloween!

[firefly124.livejournal.com]

I don't start cards and things until after Thanksgiving, but I do start shopping pretty much whenever I find something that jumps out as appropriate for someone. If I'm lucky, I can still find where I've stashed it by the time the holidays arrive.

[phaetonschariot.livejournal.com]

We don't have Thanksgiving. Christmas season for the stores is after Halloween.

One of the comments on that last link has "I don't remember the administration making any kind of a fuss about it, as long as no one wore hats indoors. They had a very strict anti-hat policy." A+

[timelady.livejournal.com]

Personally I don't think you're old-fashioned at all in not wanting to move on to Christmas until after Thanksgiving is over and done. I've been complaining about it for quite a few years now and each year it seems to get worse. Like this year, they started putting the Christmas stuff in the stores at the end of September. My complaint is that it belittles the wonderful holidays of Halloween and Thanksgiving. I know with the economy being how it is right now, the stores want the Christmas buying season to be longer. But I refuse to give up Halloween and Thanksgiving and think they should be given their own time in the spotlight without Christmas encroaching on them, whatever the stores might think.

[dulcinbradbury.livejournal.com]

I don't like seeing Christmas themed stuff, but, I like getting the jump on the shopping earlier rather than later.

[rednwhiterose.livejournal.com]

In terms of shopping I like to get as much done as possible before December because 1) I hate shopping around the holidays people are either annoying, mean, or both, 2) I'm poor and I like the spread the financial hit out as much as possible and 3) if I don't make myself do it in October or sooner I'll procrastinate.

In terms of theme-y stuff...the park near my house took down their Halloween decorations down a week *before* Halloween and had the X-mas stuff up the next day. That sums up my dislike of the commercialization of the holidays.

[firinel.livejournal.com]

I pick up items for gifts all year around. Whilst I tend to give them all year round too rather than waiting, around this time I do try to make an effort to put them away in the container in closet for such things around this time of the year. I also craft a lot of our gifts, or intend to anyway, and so ought to have already started doing that - I never seem to leave myself enough time, as I think, around August would be ideal for getting everything done.

I don't celebrate thanksgiving, and would prefer to not even acknowledge it at all, even as a marker to begin holiday shopping. I'd probably use Halloween as a marker if I were to feel the need for one.


I can't read the article, because I don't have a login, but I'd think that regardless of if the request was an attempt to protect a student from harassment or not, it's still wrong if only because it's the wrong approach. The principal should not be asking victims or potential victims to stop doing perfectly sensible things which the perpetrators use as an excuse - the principal should be finding and punishing said perpetrators, and finding ways to discourage future acts.

[ruisseau.livejournal.com]

The holiday card thing? Because of school, I find that the day after Thanksgiving is the best day to sit down with some tea and my list and address holiday cards. I then generally get them all in the mail by early December. I also spend that day decorating for the holidays.

I want to build traditions for my family, since my husband and I live so far from our biological families and aren't Christian anyway. This is one of my traditions. :)

[delchi.livejournal.com]

I stopped celebrating holidays a long time ago, simply because the holiday became a reason for my family to get together and drink, argue, and hate each other.

Later on I found that the holidays were ok to celebrate in a general way - like being the person who gets invited to some house or another as a 'holiday orphan' and stand around looking awkward while the family has family time.

Now I find that no matter what the holiday , there is some person or group that is screaming about how I'm horribly oppressing someone, celebrating a mass murderer, or partaking in the celebration of evil by taking part in the holiday.

I don't do holidays anymore.

I do good , thoughtful things for my friends all year long. In 99.5% of the cases my friends understand that I'm doing these things to celebrate their place in my life. The .5% think that I'm hitting on them, want sex in return, or some other nonsense. Luckily I eject these people from my life directly and never have to hear from them again.

I celebrate the people in my life all the time, not just once a year. It's just better that way. I don't offend anyone by sending the wrong card, mispronouncing or misunderstanding their traditions, or something equally unintentional and unforgivable.

All I really ask for is the respect, understanding , and forgiveness ( when needed ) from the people in my life. That to me is more valuable than any thing they could wrap and hand to me praying that they made the right choice.

[isil-helyanwe.livejournal.com]

I actually hate when people start doing the Christmas thing before December 1st. Actually, it's maybe acceptable to begin about halfway through November, but it really ruins all the fun of it when it starts to early. Obviously before Hallowe'en is a no-no, but it bugs me when people do it before either Guy Fawkes night or Rememberance Sunday here... It just all seems slightly obscene.

[sociallyawkrd.livejournal.com]

I start holiday shopping immediately after my son's birthday in June (June 25th!)Both of our families all anniversaries and birthdays fall between June 10th and Nov 21st and most fall within Oct and Nov. It just makes it easier.

I am almost done shopping which means I really get to enjoy the Holiday part without the just need to buy one last gift part.

[19-crows.livejournal.com]

I pick up things I see that people will like all year, and don't really do a big Christmas shopping effort. I'm irritated by stores starting Christmas before the day after Thanksgiving. It's so transparent. I want each season to come in its own time.

Yeah, I got a feeling that "neither sex is more likely to suffer from gender confusion nor to identify themselves as gay" was about "see? their children don't turn out queer!"