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I Haven't Been This Angry in a Very Long Time

Islamic Center to be Built Near Ground Zero.

So?????????

According to CNN people are protesting a new Islamic Center and mosque that is in the works to be built about two blocks away from Ground Zero.  There has been a slew of protestors claiming it is inappropriate to put the center in this location.
Are you freaking kidding me?!?

Number one: the horrors that occured on September 11, 2001 had nothing to do with the Islam faith.  The misguided attempts by a radical group can never be linked to a religion as a whole -- do people think the actions of the KKK represent all of Christianity???
Number two: shame on CNN for making the story seem like a real debate.  The constitution clearly states we are entitled to the freedom of religion.  If a group needs a facility to come together and celebrate, why not occupy an adandoned building?  I'm willing to bet it will increase property value in the neighborhood and reduce crime because there will be less places to loiter.  I wonder why CNN isn't realizing how racisit they are sounding calling the issue a "sensitive subject?"  So because an Islamic center is being built in a big city with a large Muslim community we should all riot in the streets.  Once more, regardless of the tragedy that took place on that day the rest of the Islamic community should not be held responsible or punished because the attempts of the ignorant few -- does anyone blame every single German for the rise of the Nazi party?

And no one's falling for the opposing side's argument that the adandoned building should be registered as a historic monument.  Hell, that's the most logical argument they have and even CNN didn't play it up.  It's a very thin mask to hide the racism underneath that everyone can see through.

(CNN) – A New York City preservation commission has cleared the way for an Islamic center and mosque to be built just blocks from Ground Zero. That's after the panel voted against protecting an abandoned building that's standing in the way of the project.

The commissioners voted unanimously against landmark status for 45-47 Park Place. It and an adjoining building already connected on the inside, 49-51 Park Place, are owned by real estate developer Soho Properties, which intends to build the Islamic center two blocks north of the former site of the World Trade Center.

Backers of the center say they plan to use it to promote interfaith understanding, but critics don't buy it and have vowed to sue the city.

Way to make America seem like a bunch of ignorant hicks.  "Oh scarey unknown religion.  They cannot be here!  They will kill us!  Brown people are bad!"  I am sincerely considering never watching CNN again for this racist bullshit they are trying to pull.

Way to prove Family Guy right...

Pop-Tarts to Open First Ever Shop and Cafe in Times Sqaure

I have mixed emotions.

On the one hand, as I have always said, if I could live off pop-tarts I would so offering me a cafe where I can eat to my heart's content sounds awesome.

On the other hand, if you're gonna charge me $5 for a pastry goodness that costs be a fraction of that at home (and tastes EXACTLY the same), then forget it.

I will have to follow this.  If they come up with new recipes or offer different flavors then it may be worth the pilgrimage.  But with big real estate comes big prices and I will never condone spending double digits on a pop-tart.  That's just sacrilegious.

Pop-Tarts to Open First Ever Shop and Cafe in Times Sq.

One the one hand: who cares what gimmicky corporate restaurant/"experience" is opening in Times Square? On the other: check out what just hit the Eater inbox:

Please join us at this exclusive “behind-the-foil” opportunity the evening before doors open to the public. Help us celebrate the opening of Pop-Tarts’ first-ever retail store and experience its one-of-a-kind interactive elements, including:
- samplings from the Pop-Tarts World Café;
-the Varietizer, which creates customized boxes of Pop-Tarts that feature your favorite flavors
-the Customization Station, which helps you design your very own Pop-Tarts T-shirt.

If there's one thing that could make Pop-Tarts better, it's having them served to you in a restaurant? Maybe there will be toasters within the tables, shabu-shabu style.

It opens to the public on August 10.

I'm still trying to decide if this growing up is all it's cracked up to be...

Obama Has the One Ring?

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Dear President Obama,
I have been your biggest supporter.  I campaigned for you, I voted for you, I stuck with you.  But I'm starting to see some similarities in your presidency and some predecessors that really begins to make me question you.
But I am willing to give you the benefit of the doubt.  If Jon Stewart is correct, you have just been seduced by the power of the One Ring.
So come on Mr. Obama, be Frodo.  At the end have the power to let the ring go into Mount Doom.  Destroy it once and for all so you can become a leader worth remembering.
Maybe that's what Joe Bidden's role is in all of this.  He has to be the Gollum to chew off Frodo's finger to make sure the Ring goes into the fire?

Marrying Edward Cullen: A How-To For the Mega-Obsessed

I found this site while exploring my frequent blog reads.  Now, I will admit I have read the Twilight series.  And I will admit I use to LOVE it... at first.  Then the series progressed and the horror that is Breaking Dawn hit bookshelves.  And I was over it.

I am one of the few to feel this way, however.  And Stephanie Meyer is making the big bucks marketing the crap out of her creation.  So I guess it only makes sense that she would create, and then replicate and sell the engagement ring Edward gives Bella in Eclipse.  (More ahead...)

My Summer Projects!

This summer I'll be super busy. Between working, my internship, and preparing for my Master's program and thesis I have a lot on my plate. However, summer is the season for projects. Therefore there are three things I want to complete by the end of the summer:

Painting My Kitchen

I only moved into this apartment a few months ago. My landlord was nice enough to put in new carpets, add a fresh coat of paint, and redo the kitchen's cabinets. The place looks great. However, there is some unattractive wallpaper hanging in my kitchen. I would love to take it down, and repaint the entire room. I've been browsing the Sherwin-Williams website and I like the color on these walls the best.  It's called Knockout Orange.  The bottom half of my kitchen is an off-white wood paneling so I think the bright orange will really pop.  I think that'll be a nice weekend project sometime when I can recruit the boy and get some work done!

Growing an Herb Garden

Like I said, I live in an apartment and don't have a garden.  However, I would love to grow a small pot of herbs to use in cooking and just to smell nice.  Something like the picture wouldn't be too hard to maintain.  I'm still in the researching phase of this little project but I feel like it wouldn't be too hard and ultimately would be quite rewarding.  Of course, there are those wonderful As Seen On TV marvels that claim to grow an herb garden in a tiny little micro-greenhouse.  ALL FOR ONLY $19.99!  Not sure the success of those but since I'm interested in the basic basil, parsley, oregano, and rosemary it may be a worthwhile investment.

Learn to Drive Stick

Someday I would LOVE to own this car. The new Camaros are just too sexy to resist.  Granted this does have much to do with god-awful Transformers movie (the second one, the first wasn't too bad) but I'm willing to forgive Michael Bay when that car looks like that!  Anyways, if I'm going to drive a car like I'm going to do it right.  And knowing how to drive stick is a big part of that.  Now don't get me wrong, I'm actually a good driver.  But I've never learned stick.  Sad, but true.  So, my final summer project will be to have my boyfriend teach me to drive stick.  Luckily, since his car is stick I have a perfect opportunity to learn.  I've been promising myself I'd learn for years and this is finally the time!

Are there any summer projects you've established for yourself?  What are they?

A Little Chivalry Never Killed Anyone...

I found this post on one of the blogs I read. I have mixed emotions. On the one hand I believe it's important to teach respect, especially in high school where now a days teachers are afraid to even give a student detention because they may be sued. On the other hand the over-the-top enforcement of these rules implies that, women deserve special (aka inferior) treatment. That was the implication when these types of rules first were implemented. I'm not sure. I feel a basic repertoire of respect to all would be more appropriate than "men! don't step on women's toes... they may cry!"

A high school Latin teacher in Arizona has created mandatory chivalry rules for his students in order to force the male students to behave like "gentlemen" with the young women.

Here's the rulebook:

• Boys would hold doors for girls.

• They would ask girls if they would like to be seated, and offer to take their backpacks before they sit down.

• Boys would stand if a girl leaves the room.

• They would allow girls to be served first if food is in the classroom.

• And, girls always had the right of refusal.

Why did he do it? As the teacher, Cord Ivanyi, told ABC News: "This year after watching a mass of boys literally push through a line of girls who were waiting to get food for a class party, I was bothered by the lack of respect either sex seemed to have for the other. The next day, I sat down with them at the beginning of the class and asked them if they considered what decency was."

Some might say Ivanyi's forced chivalry is sexist, because instead of encouraging good manners for all, he's teaching the young men that women deserve special treatment because of their special (inferior?) status. But others would say that there's nothing bad about teaching men to be courteous and respectful and that chivalry is just an expression of good manners.

Is it bad to FORCE men to be chivalrous?

Kick Ass Article of the Week

Parma High School Teens Make a Request for Real Sexual Education

By Connie Schultz
February 24, 2010, 6:00AM
On Monday night, two teenagers stood before Parma's school board and essentially pleaded that the grown-ups in charge change how sex education is taught in their district.
Their courage was a timely reminder that we ignore our children at their peril.
The first student to speak in the room of 150 or so in attendance was 17-year-old Daniel Sparks.
Teenage boys don't come any cleaner-cut or more poised than Daniel. In a strong, steady voice, the junior at Parma Senior High School attacked the district's abstinence-only-until-marriage sex education program, taught by Operation Keepsake.
The program sounds like a military exercise, but it sends kids virtually unarmed into a sexually complex and potentially dangerous world.
This, Daniel told the school board, is poor public health.
"Operation Keepsake has made me question education as a whole, for while they scared us into understanding what could go wrong, they afforded us no information on how things could go right," he said. "On how to protect ourselves, on the effectiveness of contraception, and empowering us with knowledge to make the right decisions before making the wrong ones."
Daniel told the board that, for 19 months, he has been unable to meet or even speak with those responsible for making decisions about how he and his classmates learn about sex, despite his dozens of letters, phone calls and e-mails.
"As a gay student," he asked, "how can I be expected to uphold a standard of abstinence until marriage when I live in a state where I cannot marry?"
Daniel's classmate, 16-year-old Jelena Loncar, borrowed from Operation Keepsake's own language to blast the curriculum for promoting gender stereotypes.
"I personally don't view men as predators or protectors," she said. "And I certainly don't view myself as a treasure or a target. I found it insulting and undermining that Operation Keepsake reduced me to a social stereotype."
Daniel and Jelena added that they were abstinent, but only because access to comprehensive sex education elsewhere helped them make informed and confident choices for their young lives.
The audience was respectful during the students' speeches. There were audible gasps only after Jelena pointed out that, in her high school's sophomore class alone, eight girls were pregnant.
Several parents came up afterward to congratulate the teenagers for their courage and to voice support. Superintendent Sarah Zatik, who earlier in the meeting announced that she was resigning in July, assured Daniel that she would meet with him. She told me later she favored comprehensive sex education, and would form a committee to "start the conversation."
Most parents -- liberal, conservative and somewhere in between -- want their children to abstain from sex, but they also want them to be safe if they choose otherwise. The overwhelming majority of studies have shown, time and again, that abstinence-plus education is more effective than programs like Operation Keepsake.
Abstinence-only proponents are heralding a small study published this month in the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine that showed, for the first time, that their brand of sex education reduced sexual activity by nearly a third in 12- and 13-year-olds. The study involved 662 African-American middle-school students in four low-income schools in the northeastern United States.
An editorial accompanying the report cautioned against reading too much into this, and the study's lead author, psychologist John B. Jemmott III, agreed.
"Policy should not be based on just one study, but an accumulation of empirical findings from several well-designed, well-executed studies," Jemmott wrote.
Meanwhile, let's keep this in mind: The Centers for Disease Control reported only three months ago that chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis continue to spread in the United States, and that almost half of the 19 million new sexually transmitted infections each year affect 15- to 24-year-olds.
"We have among the highest rates of STDs of any developed country in the world," John Douglas, director of the division of sexually transmitted diseases at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told Reuters.
"We haven't been promoting the full battery of messages," Douglas said. "We have been sending people out with one seatbelt in the whole car."
When it comes to protecting our kids, perhaps we need more teenagers like Daniel Sparks and Jelena Loncar in the driver's seat.