In Memory of Grandpa

Grandpa Sal as a Young Man in ROTC

Grandpa Sal as a Young Man in ROTC

On the morning of Friday, December 1st, I had dropped my parents off at the airport. They were heading to Atlanta for a conference. Later in the day, I drove over to work to get my schedule for the coming week. While I was heading there, Dad had rented yellow Mustang convertible for their week, and had texted me a picture of it. So I got to work, got my schedule, and hung out for a bit.

Then I got a phone call from my mom, who was crying. At first, she could barely talk, and two horrible thoughts went through my head. First, I thought she and Dad had gotten into a bad accident. Then I thought my brother, and best friend, Aaron, had gotten into an accident.

What she finally told me did not make me feel better.

At all.

Her dad, my grandpa, in Connecticut, had had a heart attack. He was in the hospital on life support.

Not long after, Dad called me. Grandma was taking him off life support, so he wouldn’t suffer.

I picked up my parents and my brother at the airport the next morning, and we went straight to Connecticut.

That side of my family is Catholic. The wake was Wednesday. The funeral was Thursday. And we came back home on Thursday night.

[Read more…]

לשנה טובה! זה תשע״ח

Oh… *ehem*… my apologies…

So it’s Rosh Hashanna, the Jewish new year. The year is 5778. For two days, we celebrate and eat far too much delicious food, so that the week after, on Yom Kippur, we can fast for around 24 hours or so to atone for our sins (because unlike Catholics, we only have to feel guilty once a year, instead of year round… we spend the rest of the year making everybody else feel guilty. BOOM! [I can make that joke because I’m Jewish… you can’t… unless you’re Jewish]).

[Read more…]

Yeah… That’s Not Gonna Happen…

So apparently Agent Orange thinks he can bring peace to the Middle East…

Despite bleak prospects for success, President Donald Trump promised on Wednesday “to do whatever is necessary” to forge an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal.

At a White House meeting with Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, Trump pledged to reinvigorate the stalled Mideast peace process that has bedeviled his predecessors and said he would serve as “a mediator, an arbitrator or a facilitator” between the two sides. “We will get it done,” Trump confidently told Abbas.

[Read more…]

Orange Pope-Wannabe Chips Away at Separation of Church and State

HEY ATHEISTS! SKEPTICS! ARE YOU OUT THERE? IS THIS AN ISSUE YOU’RE WILLING TO CARE ABOUT?

Fucking Asshole-in-Chief fucker has now given churches the freedom to be openly political without losing their tax-exempt status.

Declaring he was giving churches their “voices back,” President Donald Trump signed an executive order Thursday aimed at easing an IRS rule limiting political activity for religious organizations — a move that fell far short of a more sweeping order some supporters had expected.

As he marked the National Day of Prayer at the White House on Thursday, Trump signed the order on religious freedom, which directs the Treasury Department to not take “adverse action” over churches or religious organizations for political speech. The rule has rarely been enforced. Still, opponents said the restrictions have a chilling effect on free speech.

[Read more…]

Self Care – A Few Pics from Passover

(Quick note… this is the last of the overly religious posts for now, my fellow atheists. I just enjoy this holiday and want to share it with y’all.)

The first night of Passover ended on Monday, April 10. Well… okay… it actually ended today, March 11th, just after midnight. And it was a lot of fun… well… it would have been, but I’ll get to that…

First things first…

Of course there was a lot of religiosity, here. It’s a Jewish holiday, after all, which means services, prayers, and all that jazz. I don’t mind it, personally, because I grew up with it, and it’s not boring. Since my atheism isn’t exactly a secret, I got to make little asides and jokes last night that my family largely found funny because they know where I’m coming from. I have to be more careful tonight, because tonight’s seder is with some of Dad’s congregants, and they don’t know. But I’m okay with that, since I’ll probably be more focused on my fingers which… again… I’ll get to that…

We actually shortened things up nicely last night, so we got to the meal quicker than we have in the past, which was great. And the meal, of course, was delicious!

But I’m getting ahead of myself (largely to pad out this intro before the fold… 😛 )…

[Read more…]

Passover Starts Tonight

(Quick note: all but one of the links in the paragraph about music go to YouTube videos.)

So… sundown tonight starts the eight-day Jewish holiday of Passover. I largely enjoy the holiday. The seders on the first and second night are quite a bit of fun, and the food is amazing. Wine, horseradish (my brother and I are making the horseradish sauce from scratch this year!), homemade haroset, brisket (So. Much. Brisket.), surprisingly amazing desserts (surprising because of the Kashrut restrictions for Passover) and more… the food is wonderful.

I’d be lying if I said that the food at the seders isn’t what makes it for me. It’s a bit of a joke that most Jewish holidays (with the exception of Yom Kippur, since it’s a fasting holiday) basically just exist as an excuse for massive feasts, but there’s some truth to that. Jews really know how to eat, and Passover seders are just one really good example of that.

[Read more…]

In Obvious and Obviously Horrible News…

From AlterNet…

In early 2016, few evangelical leaders were on Team Trump, as they had Ted Cruz and other conservative Christians to choose from in a crowded Republican presidential field. After Donald Trump embarrassed his GOP competition and became the party’s nominee, prominent evangelicals began changing their tune. Some, including a number of outspoken anti-LGBT activists, worked with the Trump campaign on a large evangelical advisory board. After Trump won the presidency with 81 percent of the white evangelical vote, most far-right Christian leaders who hadn’t endorsed him came around. Many were gleeful, and some even pronounced that God had stepped in and handed Trump the job.

That excitement has grown since the election as Trump prepared for and took office, nominating several ultra-conservative Christians for key posts and promptly following through on several of his campaign promises tailored to evangelical voters. Trump had already picked far-right evangelical Mike Pence for vice president. Then he nominated Betsy DeVos, who was raised in a Calvinist community in Michigan, for secretary of education and Seventh-Day Adventist Ben Carson for Housing and Urban Development secretary, and appointed several other conservative Christians to additional top positions in the administration.

Ronnie Floyd, an Arkansas megachurch pastor and former president of the Southern Baptist Convention, told the Washington Post that the Trump administration was full of “followers of Christ,” not just DeVos but Health and Human Services Sec. Tom Price, EPA head Scott Pruitt, Energy nominee Rick Perry, Agriculture nominee Sonny Perdue and Attorney General Jeff Sessions.

[Read more…]