Straight talk on Iraq?

An interesting article in the NY Times interviews current students (primarily Majors) at Fort Leavenworth's Command and General Staff College and their take on mistakes made in Iraq.

A night alone.

I get to go to Munich, Disneyland for Adults, all by myself next week for work.

What is a girl to do without husband or child in good ol' Muenchen? I can barely consider the possibilities.

Interesting.

Abortion just as common where it's illegal.

A woman I used to volunteer with as a "buddy" for HIV+ patients once told me about her abortion. She was 17 and about to go off to Mount Holyoke -- a big deal for her. One night, she and her steady boyfriend just went a little too far in the heat of passion. The year was 1968. Abortion was illegal.

But that didn't stop her from getting one. It just stopped her from getting one in the safety of a hospital or doctor's office. Hers was done, literally, in the back of a station wagon for $200. She felt lucky that she didn't die of an infection. Others, she knew, did.

It's basic supply and demand. There will always be unwanted pregnancies -- more, most likely, as we push "abstinence-only" sex education -- and as such, there will always be someone willing to perform terminations, no matter the political, religious or socio-economical trends of the day.

I think this is a crucial thing to remember moving forward. The reasons why Roe vs. Wade made it to the Supreme Court in the first place. Why they determined that abortion should be legal. The outcome if it were to be made illegal again.

Just something to think about.

Top 5 films guaranteed to make you laugh*

1. Clueless.
2. Super Troopers.
3. Happy Gilmore.
4. The 40-Year-Old Virgin
5. Blazing Saddles.

*That is, if you have a sense of humor as messed up as mine. For a pseudo-intellectual, my taste in movie humor is pretty low-brow. But honestly, if dick and fart jokes were good enough for ol' Will Shakespeare, who am I to turn my nose up at them?

Depressing.

I want to be in a book club.

Back when I was in graduate school, I started a book club with some of my colleagues. Admittedly, we were a hoity-toity bunch. Our book picks ranged from James Gleick to William Faulkner (with a little Jonathan Safran Foer and Michael Chabon in there to be trendy). We drank lots of wine and discussed things that made us feel smart and superior. But it was a lot of fun and I read a lot of books that I probably would not have normally picked up.

And so, when a friend at our last duty station said she was interested in doing a book club so she could expand her horizons, I jumped up and said I'd round one up.

I invited a lot of people. By the time I was done pestering, about 7 decided to give it a try. Book club rules were the person hosting the next month's meeting would select the book (as well as provide the wine and cheese). When N., a woman I didn't know very well, chose Jodi Picault's "My Sister's Keeper" as the first book, I wondered if I wasn't treading on dangerous ground. But I found that much of the comraderie and branching out was there to be had in the second group as well once I got past my uptight literary snobbery.

New duty station, new book club, right? Third time's got to be the charm. But when I ask around, at meetings and Fundraisers, no one is interested. Just the other week, at a coffee, I asked people if they were game and got the following responses.

"I'm too busy."

"The only reading I do is in my Bible."

"I don't really read."

"I do Oprah's book club." (I asked for clarification on this. It means that when she thinks of it, she picks up whatever Oprah recommends and reads that book. She does it about three times a year).

So I think I will start a book club of one. Half the time, I hold conversations with myself these days anyway so why the hell not. For the first book, I'm going to check out David Mitchell's "Cloud Atlas: A Novel."

For the second? Who knows. Got anything to recommend?

God, it's great being married.

CPT Dick has failed yet again to clean up the dinner I made him as a courtesy. I had to go to a ball planning meeting (I've been volun-told that I'll be helping since I'm FRG leader - oh joy!) and he had boy duty. Of course, when I came home and protested, he said that I owed him dinner because he was babysitting and that was that.

Grrr. Umm, not that you should need reminding, honey, but I don't think it's called "babysitting" when you are the father. It's called parenting and does involve quite a bit of tidying. You'd think after a few years, he'd have caught on to that.

Men.

"Holy crap, is that?! Yes, it is! That is Selma Blair!"

"Who?"

"Selma Blair. You know, Selma Blair. The actress."

"I have no idea who you are talking about."

"Yes, you do. You like her. Selma Blair."

"Which one?"

"The dark-haired one in the white knit hat that just got on the elevator. That is Selma Blair."

"She does look kind of familiar. What has she been in that I would have seen?"

"Oh gosh, a ton of stuff. Ummm, she was the snotty fiancee in Legally Blonde."

"Like I remember Legally Blonde."

"Okay, fine. She played the young, innocent girl who makes out with Buffy the Vampire Slayer in that teenage remake of Dangerous Liaisons. You know, the one with Ryan Phillippe and Reese Witherspoon. Cruel Intentions. She's got the dark hair and eyes."

"I'm pretty sure I never saw Cruel Intentions. But now that you mention that there are hot chicks making out in it, we should put it on our Netflix queue."

Screw you, Otis.

Okay, so I'm not a total idiot. I know that a muffin is not a great breakfast choice. But I had to take Munchkin to an appointment this morning and had to grab something on the go. So a banana nut muffin it was. It seemed the best of a lot of bad choices.

I had taken a precursory glance at the label when I bought it but it wasn't until I put the calorie information into my food journal that I noticed something quite important.

The serving size was for only half a muffin. Yes, that's right -- half.

So by eating the entire muffin, I had a 760 calorie breakfast. Half of my day's calories in a not that big and not so great tasting muffin. Holy schnikeys.

What the hell is wrong with Otis Spunkmeyer for making an on-the-go food item -- and a fairly messy one at that -- where the serving size is half? Who eats half a muffin? How the heck can you evenly split a crumbly muffin? Who advised them that this was a good idea? The only explanation I can cotton to is that it's done deliberately to mislead the buyer/eater about how many worthless calories they are actually eating.

Well, screw you, Otis. If I didn't think ill of muffins before, I certainly do now.

How do you explain?

How do you explain to a seriously upset wife that her ingrown toenail surgery, though certainly gruesome sounding, is not the life and death situation that she makes it out to be? Seriously?

For the record...

...Despite the fact that mere speculation about the contents of her womb is a top headline, I could give a rat's patootie if J.Lo is pregnant.


Though, if I'm being honest, I'd be helluva curious what a child Marc Anthony spawned with her might look like.

All I can picture is Skeletor with a big ol' booty. Is that wrong?

Beauty where you least expect it.

And when I see this, all I can think is, "I have to get a picture for Butterfly Wife."

It's funny how folks online can become your anchor, sounding board, kindred spirit...friends, really...before you even know it.

NOTE: BW was nominated for a Best New Blog award! Go on over to the 2007 Weblog Award page and let people know that you dig her, too.