miracle or coincidence?

When you look at this picture, what do you see? A fire-ravaged hillside with several dozen homes burned to the ground.

Yet one survived, virtually untouched. Only a small part of the lot was singed.

Why?

I saw this on a photo discussion page and a lot of people posted messages like "a true miracle" and similar.

How do you know it's a miracle?

Maybe the person who lived in the single surviving house was a rapist who had escaped justice. A pedophile who has gone undiscovered. A murderer who was never caught.

Would it still be a miracle?

What if a heinous person lived in that lone surviving house but several neighbors in the destroyed homes were altruistic, genenerous, kind, virtuously honest people.

Would it still be a miracle?

The dictionary describes a miracle as "an effect or extraordinary event in the physical world surpassing all known human or natural powers that is ascribed to a supernatural or divine cause."

So when good things happen to bad people, why aren't they miracles?

And how can you tell the difference between a miracle and just a coincidence?

I think I'm too cynical to believe in miracles.

he entered her

I'm reading a Don Delillo novel now where, in one chapter, a man and woman decide to read dirty fiction to each other in bed.

"I don’t want you to choose anything that has men entering women," the female says. "We’re not lobbies or elevators. I don’t care what these people do as long as they don’t enter or get entered."

The characters then go on to discuss at length why they don't like the verb "to enter" in sex talk or things like "he entered her."

The man and woman are somewhat superficial, so perhaps we're not meant to take them at face value. Why would someone actually care about something like that?

When you think about it, "he entered her" is both succinct and specific. "He made love to her" is far too vague and could encompass all kinds of activity. Ditto for "he fucked her." And phrases like "he rammed it inside her" are more verbose and silly.

"He entered her" describes the exact moment that intercourse begins. It also subtly tells us he's at the steering wheel, as opposed to "she lowered herself onto him."

Whenever I read "he entered her" or something similar, I feel a little tingle. Oooh, I know that feeling exactly, that moment when he starts inside me. I get a little frisson of excitement every time I read that. Sometimes I even get wet.

news humor

This was sent to me by a friend. Although humorous, it's also probably pretty close to the truth, with a few exceptions.

1. The Wall Street Journal is read by the people who run the country.

2. The Washington Post is read by people who think they run the country.

3. The New York Times is read by people who think they should run the country and who are very good at crossword puzzles.

4. USA Today is read by people who think they ought to run the country but don't really understand The New York Times. They do, however, like all their statistics shown in pie charts.

5. The Los Angeles Times is read by people who wouldn't mind running the country, if they could find the time and didn't have to leave Southern California to do it.

6. The Boston Globe is read by people whose parents used to run the country.

7. The New York Daily News is read by people who aren't too sure who's running the country and don't really care as long as they can get a seat on the train.

8. The New York Post is read by people who don't care who's running the country as long as they do something really scandalous, preferably while intoxicated.

9. The Miami Herald is read by people who are running another country but need the baseball scores.

10. The San Francisco Chronicle is read by people who aren't sure if there is a country or that anyone is running it, but if so, they oppose all that they stand for. There are occasional exceptions if the leaders are handicapped minority feminist atheist dwarfs who also happen to be illegal aliens from any other country or galaxy provided, of course, that they are not Republicans.

11. The Seattle Times is read by people who have recently caught a fish and need something to wrap it in.

12. The National Enquirer is read by people trapped in line at the grocery store.

gestures versus action

One of my regular readers emailed last week encouraging me to blank my blog on January 18 to protest SOPA. Many big sites, like YouTube and Wikipedia, blocked access that day in protest. I imagine the reader contacted me because I wrote a snide little piece a few weeks ago about the US Congress's SOPA hypocrisy.

I emailed back to say I thought such a gesture was futile for small blogs like me and declined to participate. The same reader then hammered at me a few days later in a second email after I posted about Megaupload and the MPAA. "But you refused to protest SOPA!" the email said.

I declined to go along with the online blanking protest for a variety of reasons. I only receive a tiny, tiny fraction of traffic compared to a site like Google. More important, I don't believe in self-censorship as a means to protest censorship. That's like people who don't vote because they claim voting is rigged. You defy them and vote anyway for your candidate. Let the shame be on them, not you, for rigging your honest vote.

I believe the same for censorship and prefer direct action. I'd already emailed my congressional representatives about SOPA several times. I also hunted down the emails for both of my senators' key staff members and hit them, too. Additionally, I posted various places on internet message boards against the measure and encouraged people to contact their elected representatives.

If I was physically in the US, I also would've phoned and faxed my representatives and maybe even showed up either at their district office or at an event where they were scheduled to appear so I could engage them directly.

Personalized bitching like this is an uphill battle to get any traction, but I believe it has more potential than a symbolic gesture they wouldn't even see. If I blanked my blog, my elected representative wouldn't have a clue. If I sent five or six emails, each time in response to the previous canned email until I got a personalized response, then that's engaging someone who might actually do something.

Symbolic gestures are easy but do they really achieve anything? Action requires more work but, arguably, might actually achieve something. SOPA was stopped because a ton of people contacted Congress. It wasn't stopped because people blanked their personal blogs.

prime minister's kerfuffle

I don't know whether this is making much of an appearance in the American news, but here in Australia it's been a major story. Prime Minister Julia Gillard was confronted by some vocal demonstrator at a photo op the other day.

While I'm sure maintaining her safety is important, it seems her security people were more of a danger to her than the crowd, as can be seen in this news video. The voiceover hyperbole certainly doesn't match what you're seeing in the picture.

At one point we're told "the angry mob trapped" her inside the restaurant. That makes it sound like they chased her in there with pitchforks, when in fact she was already inside when they turned up. She decided to leave and seems quite calm about it, but then the security people look like they're the ones in a panic as they run like children. There are also several references to "violence" in the voiceover. Where is the violence? No windows were smashed, no one was hurt, and no one was arrested.

I couldn't help but chuckle when comparing this to events in which the US President or the Queen appear. The PM gets clumsy cops whereas the Queen and the prez get helicopters and snipers on rooftops.

grandpa munster tattoo

Did The Munsters at some point become ultra-cool? When I was a kid, it was considered one of the lamest reruns by nearly everyone I knew. My uncle once told me he had a Munsters lunchbox in elementary school when the show originally ran. His mother bought it, and it was the ultimate childhood humiliation for him.

If I went to bed with a man and discovered he had a Grandpa Munster tattoo, I'm afraid that very well might be the last time. Unless, of course, his sexual skills were fantastic. Then the tattoo wouldn't matter in the least.

Could you take a fifty-year-old man seriously if he had a tattoo like this? What if you were sitting in the dental chair and, just as he was about to stick a needle in your mouth, you saw his sleeve ride up and this was revealed?

All that notwithstanding, the artistry here is fantastic. If your goal in life is to look like an old cover from TV Guide, then this tattoo is for you.

is hollywood extorting washington?

As you likely heard, the US Congress has abandoned the proposed SOPA/PIPA legislation. Hollywood was not happy. Chris Dodd, who heads the MPAA, which is the trade and lobbyist group representing big movie studios, said this on a recent news program:

Those who count on quote 'Hollywood' for support need to understand that this industry is watching very carefully who's going to stand up for them when their job is at stake. Don't ask me to write a check for you when you think your job is at risk and then don't pay any attention to me when my job is at stake.

Dodd's threat is simple: vote the way we tell you or else we won't give you any campaign contributions.

Now tacit quid pro quo is presumed in Washington, but coming out and explicitly threatening like this took a lot of people by surprise. The influential blog TechDirt wrote in a recent article: "To be so blatant about this kind of corruption and money-for-laws politics in the face of an extremely angry public is a really, really, really tone deaf response from Dodd." And also: "Even worse for Dodd, he bizarrely sent his message in a way that everyone who's already fed up with this kind of corruption can see it too."

The White House now has a petition system where citizens can request action on an issue. To that end, a petition was started demanding an investigation into this threat. While I'm not entirely thrilled with some of the wording in the last sentence, I nonetheless added my name. If you're a US citizen and would like to chime in, let the White House know here.

iranian nudity scandal

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

goodbye megaupload

You may have heard the news that the massively popular online storage site Megaupload was seized last week by the US government when the key company executives were arrested on charges of running a copyright infringement conspiracy.

An unknown percentage of the several hundred million users uploaded legitimate material to the site, but there's no secret a lot of backdoor filesharing of movies, software, and music was happening, too. I feel sorry for the people who paid to use the site for 100 percent legitimate purposes -- they've lost all access to their property. I imagine how that will be resolved has yet to play out.

I'm sure there were others like me who used it for legitimate archiving purposes but also for a bit of filesharing, too. And I suspect I'm not alone in having put some of our own homemade porn on the site. We never fileshared that but uploaded a few of our most memorable vids for safekeeping. Fat lot of good that did. Fortunately we have backups.

I'm not really worried our own porn will end up fileshared by any FBI agent who might have access to it. Hopefully at least he or she might get a little thrill watching it, that is if he or she can crack the passwords on the double archived zip files.

I always knew there was a chance access to MegaUpload might not be permanent. But I never suspected the US government would institute criminal proceedings, given the company was based in Hong Kong, but it turns out they unwisely leased servers in Virginia, which gave the feds legal access.

I've seen postings on a few forums where people say optimistically it could return one day. I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for that to happen.

my new laptop

I am up and running with the new laptop -- technically a notebook -- and this is my first blog post written on it. Weeeee!

I totally love it, except for two minor things -- the USB ports are a fraction too close to each other and the touchpad sometimes activates when I'm typing, which means I have to watch where I put my hands.

The husband isn't wild about the typing feel, although he rarely used my old laptop and prefers the desktop anyway. That's just as well because he pounds on a keyboard like it's a rusty old manual typewriter, so I have visions of my brand-new laptop flying off the table while he's slamming on it with his big paws.

I now feel a bit like an ungrateful stoneheart for not missing the old laptop any longer. Baby's new toy is so much more fun. James teasingly pondered aloud whether I'd be equally remorseful for only a few days if he kicked the bucket. He says I'd grieve until the new replacement arrived and then forget about his predecessor.

is it just me?

A naked woman with four ginormous dogs, one with particularly noticeable testicles. Does that strike anyone else as a little icky?

The sexual subtext aside, she's wearing platform shoes on cobblestones attached to 800 pounds of canines. What if those dogs saw a cat and took off with her attached? She'd be battered and bloody.

The veil is a curious addition, too. But ultimately pointless, I think.

premature ejaculation

I guess this cartoon is funny except if you happen to have this problem. Presumably every man, on occasion, suffers from premature ejaculation. My very unscientific personal observations tell me that the younger the man, the more likely it will happen.

If it happens all the time, that is a problem which, hopefully, can be remedied with medical attention. I don't ever recall encountering a man who had this problem more than once, but of course you can't tell with a one-night stand.

Men usually seem humiliated when it happens, at least in my experience. As long as he can go another round in a few minutes and it doesn't happen again, I don't think it's an issue. If anything it's sort of flattering -- he's so hot for you he can't help himself. You turn him on that much that he just loses all control.

Hopefully if it happens it doesn't land on your good wool or silk garment that must be dry cleaned. And hopefully it doesn't happen if you don't have a chance to change your clothes before going out in public.

I remember one premature event when I was in school and went home with some guy after classes. He had an early and substantial misfire that landed on my wool skirt. I wanted to dry it out with his hairdryer so I could then remove it with a hairbrush but there was no time. I arrived home to find my mother's last patient had cancelled for the day so she was there unexpectedly. I somehow managed to get from the back door upstairs to my room without her seeing the rather noticeable and still wet cum stain.

temper trantrum

This got lots of airplay here in the Sydney media. Cypriot Marcos Baghdatis smashed four rackets during a break in the Australian Open the other day. He ultimately lost to the Swiss Stanislas Wawrinka.

The fans loved his tirade, but most of the general public seemed to think Baghdatis needed a good spanking and an hour sitting in the corner on a stool. The rackets are supplied by Tecnifibre, one of his sponsors, so they can't be entirely pleased at this.

cum report

Several weeks ago I wrote about a forthcoming sperm sample the husband would be proffering to see if he had any fertility issues. I realized recently I had provided no further updates.

The donation occurred splendidly. I was allowed to go along for manual stimulation, but the nurse (or whoever she was) on the phone beforehand was incorrect in telling me I could give the husband a blowjob to help him along, if need be. I think perhaps she misunderstood what a "blowjob" actually is -- I suspect she thought I would puff air on the husband's junk or something.

Needless to say, the husband delivered a commodious load of baby batter after only a few minutes of handjob and some filthy talk.

The report came back with excellent marks. He has an extremely high sperm count and volume, excellent motility, the proper liquifaction, vitality, and so forth. The doctor said there were no apparent issues with his sperm.

So I will be tested now. There are many possible reasons why his five-star sperm is not working inside me. Hopefully we will get an idea of why after some of my tests.

catastrophic failure

My laptop pretty much toasted itself last night.

I was looking up something about a movie on IMDb and everythink froze while the pixels sort of freaked out on the image. I rebooted and could only run in safe mode and when hooked up to another monitor. The laptop screen remains blank.

Fortunately, I back up religiously and could still access the hard drive to copy a few new files that had not yet been archived. Then I closed it down and put it away.

I can't bring myself to take it to recycling yet. I've had that laptop for more than six years, longer than I've known my husband. I bought it in New York, then moved to LA with it, then to Vegas, then to Australia. It's been with me the whole time.

It's silly to be sentimental about an inanimate object. The laptop has no sentience. It feels no pain. It's just a bunch of wires and electronics. Nonetheless, it's seen me through both bad and good times. I wrote most of this blog on it.

I'm not surprised it died. It could no longer be closed, so I couldn't take it anywhere. Sometimes it would emit these weird electronic noises even though I always have it plugged into my earbuds. Other times it would just freeze and I'd have to reboot.

So I knew the end was coming. For now, I'll use the husband's desktop. And although I feel bad about my old laptop dying, I'm also looking forward to getting a new one.

manscaping -- hot or not?

The Daily Beast ran an article recently about the growing manscaping trend among straight men. The piece discusses how opinions change depending on the degree of hair removal involved, particularly along the trimming versus shaving divide. Some prefer to trim but think shaving is ridiculous, while others feel the opposite way. The article suggests that most younger men do at least some trimming if not outright shaving or something similar like waxing.

As a married woman, I've been out of the single sex scene for several years now. My experiences of sleeping with single men are now somewhat dated. I'm guessing men are less hairy and more manscaped than they used to be. I asked the husband if men seem to be shaving more, based on what he's seen in locker rooms, but he hasn't noticed.

For what it's worth, I'm not a fan of men shaving below their equator. I've always thought shaved pubes makes a man look pre-pubescent. Only very light blonds can pull this off. Their hair is so difficult to see anyway, so if it's gone it's not missed. In contrast, a very dark-haired man who shaves looks like he's been prepped for surgery. Or maybe a delousing.

Trimming is perfectly okay in my opinion as long as it's done with some restraint. I think it's best when it's tidy but doesn't look obviously landscaped. Maybe you could call that look "naturally neat."

The absolute worse thing is a man who shaves his crotch but does nothing to the rest of his body. He has a hairy chest and legs plus thick armpit hair. But his groin is as hairless as a baby's and you can see a five-o'clock shadow down there. That, I think, is totally ridiculous. It looks like plucked poultry.

piggy tattoo

This photo was in an online news feed about a boxer puppy and her piglet friend. The first thought that flashed through my mind upon seeing this was -- does that pig have a tramp-stamp tattoo?

very unique story

One of my favorite pet peeves is the phrase "very unique." Equally naughty are variations like "totally unique" or "highly unique" or "really unique" or "truly unique."

The word "unique" means one of a kind. So something is either unique or it isn't. Once unique, it can't be any more unique than it already is, ergo there's no way it can be "very unique." A very tall man is taller than a tall man, but something "very unique" isn't any more unique than unique without a "very."

ancient porn found in london

A pastry chef who dabbles in amateur archeology recently found an ancient bronze coin depicting a man and woman having sex (see photo below). The 2,000-year-old artifact was found in the Thames at low tide during a heavy rain early in the morning and dates from the Roman occupation of that era.

The coin originally would have been used in a brothel to buy the depicted sex act. The chef has donated it to the Museum of London; it is the only one of its kind ever found in the United Kingdom.

I think that shows true altruism -- the man stood out in the rain at sun-up and finds a treasure. He could easily have flogged it for a tidy fortune, but he just gives it away so everyone may see it. I think someone should at least give him a complementary trip to a modern-day brothel to receive the sex act depicted in his coin.

lion vs. little girl

The little girl here is pretty brave, but what really interests me is how much the big lion's actions are like cats and dogs I've known. Maybe you too have seen a cat or dog sit at a window and dig furiously at the glass because it wants to get at something outside.

This suggests it's a natural, instictive reaction to dig like this, perhaps out of frustration or annoyance. But no glass windows exist in the wild. Maybe it's just something about the physiometry of captive animals that they adapt in similar ways.

punking news websites

I've noticed that some of the top news websites are once again limiting access to non-subscribers. This was a trend a few years back, but then they went back to free content. Now the pendulum is swinging the other way again, it seems.

Many of them tease you by offering a limited number of articles for free. Once you hit your weekly or daily quota, they stick their electronic hands out for cash.

What's laughable is how easily these limits are circumvented. You read your free quota and hit the paywall. All you need do is clean that website's cookies off your browser and your odometer is back to zero. You can continue reading all the articles you want for free. You don't even have to close your browser and it takes all of five seconds.

So I wonder why these sites even bother? Apparently they do make money, presumably from people who don't know enough about their browser to evade this little cash trap.

Another way to evade these is with an online proxy like Ctunnel or Anonymouse. That takes maybe two seconds and you don't even have to clear your cookies.

Maybe not everyone is a cheapskate like me, but if I can get something legally for free, I'm certainly not going to pay for it. When I lived in LA, I became a master at avoiding parking meters by driving an extra block to park in a no-meter zone. I could even find parking near the Beverly Center or The Grove, which many people found nearly impossible.

I'd rather spend money on me, not line someone else's pocket.

conjunctivitis again

I woke up yesterday morning with conjunctivitis in my right eye. It's a complete mystery how I got it.

Given it's only in one eye, I don't think it's the viral variety. Usually that strikes both sides, I believe.

I didn't get anything in it, which was the cause for pink eye in the past when I've had it before. Several years ago my husband and I had an oral sex accident and that was the reason.

I teased James about whether he was sodomizing me in my sleep. I know I snore sometimes, so maybe he stuck his cock in my mouth to shut me up. Either that or he was dreaming about a blowjob and tried to get one in his sleep. He insists he's innocent. Or at least he thinks he's innocent.

the end of porn?

That's a recent headline screaming on the front page of The Daily Beast. It's deliberately sensational, because the accompanying article talks mostly about a proposed ballot initiative in California to require condoms in all porn made within the state. A law is already on the books, but it's not enforced. So the headline really has little to do with the story.

The article seems sloppily researched and edited, with remarks like "California is one of two states in which porn is legal." Porn is legal in far more states than that. Perhaps the writer meant porn production but then again it's legal to make porn in many other states where it's pumped out prolifically -- Nevada and Florida are two good examples.

The piece also says Vivid is no longer in business, which of course is absurd -- it's thriving and among the largest purveyors of adult films in the world.

Yes, many porn consumers don't want to see condoms in their on-screen bonking. But somehow the headline writer made the leap from possibly requirements within the state of California to presuming that would kill porn altogether worldwide. If it can't be made in the Golden State, it will be cranked out elsewhere, as it is now. As already mentioned, Florida and Nevada are huge production locations. And, Eastern Europe is a massive porn production spot. Then there's Asia.

The important issue the article utterly overlooks, in my opinion, is whether a ballot initiative should be used to legislate morality. I don't think it should be. Who's to say that this isn't the beginning of a slippery slope -- today a ban on condom-free porn, tomorrow a ban on extramarital sex. Thanks but no thanks. That's the story Beast should've covered but it didn't.

the dreaded julia roberts

This is cute -- a husky dog is terrified of Julia Robert's photo in a magazine. I imagine he's freaked by the eyes or something, not the fact that it's a famous actress. Maybe it brings up a subconscious memory of someone who was mean to him once.

creepy is not erotic

This sort of made my skin crawl. Not because a pet is present at this particular moment as this certainly would not qualify as beastility.

But if you've ever been around a cat, you know what kind of damage they can do with their claws. Some cats have a habit of clawing first and asking questions later. The cat thinks: looks like a snake going in a hole -- grab it!

That could make a particularly embarrassing trip to Accident and Emergency when you've both been clawed in your naughty bits.

sex, sin, and damnation

I wrote a while back about how an anonymous person sometimes leaves long religious tirades in my comments. They're never signed and I don't approve them because I don't think anyone is interested in reading a 5,000-word mispelled tirade about how enjoying sex will lead to eternal damnation.

Sometimes the mystery crackpot posts two or three comments a week, and then several months may go by before I hear from him or her. But like cockroaches and mold, I can expect the anonymous crank to reappear eventually.

My post the other day about religious sex toys has reawakened the pest. I received four lengthy harangues about something biblical, all of which I deleted without reading more than the first few words.

I'm always mystified why some religious people get so uptight about sex. One of the places where I danced naked had religious protesters outside occasionally who would stand for hours with their cluttered and often unreadable signs. They were habitually ignored.

With all the problems in the world, you'd think these people would focus on bigger sins. Where is their outrage about innocent women who are abducted and sold into slavery as prostitutes? Why don't they focus their efforts on stopping something like that? That's infinitely more pernicious than people enjoying something sexy and consensual.

your most popular post

Here's a fun little webpage for those of you with a Tumblr site. (I have an adult Tumblr here, in case you don't know. OMG, she's shamelessly pimping her Tumblr site once again.)

The page will scan your entire Tumblr back to the beginning and show you which were the most popular posts for each month during its entire run. Only original posts are measured, based on likes and reposts. If you only do reposting on your Tumblr, it will not work.

The picture below from October of last year is my most popular post ever. As of this writing, with around 1,700 likes and reposts.

I wish I knew who shot the photo but unfortunately it has no watermark or descriptive exif information. I don't even know where I found it. I use this page to check exif information, a sort of digital invisible ink that most photographers unfortunately do not use.

city of angels

I found this photo in one of my folders the other day. I originally downloaded it from the LA Times about a year ago. Click on the image to see in its original larger size.

I don't miss Vegas at all. I sometimes miss New York City. But I always miss Los Angeles. This photograph immediately made me homesick.

I went through some very difficult times when I lived in LA, not financially but because of a maniac ex-boyfriend whom I wrote about several times shortly after I started this blog. That notwithstanding, I still absolutely love the city, both the beautiful and the tacky sides. There's no other place like it in the world.

Sometimes my husband and I talk about moving to LA in a few years. I would love that. I think both of us would really thrive there. Sure, we can visit, but that's different than living there. You can only really experience the city when you're a part of it, day in and day out.

Part of the magic of LA is how it transforms from day into night. Growing up in the Midwest, I never experienced a place that could change so much within twenty-four hours. New York is always going at a hectic pace, but Los Angeles goes through a physical metamorphasis when the sun goes down like no other city I've visited.

One of the many great things about LA is how you can drive to one of the remote parts of the city and watch the rest of it, like you see in this picture. It's perfectly quiet except for a siren or an engine or a coyote far, far in the distance somewhere. Yet the city is rolled out before you like a fabulous carpet made from a billion glittering stars.

religious sex toys

The Daily Beast recently published an article with the headline "Religious Sex-Toy Sites Vow to Save Marriages." The piece describes the burgeoning sex toy business targeting religious couples.

They don't want to buy products at their local adult XXX store or from some porn website. So a few savvy religious people have been selling marital aids to married couples, often the same stuff sold for us heathens and just discretely repackaged.

It's a brilliant bit of marketing, so good luck to them. It sounds like their business is on the rise. It's nice to hear about devout people who aren't narrow minded and who are interested in putting some fun in their sex lives. Nowhere in the scriptures does it say "thou shalt not have an orgasm."

Not surprisingly, some readers took offense and left comments accordingly. Some people are still stuck in the puritan era. One woman claiming to be a minister wrote "the clergy are promoting sex toys to save marriages when they should be teaching their flocks God's requirements for surviving Armageddon or Judgement Day."

I'm sure a woman having trouble reaching an orgasm will want to read the Book of Revelation. As if that will straighten everything out for her.

grandma on her back

I found this on a tattoo page -- a woman had her late grandmother's face inked on her back.

I'm trying to work this out in my head. You want to remember Grandma, so you put her likeness on your back, where you'll never see it. Okay, right, got it.

That should be a hit at your wedding if you decide to wear a strapless bridal gown. Hopefully Grandpa is already clued in about the unexpected visitor up there at the altar.

I loved my grandfather dearly but I don't think I'd slap a giant tattoo on any part of my body to remember him. A photo in a little frame is doing the job just dandy.

My grandfather would be aghast if I got a tattoo like this. He never said anything pejorative or scolded me if I did something he didn't like, but he would tell me an "interesting story" that included some horrific medical anecdote about something he once saw in medical school or with a patient that, just coincidentally, somehow related to my transgression.

When I was a small child and neglectful about washing my hands, I was honored with fascinating stories of people he had treated with wonderful ailments like tapeworms. When he learned that I was rather sexually active at an early age, I earned a fascinating story about some syphilitic sailor he once treated, complete with graphic details about his large oozing chancre sores as well as the papule all over his body which he described as "looking like dried pink oatmeal."

I imagine he'd have some equally graphic little foray down memory lane about some horrid reaction to a tattoo he once witnessed.

happy 2012!

May the new year surpass all of your expectations many times over! Be happy and be safe.