Remind me again…why are we in Iraq?

Executed for the crime of entertaining the children

Sifting through photographs of the murdered men, Mr Eadi said: “What has Baghdad come to when actors are seen as the enemy? We are not politicians. We don’t care what a child’s religion is. Our goal is to bring joy. Whoever did this cannot have a family of their own, or how could they murder someone who just wanted to make people laugh? This is the start of a mini Taleban in Baghdad if the gunmen decide what we can and cannot do as entertainers.” He buried his head in his hands.

Currently, I’m coveting these cute John Fluevog “Sandra” Mary Janes. I’ve wanted them for months, but can’t justify the expense. Deep down inside I know I’ll end up buying them…they’ll make me very happy, but I won’t hardly wear them, which will kind of make me feel bad, but I’ll still be really happy that I own them.

I love the soles!!!

An interesting article from the New York Times: Pro-Life Nation

Some interesting excerpts:
“Abortion as it exists in El Salvador today tends to operate on three levels. The well-off retain the “right to choose” that comes of simply having money. They can fly to Miami for an abortion, or visit the private office of a discreet and well-compensated doctor. Among the very poor, you can still find the back-alley world described by D.C. and the others who turn up in hospitals with damaged or lacerated wombs. Then there are the women in the middle; they often rely on home-brewed cures that are shared on the Internet or on a new underground railroad that has formed to aid them.”

“In the event that the woman’s illegal abortion went badly and the doctors have to perform a hysterectomy, then the uterus is sent to the Forensic Institute, where the government’s doctors analyze it and retain custody of her uterus as evidence against her.”Yikes-women lose the right to their uterus and it’s used against them!

“According to Sara Valdes, the director of the Hospital de Maternidad, women coming to her hospital with ectopic pregnancies cannot be operated on until fetal death or a rupture of the fallopian tube….If there is a persistent fetal heartbeat, then they have to wait for the fallopian tube to rupture.”

The issue of proving viability after an abortion is a tricky one, of course. There is no legal standard. But many of the people I talked to in El Salvador, including Tópez, the prosecutor, said there was a rule of thumb: if an aborted fetus weighs more than 500 grams, or a little more than a pound, then you can argue that the fetus was viable. When I mentioned this to Judge Sanabria, she said she wished she had known more about the rule before. She recalled one case, that of a 20-year-old mother named Carmen Climaco, whose abortion of a fetus estimated at 18 weeks had been recast by the prosecutor as aggravated homicide. The judge admitted that if she had known this rule of thumb, she might not have sent the case to trial. “I feel bad about it,” she said.”-What? Shouldn’t the judge have asked a question about viability???

There’s no place like home…
We are finally home. The 50 degree temperature change is quite a shock.The drive back was pretty bad. Not because of the severe storms, but the horrible traffic. It took us an hour to get out of Rockford, IL because of construction in the toll area. Ugh! It’s nice to be home, but now the work begins. I have to clean and do laundry plus grocery shop and get my books for my classes that start this weekend. Plus, I have to wrap up all my bowling stuff and work on Thursday. I need another vacation already. No…really… it’s nice to be home.

We just returned to Nashville after spending three days in Lake Placid, FL. We were unable to get a decent internet connection hence the lack of posting. We went to Sea World on Wednesday. It was very disappointing although Max loved it. It’s all basically shows or rides then you get access to the animals, which was irritating because the lines for the shows were horrible. Max got to see all the major exhibits and we did a ride simulator which he loved but made the rest of us want to toss our cookies. We also went out on pink flamingo paddle boats which was lots of fun. We spent about 6 hours at Sea World then headed to the Atlantic Ocean. It was so amazing. The depiction of Florida beaches on television is dead on. People dress as if no one is watching (ie big belly hanging out of tight speedo!) yuck! We spent about an hour at Cocoa Beach then headed down to visit friends in Lake Placid. We basically vegged out there relaxing after our hectic week. We did go back to the Atlantic yesterday but to Fort Pierce beach. Cocoa Beach is white sand and really soft whereas Fort Pierce is darker sand and full of broken seashells. Fort Pierce had a lot of errosion from the hurricane too so it was really messy. The kids had fun swimming in the ocean and collecting seashells. Jaycie even found a 1/4 of a sand dollar. She was very excited. We left Lake Placid early this morning (5:15 am). Traffic was horrible–it took us about 3 extra hours to get here because of traffic in the Macon/Atlanta area. Tomorrow’s destination: HOME!!!

Pictures in the ‘More’

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