Goddamn it, Karen!

This actually is Karen. See here!

This is Karen. Karen is my GPS. I always talk to her as if she were a real person. I often talk *about* her as if she were a real person.

I've read the "avoid ghetto" joke, but what I really wish was that Karen had a "be sensible" option.

If I've programmed Karen to take me where I want to go fastest, she makes me drive on the mo-foing beltway just to get from my house to the shops. If I program her to take me there using the shortest distance, it will invariably involve driving down alleys behind disused factories that I'm not entirely sure actually are roads.

Obviously, I don't want to drive 5 extra miles on the scariest highway in America to save one minute on my drive. Obviously, I don't want to twist and turn down tiny laneways just to drive 10 metres less in distance. Goddamn it, Karen. Be sensible! Use some normal streets for once.

Conceded: Or, Shoes Part Deux

These boots were made for walking... on my feet.

I bought these boots.

After wise words from a friend to the tune of:

1. How environmentally friendly can it be to have dozens of pairs of shoes shipped overnight to and from your house while you try to find the one non-fug pair of non-leather boots in existence?
2. How environmentally friendly can it be to buy a pair of thin plastic shoes (if that's all there is AND THAT *IS* ALL THERE IS!) and have them last one season (viz, the last pair of non-leather boots I bought for $50 that kept my feet freezing and fell apart after a year)?
3. Spend decent money on one pair of of leather boots and take care of them well and they will last many years.
4. You did your best. Now stop.

I researched the various environmental costs of leather vs plastic, and it seems leather still loses. And there is the ethical issues I still have with the dead things on my feet. I looked into which countries make the most environmentally destructive shoes, and have the most egregious animal treatment industries, so I could avoid them (guess what? CHINA WINS. Guess what else? CHINA MAKES ALL THE SHOES IN THE WORLD). I couldn't win there either. All I could do is buy a pair that uses vegetable tanning techniques instead of chemical tanning techniques. One win. And I sought a pair that had a sole that protected the upper leather at the sides, so it would last longer.

One win plus gorgeous, gorgeous boots.

Is it too much to ask that I be allowed access to some nice boots?

Not my boots.

World, bewares, first world problem of the highest order coming your way.

I can't find any good boots to buy. I think I want them knee-high, brown and flat. Maybe riding boot style? But I'd settle for scrunchy-down ones if they looked good. But none of them do look good. Because I am trying to not buy leather. I dunno, I just feel like leather is the wrong thing to do these days. I'm not eating meat. I'm not wearing leather. And there is NOTHING out there in not-leather that doesn't look like awful, cheap, plastic crap. I think people who make non-leather boots assume that one doesn't buy leather becuase one can't afford leather. So the shoes are poorly constructed and thin and designed for 12 year olds who've saved up their pocket money to splurge $50 at Aldo. FUG FUG FUG FUG FUG.

I have bought and returned EIGHT PAIRS OF BOOTS online in the last few days. I have had my heart broken over and over again. Especially when I learnt that the "vegetable leather" invovled in these boots doesn't mean "leather made from vegetables", it means "leather dyed with vegetable-dye". Fuck this shit.

What I'm making do with (oh, poor suffering me) is a pair of vintage cowboy boots from an op-shop in Old Town and a pair of three-year old quilted faux-fleece lined cheap, leaky, snowboots from Target. The cowboy boots are leather, but it doesn't count because they are 30 years old. So I'm not killing any new cows to get them.

Tell me, where are my boots? I HAVE MONEY LET ME SPEND IT.

False Advertising

So Squirmy's going to be starting day care in January. All the day care centers around here actually call themselves "pre-schools" so that all the parents around here can double-think their way to the idea that pre-school is like, necessary or something. Problems with that?

• Going to work if you want to or need to fine
• Staying home is also fine (I personally dig the 'sticking it to the man' aspect of this choice- but if it's not for you, sweet)
• Day care is fine
• Kids don't need school when they're 18 months old
• Capitalist consumption is bad.

Seriously, there is so much to consume to make sure your child grows up on the straight and narrow. Fortunately, you only have to be a semi-conscious individual to just ignore the shit out most of it.

Anyway, Squirms was all ready to go to one center, until I found out that I had been duped! Duped I tell you! This place was no ordinary day care center. Oh no, it was a FUNDAMENTALIST CHRISTIAN ACADEMIE FOR TOTS. And believe me, as I know you do, if I had known this was what that place was like I would never have enrolled her there in the first place. It was never mentioned to me. It was never raised at all. The place was new (since May 2009) and it wasn't on their website at all at first. I think as the business began operations, they built up their website to include this small fact. Because they are in the business of providing bourgey parents with a soul-soothing academic environment, of course, they have a "curriculum". Let's take a gander at their "curriculum":

"...presents the universe as the direct creation of God and refutes the man-made idea of evolution.

“The lessons flow from the Word of God, through the heart of the teacher, to the heart of the student.”

“Students need a realistic view of history, government, geography, and economics based upon the foundational truths of the Scriptures.”

“…uplifting history texts that give students an historical perspective and instill within them an intelligent pride for their own country and a desire to help it back to its traditional values.”

“They give a solid foundation in all areas of science -- a foundation firmly anchored to Scriptural truth.”

“But as Christians, we still believe that the Bible provides the only credible explanation for the universe, of man, and of language.”

The first clue I got about the God stuff was when I went to pick her up after a trial visit one day, and there was some Jesus music playing. I tried to think charitable thoughts like "maybe this is a CD with all kinds of cultural songs on it and they will also play Hava Nagila and Frere Jacques". Then I saw a poster with their theme of the week. The theme was sharing. The poster said "sharing is a biblical concept". Then I looked up the website again and found that shit.

And so today, on the 150th anniversary of the publication of Charles Darwin's 'On the Origin of Species', I would like to say a very hearty 'go fuck yourself' to Dr and Mrs Arlin Horton of the Abeka Curriculum, and the insane schools that use it.

Needless to say, I withdrew her and she's going somewhere else.

Well hello there!

World, for my 29th birthday I have given myself a blog. At the moment you can consider it an open letter to my dear friend Jess. Even if we are each the other's only reader, the endeavor will be worth it. And that reminds me of this.

Which reminds me of two more thoughts. Firstly, I really hate it when websites provide a link and not an embed of a REALLY FUNNY AND CUTE AND ALSO SHORT video. Secondly, first world problems; I haz them. Aside from that little sook, I have been occupied for days with the irritation that the new $70 headphones for my iPod keep falling out of my ears. Also, my Grandpa thinks the word 'Hi' is an "Americanism" and was palpably disappointed when it was my daughter's first intelligible utterance.

OK, that was three thoughts and the last didn't make any sense, disconnected to anything except that I am saying hi, right here.