Shotgun

Do these things work retroactively? She lost one of the remotes about a week ago and I think, is expecting me to find it.

My grandma used to remind me that they played the national anthem at the end of the film at the pictures. In a tone that suggested I was personally responsible for the tradition ending. I ‘do’ remember when they played it before the television broadcast shut down for the night. (Shakes fist at nothing in particular).

This isn't my photo but it was taken about 2 miles from my house. The 'cloud' on the horizon is smoke from a forest fire blazing about 70 miles from us. It grew by 100,000 acres yesterday and is now at about 260,000 acres. Several towns are being evacuated and the fire fighters are struggling because there's an even larger fire which has been burning for over 2 months, only a few miles east of this one. They're the 2 largest fires in Colorado history. The good news is, the temperatures dropped dramatically today and snow is in the forecast.

Jasmine had a long overdue bath and wants you to know she isn’t happy about it.

You can’t even honour a man who murdered 6 million Jews these days.

Years ago I read a James Herriott-esque humour book by a primary school secretary. No idea who the author was or what it was called, or even if it was autobiographical or just fiction. Anyway...part of her duties was taking the minutes at the school board meeting. One of the beardy, sandal wearing lefty board members objected to RE being taught but the local minister insisted it was necessary to "give the children moral guidance and prepare them for life". At the next meeting, the sandal wearing lefty board member proposed that Politics be added to the school curriculum and volunteered to teach the class. Why? To give the children moral guidance and prepare them for life, of course.

...and two thousand years of christians torturing, murdering and waging war on non-believers There's a bit to go before christians are anywhere near as oppressed as they think they are. If a grown man told me he still believed in Father Christmas, I would assume he was a simpleton and let it go. If he started using violence to try and force ME to believe in Father Christmas, then we'd have a problem.

1. Liberated us from what? Many humans lead horrific lives. Usually through no fault of their own. If god gives a rat’s ass, he doesn’t seem to show it. 2. What does “died for our sins” mean? I’ve committed plenty of sins. Do I get a pass on them? If not, then what? Also, he only “died” for 2 days. Basically he gave up his weekend. And plenty of humans have suffered worse deaths. Including several, whose only crime was being gay, or black, or female, or worshipping him in a slightly different way. 3. I’m glad to don’t need to sacrifice animals. Except I wouldn’t do that even if some twat told me I did need to. Why? Because it’s fucking abhorrent. What kind of deity would ‘ever’ have demanded that? An omnipotent, infallible one? 4. Again, what does “mankind has been redeemed by christ’s blood” mean? Redeemed from what? Mankind, as a species is utterly toxic. What changed as a result of us being redeemed? 5. Is it likely that an omnipotent, infallible being could think of no better way to redeem his own creation than by impregnating a young virgin, being born in human form, disappearing for 30 odd years and then making a few speeches before dying. Except not really dying. This is fairy story shit for children.

I once asked a self proclaimed christian that 2nd question. His answer was something like “if he’s heard the word of god and chosen not to follow him, then yes”

If I recall, Mr Bakker went with the traditional "It wisnae ma fault - Satan made me dae it!" defence.

SOP for American christians. I'm not making this up but many of them genuinely don't understand how atheists can possibly be good people because they don't have the bible to tell them how to behave. I've asked many of them "So the only reason you don't murder and steal is because the bible tells you not to? That's the only reason?" But I've still to receive a straight answer. As for the "Thou shalt not kill", I've yet to meet a christian who didn't support the Bush/Blair invasion of Iraq. A large number of them now claim the commandment is really "Thou shalt not murder". As in, dropping bombs on innocent people is fine, executing prisoners even on sketchy evidence is fine, shooting black men who don't do what they're told is fine. Basically, it's OK to kill people if you've decided it is.

Try now.

I was out this evening but received a series of increasingly hysterical texts from Mrs Shotgun after she discovered this charmer in the house. For perspective, that's a curtain rod he's sitting on and it has a 1 inch diameter. Fortunately it hadn't moved by the time I got home so I was able to capture him with the aid of a paper towel and a small bucket. Took him down the road and saw him off on his new life in the forest. I don't mind spiders as a rule but this one gave me the heebie-jeebies.

...and circumcision because water was too precious to waste on something as trivial as washing. Yet a huge percentage of male babies are still mutilated today, even in developed countries..

Or anything outside the middle east. Presumably the big guy was keeping an eye on everyone else alive at the time too. It's almost as if the bible was written by humans based on their own knowledge of history up to that point.