Adoption and a Kleptomaniac Cat.

I am glad to report that I don’t think we have driven our social worker insane just yet (she might beg to differ).  Being overachievers with most aspects in our lives, in this life event we are no different.  Like I wrote before, everything has now been done and dusted for phase I of the adoption process and we are now eagerly waiting for phase II to start.  Also, not being the most patient people on this rock we call earth the waiting has been somewhat, how do I put it, torturous.  Not having gone through this particular process before I did take some time to get to know some people who have. With some of the conversation I had I have come to the conclusion that the adoption process is specifically designed to test not only your true determination to have a child but also your emotional and psychological readiness to have one.  Let me explain…

Even before we met with our adoption agency hubby and I did our research.  We wanted to make sure we choose the best possible one and that we would not be turned away because we are a homosexual couple.  Luckily, one of our friends had recently adopted through PROCARE and I could not find anything negative about them on the Internet.  So by the time we actually had our first meeting with them we knew exactly what documents we would need and we had an idea what to expect.  At our first meeting we had 90% of all the documents that were required and after that meeting we also made sure we had the necessary funds to pay for the whole process and prepare for the baby.  The adoption process is not cheap.  What we did not count on was that there would be long waiting period between phase 1 and phase II.  We thought that because we were proactive and organized that this would also expedite the red tape part that is the screening phase.  But we were wrong.

We have found that after you have finished everything that is under your control you end up waiting for the next phase to begin.  During this period you also have some time to think and reflect on what you are actually busy with and it is then when all those questions and doubts start swarming through your mind.  Questions like:  Are we really ready for this?  What if we suck at being parents?  Our lives are about to take a 180 degree turn, are we ready for all the sacrifices that we will have to make?  Can we really afford to raise a child?  What if our baby does not bond with us?  What if we finish the screening and no birthmother chooses us?  What if we encounter discrimination because not only are we gay but we also have a child from a different race?  And the “what if’s” goes on and on and on…  Both of us even ended up dreaming about it.

You can sit around and ask yourself a thousand questions, and I promise you we did.  But in the end we did realize that even though we are, at times, petrified (which we heard was totally normal) we are just as excited and determined to have a child as ever, even if our lives are under a microscope and our future family is in the hands of strangers.  It’s natural to have some self-doubt especially when you are going to be a first time parent to a baby but hey, that’s why there are Google, prenatal/postnatal classes and family.  Between these three you are bound to get some great advice.  I am looking into booking some postnatal classes for hubby and I to go to.  Both of us know how to change a nappy and the correct way to bath a baby but getting a refresher course and also some baby CPR training cannot do any harm.  Besides I think all future parents should attend these types of classes.  Also, seeing as phase II of the adoption process is out of our control we also decided to start focusing on more tangible things, like the nursery.

Some people think we are mad for having started with the nursery so soon but I think it has helped us tremendously with the psychological preparation and with the waiting.  We have done some shopping around and about two weeks ago we bought a cot, compactum, rocking chair and curtains.  All of which are being delivered this weekend except the curtains, which we have already put up.  We are slowly getting the nursery ready, with the emphasis on slowly.  Our cats have also caught wind that something is going on and that it relates to the guest bedroom which we are now converting into a nursery.  Some of them are more perturbed by this than the others and their ways of acting out I also found rather queer.

Last weekend hubby and I decided to put up the curtains in the nursery.  Naturally all our cats came to observe, mostly because I think they expected one of us to fall off a ladder and planned on having a good laugh at our expense.  Unfortunately for them that did not happen.  We spent a good half an hour making sure that the curtain railing was level.  Hubby measured.  Re-measured and finally committed to drill the necessary holes.  It resulted in some foul language and several four letter words.  You see the bricks the builders used on that wall apparently were not of the best quality and hubby had an extremely difficult time which he freely vocalized.  Eventually the railing was up but then we realized something was not quite right.  The railing did not look level.  Then we realized the wall was skew which opened up a whole OCD can of worms.

To the eye the railing was not level so we had a choice:  We can adjust the railing to “look level” and live with curtains that wasn’t OR we could leave the railing looking skew (but know that it wasn’t) and also have the curtains hanging level.  This seemed like a choice made up by the devil and where nobody wins.  Eventually we decided that we knew the railing was level and left it the way it was.  In the mean time one of our cats decided to start acting out by starting to steal things from the neighbors and leaving it on our bed.  He clearly knows something is up and feels threatened in some way, and in cat language bringing us gifts that are not dripping with blood and guts will win him favor with us.

About two weeks ago our cat started leaving innocuous items on our bed.  Mostly gardening accessories.  At first I thought nothing of it and just thought it was stuff that he picked up in our garden and was playing with.  But as the items started getting bigger and looking less familiar I realized it wasn’t any of our stuff.  Some of the latest items he stole from the neighbor(s) were a garden hose spray nozzle, small gardening fork, a bra (which clearly was not ours), socks, a glove and a Barbie doll’s arm.  The problem is that I don’t know how to give these items back to the neighbor(s) without having to explain to them how I ended up with them.  So I just threw them back into their yard hoping that if it’s not theirs that they would think their pets are kleptomaniacs and not suspect ours.  Not the best solution, I know, but I don’t know of any cat psychologists in my area or how to explain to my neighbor(s) that our cat is the neighborhood thief.  I mean we raised him to know better! Don’t judge me!

So not only are we stressing about the adoptions our animals are also sensing something big is about to happen and are misbehaving accordingly.  I am not sure exactly how long the adoption process is still going to take or how long it will be until we start with and complete phase II, but in the mean time we are preparing as best we can.  This is an exciting, frustrating, emotional and harrowing time on so many different levels, as it should be.  After all this is no small step to take or decision to make.  We are taking it each day at a time, some feel longer than others, but we know that we will get there in the end.  Also, I think our cat might end up on cat Prozac.

To follow our progress with regards to our adoption just click on #adoption to read all about it.

Till next time.

It doesn't get better!

With all those "It Gets Better" videos doing the rounds it is important that we speak out about all those forgotten victims - the Homo Haters!  This video is for you.

Vladimir Putin is so Gay!

If you don't know what is going on in Russia you must be living under a rock.  This is my fuck you to Vladimir Putin, some of the best the web has to offer.  And I must say pink is definitely his color.

I Have CDO.

You all know that I suffer from a mild case of OCD.  Well, if you didn’t you do now.  And with mild, I mean I don’t have to count shit or have little routines that make me late for work.  I am usually late for work due to my cats, because they can be assholes sometimes.  A good example of my OCD is like the other evening:  I got up at 1am to go rinse out the dirty coffee mugs in the sink.  I could hear little crusts forming on the bottom of the mugs, which drives me insane, and also I had to pee.

Now that we are busy with the adoption process certain parts of my OCD are in overdrive in ways I did not expect.  I have learned through therapy that I have some “control issues” but I like to refer to it as “being organized”.  It’s all just semantics really.  Because if you are not organized that is how wars start and how the apocalypse happens.  Having now completed Phase I of the adoption process I don’t know who is more annoyed, my husband or our social worker.  And I can’t help feeling like I may be the cause of some that.

Firstly, even though I absolutely despise red tape and bureaucracy and think it was invented by Lucifer, I am really awesome at it; partly because I am a persistent and stubborn bitch, and also because I am fluent in bureaucracy.  It’s like when you travel to a foreign country, if you don’t speak the native language you are somewhat fucked.  Well, bureaucracy is no different.  The trick is to just speak the language of governmental employees in a way they are more likely to respond to positively.  The secret is being caring and finding new innovative ways of bypassing the black hole that is the dreaded mailroom.  The mailroom is the place 90% of governmental correspondence goes to die!

Part of Phase 1 of our adoption process was to obtain Police Clearances stating that we are not axe murderers and National Child Protection Register Clearances saying we are not pedophiles or something vile like that.  With the Police Clearances it was easy as I knew some people who work there.  So I could track the process and even though we received no special favors, at least I knew exactly what was going on the whole time.  With the Child Protection Register it was a different story.  Being allergic to snail mail, because it is no longer 1964, I spent a good hour on the Internet and on the phone getting a contact number and an email address of a person who deals with these clearances.  I finally found a lady and let’s call her Beth.  Beth sounded like she was recovering from the flu and a bad case of job dissatisfaction when I spoke to her and we spoke on the phone at least once a week and corresponded via email regularly.  I managed to get our clearances in two weeks.  Which is a record; however there was one little snag.

You see, when Beth told me that our clearances were processed and finalized, she also told me there was an issue and my call was transferred to the Deputy Head of her department.  He was pissed off at me!  Apparently his department has not yet come into the 21^st Century and email submissions were “unacceptable, unorthodox and irregular”.  After asking him why he was so negative he rather rudely told me that they had made an exception for us “this one time!!!” and that in future all submissions were to be submitted to their mailroom “AND. NOT. VIA. EMAIL.”  He didn’t want to hear about how mail in their mailroom didn’t want to die and how depressed the mailroom staff must be because he transferred me back to Beth in mid sentence.  Beth, on the other hand clearly craved positive human contact and we chatted for a while before she wished me luck with our adoption.  I still worry about Beth a little and we still mail each other.

The other paperwork for Phase 1 of the adoption was a breeze but we did have some trouble with the last aspect which was our Adoption Profile Book.  When we finished it and got the printed copy back I was displeased and I think my first words after paging through it were “What the fuck?!” There were some formatting issues and page layout issues in the book that gave me hives.  I mean, the book was not perfect like it was on the computer and, like I said before, if your book sucks then you are totally screwed!  So we had a long hard and sometimes boisterous time redrafting the book.  Formatting issues were corrected, some spelling was changed and some photos removed and others added.  We reworked the book up until the point when we were literally sick of it.  I am not sure if the book is perfect now, but the last draft was printed and hubby, I and the petting zoo signed off on it.  Then hubby took it to the social worker.

Apparently we (mostly I) are overachievers and the social worker refused to take the book.  She said that the book formed part of Phase II of the adoption process and that we should hold on to it until after our panel interview.  So, we completed Phase I and didn’t even know it and now we are anxiously waiting for the start of Phase II.  I am fully expecting to be poked and prodded physically, emotionally and psychologically more than your standard Alien Abduction, but I am sure in the end it will be all worth it.  In the mean time we have cleared out the closets in what will become the nursery and started planning what we need to buy.  We have lists, because lists prevent wars and the apocalypse and I have CDO, which is the same as OCD but the letters are in order as they should be.  For this, I apologize to our Social Worker in advance.  And if you are reading this, how about speeding up Phase II already?  I do have your number you know.  Don’t worry, I am only kidding.  Or am I?

Till next time.

Wallow in Self-Pity. It’s Liberating.

I am in a mood.  Actually, I have been in a mood since Monday.  For those of you who are not sure what I mean with “in a mood”, let me explain.  Since Monday I have not been able to snap out of my normal, not so pleasant, grumpy Monday morning personality and I have been a Debby Downer ever since.  Much like Grumpy Cat, I have been somewhat on the “glass is half empty and you can go fuck yourself” side.  But don’t get me wrong.  I am not apologizing.  Everyone is allowed to have a bad day; or in my case a few of them.  I just pity the people around me who have not learned how to deal with me when I am behaving like an emotionally stunted child alternated by me breaking down into a snot filled mess.  The secret is to just ignore me or to say “you are pretty” but you have to get your timing exactly right or else things can get ugly.  After some introspection (talking to our cats because I am eccentric or normal that way) I have come to the bottom of why I am being such a bitch.  It was narrowed down to Vodka, Fat and Pollen.

Not being a big Vodka drinker, other than my love for Bloody Mary's in summer, you may ask yourself why Vodka is upsetting me.  Well the answer is simple – Russia!  You see I recently learned that a certain Vodka company is sponsoring Joburg Pride and this has caused a shit storm in the South African LGBT community.  So much so, that I publically declared that my husband and I will be boycotting Joburg Pride this year.  I mean how can we in good conscience participate in an event that is sponsored by a company from a Fag Hating country?  Attending Joburg Pride would be like saying it’s ok that Russia is treating our LGBT brothers and sisters like shit, but hey at least they have Vodka!  Right?

After posting our plan to boycott Joburg Pride on Facebook, I received some rather unpleasant Facebook messages and emails.  All of which, I suppose, were from Vodka drinking homophobe loving assholes.  Some did get my tits in a twist, but I decided to just let it go.  Frankly, I am not being paid to think for people and I am not here to force my opinions on others (no matter how right they may be).  However, all I will say about this matter is, if you are a LGBT event accepting sponsorships from homophobic companies, companies from homophobic countries or any other homophobic person and/or group it is just as good as saying you condone their attitudes toward homosexuals.  It kind of makes you an event whore and I am not into shit like that.  And because I am not into whoring out my moral values and integrity for money, we are not attending Pride.  So if you want to send me more related hate mail on this subject matter, please don’t waste your time and enjoy your homophobic laced Vodka.  Ok!

Apart from Vodka, I also was mortified to discover this weekend that I actually put on 4 kilograms.  I have never had a good relationship with our scale, I hate that bitch and I am convinced she is a compulsive liar!  I mean really?  How could I have gained 4 kilograms but not have increased my body fat percentage?  Where the fuck did the fat go, or better yet where did the weight come from?  It’s not muscle, I am sad to say.  Also, it’s not like I have been eating that badly lately.  Sure I have stuffed my pie hole with some chocolates, but they were medicinal in that they made me feel better.  After all, chocolate doesn't judge you or tell you that you gained a few.  But scales do.  They should be banned or at the very least be renamed “Deceitful Machines of Soul Crushing Misfortune!”

I am fully aware that I need to start doing something about my weight gain.  I don’t want to end up on some reality show where the person can’t get out of bed and where the show starts with the word “Morbidly”.  Luckily I am too lazy to develop an eating disorder and I am still in what is considered to be a “normal weight” range.  Unfortunately, I have no immediate intention to start with an exercise regiment because that is for people who don’t own cars and have loads of free time.  Besides, I consider herding the bunnies in the afternoons as sufficient exercise.  After all it does contain some running around and some various other unconventional exercises like reaching underneath the car, climbing over wicker furniture, jumping over lounge chairs and crawling around on the ground on all fours.  However, of late this too has seemed to become a lazy routine.  You see, the bunnies too have gained some weight.

Our bunnies have a sweet tooth and, like children, they give preference to the foods they like.  Foods like grapes, apples, pineapple and bananas.  All of which are rich in sugar and the bunnies leave foods like hay, pellets, herbs, and other vegetables for last.  Due to this they too have become somewhat chubby and lazy.  Our herding sessions in the afternoons have gone down from forty minutes to five, maybe ten minutes at best.  They also halfheartedly run, or sometimes stroll away, preferring for me to do most of the physical exertion.  To the point where I wondered last week for who’s benefit am I doing this really.  Sure, herding them is the time they should come into the house for dinner and settle in for the night, also it is supposed to be play and exercise time for them.  Yet, I am the one getting all of the exercise, and lately not even much of that was happening either.  All I really have to do is leave a trail of grapes to the front door and they will come in on their own.  And technically letting them get fat is animal abuse.  So I guess the two bunnies and I are going to have to go on a diet and I possibly may need to buy a giant hamster wheel.

Lastly, I am in a mood because of pollen and I blame global warming for this.  It is August and spring is still a month away in the Southern Hemisphere and yet my garden has decided to start spring early.  Now, most of you who read my blog know that spring is the worst time of year for my allergies.  This is the time of year when I suffer from chronic hay fever; get pink eyes and generally look and feel like shit.  Why nature decided to get a head start, a month early, on torturing my allergies I do not know.  But one thing is for sure, I hope it ends a month early as well.  If it doesn’t then Mother Nature is just being vindictive and taking out her vengeance on humankind for treating her like shit out on me!  So to conclude; No, I am not in a good mood this week.  Vodka, fat and pollen are pissing me the fuck off and I am allowing myself a “wallow in self-pity” week.  If you have never had one, try it.  It’s liberating.  And fattening.

Till next time.

Breaking, Earth Shattering, Life Changing News

Ok folks, I have some groundbreaking news to share with you.  My husband and I have been debating when the right time would be to make this news public and we decided that the time has come.  We have already shared this news with some of our close friends, family and employers and it is only fair that I now share it with you, my loyal readers (all 10 of you!).  Before you grab a paper bag to start hyperventilating, there really will be no need for that.  Except if you were already having a panic attack because you cannot handle anticipation, in which case grab the paper bag, nobody will judge you.  Also, I am not quitting my blog, getting a sex change, fleeing the country, being arrested by Zimbabwean or Russian authorities or getting a divorce.  And neither one of us is dying.  This is good news people!  We are adopting!  And no, we are not adopting an Alpaca or my much coveted Gay Donkey.  We are adopting a baby.

The adoption process was set in motion about a month ago.  After a lot of discussion and some emotional theatrics, hubby and I finally came to realize that we are in the right place in our lives and marriage to expand our family.  After all, I have been overcompensating for my need to nurture for a while now:  our elaborate menagerie is evidence of this.  I mean, how many animals can one person acquire before someone says “Adopt a child already!” And this is exactly what my mother-in-law did (coincidentally, she suffers from the same foot-in-mouth disease I suffer from).  In the end she was right, and I did come to realize that I do have a deep seated desire to be a parent, so hubby and I took the first tangible steps towards becoming parents.  We contacted PROCARE, a local private adoption agency that recently assisted friends of ours in adopting their son.

Now, anyone who has ever adopted will tell you the adoption process involves a lot of red tape.  And with red tape I mean a shit load of paper work and physical and psychological assessments falling short of submitting to DNA testing and an anal probe.  Currently, hubby and I are completing phase 1 of the 4 phase process.  We have completed all our paper work, obtained medical assessment reports, got tested for HIV (which was optional), obtained mental health reports, obtained our Police Clearances stating that we don’t have criminal records and will be getting our National Child Protection Register clearances this week which will state that we are not pedophiles or have ever been flagged as being a danger to children.  We have also successfully completed our first meeting with our Social Worker and the head of the Adoption Agency.

Our first meeting with them was rather nerve-racking.  Both hubby and I were rather tense, not knowing what to expect and being scared that we would be turned away.  There are some agencies that do not help gay couples.  Luckily for us PROCARE is not one of them.  They explained that they only take in a certain number of applications from gay couples per year and that we were the last intake for 2013.  They do this in order to provide an equal opportunity for their prospective parents to get placements.  Also, it takes a little longer for gay couples and single people to get placements due to social prejudices, which is understandable.  Our first meeting was emotional and I did get teary eyed a couple of times during that meeting as did hubby.  I didn’t feel that emotional since the time, a while ago, when I thought I was suffering from early onset male menopause.  Except this time I did not have hot flashes and I got emotional about babies and birthmothers not the lack of air-conditioning and weight gain.

During this phase we also completed our adoption profile.  For those of you who don’t know what that is, an adoption profile is a book that you put together with photos and some writing that introduces you to the prospective birthmothers and is the first impression she gets of you.  The profile is also what they use to decide who the adoptive parents of their babies will be.  So yes, you guessed it!  The profile is super important and hubby and I have been stressing that ours sucks.  I even had nightmares about it!  And if your profile sucks then you are screwed; and not in a good way - more in a “you will be childless forever” way! Needless to say we have redone our book so many times to date, trying to make it as reflective of who we are, who our family is, our home is like, what we can offer a child and why we would make good parents.  It came close to driving us totally insane until sometime last week when we had an epiphany.

During our first meeting at PROCARE we were shown a couple of examples of Profile Books and when hubby and I discussed those profiles we were underwhelmed by most of them.  Also, after doing some research on the internet we came to the conclusion - fuck it!  Our profile book should be reflective of who we are, it must be authentically us and should not be made to live up to some unrealistic expectation we created in our own minds.  The Profile must not be perfect.  The Profile must be us.  This way, the right birthmother will love our book, she would look at it and feel that we will be the best parents to entrust her child to and we will get the right baby for us.  It’s better to have a book that one birthmother will think is awesome rather than having one that ten birthmothers will think is just OK.  So last week hubby sent our book to the printers and we decided that the version that is being printed is the version we are going to stick with.  We might still end up childless, and that would really suck.  I mean how am I then going to explain my weight gain?  But I digress…

Next we are about to enter Phase 2 of the adoption process.  This phase involves more psychological assessments, more interviews, reference checks, socio- economic profiling, a house visit and a panel interview; all of which we are prepared for and looking forward to.  However, one thing I realized recently is that I have to work on my potty mouth.  Words like “fuck, shit, asshole”, and a few others, need to be replaced with words like “fudge, bollocks and butthole”.  I am not sure how this will work, but I will try my darndest to stop cursing and it is going to be hard as fudge!  Or maybe if I just say those naughty words in my head and not out loud it could also work and be less offensive and more child friendly…  I will let you know how that goes.

Phase 3 and 4 of the adoption process are the placement phase of the baby with the adoptive parents and all the legal aspects that goes along with that.  Phase 2 and 3 can happen simultaneously which makes it rather hard to plan things.  In this regard we have a lot of questions and we’ve only got answers for some of them.  For instance, when is the right time to prepare the nursery, how long will we have to make the final preparations to receive our child (2 weeks), how old will the child be when we get him/her (2 to 3 months old), and the list of questions goes on.  I will keep you updated on the progress of our adoption on my blog.  Seeing as this was just the breaking of the news to y’all some future posts will have more details.  In the mean time if you want to send us baby or nursery stuff, you are more than welcome to.  Or just send us cash.  I am sure it could be tax deductible.  Or send us some advice, it’s free and I am sure we are going to need plenty of that.  We are pregnant people, only not physically, but I have gained some baby weight.  Because I can and things like this happen during pregnancy.  Don’t judge me.

Till next time.

Sexing It Up

I have been a fan of Cazwell and his steamy and sexy homoerotic music videos for a while.  So in case you have never heard of him or seen any of his videos, here are a couple for your viewing pleasure.

Russian Propaganda: Arrest me if you want to assholes!

Seeing as I was banned from the Russian Social Media site VK.com last week and my blog is about to be completely banned from Russia, I have decided to post this blog post as a FUCK YOU to President Vladimir Putin, courtesy of the blog Russian Propaganda.

RUSSIA’S president, Vladimir V. Putin, has declared war on homosexuals. So far, the world has mostly been silent.

On July 3, Mr. Putin signed a law banning the adoption of Russian-born children not only to gay couples but also to any couple or single parent living in any country where marriage equality exists in any form.

A few days earlier, just six months before Russia hosts the 2014 Winter Games, Mr. Putin signed a law allowing police officers to arrest tourists and foreign nationals they suspect of being homosexual, lesbian or “pro-gay” and detain them for up to 14 days. Contrary to what the International Olympic Committee says, the law could mean that any Olympic athlete, trainer, reporter, family member or fan who is gay — or suspected of being gay, or just accused of being gay — can go to jail.

Earlier in June, Mr. Putin signed yet another antigay bill, classifying “homosexual propaganda” as pornography. The law is broad and vague, so that any teacher who tells students that homosexuality is not evil, any parents who tell their child that homosexuality is normal, or anyone who makes pro-gay statements deemed accessible to someone underage is now subject to arrest and fines. Even a judge, lawyer or lawmaker cannot publicly argue for tolerance without the threat of punishment.

Finally, it is rumored that Mr. Putin is about to sign an edict that would remove children from their own families if the parents are either gay or lesbian or suspected of being gay or lesbian. The police would have the authority to remove children from adoptive homes as well as from their own biological parents.

Not surprisingly, some gay and lesbian families are already beginning to plan their escapes from Russia.

Why is Mr. Putin so determined to criminalize homosexuality? He has defended his actions by saying that the Russian birthrate is diminishing and that Russian families as a whole are in danger of decline. That may be. But if that is truly his concern, he should be embracing gay and lesbian couples who, in my world, are breeding like proverbial bunnies. These days I rarely meet a gay couple who aren’t raising children.

And if Mr. Putin thinks he is protecting heterosexual marriage by denying us the same unions, he hasn’t kept up with the research. Studies from San Diego State University compared homosexual civil unions and heterosexual marriages in Vermont and found that the same-sex relationships demonstrate higher levels of satisfaction, sexual fulfillment and happiness. (Vermont legalized same-sex marriages in 2009, after the study was completed.)

Mr. Putin also says that his adoption ban was enacted to protect children from pedophiles. Once again the research does not support the homophobic rhetoric. About 90 percent of pedophiles are heterosexual men.

Mr. Putin’s true motives lie elsewhere. Historically this kind of scapegoating is used by politicians to solidify their bases and draw attention away from their failing policies, and no doubt this is what’s happening in Russia. Counting on the natural backlash against the success of marriage equality around the world and recruiting support from conservative religious organizations, Mr. Putin has sallied forth into this battle, figuring that the only opposition he will face will come from the left, his favorite boogeyman.

Mr. Putin’s campaign against lesbian, gay and bisexual people is one of distraction, a strategy of demonizing a minority for political gain taken straight from the Nazi playbook. Can we allow this war against human rights to go unanswered? Although Mr. Putin may think he can control his creation, history proves he cannot: his condemnations are permission to commit violence against gays and lesbians. In May a young gay man was murdered in the city of Volgograd. He was beaten, his body violated with beer bottles, his clothing set on fire, his head crushed with a rock. This is most likely just the beginning.

Nevertheless, the rest of the world remains almost completely ignorant of Mr. Putin’s agenda. His adoption restrictions have received some attention, but it has been largely limited to people involved in international adoptions.

This must change. With Russia about to hold the Winter Games in Sochi, the country is open to pressure. American and world leaders must speak out against Mr. Putin’s attacks and the violence they foster. The Olympic Committee must demand the retraction of these laws under threat of boycott.

In 1936 the world attended the Olympics in Germany. Few participants said a word about Hitler’s campaign against the Jews. Supporters of that decision point proudly to the triumph of Jesse Owens, while I point with dread to the Holocaust and world war. There is a price for tolerating intolerance.

Влади́мир Влади́мирович Пу́тин пошел на хуй

(Please support Russian Propaganda by visiting their website, reposting/re-blogging their posts and keep the message of the atrocities propagated against the LGBT people in Russia in everybody’s minds.)

This Will Not Save You In a Zombie Apocalypse.

Sometimes throwing money at a problem really is a good idea to solve it.  However, when you are in the midst of a tough economic climate, as we all are of late, this is not always possible.  But in certain circumstances your failure to do so will end up costing you a lot more that you might have thought.  And to make matters worse you will end up realizing it was all your own fault to start with.  This past weekend hubby and I decided to take on some long overdue projects around the house, and in an effort to save some money we decided to do it ourselves.  As most of you know, we do not have the greatest track record when it comes to DIY and this time was no different.  This is how giving our guest bathroom a makeover and overhauling our garden’s sprinkler system ended up having us in dire need of a Plumber and Electrician and why we may possibly not survive a Zombie Apocalypse.

Let me first start off by saying that hubby is very handy with power tools.  He even knows what types of drill tips to use on different surfaces.  I on the other hand have no clue and never bothered to actually give a shit.  All I know how to use is a hammer and a screwdriver and that should be sufficient to save our lives if there ever is a Zombie Apocalypse.  After all, in an Apocalypse there won’t be any electricity so a drill will be pretty useless and won’t make much of a weapon.  And if that is all you are going to rely on you will die and in your final moments you will seriously envy my self-defense skills with a screwdriver and hammer.  But I digress…  Let’s get back to our DYI.

Seeing as I have always been brutally honest with you on my blog, I should admit something.  I cheated.  I did not install the new sprinkler system all by myself.  I hired a guy to do it for me.  Did you really think I would do something like that all on my own?  Gawd, it’s like after four years you don’t even know me!  I did however take him to a “Farmer’s Outlet” to go and buy all the material.  It being early on a Saturday morning and me being slightly hungover from one too many glasses of Chardonnay the night before, I found the whole experience rather daunting.

Apparently real farmers shop there and me standing around pretending to Facebook or Twitter on my iPhone with my sunglasses on in the middle of the shop did not really help me fit into the setting at all.  Also, apparently it is rude when a shop assistant in Khaki clothing asks you if he can “Help” you to screech out the word “No!”.  But in my defense the fucker snuck up on and startled me and when he spoke I thought he was a member of some kind of far right militant group who was about to kidnap me.  I mean really, who wears Khaki anymore these days?  It’s so 1980’s Apartheid era, don’t you think?

About thirty minutes later, in a shop that made me feel like I was in a bad version of the Twilight Zone, we had all the supplies we needed.  We headed home and he started with what seemed like the digging of trenches around our garden.  I remember thinking how cool it would be to have a moat around our house and how useful that would be in a Zombie Apocalypse because zombies can’t swim, but then realized it would be totally impractical.  So I left the guy to do his thing, went inside the house and caught up on some of my television programs.  In the mean time hubby was out shopping for all the new additions for our guest bathroom’s makeover.

Sometime during the day I got called by the sprinkler guy who profusely apologized for severing some electrical cable in the garden.  Being a tad confused seeing as I did not know that there were electrical cables under the ground in our garden and also thinking that it was dangerous and a health hazard I just looked at him for about five minutes not knowing what to say.  Eventually, we figured out that the electrical cable supplied power to our garden lights and I told him not to worry about it and to just finish installing the new sprinklers.   I also cautioned him to try not to cut off any other yet undiscovered health and safety issues in our garden.  He eventually finished without unearthing any more dangerous and potentially lethal garden traps of doom.  We tested the new sprinklers, they worked fine, I paid him and then wondered how much an electrician would cost to come out on a Sunday.  In the mean time a more serious issue was about to develop in the guest bathroom.

Hubby decided that seeing as the style of our guest bathroom is a bit outdated and old that he might as well stick to that theme and hang old classic mirrors in the bathroom.  He also picked out some old painted pictures from the early 1900’s of my deceased ancestors to accentuate the theme.  No wonder our house gets so many ghostly visitors.  So on Sunday afternoon hubby started drilling holes into the tiled bathroom walls.  All was going well until hubby walked into the living room with a concerned look on his face and the only words that he spoke were “I think we have a problem”.  And he was right.  We did have a fucking problem.  He had accidentally drilled a hole right into a water pipe in the wall.

Water was gushing out of the hole in the wall and it did not take long for us to determine that he in fact hit the hot water pipe.  He had inadvertently created a steaming waterfall right above our bathtub, which would have been romantic and whimsical if that was indeed the look that we were going for.  But it wasn’t.  So now we had two problems:  A severed electrical cable and the Victoria Falls, that was heated I must add, in the guest bathroom.  To make matters worse – it was a Sunday!  So calling out a Plumber and an Electrician would have cost us a fortune.  So we did the only thing we could.  We turned off the geyser and the water and pretended like nothing had happened.  But denial can only last that long.

On Monday I had to take the day off to deal with our DIY mishaps and get in the professionals to help us fix our mess.  Luckily hubby uses a handy man at his work that is not only good with plumbing and carpentry but electrical work as well.  So at around 9:30 he pitched up and I had to explain to him that not only are Hubby and I hot messes but we had a little fuckup in the bathroom and in the garden.

He gave me that look that I am sure means “Thank God for people like you.  Without you I’d be out of business!” and he started digging in.  He removed the tile through which hubby had drilled into the water pipe, fixed the hole and patched back the tile, then he proceeded to the garden to work on the case of the severed electrical cable.  It took him quite a few hours longer to fix the electrical cable and he did concur that the cables weren’t safe.  He did something or another to make sure that our garden doesn’t kill us and left and we got his bill several hours later.  His fee was reasonable and we were more than happy to pay him because we really should be punshed for our own stupidity and we should be ashamed of ourselves.  Which we kind of should be but in reality are not so much.

So this weekend ended up costing us a lot more than what we anticipated but at least we learned a few valuable lessons:  1) If there are any electrical cables buried under ground in your garden make sure you know where they are or you could die and 2) Always make sure you know where all the water pipes are in your walls before drilling any holes.  Neither one of these two lessons will help save your life in the event of a Zombie Apocalypse but they will save you a shit load of money.  Which is always a good thing.

Till next time.

Addiction: Is It Really Worth It?

Another celebrity died due to a drug overdose this weekend.  Cory Monteith who played the role of Finn Hudson on the popular television series Glee passed away on Saturday.  It was confirmed that he died as the result of a heroin and alcohol overdose.  Cory now joins actors like Heath Ledger, Corey Haim and River Phoenix, who all battled with substance abuse and died as a result of their addiction in their early twenties and thirties.  In recent years we have also seen many well know celebrities tragically succumb to drug addiction.  More recently there were Whitney Houston, Amy Winehouse and even Michael Jackson (although technically his doctor killed him).

The drugs most frequently found in these reported deaths were cocaine, heroin, alcohol, diazepam, alprazolam, hydrocodone and methamphetamine, to mention but the top 7.  We would be fools to believe that drug addiction is only secluded to poor communities, the homeless and prostitutes on the streets.  We would also be even more ignorant to believe that only the super rich and famous can become addicts.  Addiction affects everybody and chances are that even you have been affected by addiction in one form or another.  So this led me to wonder, why we are so afraid to talk about it.

For many years drug addiction was believed to only be associated with the illegal substances we all are familiar with today.  Alcohol and nicotine addiction are also still common and are also responsible for numerous deaths each year.  But, in recent years new trends developed – people started abusing and getting addicted to prescription and over the counter medication:  The most common being Opioids (painkillers like Oxycontin or Vicodin), Depressants (tranquilizers and sleeping pills like Xanax or Valium) and Stimulants (mood stabilizers like Adderall or Ritalin).  Today people can buy these drugs from their drug dealer right alongside cocaine, crack, heroine, ecstasy and marijuana.  But I don’t want to bore you with a lesson in drugs with this blog post.  I want to share with you my story about being affected by addiction.  I want to tell you about alcoholism.

You cannot always tell if a person is an addict.  It could be the housewife down the street, a colleague at work, a professor at college and even a family member.  My father is an alcoholic and one thing I have learned growing up in a home with him is that addicts can hide their addictions very well.  I also learned that addiction is not something that happens over night (not with alcoholism anyway) and it is a gradual process sliding towards a precipice, and once the addict has slid over it, coming back from it is very difficult if not impossible for some people.  My father’s drinking started when I was about six or seven (or at least that’s when I became aware of it).  It started off with him and my mother having a sundowner after work.  Then it progressed to my father drinking too much at every social function he attended, most times driving us home as drunk as a skunk.  As I grew older his drinking increased resulting in innumerable fights between him and my mother.  Fights I still remember to this day.

My father would come home from work functions drunk, too inebriated to make sense.  Sometimes my mother would lock him out of the house resulting in him once breaking down a door.  None of their fights were particularly pleasant and luckily my father was not the type of alcoholic who got aggressive and physically abused us.  The first time he went to rehab for his addiction was when I was in my late teens.  He came home and drove his car into the gate of our house.  He was too drunk to get out of the car and my boyfriend, at the time, and I had to carry him to the bedroom.  It was embarrassing as hell as the accident drew quite a crowd in our street.  The following day my dad was admitted to a rehab facility.  After a long time being treated physically and receiving therapy he finally came out clean.  Or so we thought.

Addicts are extremely manipulative and they are proficient liars.  For a few years after my father came out of rehab we believed that he was finally clean and that he was a recovering alcoholic, but we were deceived.  As it happens my father never stopped drinking.  He just did it in secret.  After my mother was diagnosed with terminal cancer and with her passing eight months later, I discovered a journal my mother had kept.  From reading it I learned how bad my father’s drinking really was and how my mother tried to protect my sister and I from the truth about the man my father truly was.  I was shocked but being naïve, my sister and I wanted to believe that my father had changed.  We were in for a rude surprise.  It seems that after my mother died there was nobody left to keep him in check and his addiction got out of control.

After my mother’s passing my father lived with my sister and her husband and he stayed in the garden cottage on their property.  My sister noticed that sometimes at 4am the lights in his cottage would still be on.  During that time my father also got into all kinds of accidents with his car.  Then one day their housekeeper pulled my sister aside and told her about all the whiskey bottles she had to throw away from to garden cottage every week.  Naturally my sister was shocked, upset and felt bitterly disappointed.  So she and her husband decided to collect a week’s worth of discarded bottles (which were many) and prepared for an intervention.  Unfortunately, I could not make it as hubby and I had left for our honeymoon to Egypt.  When we returned my sister informed me that my father had voluntarily admitted himself to a rehabilitation facility.  This was his second stint in rehab.  All was well for a couple months, but again things would turn for the worst.

My father met his new wife a couple months after he came out of rehab.  I met his new wife three times in my life.  Once for breakfast when my father first introduced her to us, then at their wedding and the last time was at a BBQ at my sister’s house.  I cannot really say that I know her well, but soon after they got married she started phoning my sister and I wanting to know why we never warned her that my father had a drinking problem.  Both my sister and I were quite taken aback seeing as we asked my father on numerous occasions if he had told her that he had been to rehab.  He said he had.  But he lied.  Just as he lied when he told us that he had stopped drinking.  I knew that he started again because as hubby and I left my father’s wedding reception the first thing he did was to go to the bar and ordered a whiskey.  His addiction won yet again and he continued to lie about it.

I once also got a frantic call from my father’s new wife saying that he had fallen down the stairs, landed on a vase and had a bad cut on his arm.  I asked her if he was drunk when it happened and she said no.  Later in hospital it was determined that he was.  He got her to lie for him.  I have not seen or spoken to my father in over six years and my sister and I currently have no contact with him.  It is sad to think that my father chose his addiction over his own children and grandchildren.  It is even more distressing to think that from the age of five that I never had a real father as alcohol not only took him away from me but also took him from his family.  My father has also broken off all contact with his own brothers and sister.  So all family he has left is his new wife, her children, alcohol, and as they would like us to believe, Jesus Christ.  Because you know, Jesus made wine out of water so wine is not bad for you.

Addiction ruins lives, destroys families and even kills.  Is it really worth sacrificing everything you have, everyone you love, your dignity and self-respect and in some cases even your life for a drink, a pill, a pipe, a needle or a drug laced joint?  If my husband and I are ever to have children I will do my damnedest to make sure my marriage and child are never exposed to or have to endure the evils of drug abuse.  Having lived through it and experienced it firsthand I know how much pain it causes for those people around the addict.  I know how selfish addicts are, how they lie, manipulate and I know that if they do not really want to get help sending them to rehab will accomplish nothing.  I know this sounds harsh, but this is my experience with addiction and it’s painful and there are always casualties.  If you are reading this today and if you are an addict, I plead with you to take a long hard look at your life and ask yourself – Is this addiction really worth it?  If your answer is No, please save your own life and seek help.  Your life is worth more than what you might think and there are people out there who love you.

Till next time.

You're a Homo

Another Sherry Vine parody for your viewing pleasure.

I Am Quitting. Again.

Ok people news flash – I have decided to stop smoking.  Again.  Because you know, I don’t want to die.  At the moment it feels like my lungs are about to apply for asylum because they hate me and they want out of this body.  Also, I might be coming down with bronchitis or pneumonia or some other dreadful disease that you can only catch in the gutters of slums in a third world country.  Either way, I have reached the point where I am sick of smoking and this will be my fourth attempt to break this hold the tobacco companies have over me.  They are sick motherfuckers who are responsible for countless deaths each year and I am hell bent on not becoming one of their statistics.

As I mentioned before, this will be my fourth serious attempt at quitting fags.  The previous times I tried to quit using Patches, Zyban and Campix.  The patches worked as long as I wore them and I managed to quit smoking for about three months.  With Zyban I did not stop smoking at all as half way through my treatment I had a bad reaction to the medication, broke out in hives and looked like I rolled around in poison ivy.  With Champix I stopped smoking for about four months but the side effects of the medication almost killed me and fucked up my liver.  Champix also made me dream of Nazis and I had the most bizarre nightmares while I was on that drug.  I also blame Campix for me contracting pneumonia which landed me in hospital.  Quitting smoking is hard and the way in which you decide to do it is very important.

Going cold turkey is most definitely out of the question as I will in all probability commit a murder.  I am far too pretty for jail and do you even know what they will do to a person like me in prison?  I would become someone’s bitch and end up getting addicted to crack cocaine or crystal meth which is far worse than smoking.  Also, I like my rectum the way it is.  Medication is also out of the question seeing as the previous times didn’t turn out so great.  So I guess I am left to go back to trying the patches again.  I usually wear a patch when I take international flights and they worked wonders to suppress my nicotine cravings.  Let’s hope they do the trick again this time.

I first started smoking when I was sixteen and I blame my sister for my addiction.  You see, she made me smoke while we were on a family vacation and we had to share a hotel room.  She was already smoking at that time and convinced me to try it.  She even bought me a packet of Marlboro’s.  Admittedly when I tried it the first time I found it gross.  But I thought my sister was super cool and I wanted to impress her so I started smoking.  In retrospect I don’t think my sister made me smoke on that holiday to improve my own coolness.  Her real reason to make me smoke was to prevent me from telling on her to our parents.  She can be devious sometimes and this is just one of many times she conned me into doing things that I really shouldn’t have.  Big sisters can be evil like that but I love mine even though she got me hooked on the Devil’s crack aka nicotine.

Normally when I try to quit smoking I tend to become somewhat of a bitch.  I just cannot help it.  I develop a short temper, become emotional and overly sensitive.  I have also been known to throw tantrums in public which is embarrassing for everyone involved.  But taking into consideration that these days smokers are being treated like lepers and we are banned from smoking in most places, quitting might really not be such a bad idea.  I am tired of all the judgmental stares people give you when they walk past designated smoking areas looking at you all like “How gross are those people, sucking on those tar and cyanide filled cigarettes polluting our clean air and killing innocent puppies and kittens”.  I know you judge us; there is no reason to deny it.  If you could throw fake blood on us like Peta does you totally would.  Only it wouldn’t be blood, it would most probably be tar or muddy water.

There have been many times that I regretted that I started smoking.  When you start to smoke you do not know how hellishly difficult it will be to stop.  Many people successfully quit only to start again years later.  Look at my sister for one.  She quit smoking when she had her first child.  She was a non smoker for seven years and then at my birthday party last year she bummed a smoke off me et voillá, after seven years she started smoking again.  Sure it could be seen as my revenge for her getting me hooked on the Devil’s Crack (nicotine) but it just shows how hard it is to stay clean of cigarettes.

The real reason why I have decided to stop smoking, other than the fact that I don’t want to die of lung cancer, emphysema, a heart attack or ass cancer, will be revealed in due course.  Yes, people there is some big news on the horizon and if you want to find out what that is you will have to keep on reading my blog.  And no, I am not just saying this because I want to bullshit you into coming back to read my blog.  The news will blow your mind! But I digress.  My deadline to start weaning myself off the Devil’s Crack is Monday next week.  Bad things usually happen on Mondays so why not start my nicotine rehabilitation on a Monday as the day is going to suck ass anyway.  Hopefully I will stay the course and really quit smoking this time.  Smoking is a filthy habit that will kill me if I don’t stop.

Till next time.