They took Amina. Fuck. [IMPORTANT UPDATE! See in the end.]

It was to be expected, of course. Doesn't make it less horrible. Amina is an out gay blogger in Damascus, out of all places. And, of course, she is against Assad's regiment. If you never heard of her, please read this story. It is amazing. It tells about two armed security service thugs who ( Read more... )

This is an email I wrote nearly 5 years ago. It talks about the book “Life Of Pi” by Yann Martel (btw., this post contains spoilers of it. If you intend to read the book -- which I wouldn’t recommend -- stop reading here). I still remember the novel well, and it was interesting to see how I myself changed over these years. The email was sent to a ( Read more... )

This is from 2007, but I only now heard of it (via talash ). This is, officially, The Most Stupid Leftist Thing I have ever heard. And I've heard plenty! I have friends on both sides who love to point and laugh at the crazy. But this... this is truly unique. I dare even you, chasovschik , to come up with a better candidate for the ultimate all times leftist-gone- ( Read more... )

My wonderful mom, roztamara, has a hobby: pottery. I'm no expert, but I (along with many of our friends and relatives) think she is very talented. Here are some more things she made. But this teapot she just finished especially for Danny and me:


( Read more... )

This is something that I changed my mind about only relatively recently. Only a few years ago, my reaction to fundamentalist Muslims and their actions was “It is such a pity that a small percentage of crazy fundies poisons our perception of an entire religion!”

It isn’t any longer.

( Read the rest... )

Most of my problems with monogamy are not with monogamy per se, but with the way that it is commonly implemented. For example, a big pet peeve of mine is the unrealistic expectation that people in happy relationships will never be attracted to someone else. Dan Savage rants about it here much better than I would (in reply to a letter from a woman ( Read more... )

My good friend, emi_ka, told me once: “You know, I suspect that people who are not like you or Danny only attempt open relationships to please their partner, which brings them a lot of suffering and usually ends very badly”.

By “like you or Danny” my friend meant people to whom open relationships are natural - people who were seemingly born without the ( Read more... )

 One of the cool things about learning a foreign language is being able to understand the words of these wonderful songs that I love so much. But sometimes it backfires! Big time.

All of you out there who don't speak Portuguese -- rejoice! Because you can enjoy this divine, amazing song by Elis Regina even more than I did:

Click to view

Just don't look for the ( Read more... )

If you suffered through this movie the way I did, you probably really need this to help wash off the aftertaste:

Click to view

That's it, I have nothing to add. Tim Minchin said it all better than I would. 
( But that doesn't stop me... )

                                                                          Him that I love, I wish to be free -- even from me.
                                                                                                               -- Anne Morrow Lindbergh

So, Danny and I have been thinking about getting married. No, it does not mean we are ( Read more... )