Small Victories!

This is my spring break, and great things are happening.

My garage door is fixed, thanks to some nice young men with garage door smarts.

My plumber and I both decided that my brand of toilet was the problem.  (The guy that remodeled my bathroom 2 years ago had told me the same thing, but I had not heeded his advise.)  So, I have purchased a new toilet and had it installed.  It's a think of beauty, not to look at, but it just does everything a toilet is supposed to do, which is not something you think about until it doesn't.

After much work, my numbers are ready for me to take to my tax preparer tomorrow.  No, I don't do my own taxes.  Due to my rather complicated financial situation, everyone concerned is happier that I use a professional preparer. 

I have purchased new tires and had them mounted.  I didn't notice until I walked in the garage this morning that new tires have a pleasant "smell", kind of like a new car smell. 

Of course, none of these things are paid for yet, but that's another problem for another day.

On top of that, the weather has turned relatively warm over the last several days (highs in the 40's!) and the snow is melting fast.  I can actually see 3 small patches of grass in my yard.  I haven't seen my grass since last November. 

Now, I get to grade homework!  

Pray for Japan

The more I hear about the earthquake in Japan, the worse it sounds.  It was 8.9 strength, which is pretty darn big.  Massive damage in a country that has tried to make its buildings and roads more earthquake-tolerant for years and years.  Not enough. 

Here, we are having some cold and snow after several days of relatively warm weather, so people are grousing.  After hearing about Japan, we must realize we have nothing to complain about. 

The New Puritanism

As a relatively new Catholic, I have found it of great value to watch the Catholic network, EWTN, to get a better understanding of the Church and its practices.  I especially like the two shows hosted by Father Mitch Pacqua, a Jesuit priest who has a Ph.D. and is fluent in 12 languages. He is a very nice person and an excellent teacher, also.  One of the shows he hosts is EWTN Live, in which he interviews various guests.  This Wednesday night his guest was a Catholic psychologist (I forgot his name!) who mentioned something called the New Puritanism. 

Essentially, if a society abandons traditional faith-based morality (as much of the US has done) it invents its own morality.  He mentioned several new "sins" in our modern culture that were not sins in the traditional sense.  But he did not mention one that I have noticed for a while, and one that is probably more obvious to women.  The body standard for today's woman is thin, thin, thin, in spite of some who say it shouldn't be.  And, now, you need to be both muscular and thin.  Yes, it's true that many Christian churches promote maintaining a healthy weight and taking care of your body, but this goes well beyond that.  So today, we have the young single woman who will, in one evening, have sex with a man she just met and also have a piece of cheesecake, feel guilty about the cheesecake but not about the sex.  There is something backwards about that.