green

Come to lovely chilly Toronto, Canada. This is the land of the V-neck, eh. And our dollars are cheap!

My husband came with roses a few days before Valentine's Day. He said that he was afraid that he would forget. He is an absent-minded cat and I was amused. Now, he works second shift and by the time he comes home I am usually in bed reading a book and being kept company by a cat or two. When he arrived home on Valentine's Day he announced that he brought me more flowers, some chocolate, and that a friend of his, a guy to whom he often gives a ride home, had bought me a tub of my favourite icecream. All of this was awful nice and entirely unexpected as we had long ago decided not to make a fuss over birthdays, Christmas, and the like. We tend to indulge each other frequently, you see. smatyas: I am curious. How many bubbles did you pop? gadget: your business sounds fascinating and most fun. It must be a tremendous rush for you and your husband to experience couples experiencing their Valentine's Day. I've got a hunch that many of us would love to hear some of your stories. If you can post a few without breaking confidence, how about it? As for all the rest of us who posted on this thread, it seems like we got the right stuff: love, food and flowers.

Although I don't watch Dr. Phil I would suspect that these poor individuals are not simply victims of their own addictions. Marys' post about the failure of her lapband even though she had been carefully following her caloric intake indicates that this business of how much you eat and what you eat may tragically be only one part of a complex equation for some of us. I believe that the lapband works for most of us. It trims our appetite and if we are wise we also do our part by learning how to eat more intelligently. But we must acknowledge that this business of who gains weight and why is a deeply complex issue and has to do with so much more than simple gluttony although that does play a role, of course. While I do think that counselling will be of use for those two individuals showcased on Dr. Phil, I kinda think that metabolic specialists are much more useful at this point, metabolic specialists and gastric surgeons. Eventually these poor souls will need extensive counselling by psychologists and dieticians. A one shot TV session by Dr. Phil is not really going to help them.

I was gaining weight and this was an upward trend which I couldn't control. I was in a state where I loathed and feared my body and when I heard about the lapband I decided to go for it. I paid for it myself and I have been very, very happy that I have had the surgery.

I have only just seen this thread and so my comments are a little late. My mother died two years ago and this is when I became an orphan. It is a strange state to find oneself in and a painful one, too. My condolences to your friend and to you, Lisah.

One of my peeves is this: why does every sweater or T-shirt have to be a V-neck? I look best in a boat neck or a jewel neck (like Audrey Hepburn used to wear in her films). And I am 57 years old. Nobody in their right mind wants to see my cleavage! And I sure am tired of looking at other long past sale date cleavages. And lets bring back the 3/4 length sleeve while you are at it. This length looks really great with bracelets and yet hides the upper arm tragedies that many of us are afflicted with.

People up here in Canada don't usually put bumper stickers on their cars. I think that we are afraid that we will get rust build-up around them. I guess the only one I have seen is the breast cancer ribbon.

He's a strange cat. I've never met anyone quite like him in my real life. Have any of you?

No, I considered that the manner in which you answered ousooner, by putting apostrophes around the word Christian when you applied to the title to him, as being very disrespectful for this implies that you feel that his Christianity is in doubt. This was a low blow indeed! And certainly it is not up to you to judge the relationship that a fellow Christian has with his God. A more reasonable, less bullying fellow would have said that he couldn't agree on the point which was under discussion and then he would provide his reasons in a measured voice.

Well, it does sound from the above remarks that you would have a difficult time living in a pluralistic society, that a theocracy is really what you wish to see in place in your country, nicht war?

Cusano, you are behaving without any respect towards other people's beliefs. It is my way or the highway for you. You are, in fact, a one-man theocracy. You do not seem capable of seeing that while we are comfortable with your beliefs we do become stressed when you do not permit the rest of us, even your fellow Christians, the same respect. You are quite the bully, kiddo.

Well, that's okay. So now you are a cool kitty and that is a good thing.

Oh, duh, if we are talking opinion, well, here is mine...I really don't feel that anyone should rely on beige in their home decor. Beige is in the way of being a dirty non-colour. Better to rely on white rather than the colour of a smoker's teeth. Here is a simple test which anyone of you can do: take a colour, any colour, and hold it up against something white and then against something beige. Now, doesn't beige look pretty bluddy awful? Black, by the way, is also a fun colour to place other colours against. Another neat thing which you can do is to contrast colours which you like against each other. You will be surprised by the results.

An opinion as to whether beige is an attractive colour and should be extensively used in home decor is quite different from an opinion on racial behaviour patterns. The first, this issue surrounding the use of beige, is purely a question of personal taste. The second issue falls into an entirely different category, that of demographics, and there exists a multitude of studies and statistics on this issue. This is not an arena where you get to float an opinion which is unanchored to prior research into the hard data which currently exists; the stakes are far too high. This is an issue which deals with how we are encouraged to view our fellow brothers and sisters. Careless statements may have far reaching consequences. You have displayed yourself as being very sympathetic to the plight of the Jews in Europe. I would argue that the Jews were historically set up for mistreatment and repeated attempts for destruction by the majority because they were repeatedly the target of careless and unthinking statements which not only put them in a box but pathologized them. Jews were viewed as being apart and not fully human. They were demonized. - Sorry for the rupture but my computer decided that it had to do strange things! - It strikes me that your recent refusal to backtrack on your statement that crime does not have a tendency to stay within a racial framework, even after you were provided with information which indicated that this was true, indicates that you are either racist or careless enough about examining the facts that you are willing to toss unexamined inflamatory material concerning a group of individuals into the open market. When you toss off a statement which implies that blacks are a criminal underclass who prey on white people in America, and then defend this because this is your opinion and you have a right to your opinion, you are encouraging people to believe that a group of individuals should be viewed as being apart and as being not fully human. This is called demonization, eh. As I have often said on Rants and Raves, my father's side of the family perished in the Holocaust. There were few survivors. My father's response to this was to raise his kids to be passionately concerned about the responses of all majorities towards all minorities. I believe that we must be sensitive towards each other although this is terribly difficult to do. I believe this is why I enjoy our awful conversations, Cusano. I kinda think that they are productive.

Congratulations, grrl. I am a TLBC grrl, too. I don't know where those little charts come from but this is a question which periodically crops up on TLBC and you will receive an answer from one of the more knowledgeable members. How are you feeling?

Now, this is what I find disturbing about you, Cusano. If a fellow Christian disagrees with your stance on an issue, a secular one in this case, you don't merely disagree with him, you respond by implying that his "Christianity" is questionable. This is why, though belief may well have its proper place in the hearts of men, it does not belong in politics or in government; it seems to introduce a passion that sometimes tramples reasonable thought and the rights of other human beings. You and others of your ilk are self-righteous and are bullies; it is, unfortunately, the aggressive and the noisy Christians like yourself, and not the humble ones, who tend to achieve worldly power in America. This should be of real concern, in my opinion, to all Americans.

I bought a couple of belts at Zeller's the other day. These are to keep my new pants up. They are size XL. But I am having a problem with my latest NSV.:cry The trouble is that my brain has not caught up to my body and I still think of myself as being tubby. Are any of you having this mind/body disconnect? The other problem that I have at the present is that now that it is cold my old carbo-mania has returned and I want comfort - fattening - food.:hungry: Last night I ate pasta with lots of cheese and butter and broccoli.:omg:

Congratulations, Cloe!:clap2: An NSV from a jerk is still an NSV, you know. It might be an even bigger NSV because jerks don't give compliments easily. That's why they are jerks.:heh:

And yah, that is weird. The dude is identical but nothing else is.

Mandi, I am having much the same reaction as Cloe. I haven't been around here much and now I am reading up on all the stuff that has been happening to you. The weight loss is fantastic of course! Congratulations from Green. But what a horrible experience to go through! :cry Both you and Dan must have been freaking out. :omg: I am glad that you are feeling better now and I hope you won't have to remain defilled for too long.:girl_hug:

I just read your latest post and I must say that I regretfully agree. Black people are most certainly NOT preying on white people but bad things are happening to some of the young black men up here in Toronto. They are slaughtering each other with illegal guns which are smuggled up here from south of the border. They are killing each other at the rate of one to two kids per week. This is a painful thing for our community.

Naughty Cusano! We were talking about young urban black male on young urban black male gun violence in Toronto, Canada. You then twisted this to state that packs o gun-toting black folk were attacking white guys south of the border. Your fellow Americans then provided statistics which indicated that you were wrong and that such erroneous statements promoted racist attitudes. After much agreeable discussion we all learned that criminal activities tend to remain inside race and culture and socio-economic divides. Apparently you were not paying attention at the time. Too bad, eh. Now, I am going to admit that I have come to have a certain fondness for you, but I have often noticed that you do misread material which others have posted. This is not good for you. It weakens your arguing position as I believe I have pointed out before.

I would remind you that slavery practices are also mentioned in the New Testament but this is only a minor point. The truth is that although you and I are both decent, honest, and caring people with respect to how we conduct ourselves on a daily basis, our basic beliefs are poles apart. It is crucial, I believe, that the governmental system which is in place be able to serve us all. This is why I am more comfortable living under the Canadian system, a system which is more belief neutral. God and his pundits are not welcome to play a direct role in our politics, nor in our governance. Your beliefs are, as I have just said, wildly different from mine, and yet we are both decent people. In a free country I must have rights to my beliefs just as you must have rights to yours. In a theocratic country someone is gonna lose out. We have been receiving reports of this in action from a number of Islamic theocracies. Indeed, tales of life under the Taliban were particularly blood-chilling, were they not? Now, Cusano, what I fear most from you is that your passion is so intense that it is grown quite immoderate and that you are in the way of being a one man Talibanista yourself. You have found faith and you would like others to do so, too. This is understandable. But if they won't or don't or can't, what then? Are you going to deny these individuals their civil freedoms? Are you going to leave them alienated from a homeland which now suits you? I don't know how much history you have studied but both Christianity and Islam have been spread by the sword at certain periods during their early growth. Of course you know what I am talking about: the newly conquered tribes were told that they should convert or die. In just such a way I have this sense of a serious dichotomy between your religious beliefs and this business of man's civil rights. I sense that this is a big, a very big, issue in the United States today.

Theft, murder, rape, and selling drugs to your children are activities which harm other people and disrupt the fabric of society. This is why such activities are condemned by religions and by secular humanists alike. It is generally agreed upon by all of us who are informed by the western culture that sexual relations/marriage between a child and an adult is deeply damaging to the child and is, therefore, wrong. (There are cultures where young girls are still routinely married off to adult men.) A civil marriage between two loving adult members of the same sex in no way harms you or me, Cusano, and so I fail to see the connection which you are attempting to make between this and rape or murder or whatever. I believe that one of the functions of all religions has been to help mankind deal with this issue of how to arrive at and maintain social order. Certainly the Ten Commandments are all about that. As we know, during the period when the Bible was being written people had slaves. The Book contains much information on the care and treatment of your personal slave collection. Not only is this information no longer applicable today, we now believe that owning other people is horribly immoral. During biblical times people had no understanding that homosexuality is not a lifestyle choice but an issue of genetics. Yes, the latest scientific research indicates that homosexuals are born that way, and just as civilized people are no longer comfortable treating other folk who are born with different attributes as though they are lesser in value and thus merit fewer rights, so this recognition and respect must extend to homosexuals. No religious rights are trampled by allowing homosexuals to have the right to a civil marriage. And the argument that this opens the door to polygamy or folks wanting to marry their pets is specious. No one is born with the built in desire to mate with a dog or to have multiple wives.

Although I totally agree your post made me giggle. My husband spends a whack o dough on his undies. He buys Hugo Boss and I shop at Walmart for mine! :phanvan I really don't mind. His body is prettier than mine.:cry