Category Archives: Pointless Posts

How I Managed To Avoid Being A Victim of Sexual Assault

30 Thursday Oct 2014

Posted by in Life and Love, Pointless Posts, Well, That's Just Stupid

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I have never been raped.

In a world where victims of sexual assault are blamed, disbelieved, and shamed, I am fortunate to be free of that.

FORTUNATE.

Canada is currently going through Ghomeshi-gate, in which an always-creepy Canadian celebrity has actually lost his job amid a wave of accusations from multiple women who all say that he has beaten them and sexual assaulted them.

Canada seems firmly divided on who to believe – the powerful celebrity who hired a PR firm to help craft his “poor me” facebook post defending himself, or the multiple unconnected women who have only their reputations to lose by coming forward.

One man on Perfect Husband’s facebook feed actually had the gall to say that since some of these women went on one or two subsequent dates with him after the initial violent incident, and since none of these women went to the police about it, they were therefore “consenting and complicit” to the abuse which followed.

*cue steam coming out of Perfect Husband’s ears*

Furthermore, while some people ripped this guy a new one, others, including women, agreed with him.

And I can’t understand it. Because even if you’ve never been assaulted, does that really imagine that you can’t imagine what it would be like? Why do people need to believe that assault victims are lying, or to blame?

I know people who were molested as children. By a family member, by a babysitter, by a parent’s boyfriend.

I have friends who were raped. No, they didn’t call the police. They somehow allowed the rapist to convince them that it was their own fault. They didn’t think they would be believed. They didn’t want to be called a “slut” by some victim blamer on Facebook.

I can’t blame them. Not for the rape, not for keeping silent.

I firmly believe that sexual assault victims did not bring their assault on themselves. I firmly believe that rape can happen to any woman. When people blame a victim of sexual assault, or refuse to believe her because she didn’t tell anyone for years, I am filled with fury on their behalf.

Because there but for the grace of… what? God? Who is he to pick who is and is not raped? No. There but for the grace of good fortune go I.

Do certain situations increase the likelihood of rape (such as, for instance, drinking at a big frat party)? Sure. But getting into my car increases my likelihood of being in a car accident. If someone ELSE runs a red light and hits me, THEY are the ones who broke the law, and they are the ones the insurance company would find to be at fault. The insurance company wouldn’t say, “Well, you chose to take that particular route, even though there is a high crash frequency at that intersection, so what did you expect?”

I have been through a few high-risk intersections, when it comes to sexual violence.

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The Gentrification Of Sesame Street

21 Thursday Feb 2013

Posted by in Life and Love, Pointless Posts

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Now that Owl is two we occasionally allow ourselves the luxury of putting Owl in front of the TV for some quality programming.

Over Christmas we had fun showing him The Grinch (which he loved) and Muppet Family Christmas (which he liked) and Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer (which he had no interest in).

Sometimes we let him watch some Sesame Street.

I really notice a difference between letting him watch Sesame Street on Netflix versus the Old School Sesame Street DVD that we picked up years and years ago.

Sesame Street has really changed over the years, and it’s more than just the loss of Jim Henson.

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Cereal Killer

08 Sunday Jul 2012

Posted by in I'm Sure This Happens To Everyone..., Pointless Posts, Well, That's Just Stupid

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Remember cereal boxes when we were kids? They usually had cartoons, occasionally puzzles, and promises of prizes inside, like this:

Cereal boxes seem to have changed rather dramatically since the 1980s.

I was looking at the back of my cereal the other day and saw that it consisted of a single cartoon.

Let me take you through it…

Aw, he’s playing hide and seek, and there’s a kitty!

Aw, his friend was hiding behind the kitty.

That’s right, he just got incinerated and his ashes are ALL OVER HIS FRIEND’S FACE

Mmm!

Eat Cinnamon Corn Pops, kids! They long for the sweetness of death because they’ve witnessed too many atrocities perpetrated by murderous sphynx-like tabby cats.

DELICIOUS!

 

The Chairman

29 Tuesday May 2012

Posted by in Life and Love, Pointless Posts

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Does anyone else watch Iron Chef just for those opening minutes with The Chairman?

I don’t know what I love more – the backflip onto the podium, the ridiculous questions he asks the challenger, or the foley that they place on his darting glares.

It almost makes me forgive their constant dubbing of Morimoto’s perfectly intelligible speech.

“And now, we must jettison our well-crafted japery…”

Dog or Baby? Learn The Truth!

28 Wednesday Mar 2012

Posted by in Damn Dogs, From The Owlery, I'm Sure This Happens To Everyone..., My Blag is on the Interwebs, Pointless Posts

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Hi folks!

Thanks for waiting. I know you’ve spent the last week wondering “Was it the dog or the baby??”

The answers you have been longing for are finally here.

Exhibit A - stain on the carpet: Dog, or Baby?

Survey says: BABY!

The Truth: BABY!

Man, I thought I’d get you guys for sure with this one. Surely brown stain on carpet = dog? But you were too clever for me! Yes, Owl did this. He managed to get his hands on a bottle of liquid Claritin and dump it all over the carpet. We THOUGHT we cleaned it up well, but I guess there must be some residual stickiness, because it has become increasingly more brown as time has gone on as it slowly gathers dirt from the detritus of our lives…

Exhibit B - chewed-up Baby Bels - Dog, or Baby?

Survey Says: DOG!

The Truth: BABY!

That’s right. Owl chewed through the plastic mesh, through the wrappers, through the wax, and destroyed half of our Babybels before we even arrived home from the grocery store.

Exhibit C - Decapitated cup - Dog, or Baby?

Survey Says: Baby, but by a nose – the split was pretty close to 50/50.

The Truth: DOG!

Apparently it was left on the floor, with milk still in it… Beloved Dog must have thought this was a new puzzle… It’s a shame, too, because Owl picked this cup out himself at the store. Ah well…

Exhibit D - Damaged sofa - Dog, or Baby?

Survey Says: DOG!

The Truth: BABY!

Owl not only took a small hole in the cushion fibres and picked it into several large and gaping holes, but he now pulls the fluff out of them whenever he gets a chance. THIS IS WHY WE CAN’T HAVE NICE THINGS.

Exhibit E - Shredded L.M. Montgomery - Dog, or Baby?

Survey Says: BABY!

The Truth: DOG!

Beloved Dog wrecked this book in his youth, when he was two years old or so. Before we got the cat, leaving him with enough to do when I went to work every day was a challenge. This was the victim of a day when he did not have enough to do. So I got him a cat. He hasn’t chewed a book since…

Exhibit F - dented cheddar - Dog, or Baby?

Survey Says: BABY!

The Truth: BABY!

The dentition pattern gives this one away, I know, but I had to include it, because it happened in the SAME grocery run as the Babybel fiasco (notice the Babybels in the background). In fact, it happened WHILE I was putting the Babybels out of reach…

Exhibit G - shredded Kleenex - Dog, or Baby?

Survey Says: BABY!

The Truth: BOTH!

This one was a bit of a cheat, because it was really a toss-up. The Kleenex in this particular photograph was shredded by Owl, but actually Beloved Dog is just as frequently guilty of this exact same crime, even with the addition of the cat to the household. There’s just something fun to rip about Kleenex, I guess.