Friday quiz results: Finding my religion. Or not.

This is a pretty interesting test: the Belief-O-Matic™, but I gotta say I'm a little surprised by the results. I've been perfectly happy all these years without a religion. Except for a short while when I was about eleven and wanted my family to be Amish, or maybe Hasidic Jews. I think I craved more rules and structure. A kid needs something to rebel against, or what's the point?

But anyway, who can resist this?

"Even if YOU don't know what faith you are, Belief-O-Matic™ knows. Answer 20 questions about your concept of God, the afterlife, human nature, and more, and Belief-O-Matic™ will tell you what religion (if any) you practice...or ought to consider practicing."

I'm not actually considering practicing a religion, but I took the test anyway, because -- well, mostly because Julie IM-ed me a while ago wondering where the Friday quiz was. I think she was bored. But also I wanted to see how a heathen like myself would score.

When you're all finished, the results page lists 27 faiths, each followed by a percentage score in descending order of how closely your stated beliefs match those of each particular faith. The explanation of the scoring system is as follows:

"The top score on the list below represents the faith that Belief-O-Matic,™ in its less than infinite wisdom, thinks most closely matches your beliefs. However, even a score of 100% does not mean that your views are all shared by this faith, or vice versa."

Well thank goodness they added that last bit. I'd hate to think that all Unitarian Universalists were a bunch of heathen commies like me. Likewise with the Liberal Quakers: I scored 98% on that one.

But the third one on my list was Mainline to Liberal Christian Protestants? WTF? Secular Humanism, which is more or less how I'd describe my beliefs if I had to describe them, was #4 on the list (88%). I have to confess, though, that I didn't even know that there was such a thing as a Secular Humanist Association. I've never been to a meeting. But if there is an organization and it has meetings, it's probably not really my scene.

I was glad to see Scientology so low on the list (#22), but frankly a little surprised that New Age and Neo-Pagan were so high (#12 and #6, respectively).

In praise of the lowly Ace(tm) bandage.

I'm not sure what exactly I did to my knee, or even when I did it; I don't think it's very serious, but it's extremely annoying. It happened sometime last Sunday, I'm pretty sure, when Tigger was over for a play-date with Hilda. They helped me carry boxes -- heavy boxes! full of Very Important heavy things!! -- up the steep narrow staircase for a while until I was tired of tripping over them and I sent them outside to play.

And then I stood outside watching them for a while and they crashed into me when I wasn't expecting it.

You've gotta keep your knees kind of loose and slightly bent when two large, unruly dogs are running around in the vicinity, because otherwise they will whack into you at a full run and break your kneecaps.

Fortunately they only tumbled into me a couple of times while they were wrestling.

It's enormously entertaining to watch them, though. Tigger has finally figured out that he's quite a lot bigger than Hilda, so he is less intimidated by her than he was the first time he stayed with us. And Hilda loves it when he plays rough with her. Some girls are just like that.

Anyway, there wasn't a particular impact or moment when the hurty knee thing started, but after a while I noticed it sort of went out on me on the stairwell, but it was on my walk to work in the rain the other morning that it started actually hurting when I went up the hills and then again later when I get up out of the chair & stuff like that.

And it hasn't been improving at all, the knee hasn't, and in fact it seemed to be getting worse yesterday, so last night I found my stash of ace bandages and wrapped the knee up for a while. And again this morning before I left for work. I don't know why they help, but they do. So much better than drugs.

Friday test results: It's in the cards

You are The Empress:
Beauty, happiness, pleasure, success, luxury, dissipation.

The Empress is associated with Venus, the feminine planet, so it represents beauty, charm, pleasure, luxury, and delight. You may be good at home decorating, art or anything to do with making things beautiful.

The Empress is a creator, be it creation of life, of romance, of art or business. While the Magician is the primal spark, the idea made real, and the High Priestess is the one who gives the idea a form, the Empress is the womb where it gestates and grows till it is ready to be born. This is why her symbol is Venus, goddess of beautiful things as well as love.

Even so, the Empress is more Demeter, goddess of abundance, then sensual Venus. She is the giver of Earthly gifts, yet at the same time, she can, in anger withhold, as Demeter did when her daughter, Persephone, was kidnapped. In fury and grief, she kept the Earth barren till her child was returned to her.

What Tarot Card are You? Take the Test to Find Out.

via Average Jane

Spider pics

I stopped by to say howdy to my friend fstorch, intrepid urban wildlife photographer, the other day and found him crouched in some shrubbery behind his workshop.

He had a camera in his hand, so I tried not to make any noise until he stood up. I didn't want to frighten any timid wildlife.

By the time he was done and I walked over to see what he was photographing, it was already gone. While he watched, this tiny spider had tossed out strands of silk into the breeze and then when it caught somewhere, the spider took off -- whoosh! You can see the first strand of silk here, and then multiple strands here, and what I think is a pre-launch shot here.

Extinction is forever

Prince Charles has said he believes the world has a duty to save the endangered albatross from extinction. No, really. I mean, it's not that I'm in any way opposed to saving an endangered species.

I agree totally with Prince Charles in fact that it is "our duty to ensure that we do not lose any species if we possibly can help it." Even if it's one that is used figuratively to mean "a source or mark of misfortune, guilt, etc., from which one cannot (easily) be free; a burden or encumbrance. Cf. millstone 2a."*


*From the online OED (subs. req.)

Add this to the list of things I worry about

Squirrel bitings.

I worry sometimes about my sister the mailman: she could be attacked by a mean dog, or a mean customer, or a crazy person; she could be run over by a crazy person in a car; she could fall on the ice, or on someone's unshoveled sidewalk, or a broken stair railing could catch her bag and cause her to tip over into someone's shrubbery (that really happened); plus the back pain from carrying around all those stupid mail-order catalogs, the stress of mandatory overtime -- especially during the winter with the damn daylight savings time thing making it dark so freaking early. But it never even occurred to me to worry that she might get bit by a squirrel and have to get rabies shots.

Well, it happened to a letter carrier in Oil City, PA, last Monday and she had to go to the hospital and get treated for cuts and scratches inflicted by a squirrel that attacked her while delivering the mail. "We are not issuing a squirrel alert," said Steve Jolley, a USPS manager in Oil City, "but everyone is aware of the incident."