Coucoumellisms

"We are afflicted in every way, but not constrained; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed." 2 Cor. 4:8-9

Deuxième lettre de saint Paul Apôtre aux Corinthiens 4,7-15. Mais ce trésor, nous, les Apôtres, nous le portons en nous comme dans des poteries sans valeur ; ainsi, on voit bien que cette puissance extraordinaire ne vient pas de nous, mais de Dieu. A tout moment, nous subissons l'épreuve, mais nous ne sommes pas écrasés ; nous sommes désorientés, mais non pas désemparés ; nous sommes pourchassés, mais non pas abandonnés ; terrassés, mais non pas anéantis. Partout et toujours, nous subissons dans notre corps la mort de Jésus, afin que la vie de Jésus, elle aussi, soit manifestée dans notre corps. En effet, nous, les vivants, nous sommes continuellement livrés à la mort à cause de Jésus, afin que la vie de Jésus, elle aussi, soit manifestée dans notre existence mortelle. Ainsi la mort fait son oeuvre en nous, et la vie en vous. L'Écriture dit : J'ai cru, c'est pourquoi j'ai parlé. Et nous, les Apôtres, animés de cette même foi, nous croyons, nous aussi, e...

There is a thunderstorm here, rain is coming down in sheets. The grass roof of my hut does not keep out all of the rain, some of it is dripping down. I have a blanket around me to keep myself warm as it has gotten a bit chilly because of the dampness and the wind. The waves are crashing on the beach, and against the rocks, it is almost as loud as the thunder itself. Thunderstorms are usually brief and the sun comes out and dries everything up after. I wonder what the rainy season is like. The sandcastle I made on the beach has been totally destroyed.

Me, on a hippie-hair day... Apparently, my glasses are passé , outdated, out of style, old, they have gone the way of big hair and legwarmers. I am aware that my glasses are no longer the latest style, but at least they aren't ugly (yet) not like the huge glasses I had as a teenager back in the eighties... you know, the kind we'd all like to forget any of us ever wore... A friend of mine wanted me to try on his glasses yesterday (his are so much more IN ) the thick square plastic brown glasses that were so avant-gardiste back when I bought these glasses. (Only artists and rebels were wearing them) Had I gone for avant-gardiste instead of just à la mode I might still be in style today... My friend was trying to convince me I really needed to get a new pair of glasses. Okay, so mine are 10 years old, but I can still see clearly with them, they aren't falling apart, and they go not too badly with my face, do I really need a new pair? Or would that just be vanity? However,...

My handsome dude Jean-Alexandre

This is the most silly DH'ism I have had the honour of witnessing: DH does not like to throw things out, I did not either until I realized (1.) how much better the quality of my life is without a whole bunch of useless objects in the way, (more space to put things, less clutter, easy cleaning, etc...) and (2.) with the exception of two letters, (that I am not even sure if I threw out or just lost...) I have not regretted throwing out or giving away any of it. Earlier this year, DH had just finished putting up some new shelves in our office/computer room/hairsalon. He placed two shelves above the computer and five on the wall to the left of the computer. Two of the shelves on this wall are slightly longer than the other five. DH filled the shelves above the computer with a bunch of computer programming books. I filled one and a half of the slightly longer shelves to the left with my things and the childrens' things that I want to keep (baby souvenirs, report cards, certifi...

by Dr. Jeff Mirus, special to CatholicCulture.org July 16, 2005 A LifeSiteNews article from last week, headlined “Pope Opposes Harry Potter Novels”, made it appear that Benedict XVI has read the Potter books and found them dangerous. Given the release a few days later of the sixth novel in J. K. Rowling’s famous series, the timing of the story can only be considered brilliant by those who oppose the Harry Potter phenomenon. This news is already swirling around the Internet. When contacted by LifeSiteNews, Potter opponent and Catholic novelist Michael O’Brien was quick to state that this judgment “reveals the Holy Father’s depth and wide ranging gifts of spiritual discernment” and that “it is consistent with many of the statements he’s been making since his election to the Chair of Peter, indeed for the past 20 years.” O’Brien concluded that Benedict XVI “is the father of the universal church and we would do well to listen to him.” Now I’ve made no secret of the fact that I regard...

Here I am, again, for the umpteenth time in a row, unable to sleep in the middle of the night. I don't know if it is the heat or the pregnancy or a combination of both... I had the same problem a bit earlier in this pregnancy, before it was really all that hot. But it wasn't as bad. There isn't a night that goes by that I sleep all night. Most of the time I lay awake for hours for part of the night. Read in the newspaper yesterday that the heat that we are having is tropical. When the nights don't get colder than 24 degrees celsius, that's tropical, and we've had a couple of nights like that. Most nights don't even go below 20 degrees apparently, and even that is still too high to permit the body to recuperate from the heat. Apparently the norm for a minimum temperature (at night) in July is about 16 degrees. But the others don't seem to be suffering as much as I am. They all seem to be sleeping anyway... Someone gave me a trick to try, lying ...

On my island it is always hot and humid, or warm and humid at the very least, but with the continuous breezes off the ocean, one does not notice the heat so much. There is air here, plenty of it, tinged with the scent of salt, decayed seaweed and marine-life. I walk the beach and listen to the music of the waves rolling in, the gulls shrieking overhead, the breeze blowing in my ears, the sound of my feet on the sand... there is no other music here, except the sound of my own voice. I do not pretend to sing well, but I sing. There is noone else to hear me anyway. If I had someone else to sing with, I would. There is no instrument more beautiful than the human voice. No orchestra of instruments invented by man sounds more lovely than a choir singing in perfect harmony. Here, I am close to God. He speaks to me in the breeze, in the thunderstorm, in the butterfly flitting. Here, there are no controversies, there is no war. There is no injustice, no false idealism, no consumerism, lif...

... it goes from hot, to hot and humid, to hot and unbearably humid, to rain and slightly less hot, to hot, to... We go in the pool every single day... I don't like that pool much, I thought it would be neat to have our own pool, it came with the house, most houses for sale in this area have pools,... it seems to be another necessity that quebecers have created for themselves... but it is so much work and actually costs quite a bit to run that I wonder if it is worth it after all. I would much rather have a neighbourhood pool nearby to go to, for social interaction and then I wouldn't have to fuss with taking care of the darn thing. But I have to say, we'd probably be going to a neighbourhood pool a lot less than we go in our own pool. Especially this summer... Last summer it was barely worthwhile having the thing... we mostly had to force ourselves to go in just by principal... (you have a pool you gotta use it at least once in a summer right) Last year's summer w...

So, there was this big meeting of sexologues on the weekend in Montreal. I read about it in the paper and one of my friends, a sexologue, went to parts of it. Apparently the big topic this year was all about helping handicapped people with thier sexual needs. Now, I recognize that some handicapped people and their partners probably do need some help with sexuality in their lives, and I am not against helping them out with that. But to go from there and to offer services (as some do in Europe now and some would like to do here) such as helping them masturbate (because they can't do it themselves), well that's pretty much prostitution. Just because you follow some special course to be able to do it better for a handicapped person, and just because you're doing it on a handicapped person doesn't change what it is. Right now, in Québec, apparently we already have the following services available specifically for handicapped people: sensual massage, strip-tease, porn......

Lyrics to "Don't Tell Me" by Avril Lavigne You held my hand and walked me home, I know Why you gave me that kiss It was something like this and made me go ooh ooh You wiped my tears, got rid all of my fears Why did you have to go? Guess it wasn't enough to take up some of my love Guys are so hard to trust Did I not tell you that I'm not like that girl? The one who gives it all away, yeah.. Did you think that I was gonna give it up to you, this time? Did you think that it was somethin' I was gonna do and cry? Don't try to tell me what to do Don't try to tell me what to say You're better off that way, yeah Don't think that you're charmin' And the fact that your arm is now around my neck Will get you in my pants, I'll have to kick your ass And make you never forget I'm gonna ask you to stop Thought I liked you a lot But I'm really upset (really upset) Get out of my head, get off of my bed Yeah, that's...

http://www.wprc.org/22.73.0.0.1.0.phtml (My note: I especially like the quote she uses at the bottom of this, I like that it is from a "feminist" point of view and that there are only facts here, no religion, religion doesn't make a good reference for atheists and lukewarm people. Feminism is "in" now, these arguments are things our culture can understand.) Julie's Story Self-Reflection, Self-Regrets I was an 18-year-old freshman when I went to UC Santa Barbara's Student Health Services for my pregnancy test. Even though my body was changing, I wanted to deny all the symptoms: nausea, frequent urination, breast tenderness and worst of all, a late period. When they told me I was pregnant, I broke into tears. I couldn't believe it was happening to me. The counselor wasn't very helpful. She seemed cold and distant. I wanted someone to hold me and tell me it would be alright, but no one did. I was really afraid. The abortion was done in town. The p...

Ok, so I am walking down the health food isle in the Provigo Grocery store and I stop at the herbal tea section. (I love herbal teas and I love trying new ones out.) What do I see? GUAYAKÍ Yerba Maté. I know Yerba Maté. You don't spend 6 months in Paraguay and not know yerba maté, more specifically, maté when drunk hot and tereré when drunk cold. In Paraguay you fill a cup-like instrument carved out of a horn or some wood, (can't remember the name of it) with your yerba, and you fill up a container of either hot water or cold water, then you sit around with your friends, family or co-workers and one person fills up the cup with water and passes the cup. You drink the maté or tereré out of a straw-like instrument with a small rounded strainer at the bottom called a bombilla. (Just so you don't get all the bits and pieces of yerba along with the drink kind of like the little round strainers some people put their tea leaves in before putting it in hot water to steep, i...

Gabriel fell in the pool on Tuesday and almost drowned. Well I guess technically he was drowned, but he didn't die from it. I left him with my other three children (Jean-Alexandre is 11) and a friend of Jean-Alexandre's and went inside for 2 minutes. Noone noticed that he had fallen in the pool. I came out and saw right away that he wasn't there. The others thought he had gotten down from the deck and wandered off by himself. I didn't think so because he is too small to get down himself. Then Dominic saw him in the water. He was on the other end of the pool. It looked like a kid swimming, he was moving his arms and legs. I thought for a second "Why is there another kid swimming in the pool?" I thought maybe some neighbour kid had joined them, but then it hit home. That is when I jumped up to the deck and into the pool. (the previous owners of the house did not follow the norms of security and had fixed stairs leading up to the deck which we removed because an...