Coucoumellisms

From my dad (Jean-Nil): Hi children, When I passed a kidney stone, not long ago, the hospital did an ultrasound on me. They discovered something that could be pollyps on the wall of my bladder. Those could be malignant or benign. On March 8, I will undergo a cystoscopy (examination of the bladder through the urinary tract). If the pollyps is malignant, they will remove it, which would involve a couple of days in the hospital. So, I hope you will keep me in your prayers. With love, Dad

Maryssa did her first confession this evening. She is in second year of Parish catechism, and on the way to being confirmed and receiving Holy Communion. I also talked with a lady I often see at mass, a good Catholic lady, about my age, with a daughter about Jean-Alexandre's age or older and another about Nicolas's age. Would be nice to get to know her even better.

Nicolas: How come some of the mothers (of the preschool children) never come get their kids? Me: Well, some of the mothers can't come because they have to work. Nicolas: Well, you come. Me: Yes, but I don't have to work. Nicolas: Yes you do, you go get the groceries. I'm glad someone appreciates what I do as being "work". :)

I used to listen to CHOM FM, the classic Rock station in Montreal, quite a bit. In the past year however, they annoy me more often than not. First it was the suggestive condom ads running all hours of the day, despite the fact that people's kids may be listening along. Then there were the ads for the big Convention on everything sex-related. If you don't know what such and such a term is, if you think such and such is referring to it's original innocent meaning, then you need to come to this sex conference, they claimed. Uh well, I beg to differ. I have no idea what such and such a term is, and I do not wish to know. I also happen to naively think that such and such other term still refers to its originally intended innocent meaning, and I do not wish to be informed otherwise. I do not believe that true love requires sex to be anything but simple. Simple straightforward honest sex with the person you love, the person you are faithful to forever, is enough. Ther...

However, I cannot give up internet for Lent, as I did a few years back, in 2004. Too much important information is passed alone through e-mail. I wasn't the team manager for a soccer team back then, and in fact, none of my children were even in competitive soccer at all yet. Now I have four in competitive soccer. The writer in me is coming back to my blog, after a couple of years of neglect, this is one good thing that not going on facebook is giving me, the urge to write, no matter how mundane the subject, on my blog. Most of my writing or comments has been done on facebook in recent years. It's time to pay a little more attention to the poor neglected blog and other little writing projects. By the way, Facebook imports my blog posts, so while my posts may appear in my facebook notes, I am not actually writing them on facebook, and I will not see comments posted to them until Sunday.

Jeanne Chabot © 2010 Every night when Nicolas went to bed, the dark came to visit him. It came to his window and stared at him through the drapes. Nicolas huddled under his blankets and did not move until his older brother Gabriel came in to bed. Then the dark left and Nicolas could sleep. “The dark is going to eat me.” Nicolas told his biggest brother Alex. Alex laughed. “There is no such thing as a dark.” He said. But Nicolas knew there was a dark. He could hear it laughing outside to itself. He knew it was the dark because when it laughed it sounded like the branches of the great old maple tree creaking in the wind. That night, the dark did not go away, even when Gabriel came in to bed. Nicolas did not sleep until very late. “The dark is going to get me.” Nicolas told his sister Maryssa. “He wants to eat me.” “The dark can’t eat you.” Maryssa said. “It doesn’t have teeth.” But Nicolas knew the dark did not need teeth to eat him. The dark could swallow him whole. Nicolas le...

I wanted to go to mass yesterday with the kids and get the ashes for Ash Wednesday, but when I phoned in the afternoon, to find out when the service would be, th elady who answered said there weren't any, there had been a mass in the morning and that was it. "In all of the churches?!" I asked, amazed. "In all of the churches." She replied. "They'll be doing the ashes at Sunday mass too." Yes, but it won't be Ash Wednesday anymore, it'll be the first Sunday of Lent. (Pouts) Why is there only the one service in the morning? Nobody could have gone to that, not with school and stuff. I don't get that...

The problem with the world today is that there is too much tolerance, and not enough real love. I tolerate the heat and the cold. I tolerate noise, headaches, long waits, even mosquitos. But why on earth would I only just tolerate people? Behind every face of every minority group is a person. To get to know a person is to love them, eventually. Sometimes, love doesn't always equal like. But if you truly love a person, you have their best interests, whether you like them or not, at heart. Every person should be treated with kindness and respect, even if they don't deserve it. If it doesn't make them a better person, it will certainly make you a better person. There is too much tolerance. Too much tolerance by parents of their offspring's rudeness. Too much tolerance of bad attitude, too much tolerance of harmful behaviour. Love has to be tough. Tolerance will agree with you that you are a sad victim of life. Love will tell you how it is and hopefully you will ...

Arwen on Faith and Family Live wrote this post , at the end of which she asks "How do you feel about Jane Austen's works?" It so happens that I have been reading Jane Austen's books for the first time recently and had a few observations, which I meant to write down eventually. So I am just going to paste my comment on her post here: I remember my sister read Pride and Prejudice back in high school, but I never did. It wasn't on our reading list in English Litterature. She enjoyed it, but I never got around to reading any Jane Austen books until my sister-in-law (who also happens to be a Jane) lent me Emma. This year, being quite tired of reading books in which the characters all go on about Jane Austen books and Wuthering Heights and the like, I went on Amazon.ca and bought myself 4 of Jane Austen's books (Pride &Prejudice, Sense & Sensibility, Emma, and Persuasion) plus Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre. I read Wuthering Heights first, and found it...

I hate conflict. Seriously. You wouldn't believe it to see me yelling at my kids some days, but kids can be frustratingly brain damaged, so does that really count? In adult to adult relationships, I hate conflict. Yell at me and I may cringe and back into a corner, unless you really get me going. I'm pretty much a live and let live type of person. My personal opinion may not be the popular opinion, nor even the politically correct opinion, but I believe in my right to hold it anyway. I also believe in your right to disagree, and I can even put myself in your shoes, and imagine why you believe the way you do. I believe you can still love people even when you disagree with them, and more importantly, even when you think that what they are doing is bad for them. You only have to look at any parent with his child to know this. When government decides it knows better than me what I should believe and what I should teach my kids about what what is right or wrong, and maintains...

I cannot imagine a more unfitting song than John Lennon's "Imagine" sung to help Haiti. I have come across a number of artists here and there, singing to raise funds for Haiti, and choosing that song, of all songs. To like a song, I have to like the lyrics. I hate the lyrics of Imagine. Imagine there's no heaven It's easy if you try No hell below us Above us only sky Ah yes, an atheist's song to represent the vibrant faith of the Haitian people, who, in the face of incredible poverty and destruction continue, not only to believe in, but to praise GOD. How utterly ironic. They don't need John Lennon or his song. "Imagine there's no Heaven", now there's a depressing thought. To quote the great conceited fool John Lennon himself; "Christianity will go. It will vanish and shrink. I needn't argue with that; I'm right and I will be proved right. We're more popular than Jesus now; I don't know which will go first - ...