Some of those were very cool. Some were stupid. Most were somewhere in between. I favor Zoidberg currency, by the way.

For some years, my husband has been in various positions that brought him into contact with many employees at a facility where about 1,300 people work. He said he got tired a long time ago of saying, "How are you doing?" because nobody really wants to hear the answer, and instead he greets people by saying "Good to see you." It demands no immediate response and seems to make people happy when they hear it.

Well, I know from personal experience that shards of ceramic will cut you all up to pieces, so I would not want to meet these in a dark alley.

I'm a brunette. I grew up with almost nothing but blonde dolls. I never once, not ever, wished I was a blonde.

I find this particularly interesting, because my husband is missing the part of the third and ring fingers on his left hand due to a childhood accident, and I don't believe it's ever consciously affected how I'm attracted to him. I'll have to look at his right hand and observe whether I get a thrill. :)

And anyway: that's the strength of capitalism. If you don't like something, no one's making you watch it. But feel free to trash millions of people who do enjoy it.

Well, Melphistopheles, I saw the movie this weekend and thought it did a pretty fair job of bringing the novel to life. "By all accounts" probably doesn't take into account those who actually read the book and understand it, and we were pretty much expecting this to get trashed by the media. And I quit listening to anything Roger Ebert had to say years ago, which I guess makes me no better than someone who trashes a movie or a book without having seen it or read it.

It's true: you can't fix stupid.

But sometimes stupidity presents itself for our entertainment.

I'm bugged by the fact that TV commercials showing presumably gender-neutral toys, such as Legos or other construction toys, show boys and not girls playing with them.

P.S. My little brother, who's about as butch and manly-man as they come (but a loving and sensitive daddy to his kids) used to like to go into our mom's closet and model her clothes. Big whoopie. And at the age of 7 or so, I went through a tomboy phase and only wanted to wear jeans, and liked to dig through the ditches after a rain and look for snakes. Kids go through a lot of play and experimentation figuring out who they are as they grow, but I seriously don't think the pink toenails are more than a costume to this kid at this point, provided the mom doesn't make a habit of doing this or forcing it on the kid, which she doesn't seem to do.

This has been years ago, but I was visiting friends who had a toddler son and a pre-teen daughter. The toddler was playing with his sister's cheerleading pompoms, and the dad (with whom I had grown up and gone to school and known all my life) barked at the kid to put down the pompoms because it might make him gay. That's not exactly the way he put it--he used the F-word--but you get the idea.

I asked him why he reacted that way and he said that his son being gay would be the worst thing that could happen to him (him, not his son). I asked why that was, after confirming, worse than being a rapist or murderer or drug addict? and he gave me some long, rambling explanation about how if his son turned out gay, and his son was a part of him, then part of him might be gay.

I said, "If your son's going to be gay, he already is. Playing with pompoms won't 'make' him gay."

At the school where we both attended, in kindergarten, there was an area that was where the boys were supposed to play, with toy cars and blocks and such, and an area where the girls played, with dolls, fake kitchen appliances, and so on. I never was much into dolls and found the other girls boring to play with. I was more interested in the blocks. I actually got in trouble for playing with the blocks and not the dolls.

This was 1976, I should probably point out.

Anyway, I didn't grow up to become a butch dyke, so I thought my classmate's attitude about his son was ridiculous and I said so.

Painting a little boy's toenails pink? Probably harmless to do in the privacy of your own home, and little kids haven't really learned to hate yet, so bullying at school probably won't be an issue. But I don't know if I would make such a big deal out of it. No, hot pink toenails won't 'make' a boy gay if he doesn't already have that inclination waiting to develop in him.

As for those who think it's ridiculous to even ask the question, we must ALWAYS be allowed to ask the question. It's the only way honest debate can come about.

"So, when he moved to Texas at the age of 11, he thought this new state was the gateway to hillbilly hell."

(rolls eyes)

That's kind of weird and kind of awesome all at once.

I've seen this issue discussed on other sites, and the consensus seems to be that it's not about nutrition so much as it is about control. It also teaches the kids that the school knows better what's good for them than their parents do.

This is ridiculous on its very face. I also wonder if there's not an element of bringing everyone down to the same level, so that kids whose families are maybe a little better off and who can afford to pack nicer lunches are forced to eat the same as the kids who eat the "free" lunches.

There is nothing wrong with wanting kids to eat healthier, but this is not the approach. Education would be better, and bringing back recess and PE programs to schools would be even better than that. I didn't start putting on weight until I stopped moving, and until age 22 or so was one of those people who could eat anything and stay the same size. Then heredity kicked in. Sigh.

Does Billy Carter count? He had his own beer.