JCat

Glorious success! A lovely time was had by all and sudry. The entire event was smooth as clockwork.


I am never doing it again.

It is Doctor's office official. I'm not allergic to the Midwest. The entire Midwest. Or at the very least the parts of the Midwest covered by a blood panel allergy test.

Of course I've been telling them this all along. It wasn't the stuff here that makes me look like I've been hit with a sawed off shotgun filled with coins from around the world. It's the stuff out *there* that doesn't like me.


And now I get to see a proper allergist. Eventually.

Hives suck. Hives that last for over a week because I flew to see a friend and couldn't leave when the house tried to kill me really suck. Places hives sucked the most? Scalp, hairline, eyebrows, inside ear piercings, chin, behind the neck, armpits, finger webbing, boobs, that spot on your back you can't reach, inner thighs, crack, behind the knees, that spot you get blisters on from bad shoes, and bottom of the feet. The ones on the bottom of the feet feel like little rocks that you have no choice but to walk on. Good times!

My week was an adventure, and including the shot from the ER last night I'm now on my 3rd round of steroids. Good thing I'm an absolutely ridiculously healthy human person normally because this is just kicking my ass. Thankfully the allergen was strictly specifically environmental, whatever it was. Showers are a horrible idea for now though, since taking an 'I'm HOME' shower and a nap is what landed me in the ER after I spent the entire rest of the day up to the shower watching the hives literally vanishing.

So I had a much more exciting time than I signed up for. I'm tired of being miserable so tell me something good to make me smile and feel better! Tell me about your small victories and great successes that made your week/month happy. Even just an unexpected free soda counts, as long as it made your day.

I'll go first: I survived! WOOO. That's pretty awesome. I think I had fun, which has to count for something. Finally, I'm home with the Husband who is wonderful, awesome, and is doing his best to make me feel better even if he doesn't know how.

And if my friend sees this: It totally wasn't your fault the house tried to kill me. I enjoyed seeing you, and I'm never doing it again. Thanks for doing everything we could think of to fix me and I still love you very much. Totally not your fault and I do not blame you at all. Promise.

On Sunday I met with a friend for mostly authentic Dim Sum, which included the part that had chicken feet. Surprisingly not bad, but a tad spicy for my taste. And the sweet tofu in ginger broth was amazing. Afterward we hit up the World Market to do a little shopping for me, and the shops out in Brookline for her. All in all a long eventful day of going and doing finished up with some lovely Roasterie coffee at the original (One of TWO!) cafe.

We also found the Art gallery which had a gorgeous chandelier in blue and clear blown glass spires, which we did not take a picture of. The giant lacquered heart in the alcove was somewhat more impressively distracting:




So that was my day. What have you been up to?

I managed to make an international call! To London (I think). It only took me half an hour and an unexpected chat with a friend who wasn't supposed to be home and answering the phone to work out outbound calling. The country codes were a tad bit harder, and eventually I managed to route the call properly! This is an accomplishment!

All that effort and I still didn't learn much of anything useful. Although the phone service of the company I am trying to contact (I obviously need a longer stick. Possibly with fire at the end) is slightly more competent than their email service. Once again I realize that a slight increase in competence does not actually translate into usefulness.

Darn you Europe and Debenhams in particular! I am trying my best to stimulate someone's economy from here.

Forcing more impoverished rape victims to give birth: a top Republican priority
The House GOP's Plan to Redefine Rape


Drugged, raped, and pregnant? Too bad. Republicans are pushing to limit rape and incest cases eligible for government abortion funding.

— By Nick Baumann

Fri Jan. 28, 2011 3:00 AM PST

Rape is only really rape if it involves force. So says the new House Republican majority as it now moves to change abortion law.

For years, federal laws restricting the use of government funds to pay for abortions have included exemptions for pregnancies resulting from rape or incest. (Another exemption covers pregnancies that could endanger the life of the woman.) But the "No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act," a bill with 173 mostly Republican co-sponsors that House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) has dubbed a top priority in the new Congress, contains a provision that would rewrite the rules to limit drastically the definition of rape and incest in these cases.

With this legislation, which was introduced last week by Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.), Republicans propose that the rape exemption be limited to "forcible rape." This would rule out federal assistance for abortions in many rape cases, including instances of statutory rape, many of which are non-forcible. For example: If a 13-year-old girl is impregnated by a 24-year-old adult, she would no longer qualify to have Medicaid pay for an abortion. (Smith's spokesman did not respond to a call and an email requesting comment.)

Given that the bill also would forbid the use of tax benefits to pay for abortions, that 13-year-old's parents wouldn't be allowed to use money from a tax-exempt health savings account (HSA) to pay for the procedure. They also wouldn't be able to deduct the cost of the abortion or the cost of any insurance that paid for it as a medical expense.

There used to be a quasi-truce between the pro- and anti-choice forces on the issue of federal funding for abortion. Since 1976, federal law has prohibited the use of taxpayer dollars to pay for abortions except in the cases of rape, incest, and when the pregnancy endangers the life of the woman. But since last year, the anti-abortion side has become far more aggressive in challenging this compromise. They have been pushing to outlaw tax deductions for insurance plans that cover abortion, even if the abortion coverage is never used. The Smith bill represents a frontal attack on these long-standing exceptions.

"This bill takes us back to a time when just saying 'no' wasn't enough to qualify as rape," says Steph Sterling, a lawyer and senior adviser to the National Women's Law Center. Laurie Levenson, a former assistant US attorney and expert on criminal law at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles, notes that the new bill's authors are "using language that's not particularly clear, and some people are going to lose protection." Other types of rapes that would no longer be covered by the exemption include rapes in which the woman was drugged or given excessive amounts of alcohol, rapes of women with limited mental capacity, and many date rapes. "There are a lot of aspects of rape that are not included," Levenson says.

As for the incest exception, the bill would only allow federally funded abortions if the woman is under 18.

The bill hasn't been carefully constructed, Levenson notes. The term "forcible rape" is not defined in the federal criminal code, and the bill's authors don't offer their own definition. In some states, there is no legal definition of "forcible rape," making it unclear whether any abortions would be covered by the rape exemption in those jurisdictions.

The main abortion-rights groups despise the Smith bill as a whole, but they are particularly outraged by its rape provisions. Tait Sye, a spokesman for Planned Parenthood Federation of America, calls the proposed changes "unacceptable." Donna Crane, the policy director of NARAL Pro-Choice America, says that making the "already narrow exceptions for public funding of abortion care for rape and incest survivors even more restrictive" is "unbelievably cruel and heartless."

"This bill goes far beyond current law," says Rep. Diana DeGette (D-Colo.), a co-chair of the congressional pro-choice caucus. The "re-definition" of the rape exception "is only one element" of an "extreme" bill, she adds, citing other provisions in the law that pro-abortion rights groups believe would lead to the end of private health insurance coverage for abortion.

"Somebody needs to look closely at this," Levenson says. "This is a bill that could have a dramatic effect on women, and language is important. It sure sounds like somebody didn't want [the exception to cover] all the different types of rape that are recognized under the law."

Nick Baumann covers national politics and civil liberties issues for
Mother Jones' DC Bureau. For more of his stories, http://www.motherjones.com/authors… You can also follow him on twitter http://twitter.com/NickBaumann Email tips and insights to nbaumann [at] motherjones [dot] com. Get Nick Baumann's RSS feed http://community.livejournal.com/r…

LINKED http://community.livejournal.com/o…
SOURCE http://motherjones.com/politics/20…

I have decided, after some deliberation, what I really want in a vacuum is a wet/dry shop vac on steroids with a powered metal beater bar attachment.

Also I did dishes, laundry, changed the bed, vacuumed and *everything* today. Which sounds wonderful, amazing, and exhausting; however we tend to keep the apartment rather tidy to begin with and I had just rampaged through at the beginning of the month. It doesn't look any different despite the hours of effort put forth.

Today I decided that Dawn dish soap can effectively be used as hand soap to make my engagement ring sparkle just as much if not more than the little tub of cleaner the jeweler sent home with me. It is noticeably less effective on silver.

Life needs better achievables.

Aren't they just so forcefully cheerful? I love them.

I won a Maker Bot on Sunday! It is $1000 worth of shiny shiny plastic printing technology. I'm giving it to my fiance for his birthday, and his gaster is flabbered.

A Maker bot doing that thing it does:


The results:

(Pictures courtesy of my super awesome friend who can rock a camera.)

The website: http://makerbot.com/