Tell me, do you blog from the land down under?

This post is for my brother and his wife, on the off chance that they venture by my blog during their Australian work/holiday-fest. And yes, the kids are all doing just fine - now get on with enjoying yourself properly, mates!

SSM in Spain - Two months later

Same-sex "marriage" has been legal in Spain for about two months now. In that time, rougly 35,000 heterosexual marriages have taken place. Only 22 homosexual couples have availed themselves of the same institution in that period of time. That is approximately 0.0628% of the total number of marriages. If 2% of the adult population is homosexual, this would indicate that heterosexuals are 32 times (3200%) more likely to consider marriage as the appropriate form of long-term commitment. If some homosexual couples have been waiting for the 'right' to marry, then presumably there was a backlog contributing to that grand total of 22 'marriages'.

SSM has never really been about people being denied access to the institution of marriage - it has always been about cementing in place those secondary characteristics of marriage (love and affection) in place of the primary ones (procreation and child-rearing).

Katrina thoughts

I'm pretty amazed at all the thoughts being laid out in the blogosphere about Hurricane Katrina - it's enough to keep you busy for a very long time. Seeing images of what's been going on there has made me think more than once that I wish I was philanthropically wealthy - in which case my kids and I would already be down there with a boat helping rescue people. I'm also liking the idea I've seen briefly of RV places donating campers to those displaced - giving them a temporary home, and something to sell to help get started again when (and where) they've decided to restart their lives.

There are a lot of comments flying about who's to blame for the delayed human response. I think the best one so far comes from Colby Cosh (check my side links, I'm too lazy to do the hyperlink just now): "The slow reaction of the federal authorities to the disaster can probably be attributed, in part, to a perfectly natural but mistaken assumption that New Orleans itself thought New Orleans was worth saving, and would take initial steps to do so."

Even with all the images, it's tough to really imagine what those people are going through (and, incidentally, people everywhere who have this type of calamity as a constant terror on the horizon).

Kudos to everybody actually doing something to fix this mess - I do wish I was actually there.

Ah, to be witty.

It's finally happened.

I began receiving some of the obnoxious comments parents of larger families tend to get, along the lines of, "Can't you keep it in your pants?" The obnoxious comments came at work, in the spirit of a joke, and caught me off-guard. I'd told myself I'd be ready with something witty if it ever happened to me - alas, I just smiled and said nothing at first. My brother has had some very effective responses (I'm not sure if he's ever actually used them, or just told them to me). For example, in response to, "Don't you know how babies are made?" (or some version of that), his retort is, "Yes, we do. And we quite enjoy it."

In the hope that this type of humour comes quickly to my mind and my lips, should this occasion befall me again ....

Feel free to drop your reply quips in the comments (or if you're daring, your nasty comments that you'd like to direct to parents of large families).