Number NIne

I've got a couple of things on my mind today.  The first is...even though I watched the season finale of Downton Abbey twice, like, five days ago, it's still haunting me.  I can't even explain what I love about it.  It's funny, but in that dry, English way, not HA HA HAAA, funny.  It's set in a lovely castle, which is nice to look at and dream about,  but if I were to try and describe what happens each week, I'd have a hard time explaining what is so interesting about a bunch of Lords and Ladies sitting around talking and eating.  

I freaking love Dame Maggie Smith 

and...Rob James-Collier (Thomas).  

She lives in a well-bred bubble and doesn't seem to realize how funny she is.  If she did, she would probably disapprove.  He is the scheming, smoking (hot) gay footman, whom you hate to love.  He manages to be completely evil and totally vulnerable at the same time.  So, yeah.  Just watch it.  If you hate it, you never have to listen to me again.  :)

Shifting gears...uh, big time...

I had to run up just over the border to Wisconsin today to pick up a donation for my son's Special Olympic's team fundraiser.  I was hoping for a sunny, slightly warm day, so that I could take a quick side trip to Lake Geneva while I was up there and have some lunch and maybe take a walk.  It is a dreary, cold day, with the promise from the Weather Channel people that we are going to get hammered by WINTER STORM Q!!!  Dun, dun DUUUNNN!

Seriously, when did we start name snowstorms?  So dumb.  Anyway, I headed home right away to avoid getting caught in the mess, but stopped for lunch on the way.  

While eating my less than diet killing and less than delicious salad at McDonalds, I noticed that the family sitting across from me had nine (9) children.  Nine, as in one less than double digit's worth of kids.  Nine, like they could have their own baseball team.  Nine, un-adopted (they all looked alike) children that all came out of the same, sad blue minivan with their parents.  I realized that it was their minivan because I parked next to them and saw four of the kids get out on my side.  I wasn't paying much attention at that point and I am kicking myself now, because I would love to know how they all fit in that otherwise normal looking family (clown) car.

I was trying not to stare as I counted and re-counted the kids.  I originally counted seven before eight and nine arrived from another table out of my sight line, so I was trying to make sure.  Who knows?  Ten and Eleven might have been sitting there as well and I just never saw them,  I don't want to sound judgy (I know I am being judgy), but...why?  Why nine kids?  It's not 1890.  You don't need Bobby Jim to work the fields and the chances (thankfully) of your kid dying young are slim thanks to you know, Penicillin and soap.  So, why then?  Birth control is not cheap, but it's a heck of a lot cheaper than nine kids.  Not every guy is up for a vasectomy, but I say a real man should be willing to go under the knife if it means getting to have carefree sex with his woman.  :)

If it's a religious thing, I will stop you right there, because that is nonsense.   I'm pretty sure God or whoever doesn't want nine kids, including an infant, in a car with only seven seatbelts.  Just no.

If these kids were adopted I would have been the first to cheer for them.  But, am I wrong to think that this is irresponsible?

And lastly...this is the big one.

I am following a little girl on Facebook who is very sick.  Her parents are very into praying and apparently, so are most of their followers.  I have no problem if it makes them feel better. It bugs me personally because I don't believe any of it, but more than that, I find myself wondering what their prayers mean.  People say things like " I hope the Lord favors her" and I go ballistic.  I mean, if there was a God, wouldn't he favor all children?  Wouldn't he want all children to be well and healthy and not need painful medical procedures?  If she pulls through, which I sincerely hope that she does, does it mean that she is better than those other kids that didn't?  Or maybe that those other kids didn't get enough people to pray for them?  Doesn't Jesus love the little children, all the children of the world, red and yellow, black and white, la la la?

This is what makes me a non-believer.  I can buy free will and that sometimes we make poor choices. I can buy God made the heavens and the earth, because the big bang sounds just as amazing as some guy up there blowing shit up.  But, I cannot buy the "God works in mysterious ways" line.  It's just too big of a cop out to me.  We chalk up everything we don't understand to some mysterious old guy in the sky's whims?  How totally unfair.

Life is patently unfair.  But, as a parent who would stand in front of a moving train to protect my kids, I cannot imagine how a loving being, our "parent",  could dole out cancer and brain tumors and earthquakes and tsunamis and hurricanes.  This is what makes me a non believer, an agnostic, an atheist, a heathen or whatever else you want to call me.

What do you believe?