Some people need offending...

You know, I've gone through a lot of my life being nice, being polite, keeping my mouth shut when someone says something that makes me want to slap the taste out of their mouth. When I re-embraced Christianity and became Lutheran in the early 1990s, I made even more of an effort to be this way. (Although, if you do some reading on Luther, you find out he was hardly a man to mince words.) I spent many years on various Internet mailing lists being the nice, helpful one who never had a bad word for anybody. Even when people said stupid, nasty and ignorant things, I said nothing. And in many cases, I should have said something.

I have since tried to leave the repression of my true feelings behind...especially since starting this blog. (One thing I don't do is use swear words, even though sometimes I'm angry enough to do so. I would like to retain some boundaries, after all.) I have "spiked" certain angry blog posts for various reasons. Some such reasons included not feeling like I was emotionally up to starting a blog-fight with someone or realizing I overreacted to a situation.

Anyway, I vented about something on another blog yesterday and called yet another blogger a name. I notice this morning that this blogger was offended at some of the responses he got, including mine. But guess what?

I am not sorry! I said it and I meant it! And although he implies my response was mindless, I assure him it was not. I've run across his type online before and I can't express how much I despise them. Yes, I called him a name and I'm glad.

I once spiked a major angry post about a liberal Lutheran who used to blog. (I don't know if she still does, nor do I care.) Her post was about how horrible and evil America was and how she wished she lived in Canada. My blog post, to sum up, basically said, "Don't let the door hit ya where the good Lord split ya, b***h!" But I decided to not post my angry rant because I didn't feel up to a blog-fight. However, it was cathartic just to write the post. Still, it would have been nice if I could have told this woman off.

So that's why I refuse to be sorry for being "mean" to certain people. I may have to take crap from people in real life, but not here. And if somebody is offended, tough!

Poking my head up...

Sorry for the extended absence. I've been both busy and not feeling the greatest. I halved my dosage of Paxil at the beginning of this week as per the tapering protocol I'm following. I didn't think much of it at the time. But yesterday, I was wondering why I was so moody and was being so snippy to everybody. Then I realized it must be the reduced Paxil dosage. I was in a good mood for only about five minutes yesterday. During that five minutes, a coworker asked me if I would do a flyer advertising a retirement party for another coworker. I agreed to do it, and then five minutes later regretted it. I'll try and put something together this evening.

To make things worse, my mother has been in terrible pain because of the nerve damage from the shingles she had two years ago. (This is called Postherpetic Neuralgia.) I took her to Urgent Care on Memorial Day so she could get some better pain medicine. Tomorrow, she will be seeing her regular doctor. Hopefully, he will give her a prescription for Lyrica, which is a relatively new medication that is supposed to treat the kind of pain she's having.

Oh, well...back to the daily grind...

Seven Things About Me

Barb tagged me and so now I have to post seven random, uninteresting things about me. So here they are:

1. I never really learned how to swim. I can backstroke and dog-paddle just a little, but not good enough for me to take a chance in the deep end of a pool.

2. My Mom wanted to name me Susan or Sherry and my Dad wanted me to name me Susannah. I kind of wish my Dad had won out because Susannah is prettier and isn't as common. But I'm glad my Mom picked Susan instead of Sherry. (No offense to anyone named Sherry.)

3. I'm 5'8" tall.

4. I'm a natural blond, although I get highlights to brighten it up a bit.

5. I used to get an upset stomach every time I ate raw apples, but I have grown out of that in recent years.

6. I cannot eat raw onion because I will have indigestion for days if I do.

7. I can have a very juvenile sense of humor and have been known to laugh uncontrollably at fart jokes.

I can't think of who to tag with this, so if you read this, consider yourself tagged (if you want).

New Counter

After over five years of using Sitemeter, I've decided to switch my counter to StatCounter. I had both running yesterday to see if I liked StatCounter enough to change. I do like it quite a lot, so I dropped Sitemeter from my main and archive pages. (My old style archives -- the ones that use the entry number rather than the title as the URL -- will stay under Sitemeter. Those are no longer accessed by the MovableType software and I just keep them around so that old links and trackbacks will work. I'm not about to go into all of those manually and change them to the new counter.)

The main reason I switched is concerns over spyware and adware cookies that Sitemeter uses. In fact, my workplace has banned Sitemeter for months because of this.

Also, I just plain like StatCounter better. The thing I like best is that you can create as many counters (or "projects") as you need under one login. You don't have to have a separate login and password for each counter. I will be switching my radio site and faith journal over from Extreme Tracking to StatCounter as well.

Rain!

After weeks of dryness and days of smoky haze from distant fires, we are finally getting some rain. It's just beautiful!

More on Falwell

Lee Anne Millinger has a very good post on the late Jerry Falwell. She expresses what I think a lot of us Christians feel about Falwell and his legacy:

While I'm sure Falwell and I would disagree on many issues political and theological, I still respect him as a brother in Christ. After all, I expect that we will enjoy the marriage feast of the Lamb together and praise the Lord who has forgiven us both our sins.

However, I regret that Falwell was made out to be a sort of spokesman for all evangelicals, while making regrettable statements that made many of us wince.

Lee Anne has more to say here.

Puzzler of the Day

How come feminists and other lefties -- who are either atheists or are vaguely "spiritual" types who dislike the entire concepts of hell and original sin -- par-tay at the thought of of eternal hellfires for Jerry Falwell?

And FWIW...although I consider myself a social conservative and a Christian, I was never a fan or supporter of Falwell's. Darleen's opinion pretty much reflects mine. Despite his flaws, I think he truly believed and tried to serve God the best way he knew how.

Violet Again!

No joke...this is what I came up with -- my favorite color:

(Via Barb, whose color is blue.)

How I'm Doing

A little Paxil related update...

I'm still tapering down my dosage. A very kind reader gave me some excellent instructions on how to do it properly. I was trying to taper down too quickly and in the wrong way, which is why I was feeling so bad. Last week was hard to evaluate because I was sick a lot of the week (non-Paxil related), but I can tell the difference this week. I am no longer having severe mood-swings and depression. My concentration is better as well. I had pretty much stopped dreaming, but when I began the new tapering protocol, I started having vivid and somewhat disturbing dreams again. However, I am sleeping well.

I am now taking the general Paxil (instead of the controlled release). I have 10mg pills which I cut in half with a pill cutter. Right now, I am taking 5mg a day. I have been taking this dosage for a little over a week and will continue for another three weeks. Then I will decrease the dosage to 2.5mg a day for four weeks. This pattern will continue until I am off of it entirely.

I may not be posting much for the next week or so because I'm going to be busy trying to get things straightened up and organized. I need to do some spring cleaning...I'm tired of the clutter.

Five Years!

I just realized that today is my fifth blogiversary. So, let me take this opportunity to thank everyone who reads, links to and comments on my little soapbox on the web. :-)

Synchronicity

While reading this disgusting story and the mostly retarded, immoral, amoral reader comments that followed it, "Roxanne" by the Police came up on my iPod.

Eye Color Quiz

This is just a little something to show I'm still alive. I haven't felt that great the past few days.

Actually, my eyes are mostly blue with a little green thrown in. I think it would be really cool to have violet eyes, though:

Your Eyes Should Be Violet

Your eyes reflect: Mystery and allure What's hidden behind your eyes: A quiet passion

The source of my foot pain...

...is plantar fasciitis, which is the inflammation of a major ligament in your foot that connects your heel to your toes. While I have this problem in both feet, it is much worse in my right foot. Fortunately, it doesn't look like I have bone spurs or anything like that. Since I can't take NSAIDs (I'm allergic to them), I got a cortisone shot in my right foot, which I think was the most painful shot I've ever had. My foot was taped to limit movement and the doctor recommended that I get at least one pair of Crocs to wear around the house as slippers. (I bought two pairs, one for home and one for work.) I have to tape a bag around the taped foot before I shower for the next few days and I am also supposed to do some stretching exercises. I'm not supposed to be on my feet more than necessary.

My foot is feeling better today and I'm supposed to see the foot doctor again in a couple of weeks. Fortunately, this is something that can heal up and get better...I'm just glad I didn't have bone spurs or something.