Is anyone else an atheist with BC besides me?

Yeah, thanks God.

Ha! Seriously.

Denver is back under mask mandates for all public indoors areas. Our local vaccination numbers are pretty strong: >70% fully vaxed, and 76% at least partially innoculated. But our mayor was gauging our hospital loads, and weighing that with holiday visitors coming in from less covered areas and bringing their Deltas, Lambdas, and Omicrons with them. I'm hoping after the holidays are over and everyone goes back home, we'll go back to laxer rules.

KIDI919, how horrible! Pray to her medical team; if there was a god, shit like this wouldn't happen.

Alice I believe you are right. If there is, it's a sadistic bastard. Sometimes I picture something looming over us having a big laugh as we scurry around on this Earth. Something out of the Twilight Zone.

Miriandra, thank you.

Miriandra, you bet ! I gotta whole lot of shit to discuss.

DivineMrsM, I hate that song!!! Whenever it came on at work everyone would say Kathy hates this song.

KIDI919, Oh good, I'm not the only one! I'm usually afraid to say it, but I've always been unimpressed with McCartney's songwriting. Too many of his tunes are simplistic and boring, at least to my ears.

Love it, Alice!

I do have to wonder if Santa's days are numbered. I suppose there are those who will always exalt him as the symbol for the magic of Christmas while in the same breath exalt Jesus as the “reason for the season". But a fat old white guy who never shaves, makes kids sit on his lap to tell him what they want and enters houses at night, as well as somehow spying on kids day and night and, as the above meme describes, judges their actions, seems counterintuitive to all the things we try to teach children these days. I especially notice it when I watch old sitcoms from the 70s-90s. It takes on a creepy feeling.

DivineMrsM, I've been reading about European countries' descriptions of St. Nicholas (a lot of gorgeous artwork, BTW), and his disturbing reward/punishment aspect was handled differently, with a nasty companion who meted out the bad stuff - anything from coals to beatings to cannibalism. It's all quite fascinating. And December 6th was for presents from St. Nicholas, with Christmas for religion and family feasts, and some other traditions like Saint Lucia in the Scandinavian countries in mid-December. Somehow it started getting smooshed together. I like the older ways which quite openly included and acknowledged the pagan roots.

Elderberry, there were several others besides Krampus. This has a quick overview.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Companions_of_Saint_Nicholas

I was particularly interested in Hans Trapp since my great-great grandparents came from Alsace.

Unbelievable!! Yet not surprising based on history of Catholics and gender and sexuality. This is reported today in the Washington Post

A Catholic diocese in Michigan has instructed its pastors to deny baptism, confirmation and other sacraments to transgender and nonbinary people unless they have "repented" — possibly the first diocese in the United States to issue such a sweeping policy about those who identify with a gender other than their sex assigned at birth.

The guidance issued by the Diocese of Marquette also stipulates that transgender people may not receive Communion, which Catholics believe is the literal body and blood of Jesus Christ. In most circumstances, they cannot receive the anointing of the sick, which is meant to provide physical or spiritual healing to those who are seriously ill. The guidance was issued in July but only recently sparked a debate after a prominent priest and advocate for LGBTQ Catholics shared it on Twitter.

Alice: I am going to remember that curse!

You and me both, Miriandra. I loathe organized religion and it's effect on our society. The damage is immeasurable, especially innocent children.

Since chemo ate my brain I've been unable to do my normal job as a TV writer, so I started making jewelry. I sell at an artisan fair at a winery in Temecula. I do really well there, especially with tourists. I struggle with the locals, however, as it is an extremely religious/enthusiastic Trump supporting community.

This past weekend took the cake. The artisan in the booth next to me was selling handmade wooden serving boards in the shape of a wine bottle. A woman walking by picked one up and started whooshing it through the air as if she was going to hit someone with it. She laughingly told Mabel, the artist, that she needed to drill holes in it, so that when you paddled your kids with it, they'd know they'd been hit. Not as handy as the belt she used to beat her kids with, but still good.

I listened to her and my first thought was: she's a Christian. I wasn't wrong. She went on to tell a "funny" story about how the principal of her Christian high school (sadistic asshole that he probably was) used to paddle the students on a regular basis. When he retired all of his students showed up and signed his favorite paddle. How sick is that?

She came to my booth and picked up a bracelet to look at it. I asked her to put it down and leave my booth as I don't sell to child abusers. She started sputtering about being a good Christian. I said "And I'm a good atheist. And I will not sell to you. Not now, not ever."

She told me I was going to hell. I said "Doubt it. I'm not the one who beats defenseless children." She left and went to complain to the management of the winery. Good luck with that. The owners of the winery are Indian and don't have much use for the wacky fundamentalist Christians. Nor do I.

Trishyla: I am speechless. Well - I'd rather be in Hell then to be with any of that lot. But then, I don't be in Heaven or Hell. So I just don't want to be with them in this life