Jeez sun! Way to be all bleachy-outy! (Also: woah, my hair looks super bright in these photos!).

Breakdown:

The tank is from Buffalo Exchange, it’s one of the items I mentioned last week. It is made out of rayon and is super super light and I’ve been practically living in it since I got it. It was in the “dress” section – sorry, I don’t think so! For the record, I’m 5′2″ and it would most definitely be chocha-licious on me. Since I don’t want to be on Winona’s blog for that reason, I wore a vintage slip-skirt underneath it (forgot where I got it. Cream Vintage I think?). The belt is F21, the necklace is secondhand, the Tarina Tarantino skull bracelet is from BX. And so are the Guess Marciano boots, which were also mentioned last week in the Buffalo Exchange saga! They’re breaking in pretty well, and as far as I can tell their retail would have been something like $150-200 new…so $25 is a frickin’ steal, considering they’re in like-new condition. Especially considering I didn’t actually pay cash-money for them and that it’s a bitch to find cute flat shoes.

Here you can see the back of the ensemble, including more of my terribly-in-need-of-a-touch-up roots. Lots of bra action, but I really can’t be arsed to care. Maybe next time I’ll wear one of my black ones and make it super scandalous!

This was worn for another Ladies Who Lunch (more photos there) – there were a ton of people there this time! We went to Somnio’s and took up almost the entire restaurant (that place is tiny). I felt bad for being late; the guy in front of me at the ATM took literally ten minutes and then when I got there I drove around the block three times panicking and looking for parking. Oh well, (sh)it happens sometimes.

I then came home and after watching some Battlestar Galactica with Matt (we’re Netflixing it), proceeded to start working on this and forget about, oh you know, eating anything or what time it was until some four or five hours later. I think it turned out pretty well, all things considered (like that it’s only my second piece of computer worked on artwork, ever!). Which makes me feel better about tackling the webcomic (which is still in the thumbnail stage, whoops).

Matt is going in for his CO (correctional officer) screening/testing next Tuesday, wish him luck! I’m really hoping he gets the job, it will make things a lot easier for us. Although he’ll have to go for five weeks of training or camp or whatever, boo. Our new roomie (who turned out to be awesome, by the way) can keep me company. And the cats.

How’s your week going?

Hmm, probably sounds better as Ladies Who Lunch, doesn’t it?

This happened yesterday. From left to right: Grechen, Megan, me (my hair is in pigtails, I swear), Sandhya, Amy, Diya, Joanna, and Anslee. It was a LOT of fun and laughs were had by all!

I felt like kind of a slob next to these lovely ladies – I had intended to go home and change before this, but didn’t get the chance. See, we went to Buffalo Exchange on Wednesday evening, experienced some truly crappy customer service, and came home without selling or buying anything – but I did spot some truly awesome pewter motorcycle boots that I wanted to come back for before anyone else got them. So I got there right at 11 the next morning, thinking that was when they opened (because that’s what Google told me, the lying bastard), but apparently not! I had to wait in line to sell my stuff. It was okay though, because the boots were still there. Of course, me being me, I waffled incessantly, and decided to get a BCBGeneration dress instead. By this time, it was about ten after, and the lunch was at twelve thirty – yikes!

So, I went ahead and went to the lunch. Then I got home and started wondering if I should have got the boots instead. Because that, my friends, is how I roll. I tried on the dress to convince myself and then in short order I started feeling itchy all over and Matt told me I looked like a Vulcan. Lesson learned: check the fiber content before buying, and don’t listen to Matt.

After which, I went back to Buffalo Exchange for the third time in twenty four hours. With the credit from the dress, plus a $5 off $20 coupon that my truly awesome friend who works there gave me, plus the $3 voucher I found in the bottom of my purse…I got the boots (Guess by Marciano for $25!), a lovely flowy tank that is super breezy, and a screenprinted knit dress for a grand total of $18 spent. HECK YEAH.

That was my Thursday. How was your’s?

Little late today – kind of worn out. Herrrrrrre the links are!

• how to fight fair with your lover
• Out of the (gene) pool: disability and biological children
• is there a point to being an artist in an unjust world?
• What’s so dazzling about ShoeDazzle? – you’ve probably seen ads for ShoeDazzle, and Ashe signed up to give us the scoop on it.
• thoughts on HUGE, the newsweek article, and the whole fat-people-on-tv thing
• You do not have to earn your weirdness.
• The High Cost of Cheap Fashion
• If people don’t come here legally, it’s probably because we won’t let them – a post detailing what exactly immigrating to the US entails, from someone whose fiance is going through the process right now.
• building trust and other tactical bullshit that you probably don’t need
• tea time – a beautiful editorial courtesy of Alicia!
• A budget is a moral document – found via Gala, a really well-written post about money & morals
• The Invisible Green Religions

Hope you’re all getting a great start to the week! We watched Howl’s Moving Castle this weekend, and although I felt the plot was a little meandering, it’s a GORGEOUS film. Also got me started on a Diana Wynne Jones kick; I read (possibly reread, although I don’t think I ever read it as a child – but I’ve read a lot of her other stuff) Howl’s Moving Castle, then Castle in the Air, and House of Many Ways + Eight Days of Luke are on my hold list at the library. Sweet!

The Maetreum of Cybele, a pagan temple (that also offers hospitality services for the needy), is involved in an ongoing legal battle with the town of Catskill. Why? The town of Catskill refuses to give the Maetreum tax exemption on their property despite the organization being recognized by the IRS as a 501C3 religious corporation. Jason at the Wild Hunt has posted updates throughout the battle, and the latest update included a link to a Daily Mail article (which, despite a little sensationalism in the lead, is pretty good) about the issue. I’m glad to see the story being covered in non-pagan centric places & wanted to do a post about it here, highlighting some of the things I find particularly irritating.

First off, the town’s reasoning in denying them tax exemption. Reading about it, it seems like the town can’t pick a reason and stick with it. One of the incidences involved the town officials touring the property and commenting that there didn’t seem to be much religious iconography, for the place being a temple. That, right there? Is an example of the dominant culture erasing a non-dominant culture & religion. Not cool, guys. Not cool at all.

Just  because a random person off the street doesn’t recognize it as religious iconography, doesn’t mean that it’s not. It just means that random person off the street doesn’t know it yet. Not everyone will recognize this, or this, or this as religious iconography or artwork (in order: that’s Islamic art, Odin hanging on Yggdrasil, and Shiva), and to assume that the reason you don’t recognize it is because it’s not f’reals is fundamentally insulting to adherents of that religion.

And of course, then there’s this (taken from the Daily Mail article):

During the Dec. 2 hearing, Pulver asked Smith for the precise arrears amount owed by the Maetreum, to which she responded that “the issue we are looking at isn’t so much the dollars and cents of exactly what the taxes are, which I don’t have off the top of my head, the issue is opening the floodgates. Once you relax the requirements, and if you stretch them too far, then you’re going to have just a multitude of organizations who under the spirit of the law go —”

At that moment, the official court transcript shows Smith was interrupted by Pulver, who again asked how much the amount of taxes owed was. Smith said she didn’t know and did not further qualify her statement.

Platine was present during that hearing and understood what Smith was getting at.

Of course she did. It’s not exactly subtle, is it? We wouldn’t want to “open the floodgates”, you know what that would be like.

People think they can shove adherents of pagan religions (and minority religions in general) around simply because we’re freaks, or because we don’t have the numbers and funding to cause adequate consequences. It’s an incredibly frustrating situation and something of a catch-22; because for paganism to be seen as legit by people, more organizations and temples like the Maetreum need to be built. But when the groups that do stick their neck out and create real life spaces for pagans to feel safe in face such difficulty (they were turned down by over 30 lawyers and dismissed by the NYCLU as “that witch group” – liberty union, my ass), it’s not encouraging to anyone else and just ends up furthering that helpless, second-class citizen feeling.

And it should probably not go without mentioning that the Maetreum is specifically a women’s temple and has several intersex and transgender women among its priestesses; I’m sure that the discrimination they’re facing is based in transphobia as well as religious intolerance. One more reason for the town officials to fear “opening the floodgates”.

The Maetreum of Cybele is accepting donations (which are tax deductible) through their website – as of the last update, it seems that their main struggle is having enough money to continue the legal battle, which has lasted four years so far. Spreading the word is also appreciated.

I’m taking the day off – hope you had a happy 4th and are getting your week started off right! (Doubly so if you have today off!) And for everyone not in the USA – well, I hope you had a good weekend too