(no subject)

Aww, kids are cute. One of my coworkers has a nine-year old grandson who was complaining that things looked "fuzzy" and he couldn't see right. So they took him to an optometrist and he was having trouble reading the chart and everything so they went out to the display cases to pick out some frames and he went right up to the Harry Potter frames and put them on. "It's a miracle, I can see." Yeah, cause those display frames with the clear plastic lenses are really good at fixing vision.

The optometrist managed to keep a straight face (I would have had difficulties). Apparently they get about one fake a week with kids wanting to get the Harry Potter glasses. Glasses are cool to have now. Well sheesh, I went to elementary school 15 years too early.

(no subject)

Really good article on common misconceptions of Islam or Ten Things Everyone Should Know About Islam.

7. Culture is not religion. So much of the oppression and misogyny (female illiteracy, "honour" killing, female genital mutilation, forced marriages, physical abuse, etc.) we hear about in quasi- and pseudo-Islamic countries such as Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and Iran stems from patriarchal cultural customs and baggage and not from Islam, although it's always "justified" sixty ways to Sunday with supposed religious dictates and self-serving interpretations of scripture.

If any of these countries actually thoroughly implemented Islam as intended and honoured the spirit as well as the letter of the "law," women, for example, would not only have far more rights and freedoms than they currently do in any of these countries, but the behaviour of men and the actions of governments would have to change so radically that you would probably not recognize these countries at all. Islamic concepts and requirements are that different from how these countries currently operate.