FunnyDuddies

I think that morality and spirituality are totally fused. Keep in mind I did not say religion. Lets take away the boundaries for a moment. Who sets your morals without spirituality. You just want to be a good person? Who defines good? Where did you learn what "good" and "bad" is? Without a higher teaching from somewhere it could be completely ok to take from one because of your need. We have certainly seen that as God is removed from our govt and everyday lives more and more that it is becoming much more common place to take from the 'haves' to give to the 'have nots'. To not cheat means to not deceive or lie. To not bare false witness. To not cause harm to someone in a non physical way. To protect inocence is to protect those who cannot protect themselves. Children, mental ill, the infirm, the aged. Keep them protected, and help guide them so that they do not bring harm onto themselves.

Our pastor had us take these tests before we started premarital counselling with him. It was quite interesting. While I do agree that opposites attract I think a base or core similarity is essential for raising a family. Just because you need to have a continuity in your rules and guidelines and how the household is setup. Dh and I are VERY opposite in personality. He is shy, quiet, reserved, strong willed, antisocial, etc. I am not LOL but our core fundamentals are very similar. we have the same religious faith, believe kids should be raised the same way, believe the roles in the household are set and firm, feel the same about dicipline, and have the same goals for our future. We also made sure that this was all agreed on and understood before getting married. It was so important to us because we see more and more couples around us getting married now days with absolutely no regard for how well they are going to get along when the going gets tough.

The constitution may be a living document, but that does not mean that the ideals laid down in them change due to modern interpretation of the english language. It just means that we as a country have the ability to change it. It can be rewritten. But the original meanings of its ideals still should stand true as they were originally intended. You cannot take a document and interpret it in such a way to fit your thoughts and feelings or to suit your argument. You can simply take a document the way it is written and "glean your own understanding of it". Which by the way can be present or past tense. :Banane10: The issue of seperation of church and state was actually originally brought up in a lawsuit of all things. Everson v. Board of Education in 1947 where some guy thought his taxes shouldn't go to bussing kids to his kids school and a christian private school. What the constitution actually guarantees us is that the govt will never put itself in a situation where it controls any part of our religion. It was written in a time when the founding fathers were running from the church of england. Of course...they would make one of the most important parts of the constitution the guarantee that such a governing body would never be formed again. Thats all. Just freedom of religion. It did not and does not state anywhere that religion would not have some sort of influence. Our base laws are formed on the basic teachings of most major religions. Don't kill, don't cheat, don't steal, don't harm, protect innocence, etc. Without religion you would not have most of these laws. Personally I like these laws :Banane09:

linds and emilee thank you. I did do something nice for myself. I went out and bought a new goal outfit. a little leather club dress. hehehe i will wear it one day. LOL

Honestly if DH didn't have the same views, I think I'd kill him in his sleep :heh: LOL We bicker over politics as it is, and we are damn near exactly the same in thinking. lol

i think just the soup recipe alone is a great recipe for whenever you are hungry. even if you don't follow the diet. it is a great low cal filling soup.

OMG those were funny. I have a whole bunch. Lemme go find em.

sounds weird...but i turn on my techno music and i dance its a great workout. andit is why i win all the dancin contests LOL

It has been hard. In fact it is because my aunt died from this specific type of cancer that I told my friend to get in and get checked. When she told me what the symptoms were, I knew right away she needed to get in.

OMG this thread has me laughing so much. My kids call their privates their "potty". And oh boy....my son won't stop touching his potty. LOL he is 3. And still sits to pee. We haven't even gotten to the standing stage yet. but if he doesn't have 2 or 3 layers on over it, his hands are on it. It is so embarassing. LOL DH looks at me and says "is something wrong with him?" I tell him no...you did that too! He denies it. I finally called his mom and made his mom tell him that yep! You did it too son!

hehehe i am at a point in my life where i really don't care what people think of my views. I have found this is only one of the few things I have total control over. and the way i figure it...if you can't be my friend because of how i vote or how i pray, then you weren't the type of friend i want. Don't be a hater!! LOL I love all ya liberals! hehehehe

Ok...since we have broken away from the original intent of this thread, and are openly discussing this. Lets hear from the raving right wing religious fanatic. Tired Old Man, you mentioned that illiterate folk are more likely to become criminals. This probably comes down to a few very specific points. *Illiterates more than likely have no money because they cannot get a job. So they have to resort to crime to earn a living. Ok. I get that. Not a good thing, but I understand the cause and effect. *Illiterates more than likely are illiterate because they did not attend the classes that they should have when they were children. Instead they were out hanging out with all the other losers more than likely getting into trouble, and raising hell, and starting their life of crime early. Once in that life, it is hard to get out of it. Ok. I get that too. So it seems to me the second would actually be the cause for the first as well. Ok. So lets look at that closely. Kids not being in school when they are supposed to be. What causes this? Its not the teachers. The fact that schools don't have enough colored pencils. the fact that the band doesn't have enough drum sets and flutes. It has to do with no one enforcing that these kids have to be in school. And don't try and say "Well they just don't want to be there". No one wants to be in school when you are a kid. You don't really appreciate school until you get older. The accountability of the parents are not there. They are not forcing their kids to get into that school house every day. Truancy is not punished any longer. Security around campuses is so relaxed, it takes nothing to get out of class, or even the whole school day. We can even go deeper and look at the serious offenders here. Lots of people will say "Most of them have no father's or come from drug addicted households." OKAY! Why are these people allowed to breed? Why are we not taking crack babies away from crack mothers? Why do we feel that rehabilitation of the mother will cure the problems with the child? It seems to me there are a lot of things that could be done at the root of the problem. Like taking children from drug homes. Enforcing the truancy laws. Forcing these kids into school to make something of themselves. We can't sit back and let that continue to go on, and then try to put a bandaid on the pile of problems when they adults end up in prison for killing a family of 4 because they caught someone breaking into their house for a tv and a turkey sandwich. There is no rehabilitation at that point. You are a lost cause at that point. There is no Go. No 200 bucks. You kill someone...you die. You touch a kid, you spend the rest of your life in jail. You steal, you don't get a second chance. You spend a lot of time in prison. I hate taxes, but I will gladly spend 50% of my hard earned paycheck to fund jails and prisons to hold all of these people. And lets start over and begin with the youth we have today. The rest are lost causes. We need to start from scratch, look at the root of the problem and try to fix the future. Ok...let the flaming begin. HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

*runs for the GOP local headquarters to hide under the desk* jeez. I seem a bit outnumbered. LOL remind me never to get into a political discussion with y'all. LOL

Thanks dawg. Congratz on your WL!! You have done so well. You are inspirational. Truely. Tell pnut i miss her. Its her fault i am depressed. LOL

I don't know. That is a very interesting question. Somethings to look at are why these people want the band. If there are people who obviously have weight issues, but they are on the low side of a diet, should they have to gain it back just to have the band put in? My mother worries about this. If she goes on a diet, loses a bunch, but sees it coming back, will she have to gain it all back just toget the band to help control her weight? In france they are actually starting to put the band in teens who are showing difficulty with managing their weight so that they do not get too big and develope health problems. I think this is a good thing. Look at people who have gotten to goal, but have a band slip or erode. Many of them get a new band put in even though they are no longer obese. Because it is more of a control mechanism rather than a weight loss mechanism. I think it is good that some of the Mexico docs are willing to put in a band on someone who is below the 35bmi level. There are a lot of factors that go into our weight. And it is all individual. But I do have that niggling feeling about people who just want it as a vanity tool. Someone who is 20 pounds overweight wants it to lose those 20. Is it necessary? Prolly not. But who am I to tell them they should or should not get it? I am not paying for it LOL Unless they have state ins or something. HA!

My doctor explained the inch loss. If you are still fat, the fat actually changes the shape of our spine. It is physically impossible to straighten as much as we used to. I used to be 5ft6. I shrunk 2 freakin inches!! I am hoping that when I get back to my original weight I will be able to stand as tall as I did before.

ugh talk about emotional eating. I totally binged last night, which is not normal for me. I have a lot of stress right now, I am scared about the surgery, I have tons of work on my plate, and my house is a wreck. The kids had me close to a migraine last night, and I got news from my mom that my grandpa is now checked into his hospice. I spiraled out of control and ate to sooth myself. This is not who I am. This is not how I got fat! Why in the hell did I do this?? I am really depressed today.

hehehe Boy and I an odd duck in this crowd. So many -'s and very few +'s. Economic Left/Right: 4.63 Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: 2.26 I am right in there with Tony Blair. That's cool. I like him.

Dr. Sanchez is who I am going with. Did you still need the link for him? It sounds like you have a lot of his information already. Kmecey it does seem tough to wrap your head around going to another country for surgery, but after some researching I found I was more comforatble with the idea of going to Dr. Sanchez than going to someone here in the states. And I can afford to go to either one.

I picked my own goals, but my doctor agreed that the goal I picked was within reason. My doc told me I may never get back to the 110's, or even 100's. but I could easily do 120's.

I am having my surgery done in mexico, but when i called around locally here the self pay amount started at around $17k and went all the way up to $31k.

5ft4, and I was a perfect size at 110, but would be really happy to be 120 again.

Thank you for posting this!! My aunt died from this form of breast cancer, and I have a friend who has been diagnosed with this. It is rare, but very hard to detect. It is so important that you check for it. It is one of those aggressive cancers, like pancreatic cancer, that once the symptoms show up it is usually too late.

Actually, I don't think it is a silly question at all. The problem is not that everyone thinks they are the best. It is that in this environment you are going to find that 85% of the people hwere are here because they focus their attention on everything but themselves. We fat people are usually the ones that over compensate by working hard, taking care of others, putting everyone before us. And that lack of interest in our own well being and our own bodies is what makes us fat. Not all....but some. I can guarantee you there are a few lazy fatties here too. But I think they are too shy or embarassed to post here. :cool: I have worked with some doozies in the past. I absolutely HATE clock watchers. Wheets...I had an almost identical exp to yours. When I worked for Microsoft we had what my manager would refer to as the "knuckledraggers". They were the ones that you would routinely not find in their offices. If you went looking for them they were either in the cafeteria getting coffee, or in the parking lot smoking. They were also the ones that would get really gung ho and work hard on parties and events, but could not pull their shit together to meet a deadline to save their souls. Then would complain that they would have to work past dark to get their work in on time. And they never had consideration for the fact that their laziness held up other people's job. It just makes me crazy!!! I am so glad I work out of my house now. I don't have to deal with idiot coworkers pulling crap anymore. Hiding my chair. Or worse yet, my computer. Setting my screensaver to porn pictures. Having candy fights where the whip tootsie rolls back and forth over my head. And I can promise you those people don't believe they are the hardest working individuals out there.

Good luck Seppi!! And Diane, You are doing awesome!! so is your daughter it sounds!! a2zhoochie, I am having both done, the apron removal (sort of like a tummy tuck) and the lapand surgery. Good luck to you!! I LOVED veggie day LOL I am such a veg fanatic! And man did it clean me out! HAHAHAHA For dinner I had...get this...and entire bunch of asparagas, a whole cuke (in slices) a large tomato, and a bell pepper sliced up. OMG it was good. I mixed some fat free sourcream and some lemon juice together. Not much, but enough to dip the veg in. Mostly I just used some salt and pepper. OMG it was so good!! And so much too! I was stuffed! I like that today is fruit and veg days. I have something to eat this morning for Breakfast. I am having cantelope and strawberries and blueberries. For lunch I am making a new pot of Soup (DH and I went through it already along with the kids. They love it!) Now I did not have the potato last night, but DH did. I kinda forgot. So I will save that for next week. So far it looks as though I have lost 4 pounds on this. I weighed yesterday, and weighed 333. That was down from the day I started which was 335. Today I am 331 (hovering slightly under actually) so I am calling this a success so far. The test will be to see if it continues and if it has such great weight loss next week and the week after.