Archives for February 28, 2011

Well, it’s practically March– and I’m happy to say that I’ve stuck to my New Years resolution so far.  I’ve resolved to de-clutter my life, one week (and one bag) at a time …

Week 4: I’ve found that hanging a garbage back on our pantry-room doorknob helps remind me that I need to keep filling it!! This week I tackled my husband Brian’s dresser drawers.

I discovered that he has about a million white undershirts, some of which are NOT white anymore! I peaked my head in the bathroom where Brian was a showering and yelled, “Honey… do I have your permission to toss out your white shirts, that are no longer white?!” and to my surprise he emphatically said, YES!!! So, they went into the donation bag in the pantry without a fight from the hubby.

There are a bunch of places you can donate your items, but I wanted to find a unique cause. I poked around for a while, and discovered this place called the St. Leonard’s Ministries on 2100 West Warren Blvd., right here in Chicago!

They provide comprehensive residential, case management, and employment services for those released from prison without resources needed to rebuild their lives. So, basically they help convicts work their way back into the real world. It is a very worthy and effective charity. St. Leonard’s Ministries are constantly in need of clothing for both men and women. I chose this organization because I believe that everyone deserves a second chance, and St. Leonard’s Ministries has been helping people achieve that since 1954– and I want to do my part to help in some way.

Watch a youtube video with Mayor Daley at the Adult High School Graduation for St. Leonard’s Ministries by clicking HERE. Daley encourages the city of Chicago to raise awareness for this great organization.

I’m looking forward to tackling another room next week. I think I’ll do the office & start going through all of our junk-drawers. St. Leonard’s Ministries will soon have another donation from us :).

You can also make donations to St. Leonard’s Ministries… here’s how:

Please address donations to:
Bob Dougherty, Executive Director
St. Leonard’s Ministries
2100 W. Warren Blvd.
Chicago, IL 60612

We’ve all done silly things in bed. You know what I mean. One minute you’re giggling innocents rollicking on the cheap hotel mattresses and then someone breaks out the heated baby oil, rubber sheets and leather masks. Or maybe you’re having some serious fun, doing the all flesh bumper cars routine, when suddenly you see 2 D batteries and hear a buzzing sound near your butt. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. Maybe you’re like me, and right now every sexual partner you’ve ever had is thanking whatever God they worship that you’re not, and you have that perfect moment to break out the sock puppets and rubber nose.

Of course, we all know that perfect moment.

It’s about 10 seconds before you think it is.

So none of us are all that surprised that a nice man burned down his home by using voodoo candles during sex, are we?

MSNBC reports that a nice man did just that. Even though serious practitioners in Chicago know the proper term is Hoodoo.

Candles arranged on the floor for a voodoo ceremony caused a five-alarm fire that ripped through a Brooklyn apartment building last week, killing a 64-year-old woman and injuring 20 firefighters, the FDNY said Friday.

Fire marshals said the fire began around 6:40 p.m. on Feb. 20, when a Brooklyn woman visited a fourth-floor apartment in the Flatbush building, where she paid one of the male occupants $300 to perform a voodoo ceremony aimed at bringing her good luck.

A city official says the man was known in the neighborhood as a priest and the two were having sex when the fire started.

The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation was ongoing. He said he did not know whether the sex was part of the ceremony.

Candles on the floor around a bed where the ceremony took place ignited bed linens and clothes on the floor, fire officials said. Instead of calling 911, the man began retrieving water from a bathroom sink in a futile effort to put it out, but the flames only grew.

According to Fire Commissioner Salvatore J. Cassano, the occupant then opened the door to the hallway, which “allowed fire to spread into the hallway.”

Nearly 50 families were left homeless, and a retired guidance counselor, Mary Feagin, died in the blaze, which took some seven hours to get under control.

Her body was found in the debris on the top floor of the building on East 29th Street. Earlier this week, fire officials said that a dispatching error had delayed getting help to the blaze.

Dispatchers had directed an engine company to the fire on East 29th Street, but it was already at another emergency, helping a police officer who had accidentally shot himself in the leg.

FDNY spokesman Jim Long said the delay lasted “over a minute,” until dispatchers discovered the error and sent another engine to the apartment fire. Officials said high winds also intensified the blaze.

Fire engulfed the fourth, fifth and sixth floors, causing part of the roof and fourth floor to collapse.

The fire department said the investigation is ongoing; it was not immediately clear whether there would be charges.

What could they charge them with? Reckless dangerous sex? Good luck with that one, counselor. We live in a society that advertises candles = sex every day.

I know that governments the world over have been intruding in our private lives more and more often. But, so far, even the worst of their attempts to legislate sex have been woefully ineffective. Thank God for that. After all, who among us hasn’t wanted to fire off a rifle when a woman has an orgasm?