I know this isn't really, or shouldn't really be, the first concern of anyone hearing about the huge earthquake in Chile but this just struck me and I wanted to ramble briefly on LJ about it. It truly doesn't mean I'm being callous about the victims or anything.

Hi, I'm Lizzie and I'm an ex-mormon. I've been out for around 7 years. There are still some things I do, or largely don't do, like not really drinking alcohol at all, ever, and not drinking tea and coffee, that flag me as culturally mormon (I never got into the habit of drinking them after I left), but more and more I find that I just don't think about Mormons or Mormonism much any more. Which is actually quite nice.

When I woke up this morning and heard about the 8.8 magnitude earthquake in Chile my thoughts went to just one thing, which really irritated me as soon as I realised what had happened in my brain. The first thing I thought, coming so soon after the Haiti earthquake was "It's the latter-days" (According to LDS Church teachings...It is...believed that there will be increasingly severe wars, earthquakes, hurricanes, and other man-made and natural disasters prior to the Second Coming.)

When I was growing up the fact that I was part of a priviledged generation who would be around for the Latter Days and Second Coming was constantly brought up in Primary and Young Women and Sunday School. In it, the thought both scared and inspired me. Out of it, I would imagine they've been saying this stuff to every up-and-coming generation since the formation of the church.

As time has gone on since I left, these irrational moments, where my brain falls back in the first instance to Mormon teachings happen less and less, but I'm finding they irritate me more when they do happen, like this morning.

Seriously brain, WTF?

(Cross posted to exmormon)

Last Monday red_pill was down for a visit, so we did the touristy thing and went to Wildwood to see all the cute animals.

We started off at Canterbury Asda, where Phil got some new jeans and I went all arty on the place with my camera.

( See my arty turn )

From there we proceeded to Wildwood. We chose Wildwood on the grounds that I've been before and Phil has been dying to see the cute British animals they have there for over a year. I took loads of pictures, but lots had to be deleted as they were mostly very good pictures of fences or perspex windows ;) Some of the pictures aren't as clear as I'd like them to be, but they were all taken through fences or windows, so I don't think they're too bad, given the circumstances and my lack of skill :)

( All the signs had a badger theme: )

( We also found a sign that clearly needed fixing - the 'preferred habitat' and 'favourite food' sections had obviously become switched at some point: )

We saw lots of animals on our travels including (but not limited to):
( A red fox. )

( Water birds of various types. )

( Cranes (at least, I think this is a Crane ;)) )

( Sleeping Arctic Foxes. )

( Wild horses. )

( Various types of Deer. I think this one is Fallow Deer. )

( Tawny Owls. )

( A sleeping polecat. )

( Sleeping Badgers. )

( A weasel - at least, I'm fairly sure it's a weasel. Getting a clear picture of it was extremely difficult. It's extremely fast and agile. )

Brief comedy interlude:
What's the difference between a Stoat and a Weasel?
( I'm so funny )

( A sleeping Lynx. )

( Wolves. These were also difficult to get pictures of. I never realised how quick they were before - they all came out slightly blurry. )

( Sheep. )

( And Black Rats. I'm rather pleased with this picture, which was a complete fluke. )

Of course, there were lots of other animals we saw, but those are my best pictures. For the rest, see here.

( Here you see the Philip Overal ('reddus pillus') in his natural habitat. )

( Also on a swing... )

( ...and a mini-zipwire. )

We got told off shortly after that picture was taken by an eight year old who told us that the playground was only for children. We couldn't find any signs to say so though, so I have a clear conscience :). I also had a go on the zipwire. T'was good fun, even if my first go was with my eyes shut and I wouldn't let Phil give me a push off ;)

( This is always good advice: )

( Some camera and lens porn (SFW - not actual porn) for camera geeks: )

( Philip and Little Bunny Foo-Foo pose for a picture: )

( It turned out that he had worn his dressing gown to Wildwood. Arthur Dent's influence on his childhood and later life can not be overstated. )

We had lunch at The Parrot (the pub formerly known as Simple Simon's). Pictures here. Food was lovely :)

Finally we explored the River Stour a little.

( It was a beautiful spring day, with the sky reflecting in the river. )

( Spring is truly springing: )

( Some cool throwbacks to the time when there was a mill on this particular section of the river: )

( Phil got very close to the river in search of pictures. Unfortunately he didn't fall in. That might have been funny. )

It was a really nice day :)

Asda.
Wildwood.
The Parrot.
The River Stour.
Phil's pictures of the day.

I couldn't sleep, so I made this:



Sorry about the picture quality, I took it with my camera phone cos I went to use my proper camera and found that the battery was flat (now on charge) and I was too impatient to wait for it to be ready. I'm very pleased with myself for working out how to stick them all together in Paint Shop though :)

Might make a better quality one if I can be bothered.

Picture is of the cover of my GGB copy of The Chalet School Reunion. It has been annotated according to the key on the last page of that edition.

I'm heading to Goole (not to be confused with Google which is what I nearly always type by accident >.<) in Yorkshire very shortly with no1typo for a few days to visit relatives. I probably shan't be online, but I'll be contactable on my mobile (see the contact details post for my number [friendslocked]). I shall also probably be tweeting. This is me on Twitter.

Have a lovely few days people :) Write lots of interesting things for me to read when I get back!

Typical, that on the day the Government withdraws the plan to keep MPs expenses secret my MP should write back to me about voting against the proposed measure.

For good measure, I'm putting a copy of his reply here. Bits in italics were handwritten and not always very clear ;)

( Letter from Julian Brazier )

In other news, should you have any spare cash lying around (I know that this is unlikely given the current economic climate) and fancy putting it towards a cool cause, the National Railway Museum in York are trying to gather funds so they can finish their restoration of The Flying Scotsman. "Steam our Scotsman" - the campaign to raise money to finish the restoration.

For those of you who like taking off ladies bras:



From here

I finally got round to photographing and uploading more pictures from "From Vision to Reality", as well as rephotographing those that were already there so they are better quality. They are here for those who want to look :) I've also made a new LJ icon.

ION: I went to see The Dark Knight this evening at Ashford. Twas good. Won't say any more though in case of spoilers.

I found this link earlier: "He Took A Polaroid Every Day Until The Day He Died".

"Yesterday I came across a slightly mysterious website — a collection of Polaroids, one per day, from March 31, 1979 through October 25, 1997. There’s no author listed, no contact info, and no other indication as to where these came from. So, naturally, I started looking through the photos. I was stunned by what I found."

Go look - it's well worth it.

I am currently suffering from pancake overdose, having had a three course pancake meal (started with pancakes with OJ and sugar, main was pancakes with cheddar cheese, pudding was pancakes with chocolate sauce and ice cream!) After that I doubt I'll be eating them again much before next Shrove Tuesday ;)

I spent the afternoon playing with my new camera, and took the opportunity to take lots of pictures of our two gerbils which we've had for about four months now but which I have not blogged about before.

Pictures of our gerbils, Stan and Nibbler. Stan is the caramel one, and named after a Canadian folk singer called Stan Rogers. Nibbler is the grey (and he does have red eyes - it's not just my crappy photography! ;)) and I named him. Which is possibly why he isn't named after a Canadian folk singer! I don't think they loved me very much for taking pictures though - after a while they went and hid in the back corner of their tank!

( Stan and Nibbler )

By the way, before anyone else pastes me the URL - I have seen the BBC's "Mormon" story about the Preston Temple/MTC. My response is at the bottom of this LJ entry for anyone who is interested.

Finally, a meme, stolen from hopeful_rose.



You are breakfasty, like a pile of pancakes on a Sunday morning that have just the right amount of syrup, so every bite is sweet perfection and not a soppy mess. You are a glass of orange juice that's cool, refreshing, and not overly pulpy. You are the time of day that's just right for turning the pages of a newspaper, flipping through channels, or clicking around online to get a sense of how the world changed during the night. You don't want to stumble sleepily through life, so you make a real effort to wake your brain up and get it thinking. You feel inspired to accomplish things (whether it's checking something off your to-do list or changing the world), but there's plenty of time for making things happen later in the day. First, pancakes.

It's great because it talks about Pancakes. On pancake day! Hurrah!

Last night I saw the most recent Wulffmorgenthaler and it amused me. As it was related to women's health somewhat and I found it amsuing I posted it to vaginapagina here late last night and went off to bed. I woke up this morning to a whole bunch of comments (how I read them) basically attacking me for posting something racist and being priviledged because I didn't notice any racial undertones. Now I feel awful. I didn't even notice that the female character was coloured in any way. Does this make me racist or something in some way?

Advice/thoughts? As I said, I feel really awful and I'm looking for some reassurance or something. I'm starting to wonder if I'm missing a huge sensitive part of my brain... :/

(If you've already replied on IRC, don't feel you have to reply again ;))