Freaky Friday

During my week-long plague, I've spent some time reading the various books that were given to me as either a Christmas gift or a shower gift. Mostly these were inoffensive and some were downright entertaining. However, there was one book in particular that really freaked my shit out. You see, most of my family is fairly religious. We're not godless heathens or anything, but we're just not particularly beholden to any particular organized religion. Well, my uncle and his family are uber-catholics, as in the weird Mel Gibson type of catholics, and they gave us this book called The Power of A Praying Parent by Stormie Omartian (her real name). Nothing about this title conveys the true insanity which lies within. For example, there is a chapter on sexual immorality which begins with the following sentence: "Next to catastrophic injury, death, and eternal hell, sexual immorality is the most dreaded possibility for our children's lives." Um, ok. Another chapter which details how to attract your child to holiness and purity claims, " (c)children who are taught to live in purity and holiness have distinctly radiant faces and a compelling actractiveness." Gee, my cousin, who is the son of the giver of the book, has you typical teen pizza face. I guess his oily sheen could be described as radiant. At the end of each chapter is a section called Weapons of Warfare! which are bible quotes you can shout at your kids whenever they go against whatever rules were set forth earlier in the chapter. I've only skimmed the book, but it's been giving me nightmares. Speaking of nightmares, when the author's son began having nightmares, she prayed in his room for god to show her the source of the bad dreams. God told her that there were satanic messages being transmitted to the kid via some innocent video game, so they destroyed the game and anointed the kid's room with oil. I am not making this shit up. I think that by giving this book to us, they may have actually made us less likely to raise our children in any kind of organized faith, which I'm sure was quite the opposite of their intent. Ha ha!

In other freaky news, I went to the OB on wednesday and got the boy-shaped pod all checked out. He is in the take-off position, so it's just a matter of fattening him up so that he'll be nice and delicious when he comes out. We are on a mythic quest to buy dresser this weekend for all of the baby clothes and blankets we have in various piles around the house. The cats will be upset when I actually wash and put away these heaps, which they have grown to love. Suck it kitties, there's a new boss in town now.