Overheard at the bus stop.

"Patagonia is, like, J. Crew to North Face's Gap."

Ahh, I think you mean The North Face, preppy post-college kids. Conversations like these always remind me of my suburban high school days.

But those kids turned out to be cool when I dropped my cookie sheet on the bus. "Oh, at least there weren't cookies on it! That's what I was worried about!" It was a nice moment of everyone looking at me (heyyy, attention!) - at least, a nice moment of quasi-community on the bus. A friend and I had a difference of opinion today on riding a crowded bus, and I'm not saying that I love standing on a moving bus or anything, but I think the extrovert in me can't hate being surrounded by so many people.

So, I LOVE THE INTERNET. And if you want to know why, well, it has a lot to do with why I like talking to strangers on the bus. Read "Plug In Better" for a little bit of it.

P.S. Did you know that Mr. Darcy's income, in today's terms, would be SIX MILLION DOLLARS A YEAR? I feel like I don't quite understand these things in old-timey pounds. And, Austen fans, please go immediately to Men of Austen.

i knew i hated mr. darcy for a reason.

right. from the catholic blogosphere.

If today's faithful Catholic is represented by Elizabeth Bennet, bright, hopeful, and coming of age, then the liturgical forms would have to be represented by Mr. Darcy and Mr Wickham.

Mr. Wickham is immediately accessible, loves to talk - especially about how bad ol' Darcy is - has some initial minor flash but soon proves to be tedious and unreliable.

Mr. Darcy at first glance looks stuffy and condescending, but proves over time to be noble, true, of high quality and charitable.

The ordinary and the extraordinary.

this blogger says he's a "St. Louis area Catholic who supports the Traditional Mass and Sacraments" and, as some of you know, casual usage of words like "traditional" and "orthodox" really rubs me the wrong way. [as does casual usage of words like "heresy," but that's a whole nother story] here's the thing. if you're talking about going by church tradition [oops, that is, Church Tradition with some extra-meaningful Capital Letters] or you claim to be orthodox, you should be, by definition, WITH THE CHURCH. you know. the catholic church. which has a hierarchical structure that is sometimes problematic, sure, but it's there. and if you're ignoring vatican ii, hello, you are neither traditional nor orthodox. i'm all about the protest, guys, but can you at least recognize that tradition and orthodoxy, in the roman catholic sense, are actually a thing that you don't get to just co-opt?

anyway, it was bothering me. and i get so rage-y that i thought, hey, maybe i'm just not understanding what this means. so i did some wikipedia research.

Traditionalist Catholics generally prefer to be referred to either simply as Catholics or, if a distinction must be made, as "traditional Catholics" (with a lower-case T). However, since Roman Catholics in general consider themselves to be "traditional" in the sense of being faithful to historical Catholic teaching, the term "traditionalist Catholics" is used in this article as a means of clearly distinguishing them from other Roman Catholics.

so, i don't really know what to say about this. i guess it's starting to look a little better, considering that "traditionalist" can be a subset of "other roman catholics" - they're just the roman catholics who think we should be doing things differently.

but back to you, mr. darcy.

beware of hippie modern liturgy, guys. it might seem like the kind of thing that is understandable and accessible to many people, but it will actually end up trying to steal your money and marry your teenaged sister.

okay, here's my problem.

THE FICTIONAL EXISTENCE OF MR. DARCY IS NOT A GOOD REASON TO PUT UP WITH SOMETHING YOU HATE.

in this case, the analogy's not very nice, and to this particular blogger's credit, certainly he intended to make a joke. i'm sure that, if i were of his opinion on liturgy, i'd be all, "you don't understand the liturgy i prefer, just like elizabeth bennet didn't understand mr. darcy." but seriously? darcy's still kind of an ass, and i'm tired of people suggesting [or seeming to me to suggest] that being rude, distant, and superior to others is a virtue in itself. sure, the less-than-attractive appearance might disguise something that's awesome. but it doesn't MAKE something awesome. and i'm not convinced that the old-fashioned-y inaccessibility of mass in latin, super-high liturgy, pre-vatican-ii forms, and the rest necessarily means that it's better. if that's your preference, fine. but don't compare the way i worship to skeezy mr. wickham just because i'd prefer a liturgy that people who haven't read the GIRM can appreciate.

this, plus a similar discussion [um, actually, only similar because they were both about mr. darcy] with a co-worker friend and two lovely students, has convinced me to read pride and prejudice again. so, stay tuned for further developments in my mind and heart.

Dating without judging?

I was struck by this comment on today's Harpyness post "Huh, So You're Gay Again?"

I feel like anyone who questions someone else’s sexuality just needs a big cool glass of mind your own beeswax. No one but you needs to “understand” who or why you date. Blah, the judginess of the world is getting on my last nerve this week.

I think because I read Jezebel's pro/con on More to Love, including this comment.

My bf always tells me that guys are just lying when they say they don't like bigger girls. They don't want to be "that guy" in their group of friends and be made fun of for not only being into skinny girls. He used to be that guy when he was younger, but now he just tells them that they don't know what they're missing.

Maybe the judginess of the world is also getting on my last nerve this week. Maybe I'm reading too many blogs. And definitely, that thing that happens to me whereby everything I hear seems to surround the same topic. ("Whereby"? Did that work?) But yes, let's allow people to date whomever they'd like to date. And let's NOT have a show about fat girls who, clearly, are all desperate to date - so it's a good thing they found the one guy who thinks they're attractive. Grrrr. (Also, "real women" is derogatory. There are lots of different ways to be a woman. Or a human being.)

Also, I need a tag for my hatred of Mr. Darcy.

If you like him, read this comic. If you hate him, read this one.

[FORMAL BLOG CORRECTION: I got too excited and am embarrassed to admit that the second comic is not, in fact, about Mr. Darcy at all. UNLESS THERE IS A HIDDEN MR. DARCY SUBTEXT. And I think there may be. Betsy would also like me to add that the Bronte sisters hated Jane Austen, or something? Whatever.]