Guns n' Roses takes me back to grade 6 (a horrible year for me!) Anything from Bowie's Let's Dance album makes me think of playing in my friend's basement to get out of the summer heat. It Ain't Me Babe reminds me of a university boyfriend I had. Born To Be Wild reminds me of a trip I took to visit my grandmother and great aunt in Ottawa.

I think it was sort of like a condom but with a scrotum cover as well? What I remember was that whomever it was said the mom (or MIL maybe) had always been a big knitter, and there was a whole box of these at the back of the closet. Being curious at the time I looked it up and you can get free knitting patterns online if its the sort of thing which appeals, and you can knit.

Wasn't it someone on these boards who found all the knitted penis-covers when cleaning her parents house out?

I knew a woman who worked in a photo shop back as a teen, and she said they had a book under the counter that had doubles of all the racy/pornish photos people brought in to be developed. She now writes racy romance novels for a living.

It's based on that but it's a fictionalised account. So the characters from the 50s are mostly based on the real people though most of what goes on is imagined - conversations, people's inner thoughts etc. And part of the story takes place in the present and is totally fiction. Part of my feelings may be that I am less and less crazy about this kind of fictionalised account of reality.

It's called "Five Wives A Novel" by Joan Thomas. It's not won anything as it's pretty new, but she's won literary awards for her other books. It's fiction about a real evangelical mission in the 50s to an un-contacted tribe in Ecuador, where the husbands were all killed. It struck me as the sort of thing you'd pick up in an airport bookshop.

FWIW I don't think the stainless and black look bad together, but I would decide on one type of stainless if you want that, and stick to it as you replace things. One thing to consider might be if some colours become less available. I think black is a standard colour, and regular stainless will be around for a long time, but I am not so sure about other "versions" of stainless.

A couple others I tried that came highly recommended were The Miniaturist - it started ok but seemed to fizzle out with no point and characters who didn't really make sense. And The Watchmaker of Filagree Street, which was similar. Both had some interesting ideas but were really unable to make them work. My strong sense wasn't of a story that had a lie of its own, but something an author was labouring to make some kind of point, without making it. They also both reminded me of elements from other books kind of slapped together.

Oh my goodness. I just finished the one I was given for Christmas by an author who has had all kinds of literary awards. It was ok, but the writing is really lacking, and it just doesn't have much depth in terms of content. It reminds me of something written by a talented but not unusual first year university student. My experience of award winning or "literary" modern books has been really negative over the last few years. It's come to a point where if I want modern books I stick to genre fiction, there is a better chance of finding something really compelling (though still a lot of crappy books of course.)

The problem is that in monotheism God defines the nature of reality. What is exists as a sort of reflection of God. Therefore what is true can only be what is of God, and the idea of goodness doesn't really have any reality apart from that. It's also why in monotheism proper evil has no independent existence of its own, its a matter of disordered goods.

Over the years I've enjoyed Robertson Davies novels repeatedly, and I feel like their appeal is wide enough that I would reccomend them. Which one, though - I like What's Bred In the Bone best I think, but Fifth Business is also very good, and people who like the theatre might prefer the Salterton books. I also find I have reread the Mars trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson many times over the years. Recently I read and really enjoyed The Power and the Glory by Graham Green. It's the second novel of his I've read, the first was last year, and he's been a happy discovery for me.

I loved The Sparrow, but I know the feeling you mean. I feel that way about The Good Earth. I really loved it in some ways and would like to read it again because I know there is so much more there, but I've never been able to manage it, I always choose something else. I just found parts of it too disturbing, particularly the part where they were all starving. It likely didn't help that I had an infant at the time that I read it.

Oh, I like it now as well, I think it's a really good book. It's interesting having read it long ago, my perspective on some of the charachters changed so completely. It's almost a bit creepy as if I am not the same person.

It's very problematic philosophically. It would be difficult to have an "evil" or even mixed God in a monotheistic system. When people attempt something like this what you typically get is something dualistic like Manichaeism.

One thing I will say about classic books that I've struggled with is that unlike pop books that are awful, I have found reading with a good, serious book group can make a huge difference. I read Tom Jones for a book group about five years ago and while I got through it I struggled, it was dense and long but I also disliked all the people in the book. But the whole story became much more interesting to me in light of the discussion we had. Similarly with Mansfield Park, while I like a lot of Austen I didn't like that because I really wanted to slap Fanny Price around, but getting more deeply into the book changed my feelings about her and the story generally. I find I miss a lot of Austen's humour as well reading alone.

Ah, es, The Stone Angel is actually Margaret Lawrence who is a slightly older CanLit staple than Atwood. I like ML a lot, but I really struggled with The Stone Angel in high school, I think it's an inappropriate choice for teenagers. It's just too difficult to identify or empathise in any way with a rather nasty old woman with no ability to see her own motivations who is facing her own mortality, and even her kids are middle aged and difficult to relate to. I reread it a few years ago and while I still didn't much like the people I found it far more relatable, a sort of tragedy really. But in terms of ML novels I think The Diviners is a much better choice for teenagers as it's a coming of age story, at least in part. I am never sure why anyone would choose TSA for high schoolers instead.

OP - This is one of the most basic of theological problems and one that affects many people on a personal level. It's worthwhile to spend time on it I think. I think for kids that age, the CS Lewis suggestions are probably your best bet. I would treat it as a guided book group but you might have to make decisions about ages, or use excerpts. A couple of thoughts from posts - natural disasters have traditionally been considered a part of the same problem, theologically speaking, which is how is it that, if there is a good God, bad things can happen. To anyone, really. This question is at the root of some pretty significant Christian doctrines, notably the Fall. It's also the case that Christianity has also said that suffering is important in our human growth and salvation of creation, often in ways we don't understand. Suffering is part of God, the First Principle, that's what the Cross tells us. The degraded form is that is problematic but it's important not to neglect the deeper idea. I think that one of the important things for students to remember is the alternate of a good God who for some reason allows evil does not solve the problem in a clearly better way. The alternate is a universe without good and evil, and whatever implications come out of that. ETA: Ah, I see you aren't going to teach this! But it is worth reading up on.

I hate some of the ones you guys mentioned, The Kite Runner, and I really dislike the Harry Potter books. I also hate almost every Margaret Atwood book. Re; Stephen King, there seems to have been a period in the 80s/early 90s where they wanted to add a lot of sex to novels, I seem to remember reading that publishers insisted on a few steamy scenes per book. Though I don't think that explains the bit in It, I think that was supposed to be something else.

And it also ignored that some of the populations they looked at increased their fish intake considerably. Fish aren't exactly plants.

I believe the China study has been pretty thoroughly debunked. As have a lot of these kinds of food docs, Forks Over Knives, etc. They tend to extrapolate too much, cherry pick etc. Even manipulate language as for example using "plant based" for the study then advocating veganism which is a whole different kettle of fish. I think people latch onto veganism because we have a psychological propensity to try and purify ourselves through diet, like the Manichaeans. I realise this sounds a bit cracked but it's the best behaviour explanation I've come up with that explains what people do and say. I think the reality is that humans are adapted to a wide variety of diets, not all the same diet, as fairly northern people my ancestors are adapted to eat dairy products. My friend lives in a town of very northern people who are adapted to eat almost all meat. No one is adapted to the amount of sugar or lab processed foods we eat now though. My goals are to try and eat in a way that would be sustainable where I live, and to reject all factory farming including of plants. I have to do this within my budget and without making myself crazy, so a lot of the time it looks like a whole food diet without too much prepared food.

The difference between personal vehicles and horses or walking are that personal vehicles rely on cheap plentiful energy, be it in the form of batteries or fuel oil. And changes in the energy economy are going to see those resources become less available except for real needs. Real needs don't really include poorly planned and designed communities and homes and neighbourhoods, those things are relatively easy to change or adapt if there is a need. For example the suburban communities mentioned without any places for shops or schools or workplaces - changes to zoning, or even people simply ignoring zoning on a widespread basis, can solve a lot of that, homes can become shops and schools, small homes can be placed in yards to create more density, other types of infills can be built. If transport is more dear people will find they need to live closer to work, but communities will also need more workers in them as people need more local services. To some extent these changes have already started, in the US there has been a reversal of urban/suburban land and home values. This has had the negative effect in many cities or forcing the poor into more outlying areas, and they are less likely to have vehicles. Those communities ultimately will create the amenties people need, whether through legal means or otherwise. Cities that catch on to this sooner will be more sucessful and save money as well.

Except that driving has been around less that 200 years, and personal vehicles have been common for a fair shorter time than that. Most rural areas here now are heavily car dependent, but when I was growing up there were many people still alive who remembered when many didn't have cars or trucks, and if they did it was still a big deal to go into own. Like was organised differently, but in many ways the community was far more active. It would be even easier to make the necessary lifestyle changes in a suburb where there are plenty of people. The real issue is political and social will.

I can't see how this wouldn't be an invasion of privacy. And parents wanting to know if their kids went off campus!!! Creepy. I don't necessarily have a problem with tracking attendance, it can be important for administrative issues if nothing else. Most of my degree, no one did that, but if you didn't show up you missed all the content, there were no text books. And the professor would notice and not think well of you. In theory this seems reasonable, but in reality maybe there are a fair number of students who aren't that interested in the work.

I wonder if she really would like to not come to some of these dinners. And you are all so accommodating she isn't getting anywhere with her plan!

It seems like going on the pill is the go-to suggestion for a lot of things like this, but to me it seems like they never really look into what is actually going on.