To Blog or not to Blog?

Sadly, no less than three of my favorite blogs have vanished in the course of the last month or so - their authors later explaining that they removed them because of privacy issues. Either people they knew - or, more worryingly, people they didn't - made comments or personal inquiries that left our bloggers deeply uncomfortable.

It's an issue that my wife and I have discussed recently and a little tête à tête between us nearly resulted in me shutting down my blog in frustration (I didn't like the idea of having to run every post past an unofficial censor before publishing.)

But the worrying thing is - Wifey had a point. Successful blogging means exposing yourself to every friend, acquaintance, stranger and nutjob on the Internet. Who knows what the result of that could be?

Many bloggers choose to blog anonymously - which gives them the delicious freedom to write about whatever they want. This is how bloggers like 'Belle Du Jour' and 'Girl with a One Track Mind' got started - writing about their steamy sex lives. However, anonymous blogging carries it's own dangers (as two of my deleted blogging pals discovered) when their real life friends and family discover their 'anonymous' blog and wind up with intimate and uncensored access to their most private (though public) thoughts.

Other bloggers, such as myself, choose to blog absolutely openly. This is great as it gives a way for friends and family to keep up to date with your adventures (or lack of them) and is perfect for an aspiring writer like myself, since blogging is self-publicity at it's most affordable.

The problem with a non-anonymous blog? Well, for a start you sometimes have to censor yourself. I don't write about particularly seedy topics, but I am well aware that whatever I write will eventually be read by my father.

Secondly - you can't hide from a blog. Once you've written something, it's out on Internet forever and there have been all sorts of stories about bloggers loosing their jobs after bitching about work on their blog - or losing out on employment when a 'google' search by a prospective employer brings up a blog filled with drunken debauchery.

If you're not blogging anonymously, you have to take ownership of everything you write and be prepared for anybody - absolutely anybody - to read it.

But most worryingly of all about a non-anonymous blog: How much of your personal information is available for everybody to see (and steal?)

This is what worried my wife, especially after the birth of our son. The blog of aspiring novelist Roland Hulme contained our names, a rough geological location, pictures of our friends and family and even personal information (e.g. a birthdate, gleaned from a 'happy birthday to me' post written on my birthday.)

Is it enough for somebody to steal my identity? Not by a long shot - and they'd have to wade through pages and pages of diatribes about religion and politics to get it. But it's enough information to make the typical Internet shenanigans (like rogue and offensive comments) seem worryingly personal.

Like, when my son was born, somebody left the delightful comment: "Argh another Ginge......get yourself sterilised. Hope the doctor slapped you."

First off - my son's not ginger. Secondly, as much as a comment like this would, in Great Britain, be considered 'harmless, just poking fun' it was pretty shitty for somebody to write.

So by blogging non-anonymously, you're potentially opening yourself up to all sorts of trouble. It was a comment on a public blog that caused the third of my blogging chums to shut up shop (at least temporarily.)

So I guess I can see why my wife would have concerns - and in some way, I share them.

But I think you have to end up taking the American approach to things when it comes to blogging. "If we leave now, the (Internet) terrorists have won!"

I enjoy blogging. I love the real-life and 'Blogosphere' friends I keep in contact with here. I love how some of the issues I discuss raise a lot of debate. I enjoy forcing myself to write every day and have been surprised at how my writing has generally improved as a result.

Blogging is an important part of my life. I'm a gratuitous self publicist and blogging gives me a chance to 'expose myself' to everybody without having to wear a dirty mac and run around frightening people in the park.

Blogging, for me, is an outlet for the tangled thoughts in my head. If I didn't publish them online, my wife would have divorced me long ago for trying to discuss McCain vs Obama in the bedroom.

But the recent spate of blogging casualties has made me reexamine the whole blogging phenomenon and I have to admit, I've noticed myself being a little more sensible about how much of my own life I share on the 'net.

You'll notice I refer to Wifey and Baby by rather unoriginal pseudonyms (like, erm, Wifey and Baby) rather than their real names. And I still avoid discussing hot button topics that might effect me at work (which is killing me, since there's an angry rant just begging to be written about a new development in the office.)

I think it's time to tone it down a bit - at least for a while. Sometimes we all need to 'dig in' and avoid the crossfire. After all, after more than two years of blogging, I don't want to become just another Internet statistic.

But don't worry. Militant Ginger will (touch wood) keep on delivering.

Renaissance Daze

I'm really excited to be in print this month, in the latest edition of Renaissance Magazine Issue #62.

You can find my article, English Accents for Dummies, on page 22 and a small (blink and you'll miss it) bio piece a few pages in.

Lapsed Christian

I was going to write a long post about Jim D. Adkisson - the unempoyed truck driver who walked into the Unitarian Church of Knoxville Tennassee and shot dead two church goers in a protest agains the church's 'liberal' views.

It seemed perfect - a classic redneck gun-nut, all riled up on conservative Christian dogma, firing off a few rounds in church because 'these Unitarians are pro-gay!'

I figured if anything proved that the intolerent and deeply stupid beliefs the religious right desperatly cling to were wrong and dangerous it was this murderous madman.

But for the sake of journalistic integrity, it's only right that I tell you something about Jim D. Adkisson the TV news might not. He wasn't a conservative religious nutjob. He was actually a lapsed Christian, just like me.

The Knoxville News Sentinel actually reports that Adkisson was angry at Christians in general. Karen Massey, a neighbor to Adkisson, reported that the truck driver had actually got very irate after she'd chatted to him pleasently about her daughter graduating from a local bible college.

"He seemed to get angry at that," she reported. "He said that everything in the Bible contradicts itself if you read it." Massey also claims that Adkisson's parents "made him go to church all his life. He was forced to do that."

It's a very interesting statement, that last one. Especially since I've been discussing with a few of my Christian blogger pals about the question of my child's upbringing - and what part religion should (or shouldn't) play in that.

My wife and I have decided to introduce our son to religion, so he gets to experience Christianity and has the opportunity to make an informed decision about his own beliefs when he's old enough. Whether he decides to believe or not - that's his choice. I believe it's morally reprehensible to impose your beliefs on your child.

One commentator anonymously argued: "Says who? If you think your beliefs are right, then why would you not impose your beliefs on your children. Right from wrong, moral from immoral, good from bad. Your child is only what you make it."

Thoughtful and considered Christian CK quoted How To Really Love Your Children by Ross Campbell, M.D.:

"At this point, let's examine a popular misconception. It goes something like this: "I want my child to learn to make his own decisions after he is exposed to everything. He shouldn't feel he has to believe what I believe. I want him to learn about different religions and philosophies; then when he has grown up he can make his own decision."

"This parent is copping out or else is grossly ignorant of the world we live in. A child brought up in this manner is indeed one to be pitied. Without continual guidance and clarification in ethical, moral, and spiritual matters, he will become increasingly confused about his world."

My problem with both of these approaches is that they're utterly controlling and wrong. Belief can't be imposed. It's utterly impossible by the very definition of the term.

You either believe something or you don't. If your child didn't look at the big picture and decide themselves to believe in something, it's not a belief at all. It's brainwashing.

That's as valid an observation whether you force your child to say they believe something when they don't, or manipulate their expose to the big, bad world so your beliefs are the only ones they're exposed to. In either way, you're manipulating your child and the result is a falsehood and a fabrication. The child doesn't truly believe what the parent wants them to and the parent is lying to themselves if they pretend otherwise.

The reason belief is such a powerful thing is because it's a truly personal choice. It stems from within. It's something as inherrent to the core of your being as the color of your eyes.

If you impose your beliefs on an unwilling child - well, maybe the result will be the same as in the case of Jim D. Adkisson. An embittered, confused, angry man.

As a parent, all you can do is lead by example and hope your children follow - but don't judge or condemn if they don't. We're all here on this earth to follow our own path. Parents who refuse to accept that end up causing their child all sorts of misery.

Moo Moo and Boo Boo: Musing on Mothers

I have learnt many things this weekend. Primarily, that even though your little baby boy is occasionally nicknamed 'Boo Boo,' his lactating mother DOES NOT appreciate the nickname 'Moo Moo.'

Secondly, if the flammable methane generated by the three-week old could somehow be harnessed, America would end it's petrol crisis overnight. We discovered this because yesterday, the Hulme household was hit by a whole different kind of 'gas crisis.'

Wifey threatened to give up all sorts of foodstuffs to help eliminate the problem. Meanwhile, I did lots of research into why babies get so gassy from their mother's milk.

Anecdotally, many mothers have observed that when they eat gas-inducing foods, like Broccoli and other vegetables, their babies get gassy as a result.

However, this commonly accepted 'fact' apparently has no basis in science whatsoever. The body metabolizes food before it's turned into milk, so whether Mum's milk originated as broccoli and sprouts, or a ham sandwich, the actual milk itself is identical. It should (according to the books) have no effect on baby's digestion whatsoever.

This isn't true of all food, though. Mothers are advised to avoid alcohol while pregnant and moderate themselves when breast feeding, since alcohol enters the bloodstream and, as a result, gets transferred (at a much reduced percentage) to her milk. Therefore, baby would benefit from more than just the nutrients and celery if Mummy had an early-evening Bloody Mary. He could get bombed off it as well!

Caffeine has a similar effect. It can be transferred to baby through Mum's milk. The curious this about caffeine, though, is that baby reacts to it cumulatively. If Mum drinks one cup of coffee too many one day, baby might not react. If she repeats the next day, there still might be no effect on baby - but on the third day (and the third excess cup of coffee) baby's system will suddenly react as if Mum had gulped down three cups of Hot Lava Java all in one sitting.

The result? One wired infant. Beatnik Baby, if you will. Unfortunately they don't do black berets and turtlenecks in newborn sizes.

Finally, while I've mentioned that foods which cause Mum to gas up don't have the same effect on baby - strongly flavoured foods DO effect the way Mum's milk tastes.

If she eats lots of garlic, for example (which is a staple in our house) she doesn't just sweat garlic afterwards - her milk actually tastes like it. This is because strong flavours permeate everything - including Mummy's milk factory.

That's not a bad thing, though. Doctors say that the flavour of Mum's milk often helps baby develop certain culinary preferences even before he's eating solid food. For example, an Indian baby will grow up with a taste for curry because that's what his Mum's milk tastes like. Similarly, a French baby (or our baby) will enjoy the taste of garlic because his Mum is fed spoonfuls of it every time Dad decides to cook. Presumably, a British baby will grow up disliking anything that's got more flavour to it than a steamed carrot.

It's amazing all the things you learn raising kids! It's also amazing just how much work is involved looking after something that weighs less than 10lbs. Our baby generates more than that in dirty nappies every day. It's a relief to go to work (although I feel guilty leaving Mum at home with the milk-vampire to feed.)

Also - how crazy is the whole milk-making process? My wife is literally a food factory. She makes baby's breakfast, lunch, dinner, elevenses, three o'clock snack, midnight feast and sunrise Slurpee. As far as our son's concerned, she's an all-you-can-eat buffet that changes his nappy as well.

What astounds me is the effect breastfeeding is having on Tina's body. The weight is falling off of her. She's still got the same soft skin she had when she was pregnant, but the rest of her body is tightening up, slimming down and suddenly reverting to the same eminently enviable curves she had when I first met her. Weight watchers look out...

Lady Godiva - Your Legend Lives On...

This article was originally posted at Renaissance Babes.

According to legend, Lady Godiva was a beautiful Saxon noblewoman who lived with her husband, Leofric, Earl of Mercia, in the English town of Coventry.

Lady Godiva was as kind and wise as her husband was cruel and bullish - and when she witnessed the people of Coventry suffering under her husband's oppressive taxation, she demanded he remit the tolls and give some relief to them. Leofric refused.

But Lady Godiva was a thoroughly modern Medieval woman and used the most powerful tool available in her feminine arsenal to entreat her stubborn husband. She nagged him.

She nagged him and nagged him and nagged him until the frustrated Leofric gave his obstinate wife an ultimatum. He would never lift the oppressive taxes - at least, not until the beautiful Godiva stripped naked and rode through the town for all and sundry to see.

But Leofric had underestimated his missus. She took him at his word.The beautiful Saxon maiden threw off her robes, ordered Leofric's bravest two knights to attend her and then rode naked through the streets of the town, with the stunned, but cheering townsfolk assembled to watch.

A humbled and penitent Leofric, humiliated at his wife's stubborn display, dutifully lifted the oppressive taxes and thus elevated the heroic Godiva to the ranks of the world's most legendary nudists.

The story ended well for Godiva - but almost a thousand years after the Saxon beauty's legendary naked hack through the streets earned her a place in history, another beautiful woman is facing stern consequences for following her example.

Peruvian model and dancer Leysi Suarez, in order to celebrate the 187th anniversary of Peru's independence from Spain, rode naked astride a beautiful brown horse wearing nothing but a look of stern patriotic pride - and using the Peruvian flag as a saddle.

But instead of acclaim and adulation, Leysi is facing political uproar and possibly even criminal charges.

Defense Minister Antero Flores angrily roared: "These are patriotic symbols that demand total respect, and using them improperly requires punishment!"

He has threatened the Peruvian beauty with up to four years in jail for modelling on the provocative cover of DFarandula magazine.

"I haven't committed a crime!" Leysi protested. "I love Peru and show it with my body and soul!"
We can only hope that the people of Peru shoulder behind their blushing benefactor in the same way the people of Coventry supported the Lady Godiva. Pride and patriotism are important things and if they can't be expressed in provocative pictures, what kind of world are we living in?
Leysi Surarez? We entirely support you. And Lady Godiva? Rest assured that your legend lives on.

A snobby Eurotrash rant about America and electricty...

Wifey called me at work and warned me that rolling brownouts were hitting the state.

That meant absolutely nothing to me - so she explained.

Brownouts, apparently, are like electrical blackouts. All your lights dim, your blender slows and your toaster oven doesn't cook bagels so quickly. It's not quite like a blackout - when you lose power altogether - but a brownout basically means your house isn't getting all the electricity it needs to run everything. It happens all the time in America.

This, to me, is an entirely new experience.

Sure, I remember power cuts when I was growing up in England. But that was back in the eighties. For the last twenty years, they've been practically unheard of. All the cables are underground and England's pretty sorted as far as the power is concerned (because it's all privatised, but that's a rant for another day.)

In America, however, things are different (they're also privatised, but that's another rant for another other day.)

First off, the power grid is pretty suspect even in the best of times. Whenever Wifey plugs in the hair dryer, for example, the lights dim like that scene in The Green Mile when the electric chair was switched on. Lights dimming is not a good thing as far as I'm concerned.

Then there are the plugs... In England, we have chunky three-pronged electrical sockets that have a comforting 'click' when they slide into the wall socket. Here in America, because we require twelve appliances plugged in at the same time, as opposed to just one, there's a much sketchier system of two-pronged plugs that look about as robust as something you'd use to plug in an electric train set. What's worse, they actually spark and sizzle when you plug something in.

These sketchy sockets are used to power long daisy-chains of dollar store surge protectors, which mean you end up running long lines of rickety wiring that would have British Fire and Safety screaming in terror.

The average American house generally has wiring that you wouldn't recommend fiddling with unless you had valid life insurance and rubber soled shoes.

Now all the power to our homes comes from power lines, strung along the road on Telegraph poles. These are deliciously precarious things and strong rain storms, lightening or drunk drivers can knock out power to a block simply by pushing one of the poles over. The electric company tries to put a redundancy in to prevent this sort of thing by coiling lots of 'slack' at the top of each pole, so if one falls down, enough cable slacks out to prevent the electric cable snapping.

But it's not an exact science and it looks really crappy and badly strung together. At best, all that cable looks really messy and untidy. At worst, the damn thing snaps whenever a pole gets knocked over and that leads us onto the next thing that happens in America, but not so much in England.

Death by puddles.

Because New Jersey drivers simply aren't very good at driving, they're always driving into telegraph poles and knocking people's power out. Then, hopping cheerfully (or drunkenly) out of their cars, they exacerbate the situation by getting zapped by the fallen power cable.

The problem with all these above-ground cables and telegraph poles is the shitload of live high-voltage wiring that gets knocked over when people drive into them (or the wind blows them over.) If it's been raining, people jump out of their car into a puddle and then become human conductors of thousands of volts of electricity.

This is where the famous America motto (which I cynically thought was invented by Drive-Thru MacDonald's promoters) 'Never get out of the car.' If you crash into a pole, stay in the safety of your SUV until the cops arrive and give you the all clear.

So basically, American houses are badly wired and the electrical grid is strung together by a bunch of incompetents who only got the job because they submitted the lowest tender. If you want to get an impression of just how pathetic the American electric infrastructure is, remember that the three day electrical blackout in 2003 was caused by a single branch falling on a single transformer in Canada.

God help us if al-Qaida ever get their shit together and attack us with lengths of wood. We'd be plunged back into the dark ages overnight.

But ignoring the badly wired American houses and the badly wired American power grid, there's one more crowning achievement in the inadequacies of America's energy incompetence.

There's not enough power to go around.

Considering America is the biggest energy consumer in the world, you might be surprised by this - but it's true. Union heavies promoting inefficient coal power plants, combined with environmental idiots keeping America's nuclear industry four decades behind the rest of the world, has resulted in a nation that can't even supply it's own appetite for waffle irons, air conditioners and electric curling irons.

In the height of summer, when we sweaty Yanks turn on our air conditioners, the power grid suddenly sucks up a whole lot more juice and there's not enough to go around - so we end up getting rolling 'brownouts' as our energy gets thinned out worse than American beer.

It boggles the mind.

I mean, this is America. The greatest nation in the world. It seems remarkable that we can't even supply our own energy without making an (expensive) pig's ear of it.

But where do the problems lie?

Well, let's start at the top and work our way down, shall we?

There's not enough electricity to go around...

As much as I dislike his snotty attitude, Barack Obama's got a point. Our current energy crisis is caused, at least in part, by the fact that we consume an incredible amount of energy. Wifey and I are following the pediatrician's advice and keeping our 650 square feet apartment air-conditioned to a tolerable 76 degrees - and that takes the work of three different air conditioners and four ceiling fans. Our neighbours have bigger houses and chill them to an icy 68 degrees.

The quickest and easiest way to eliminate brownouts would be to ration ourselves and stop consuming so much electricity. If we used less, we'd need less and there'd be more to go around.

The other option is to make more electricity. You'd think this would be the most logical idea and power companies would jump at the opportunity. But the problem is - they can't.

The environmental lobby has protested the building of any new nuclear power stations for thirty years (despite them having provided cheap, clean and safe power for countries like France for decades.) Besides, considering Americans are scared of talcum powder and plastic bottles, you can hardly expect them to line up and volunteer for them to have a big, scary nuclear power station built on their doorstep.

The lumpy old coal power plants still give America the majority of it's power (and the majority of it's pollution) and any talk of shutting them down is met by angry blue collar resistance from the Mafia-like unions, who remind people that the coal industry employs millions of Americans (although if they all got retrained to work in the nuclear industry, they'd statistically live longer, healthier lives than they would working down a coal mine all day.)

Just like the environmentalists block any progress in the nuclear field, the union heavies block any progress in the coal arena. It's all blissfully, transparently corrupt - but apparently nobody's got the testicular fortitude to stand up to them (after all, it's people like this who can win or lose Swing State elections, so politicians don't want to piss them off.)

Finally, the 'acceptable' options, like wind farms and hydroelectric power, run into the most practical problems facing the energy industry. They're expensive and inefficient and although the politicians and public applaud them, these environmentally sound options are never going to get put into production because nobody's stupid enough to invest in them. Besides, people don't want bloody great wind turbines on their horizon any more than a nuclear power station.

The electricity has problems getting to us...

Ignoring the fact that we don't have enough juice to go around, the problem of actually getting it delivered to our house creates major issues.

The snarling cable. The wobbly poles. Why can't we tear them all up and put them underground, where they'll be safely out of the way and less likely to get run into or snapped by falling branches? That's what (adopt snotty Euro accent) we do in Europe.

Well, the fact is, nobody stateside wants to invest in doing that.

The electricity companies are out to make a profit. Large-scale investment in their rickety infrastructure is going to hurt their short-term profits (and they couldn't care less about the long term) so they've got no intention of getting their chequebooks out to fix the problems.

The local townships could do it. You'd think it would be a great idea - providing work for local contractors and making the whole township safer and more beautiful. But despite demanding property taxes ten-times higher than Great Britain, the local township has their hands tied by the greedy school systems and the local law-enforcement, who thuggishly demand their 'pizza de action' and leave very little money left for doing anything remotely useful. (Trust me - our local township resembles Mexico City, but all the local police officers drive about in brand new, $30,000 Dodge Chargers.)

So short of getting a shovel and a wire cutter and doing it ourselves, there's really not much hope that anywhere except the swanky suburbs of Maryland and Connecticut will get their local electric grid sorted out any time soon.

Seeing a pattern here? American politics (and business) is centred around the Short Term Gain and ignoring the Long Term Insurmountable Problems (after all, these can be left to the next Mayor/CEO.)

But it's not all glumness!

No, there is hope!

Okay, I'm not exactly sure what that hope is, where it's coming from or what it consists of, but you know I'm an enormous fan of America in general, so I didn't want to end this rant on a bum note.

Although, with the elections coming up, maybe there is hope for the future.

Barack Obama's right out. With Al Gore strong-arming him, I don't think our Democratic candidate actually has any hope of pursuing a practical solution to the energy crisis.

John McCain's a much stronger proposition. He actually understands the energy crisis and believes in climate change (meaning, unlike most idiotic Republican politicians, he's looking beyond 'drillin' fer more oil, yuck yuck.')

He's actually looking at practical solutions to the energy problem. Like building 150 more nuclear power stations (to the ire of both the lunatic left and retarded right, who want airy-fairy windfarms or more coal and oil power plants respectively.)

John McCain is enough of a maverick to resist the idiots within his own party and the more verbose villains in the environmental movement. He's practical enough to look at both the long term and short term when it comes to finding a solution to the energy crisis.

Maybe - just maybe - there's hope for us yet.

But as for our 'local' problems - like the ropey wiring and precarious telegraph poles?

Well, maybe it's time to just chalk that down as an 'American idiosyncrasy' and stop worrying about it. After all, what's a brownout every now and then?

When bits fall off your baby...

My baby's belly button fell off last night.

Wifey and I stared at the wrinkled black lump in her hand rather incredulously. Then we examined Baby's new umbilical-less belly button (it's an innie, not an outie) and he seemed remarkably non-plussed, so we didn't panic too much about it.

But it's a VERY strange thing when bits fall off your baby.

Cleavage Combating Cancer?

Okay, I'll admit it. I don't get invited to any cool parties any more (not that it matters. Wifey, Baby and I will stay at home and have cool parties all of our own, thank you very much - and you're not invited to any of them!)

But I did recently - by no less than Tara Mack, host of Playboy Radio's awesome dating game show Play Date. Admittedly, the event was open to everybody, but I did actually get a personal email invite from Tara herself - meaning that finally, at long last, I can kid myself that am one of the cool kids.

Unfortunately I couldn't attend, since hours-from-delivery Tina would probably not have been impressed if I'd disappeared off to Los Angeles instead of being in the hospital with her when she gave birth (and she couldn't have gone herself in case her water broke on the dance floor.)

But the important thing is that I got an invite. And by all accounts, we missed a fantastic bash.

The event was a massive fund raiser Tara had organised for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, dedicated to helping those affected by leukemia and blood cancers. It's a cause everybody at Playboy Radio feels very strongly about - not least of which because Playboy Radio's own superstar Nicki Hunter was diagnosed with lymphoma early last year.

The party was apparently a blast - literally heaving with Playboy legends like Christy Canyon, Vanessa Blue, Tiffany Granath and morning show presenter (and former Special Edition Playboy model) Andrea Lowell. Awesome prizes were up for grabs and Tara hosted a live version of her quick-fire dating quiz with some of her loyal listeners.

The only downside to the awesome event was that Tara and company failed by a mere smidgen to achieve their fundraising goal. So I thought I'd ask any of my readers who might know somebody affected my Leukemia or Lymphoma to visit Tara's fundraising page and donate just a few dollars to this excellent cause.

You can make a VeriSign secured donation through www .active.com here.

Hopefully Tara will be able to reach her goal and the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society can continue their excellent work.

Oh - and if you have SIRIUS Radio, don't forget to tune into Tara Mack's Play Date every weekday at 5pm Eastern on SIRIUS Channel 198.

The Real Noah and his 'Ark'

Coffee Bean left a comment on my last post about the English language (and how frustrated I am that Obama - he of the giving orders - demanded that we teach our children Spanish to help them communicate with our millions of non-integrated immigrant pals.)

She wrote: "I just don't understand why the English language is not our official language... why we don't have an official language at all."

Actually, that's not true.

It is true that the federal government has never officially recognized English as the official language of the United States of America. However, 28 states have declared English their official state language (with Louisiana and Hawaii counting French and Hawaiian as co-official languages.)

Here are the states and here are the years the state legislature passed the resolution to approve their official state language:

Alabama (1990) Arkansas (1987) California (1986) Colorado (1988) Florida (1988) Georgia (1996) Illinois (1969) Indiana (1984) Iowa (2002) Kentucky (1984) Massachusetts (1975) Mississippi (1987) Missouri (1998) Montana (1995) Nebraska (1920) New Hampshire (1995) North Carolina (1987) North Dakota (1987) South Carolina (1987) South Dakota (1995) Tennessee (1984) Utah (2000) Virginia (1996) West Virginia (2005) Wyoming (1996) Hawaii (with Hawaiian) (1978) Louisiana (with French) (1807)

So more than half of America has officially recognized English as the official language - and the fact that law, communications and documentation in the Senate, congress and the White House is written in English makes English the unofficial, but de facto language of the US Government.

It's largely the same across the state legislature as well (although until 1920, New York translated all official documents into Dutch as well, as a nod to New York's origins as the Dutch colony of New Amsterdam.)

But as far as I'm concerned, all that pales into insignificance compared to the history of the English language in the United States of America - and how the American Revolution against Great Britain was so all-encompassing that even words and spelling rebelled against them.

Noah Webster

His name was Noah Webster - and if you haven't heard of him, you'll probably be familiar with his book. Webster's Dictionary is the bedside companion of every writer, teacher and college student and has been since 1783 - when Webster published his first 'speller.'

Noah Webster was born to a good Connecticut family in 1758 and started a good education at Yale university, until classes were disrupted by the American Revolutionary War. Webster served in the Connecticut militia during the war itself, before graduating two years after the Declaration of Independence was signed.

Following the war, Webster earned his law degree - but eventually decided to pursue education and writing as his career. He moved to New York City in 1793 at the request of founding father Alexander Hamilton, to help edit a Federalist newspaper.

Noah Webster was an incredibly prolific and accomplished writer and publisher. In addition to founding and editing New York's first newspaper, he threw himself into bettering the American public school system, which he saw as badly run, overcrowded and poorly equipped.

His philosophy was that America, as a new nation, deserved a consistent and all encompassing approach to reading, writing and spelling. With this in mind, he published three groundbreaking textbooks - a 'Speller,' a 'Grammar' and a 'Reader.'

What Noah Webster did was unheard of. He demanded uniformity in spelling and grammar, angrily hissing that grammar should follow "the rule of speaking" and therefore every archaic deviation from popular usage "must be wrong."

He was equally forthright about spelling, promising to rescue "our native tongue" from "the clamor of pedantry" common in England.

With this in mind, he created the first, definitive dictionary of the English language, establishing official spellings of popular words to be used consistently in all written English across the United States.

Most significantly, many of these spellings differed from traditional English. In order to simplify the rather arcane rules of British spelling and pronunciation, he encouraged conformity and created a breaking off point. From that date on, British English and American English would grow, develop and progress on parallel, but different paths - later inspiring George Bernard Shaw to remark that "England and America are two countries divided by a common language."

Webster's magnum opus took 27 years to complete - An American Dictionary of the English Language. This was the master work from which American English took form. It was a reference of almost unheard of breadth and comprehensiveness. Although regularly updated with new words and phrases, this dictionary is still in print as today's Mirriam-Webster dictionary.

Basically, this man invented American English. But more importantly, he invented it specifically as an American language - based on, but starkly different to British English.

So people might argue that America has no 'official' language, but that's not true. The official language of the United States was born in the flames of the revolution and has shaped the foundations of every American institution since that date. American English is as entwined in the fabric of the American nation as the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, the Gettysburg Address. It is American lore.

So when Barack Obama arrogantly demands that we 'stop worrying about immigrants learning English' and 'make sure our kids speak Spanish' he is doing so in blissful ignorance of more than two hundred years of American History.

To take a step back from American English is to retreat from the central, core values of American society. You might as well 'step back' from the Bill of Rights or the Pledge of Allegiance.

Language defines a nation. This is why little places like Wales and Cornwall fight so vehemently to protect their dying language from obscurity. Considering that America continues to be such a cultural melting pot of different ethnicities, races, backgrounds and beliefs, it seems more important than ever to have one unifying thing to hold us all together as 'Americans.' And that thing, as far as I'm concerned, is the English language.

Stretch. Yawn. And ducks.

I guess just NOBODY appreciates just how UTTERLY exhausting being VERY, VERY small can be.

Cringe...

"Instead of worrying about whether immigrants can learn English -- they'll learn English -- you need to make sure your child can speak Spanish."

10th July. Remember this date. For me, at least, it's the day Barack Obama's campaign for the presidency 'Jumped the Shark.'

The term 'Jumping the Shark' refers to the tipping point in a long running television, film or comic series. The point where it goes from 'good' to 'dire.' Specifically, a 1977 episode of the popular sitcom Happy Days in which greaser 'The Fonz' jumps over a man eating shark on a pair of water skies - and Happy Days goes from the second most popular show in America to an oft-mocked (and soon cancelled) joke.

Obama's reached that stage, as far as I'm concerned.

I've mentioned many times how frustrated I am with the pandering towards the Spanish language in America. Almost all signs and instructions are written in both English and Spanish and if anybody complains, they're labelled as a 'racist.'

I've run into more and more problems recently. For example, my credit card statements - despite numerous complaints to Bank of America - continue to be delivered in Spanish (Bank of America automatically assume any immigrant has to come from south of the border.)

Yesterday, I bought a new microphone for my computer and the warranty instructions were given to me entirely in Spanish - because that store has very few English speaking customers.

This is not acceptable.

America is an English speaking country - and if Russian, Chinese and Iranian immigrants can manage to learn English when they move here, I fail to understand why Spanish-speaking immigrants are not expected to.

But what's worse - why our potential new president doesn't have a problem with this! In fact, he's ordering (not suggesting, ordering) us to teach our children Spanish.

Bugger that!

Here and now, Mr Obama, let me tell you this... My child will learn French. Not Spanish. French - and if he wants to learn a second language, that's his choice, but I'd recommend Chinese. Or Polish. Or Swahili. Anything other than Spanish.

Why?

Because America's children should not have to be bilingual to live here! America is an English speaking country! As I've repeated ad nauseum, I was expected to learn French when I worked in Paris. Why the hell should it be any different here?

But this is all old news. An argument I've repeated many times before. It's only worth mentioning here because Obama just out and out said what I'd been dreading - that he's pandering to the Hispanic vote by promising them whatever they want to hear.

Which seems to be his stock in trade. Obama talks big and makes broad promises and gullible, foolish people (myself included, until recently) swallow them up.

He tells liberals 'I'm against guns!'

He tells 2nd Amendment nuts 'Your guns are safe with me!'

He's pro choice, pro gay-rights - but doing a better job than centrist-conservative McCain at winning over the evangelical movement (up to 15% are reported to have defected to the Obama camp since the campaign began.)

He comforts the liberals: "This notion that's peddled by the religious right - that they are oppressed is not true. Sometimes it's a cynical ploy to move their agenda ahead. The classic example being that somehow secularists are trying to eliminate Christmas, which strikes me as some kind of manufactured controversy."

H courts the conservatives: "Secularists are wrong when they ask believers to leave their religion at the door before entering into the public square. The majority of great reformers in American history repeatedly used religious language to argue for their cause."

Basically, Barack Obama tells you whatever you want to hear -depending who he's talking to (and hoping neither group compares notes.) It's only when November rolls around that we'll see the true 'colour of his money' (and his real credentials.)

"Change you can believe in."

That's the motto of the Obama campaign - and what a wonderful piece of marketing it is. By pandering to the disgruntled and unsatisfied (which is most of us, let's be honest) he promises the one thing that appeals across the board. 'Change.'

You don't need to quantify this change. You just have to promise it - and we gullible voters will envision whatever it is we want changed (and assume that Obama can give it to us.)

It's only when you start reading between the rhetoric that the hollow shell of Obama's campaign is revealed. In his July 10th speech, Obama promised 'change' alright. He promised to pressure Americans to make their kids learn Spanish - so the continued wave of illegal immigrants he welcomes to this country don't need to.

The Ten Commandments

Dear Son,

The problem with being a parent is that most mothers and fathers are terrible at 'leading by example.'

We want you to grow up into a happy and healthy adult and avoid some of the mistakes we made. But the reason your parents made these mistakes in the first place is because we're flawed, human and sometimes just as prone to temper tantrums as you are (and they're not as easily solved with a bottle of milk.)

So I'm going to outline the 'ten commandments' my thirty-odd years of life have taught me. I learnt them the hard way. Hopefully, if you do as I say (and not as I've done) you won't have to.

The Ten Rules

#1 Don't lie. Son, I'm going to be honest with you - which is something I wasn't altogether very good at during the formative period of my young adulthood. Little white lies always come back to bite you on the arse.

Until I 'grew up,' I often thought smudging the facts could avoid a confrontation - despite the fact that I was proven wrong time and time again. I can honestly say that almost every single emotional upset I had for a good eight year period was caused my well intentioned 'economies with the truth.'

So here's the straight up gospel. Don't lie. Telling the truth is often scary and often difficult - but telling the truth from the get-go is like tearing off a plaster/band aid quickly. It hurts for a moment, but then it's gone.

When you tell a fib, people might believe you for a little while - but the longer the lie continues, the more difficult it is to maintain and eventually your 'web of intrigue' will collapse around you and end up causing much, much more upset than if you'd just been honest in the first place.

#2 Do what you say you're going to do. Reliability is one of the great virtues. People gravitate towards people who can 'Get Shit Done.' So if you volunteer to do something, go right ahead and make sure you do it.

If anything's going to help you achieve success in life, it's this. It might take ages to establish a reputation as a reliable person - but once you do, influential people will pass responsibility and power your way because they know you'll deliver on what you promise.

But be warned. While it takes years of 'Getting Shit Done' to establish a reputation as a reliable person, it takes just one defaulted promise to destroy that reputation. Make a promise you can't keep and you'll be labelled as 'all talk, no trousers' even if you've never let anybody down a hundred times before.

But how can you make sure you always deliver on what you promise? Well, that brings me onto #3.

#3 Don't be afraid to say 'No.' A career in sales taught me one thing: Nobody likes to say 'no.' Except those people who love to say 'no.' You'll meet a few of those in your lifetime. They're normally impotent, angry, insecure gnomes and should be largely ignored.

But most people hate to say 'no.' Our most human instinct is to be liked and appreciated and we often instinctively feel we can accomplish this by agreeing to things.

But all the tough lessons I learnt from #1 and #2 on this list stemmed from #3 - my inability to say no.

Being nice, polite, middle-class and painfully English, I loved to say yes to things.

I wanted to make people happy so I agreed to things that I pretty soon realised I couldn't accomplish. And the momentary buzz of making somebody happy by agreeing to do something s quickly overwhelmed by the negative vibe generated by failing to make good on your promise.

So don't say 'yes' unless you want to and you can do. When it comes to the crunch, most people are used to hearing the word 'no' and won't hold it against you if you say it. Plus, saying 'no' sometimes avoids the problems you encounter with #4.

#4 Nobody loves a martyr. If there's one thing I've learned from painful experience, it's that you don't get a medal for being a martyr. So if you don't want to do something - if you really don't - then for God's sake, be honest about it.

Don't agree to go on a fishing trip (as an example) if you'd much rather stay home in bed. You'll be miserable - and your attitude will make everybody else miserable. This is where the expression 'misery loves company' comes from.

Do what you want to do. Because as much as you huff and puff and feel self righteous deep inside inside for selflessly sacrificing yourself to whatever task you don't want to do - I guarantee nobody else is remotely interested and there's no reward for making a martyr of yourself.

#5 Be cheerful. If I was king of the world, the first thing I'd do is round up every miserable bastard in the country and ship them off to Alaska.

At the end of the day, miserable people make other people miserable. Likewise, happy people make other people happy. So embrace life with a smile and make the best of it. I guarantee the way you experience the world (and the world experiences you) will be greatly improved because of it.

There are three major problems with wallowing in misery and self pity. First of all, it's unattractive. Miserable people are miserable to be around.

Secondly, the crazy law of attraction means miserable people seem to become magnets for more misery. It's as if providence hears your complaints and decides to teach you a lesson by delivering something you really will complain about.

Thirdly, most importantly, however bad you think you've got it, I guarantee somebody (possibly even the person you're complaining to) has got it a lot worse. Remember this famous quote:

“I cried because I had no shoes, then I met a man who had no feet.”

There's an often unheard third line to that one.

"And the man with no feet quickly realised he didn't have it so bad when he met a man who had no legs, had just had the bank foreclose on his house, was diagnosed with a terminal disease and had his wife leave him (taking the dog.)"

Hopefully, you'll always go through life with far more to be thankful for than not thankful for.

#6 Never talk about somebody behind their back. Oh gossip, you are such fun. There's really nothing more satisfying than sitting down with a good friend and having a total bitch about a mutual acquaintance.

But you know what? As fun as it is, no good ever comes from talking about somebody behind their back.

Sure, there's the obvious reason. The reason I learnt my lesson. The subject of your slander could find out and that would expose you as being petty and malicious!

But even if that person never suspects that you and your friends love to bitch about them behind their back, think what it says about you...

Most obviously, it reveals that you're two faced - because almost everybody who back-talks about somebody will be nice to them to their face. Duplicity is never an attractive characteristic.

Secondly, it leaves everybody wondering what you say about them when their back is turned.

Kid, stick with the age-old philosophy: 'If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all.' And if you do have to open your trap about somebody - be man enough to never say something about somebody behind their back that you wouldn't tell them to their face.

And that neatly brings me onto #7:

#7 Sometimes, it's worth keeping your trap shut. There's another old saying: "Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt."

Basically: "If you don't know what you're talking about, maybe you shouldn't be talking."

Now, I'll contradict myself and suggest that a comprehensive competency in the age-old art of bullshit is probably a good knack to master - but sometimes you'll appear much wiser by staying schtum when you're not sure about what you're talking about.

Back your facts up - or preface opinion with the words: 'I think..." Or, say nothing as all, narrow your lips, wrinkle your brow and look very thoughtful. People will promptly grow concerned that you're thinking about what they said - and be more concerned that you realise they're talking rubbish than thinking that you might.

But just as importantly as saving face, the art of silence is one of the greatest tools a charming communicator has in their armory.

Son, let me educate you about a universal truth: Everybody loves the sound of their own voice.

I consider myself a fairly friendly, likable and charming person and it all stems from doing one thing. Shutting up and letting the other person talk.

If you can cultivate the qualities of being a 'great listener' you will reap the benefits for the rest of your life. People love to talk - and if you listen to them, you'll do more than learn lots about them (without having to share personal details about yourself.)

You'll appear more attractive to the opposite sex (listening to the ladies is sexier to them than six-pack abs or Chanel cologne) and more capable at work (middle management always fancy themselves as Donald Trump and won't hesitate to promote you so they can continue telling you why.)

People who listen - who ask questions - who appear genuinely interested - will always swim effortlessly through social circles.

On the other hand, people who won't shut up - who throw their ill-considered opinions angrily into any and all conversations - are jarring, abrasive and difficult to like.

You'll meet plenty of people like this - I'm afraid opinionated people are even more prevalent in the United States than Great Britain. You'll spot them instantly by the way they can divert all conversations back around to stories about themselves - or seem to fancy themselves as experts in whatever subject you're talking about.

Just do the opposite of what these harpies do and you'll do fine. And, son, if you must have angry opinions about things, just do what I did. Start a blog!

#8 Be excellent at something. Nobody wants to be a 'Jack of all trades, Master of none.'

One thing I've always regretted is not being excellent at something. I mean, I have skills. I can ride a horse and shoot a gun and drive a car with a manual transmission. I speak French marginally better than Tony Blair. I even get paid to be a writer, so I've apparently fulfilled Stephen King's cynical definition of 'talented.'

But I've never truly been excellent at anything.

Son, the world is a great big confusing mess and I suspect the only way to survive with your insanity intact is to develop a passion and excel at it. Because a passion gives your life focus - and being excellent at something gives you pride, confidence and a sense of accomplishment.

Trust me - the few times I've actually been capable at something (at least, in comparison to those around me) I've felt a buzz that could become quite addictive. I guess this is why some people get manically competitive.

Being overly competitive is pretty tragic - but being capable and competent in something (at least, more so than the general public) will reward you and impress others more than I can explain in words.

It does matter what it is. Oil painting. Pottery. Fixing cars. Playing the guitar. Anything but writing (the people who consider themselves talented aren't and the people who are 'talented' realise that they've pretty much sold out.)

Just be good at something you enjoy. I promise it'll make you happy.

#9 Learn. Everything you can. Only the truly stupid (and religious fundamentalists) embrace ignorance. However, scarily enough, one increasingly popular movement in both England and America seems to be a celebration of stupidity.

For example, the Brits made a celebrity of Jade Goody - the grotesque chav who thought Saddam Hussein was a boxer and that East Anglia was 'abroad.'

In America, the religious right are trying to repress the teaching of Darwin's theory, come up with sham science to deny global warming and even keep their children in ignorance by only teaching them 'abstinence only' sex education (is this the first generation that actively tries to make their own children more ignorant than they are?)

Son, there's nothing smart about being dumb. Promise me you'll keep an open mind and learn at every opportunity you get.

Read. Learn. Think for yourself. Compare facts, accounts and opinions and draw your own conclusions. Let me make one thing absolutely clear - the moment you think you've got all the answers, you've just admitted you know none of them.

So read books. Watch the news. Study other people and listen to what they tell you. Just be wary of people who try to inform you what the 'truth' is.

If there's one wisdom your deeply unwise father can give you, it's this: [And you stole it from Indiana Jones - Editorial Bear]

"There is no such thing as 'truth.' There are only facts. If it's 'truth' you seek, enroll in a philosophy class."

#10 Do what makes you happy. That's paraphrasing singer Jeff Lang.

You only get one shot at life and by the time you turn 25, it screams past. So let me give you what might possibly be the most important bit of advice I can.

Do whatever makes you happy.

Maybe I covered this in #3 and #4, but even if I did, it's worth repeating. If you don't do what makes you happy, nobody else is going to do it for you.

Please, don't ever do 'the right thing' for the sake of it. If you spend your whole life dutifully doing something you don't want to because you felt 'it's what you ought to do' than I can promise you only one thing. You won't get a medal for it at the end.

At the end of the day, the only person who is truly in charge of making you happy is YOU.

Your Mother and I want you to be happy, sure. But we aren't you. We'll just do what parents have done since time immemorial and try to guide you into doing what would have made us happy (since logically, if it would have made us happy, surely it would have done the same for you.)

No, you have to decide what you want out of life and it's up to you to pursue it (religiously, although hopefully it won't be religion.)

Seriously, son. The years go by like lightening. I remember at 18, I was boasting that I'd have my first book published by 21. Here I am, twelve years later and all I've got out of it is a couple of rejection slips. Life goes by too fast! Hopefully you won't do what so many people do: Get to thirty five and realise that they didn't want to be an Insurance Salesman after all.

Nothing will give your life more meaning than a sense of purpose. At the very core of it's being, ambition is the reason successful people spring out of bed in the morning. When life is at it's darkest and most dreary, sometimes that unfulfilled accomplishment will be the only light you have at the end of the tunnel (and explains the greatest piece of advice anybody ever gave me. When it comes to the hard times: 'The only way out is through.')

My ambitions might seem dumb. Since I was a teenager, I'd wanted to move to America and write a novel. But sometimes, when life's seemed impossible, it was the thought of those two ambitions that kept me going and forced me to maintain a 'stiff upper lip.'

Son, decide what you want out of life. Choose what you know will make you happy. Set your ambitions high. Don't worry if your goals seem impossible. Remember what Josie Bisset once said: “Dreams always come a size too big, because we'll grow into them.”

But if you'll only listen to one piece of advice I give you, make it this one:

At the end of the day, be happy. Because that's all your mother and I could possibly want for you.

Religion and Baby - it's back, baby!

Readers might have noticed posts appearing and disappearing over the last few days. Hopefully now the lines of communication have been reestablished, this shouldn't happen again.

So after a three day absence, here's the reappearance of my last post - which, as I mentioned before, is an angry, opinionated rant that's bound to offend good Christians everywhere...

As readers of my blog will know, I stopped believing in God over six months ago and since then have taken a very dim view of Christianity (or the popular American derivation of it.) (See the addendum below for some clarification about this.)

But with baby's long term upbringing to consider, it's been agreed to give him a somewhat traditional introduction to religion.

I don't think this is a bad thing at all. I mean, while I don't believe in God, I'm still interested in the history and politics of Christianity and can't help but acknowledge the enormous importance The Bible has had in the development and history of western civilisation.

The Bible as (bad) Literature.

Learning about the Bible is still a valid and important thing and whether my son eventually believes in it or not, he'll still benefit from a firm comprehension of the Christian religion.

Also, it's very important not to impose one's own beliefs on your children. It's up to them to make their own minds up - when they're old enough.

The success of the more militant evangelical groups in America's Midwest seems to come from parents brainwashing their offspring as early as possible (I recommend watching the terrifying documentary Jesus Camp to see how valid this accusation is.)

Hopefully, my wife and I can give our son a broad base of knowledge with which to reach his own conclusion when he's grown up a little.

But when it comes to Christianity, what's the most appropriate sect to follow?

What flavour of Christianity do you fancy?

Well, as a historian I'm pretty old school about this. There are only two truly valid forms of Christianity. Catholic and Orthodox. They date back practically to the Biblical period itself and in the western world, all modern scripture and canon originates with the Catholic church.

However, raising our son as a Catholic isn't really a practical proposition. For a start, I'm not a Catholic myself and I certainly have no intention of going through the motions to 'pretend' to be one for the sake of him joining that church.

Secondly, and more importantly, the Catholic church is a wildly corrupt and cynical organisation headed by an octogenarian former Nazi. Plus the John Jay Report revealed that between 1950 and 2002, 4% of Catholic priests had been embroiled in accusations of child sexual molestation and that's hardly the environment I want to expose my son to!

Throw in some of the more recent decisions the Catholic church has made - like angrily declaring the use of condoms in AIDS raddled Africa as a Biblical sin - and it's fairly obvious that the Catholic church is no place for anybody capable of making rational decisions!

But where does that leave us?

Splinter Groups

Well, if there's one thing America has, it's thousands of protestant Churches. Baptists, Methodists, Evangelicals... The list goes on and on and on - leaving us with a rather generic wad of mediocre protestants who add up to a whopping 80 million Church going Americans!

I have several issues with the idea of joining any of these Churches, though. For a start, tracing the history of any splinter group of modern Christianity generally reveals them to have begun for cynical, flawed and 'human' reasons rather than any particular spiritual imperative.

Protestants broke away from the Catholic church because they didn't want to give money to the Pope, or they wanted their priests to have families, or any of a thousands similarly inane reasons. Scripture rarely comes into it and if it does, it's used as a cover to rationalize a more practical reason to abandon the Catholic church.

What really annoys me about the dreary evangelical movement is their blithe decision to pick and choose which scripture they like and which they don't. Leviticus says it's a sin to 'lay with another man,' so they oppose homosexuality. Leviticus also said it's an equal sin to eat shellfish, but go to any 'pot luck' Church picnic and somebody will have brought a shrimp cocktail along!

Three first hand accounts of Jesus' life never recorded him saying anything against homosexuality. Paul, a guy who'd never even met Jesus, attributed anti-gay rhetoric to the King of Kings and conservative Christians accept it.

In fact, they'll pick and choose any out-of-context scripture if it appears to support their 'family values.' And that's the problem... The evangelical movement is Christianity cynically marketed towards the lowest common denominator.

It's scriptually unsound and, when you delve a little deeper into the evangelical movement's murky history (throw in the Klu Klux Klan, adultery, embezzlement, homosexuality and homophobia) it's pretty clear that the movement is fairly morally bankrupt as well.

So where does that leave us?

Well, in the end there was only one clear choice for me when it came to our son's spiritual upbringing - but it's an organisation that is tarred by almost all of the flaws I've mentioned above.

The Anglican, Episcopalian, Church of England.

The Anglican church began life in exactly the same cynical, political manner as any other form of protestantism.

King Henry VIII wanted to annul his marriage to his wife, Catherine of Aragon. The Pope refused to allow him to do this (as he'd actually make a papal decree making the marriage legitimate in the first place.) Angry and frustrated, King Henry split from the Catholic Church and established a 'Church of England' of which he was the head.

This had the added benefit of allowing him to ransack the Catholic Churches and monasteries, which swiftly made his bankrupt nation one of the richest in the world.

There were pages and pages of scriptural and spiritual analysis written to 'justify' the break from the Catholic church, but looking at the facts it's difficult to see the foundation of the Church of England as anything other than a cynical political move by an unscrupulous (but brilliant) monarch.

However, since that time, the Anglican church has remained pretty true to itself and it's adhesion to certain Catholic traditions make it a comfortable compromise for many churchgoers. This, plus some excellent missionary work during Britain's empire days, has helped make the Episcopalian Church the third largest in the world.

I am, of course, very comfortable with the Anglican Church. My grandfather was a vicar and a Chaplin in the RAF. I was raised in the days before religion was banned from schools, so we sung hymns at assembly and went to the Harvest Festival at the local Anglican Church. I attended a theological college (to study history, admittedly) and dated a priestess-in-training, so I wound up going to Church far more often than I'd liked!

In fact, several of my university buddies have ended up being ordained or working in the church, so it's a body I've continued to be associated with for most of my life.

Not to mention, the Anglican church - even if you're attending services in America, Africa or elsewhere - has a irrevocable streak of Englishness about it that I am excited to expose our little Anglo-American boy to.

My wife is also unopposed to raising our son as an Anglican, because the Episcopalian church services resemble Catholic ones and it's a respectable, established church instead of one of these fly-by-night offshoots America seems littered with (what the hell is the difference between the denominations of Baptists and why do they all hate each other so much?)

Problems with the Anglican Church

Of course, one of the problems with the Anglican church is that right at this second it's basically self destructing. In Canterbury, Bishops are gathering for the annual Lambeth conference and there's enormous controversy surrounding it.

This is because the Anglican church is traditionally fairly progressive - which is why I prefer them to the Catholic church (whose attitudes towards homosexuality, sexuality and 'sin' borders on the crazy.) But even the liberal church finds itself divided over the issue of openly gay priests (the first openly gay Bishop was recently ordained in New Hampshire) and the idea of female Bishops (which was recently introduced.)

Vast numbers of Bishops are boycotting the Lambeth conference to protest these progressive moves and even though I'm fairly liberal and have no issues with gay or female priests or bishops, I can't really blame them given some of the rubbish that comes out of the Archbishop of Canterbury's mouth.

That being said, one of the reasons I'm starkly opposed to the American evangelical movement is because they spend so much time and energy ranting and raving against homosexuality and female equality. Whatever happens, I'm not prepared to embroil my son in any religion that uses poorly interpreted scripture as an excuse to be actively homophobic or misogynistic.

More important to me than any religious rubbish are the founding principles of American society - the inalienable right to 'life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.' I don't have to approve of gay marriage or female priests, but since the lifestyle choices these people make do not affect myself or my family in any way, it is deeply hypocritical and unAmerican to infringe their rights simply because I don't approve of them!

This is America. Freedom is our most important commodity. What terrifies me about exposing my son to any form of organised religion is that Christians are actively campaigning to erode people's freedoms every single day.

But, like I said. I can introduce my son to my own opinions and beliefs, but as a responsible parent I should ensure he makes his own decision about things. I just hope (since I can't pray to a God I don't believe in) that he makes the right ones.

Addendum:

Since writing this, I have been asked to clarify my position towards religion and the existence of God, so here goes:

I am not opposed to the concept of a ‘higher power’ because, in many ways, it seems so wildly improbable that this ONE planet in this enormous solar system could just randomly produce life… and of that life this ONE type of monkey randomly develop language and music and art and Cheverolets… While the rest live in the trees and all the other planets are barren rocks.

It's so random. So unlikely. When you look at the probabilities like that, it seems insane that there’s any other explanation for the existence of humanity.

In many ways, it’s like the world’s an experiment. A Petri dish. An art project. And if that's the case, there HAS to be a God-like scientist, chemist or art student overseeing the whole thing…

So while I might not believe in it myself, I certainly don't entirely discount the possibility of this 'higher power.' What I do discount - absolutely and with extreme prejudice, is the concept of a Christian God.

The God described in the Bible is irrational and contradictory. He falls totally flat from the get-go, especially with things like the concept of good and evil, or the Christian God being ‘good’ but letting bad things happen.

The tsunami killed millions for no good reason. If ‘God’ is the ultimate power, who controls everything, why did he decide to do that?

How the word was created is a mystery, and while I definitely lean towards atheist rather than agnostic, a deity could exist. However, I firmly refuse to believe in the Christian God. He seems so hypocritical. So false. So wrong.

I mean, what’s up with the Book of Job? God made the man’s life a total misery to prove a point to Satan? To win an arguement? That makes God an enormous... Well, I won't say what it makes God, at the risk of offending one of my readers. Let's just say that it doesn't make God a very nice man at all.

And I don’t like the idea of original sin. When I look at my sleeping son, he looks so sweet and innocent and I hate the concept of a religion that’s condemning him to hell until he’s baptized and grows up to accept Jesus Christ as his savior. I mean, the Bible says we have free will, but it’s not exactly free will when the deal is: ‘Accept Christ or go to hell.’ That’s not free will at all! It's slavery!

So just to clarify, my athiest pretentions are more theological in nature than philosophical. Believing in science and reason might answer more questions can Christianity ever could - but the big ones still remain unanswered.

Back to the Grindstone...

Well, my first week as a day FLEW by - and now I'm back at work.

In Europe, dad generally gets two weeks paternity leave. Before everybody jumps on the 'isn't corporate America awful' bandwagon, my company here gives the new father a similar deal (without it having to be government mandated) but unfortunately, you have to have worked there for a year to get it.

So I was at home for just a week - which was long enough to appreciate that stay-at-home mothers don't have it quite as easy as we working men sometimes imagine (and that's even without Tina having sheep, horses and a successful non-fiction career to wrangle with at the same time, like my mother did!)

But it's nice to be back at work. For a start, it means I come home eager to bounce my wee bairn on my knee - which gives Tina a few hours of blissful rest until the graveyard shift begins again.

That being said, Martin continues to be a very good baby, sleeping and eating well. The only downside seems to be his ability to generate twice his weight in garbage/rubbish every day!

The whirlwind of becoming a parent seems to be over. Now settling into a routine seems to be the next step...

Oh, and yes - that really is my 'office.' Tina bought me the poster!

Repost...

This is the post I wrote immediately after Martin came home for the first time... Sadly the original got deleted.

...

I'm overwhelmed at all the kind comments on Martin's first post! Thanks so much for your kind words and I hope to get to thanking each and every one of you in turn properly!

Well, today was the first day little Martin got to come home. When he was born, he had a rash and a fever, but was soon given the thumbs up from the wonderful nurses at the hospital. He came home and soon confirmed what we suspected about Martin - that he takes after his father in being able to quaff an outrageous amount and fall asleep at the drop of a hat.

But being a parent is a very, very weird thing!

Tina has taken to it like a duck to water. Just like pregnancy seemed to make her blossom, she slotted into mothership mode really easily and has a natural confidence that I wish I shared.

Fatherhood, to me, seems to involve two aspects:

The first is the physical one. There's a little animal in our house that needs to be taken care of. Fortunately, growing up on a farm, my parents gave me a lot of early observation caring for newborn lambs - and contrary to popular belief, babies really aren't that dissimilar.

In fact, I felt a bit removed from the whole birth process, which didn't seem like a miraculous and religious thing to me. It just reminded me of all those sheep... and cows... and dachshunds... giving birth. Which was weird because it was my wife lying on the table instead of a furry little animal.

But that was actually nice because I understood what was happening, what was involved in the whole process and what the end result would be.

Also - I was reminded that being a MAN means you're getting off lightly when it comes to the whole reproductive process. Tina is still recovering!

Anywho. Tina was a little trooper and managed 20 hours of labour very well. She was a robust little thing - sticking up to more pain than I'm sure I could handle. But she was also sensible and got the right amount of pain relief before she squeezed my hand into a bloody pulp.

Following birth comes the delirious period in which baby requires feeding every two hours. Now the wonderful people at the hospital have a great setup, which means that they'll take care of the essential post-birth care (including feeding) for the first day or so to give Mum and Dad time to rest.

Unfortunately, Tina's rabid mother-mode combined with my 'if it works for newborn sheep, presumably it works for babies, too' mode meant that we nipped back and forth every couple of hours so Tina could feed Martin freshly brewed colostrum instead of formula.

See, Mother! I was listening when you explained to me how important it was to get baby lambs to feed during the first few days! I didn't think that knowledge would be important to me during the first few hours of fatherhood, though.

I did sleepwalk through those first 48 hours, though...

The second weird thought process was trying to get my head around the whole idea of BEING A DAD.

I mean, I'm a DAD now. A father. Un pere. I'm far too exhausted to remember where the accent goes in that.

This is a very confusing situation because I'm only used to be a son. Being a father is a total reversal of my comfort zone. Fortunately, I think the fatherly challenges are starting off easy, since all I have to worry about is eating, pooping, crying etc - whereas my father had to worry about a series of wildly impractical sports cars/girlfriends and then a move to a different continent.

Anyway...

Let me tell you a little about Martin.

Ever since Tina became pregnant, I've been looking a little more intently at babies and definitely noticed babies I like and babies that are 'fine, I guess.' It's all very dispassionate, though. I mean, babies are babies and it's difficult to get beyond the 'cute or not cute' question since I don't get exposed to any of the other baby aspects.

So considering that Martin is the first baby I've ever really known intimately, I think I'm probably being wildly biased when I say that he's a totally awesome baby.

I mean, he's big and he's handsome and he is an intently practical baby who only cries or complains when he wants something. He is very strong - he's amazed all of us by lifting his head up and gazing around curiously at things, even though he's not meant to be doing that yet.

But I guess EVERYBODY thinks their baby is so much cuter, cleverer and more capable than anybody else's baby, so I will admit that I'm probably being biased. But he is a very good baby.

At the moment, he doesn't resemble Tina much (although my father points out that all babies look like their fathers for the first few months.) He has my fair-but-rosy complexion, my father's square jawline and chin and his hair reminds me of my brother's. He's definitely a Hulme.

Taking him home was a bit weird and I panicked trying to be the 'good Dad' and change him, put him to bed etc. Fortunately Tina took over with an astonishing capability and our parental responsibilities seemed to be outlined at that point. She does the driving caring for the baby and I do the driving caring for her. Which seems fine.

All in all, it's going fine for the time being. It's just a bit strange, crossing that line that can't be uncrossed. Going from child to adult.

I've always been a bit of a Peter Pan and refused to grow up (check out the silly car in my driveway) but when you actually have a child yourself, you suddenly stop being Martin's son (my dad's name is Martin, too) and turn into Martin's father.

It's a very weird transition I haven't quite got my head around yet.

But I'm happy. Little Martin is adorable, cute, clever and beautiful and it's very exciting to step out of the retreating sunset of childhood into the bright sunrise of fatherhood. Whatever existential angst and premature mid-life crisis I might have had seems to have been forgotten.

Looking unselfishly at Martin, rather than selfishly at myself, I can content myself by knowing the best years truly are yet to come.

Here's to fatherhood!