Volume XIV, Issue 4

The Gadfly “To persuade and reproach” - Socrates, The Apology

Vol. XIV, Iss. IV April 22, 2011

Love Goggles We all know the student who wears hemp skirts, attends daily Mass, and has just finished her third Marian consecration in between work with theology homework and mission team meetings.

At the other extreme, we are all too familiar with the student who wears the short skirts, heavy eyeliner, stinks of cigarettes and is failing out of two of her classes.

These two stereotypes are both present on this faith-filled campus and both inspire great controversy. Small groups gather and discuss how to condemn one, what can be learned from the other, and what judgment should be passed about both. However, let us not hastily assume that the short-skirted stereotype is the sole recipient of condemnation; both are constantly judged and attacked. This lack of love calls

for a new “law of love,” one where we learn to judge only ourselves and look at others solely through the lenses of “love goggles.”

Many come to this campus unsure of how to open themselves to this “Franciscan Experience.” When I first arrived at Franciscan, I was intimidated by the holiness I encountered. People went to daily Mass, raised their hands at Praise and Worship, and talked about Marian virtues and household bonds. I was astounded at this reality, for it was unlike anything I had ever seen. Almost immediately, I attached myself to the holiest role models I could find and tried to imitate their actions. Soon, I was disappointed by their imperfections and had to learn to reconcile people’s faith with their human-

ity – one of my hardest lessons.

Having never dealt with this “breed” of person before, I was not sure what to expect of them and how they should influence me. Even now, three years later, I struggle with what roles I allow the people in my life to fill and what I should learn from them.

Consequentially, I have decided to (for the most part) ignore others altogether. This does not mean that I am the social recluse on campus. This means that I try to reserve my criticism for myself; and if I see a situation gone wrong, I look to see how my actions led to that. After all, our Lord says in Matthew 7:3, “[W] hy do you look at the splinter in your brother's eye, and not notice the beam which is in your own eye?”

One of the biggest mistakes I Continued on page 5

Open House

Out of all of the University’s policies this is probably one that you halfstammered out to your friends back home as they asked you what you “Catholic College” was like and then playfully teased you at the prospect of announcing a “man/lady in the hall!” I’ll be honest mine did, even the Catholic ones. However, my friends did not then proceed to ridicule my choice in a college but rather questioned me on the merit of the open hour policy when they claimed to be living chaste lives as well with far less restrictions. If it is not apparent al-

ready I’ll blatantly state it now and that is: I am completely for sexual morality both on and offcampus. Attending a public high school with an infamous nationally ranked statistic regarding STDs, poor sexual morality was not hard to find and I hated it. I hated the abortions that followed poor choices made by those on my bus, I hated the reality of broken hearts and careers of fellow classmates as a result to teenage pregnancies, and I hated that these sins continuously cycled from one grade to the next without signs of

stopping. Chastity is a key issue concerning America’s youth today and I am fairly certain my FUS audience is sympatric to this tragic dilemma. However, is limiting the time girls and guys can socialize in each other’s dorms to 8 hours a week a reasonable solution to promoting sexual morality in the context of university life? The answer my experience indicates is no. I hold this to be true for three main reasons: 1) I believe the ultimate safeguard of your chastity is you, 2) if my first point be true Continued on page 4

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St. Clare, pray for us!

Staff: Keith Michael Estrada (K.M.E.) Maria Cecilia Rocha (M.C.R.) Jeremiah Hahn (J.H.) Gillian LaMuro (G.L.) Alexander S. Pyles (A.S.P.) Angelina Pierotti (A.P.)

Layout Editor: Kimberly Doudna (K.D.)

Editor in Chief: Daniel Romeyn Davis (D.R.D.)

** Please note that the views held in the individual articles do not necessarily express the views of the whole staff. **

From the Editor’s Desk Dear Gadflyians, When I started out at this fine institution as a young and impressionable freshman, I remember always arriving early to everything. I distinctly remember considering myself late to meetings and to class if I was not at least ten minutes early (at a minimum). The “German” efficiency that my parents drilled into me during high school was certainly intact. However, after spending the Fall 2010 semester in Gaming, Österreich, and then this semester back stateside, I feel as if I am late to everything.

At first I thought that my tardiness was due to my not adjusting well to an academic schedule from the general lethargy of Winter Break. However, these frequent occurrences of showing up late to, well, everything did not dissipate with the continuance of this Spring semester. Have I succumbed to

Interested in joining our staff?

Email us at notestothegadfly@gmail.com

~Mission Statement~ The Gadfly is an attempt to “bite the sleeping horse” in the spirit of Socrates. It is a student publication whose purpose is to facilitate discussion concerning campus and cultural issues as they pertain to students of Franciscan University. It aims to be a forum for open, well-thought out, and honest discussion towards the end of knowing and loving truth in its most robust sense.

Advisor: Dr. John White Advisor Extraordinaire

Senioritis in my sophomore year?! The unimaginable horror!

To worsen the situation, I generally do not feel too bad about being late to classes or meetings. It is not as if I disvalue other’s time, I think it is more of a lack of keeping my own schedule. Maybe spending countless hours playing Call of Duty: Modern Warfare online is affecting my schedule? Can such things be avoided? So I suppose that reinstituting that good ol’ “German” efficiency has become my Lenten practice – although my Lenten sacrifice probably should have been restricting my time killing people online. Alas, I still sometimes arrive late to classes – mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa.

In Christ, Daniel Romeyn Davis

Letter to the Editor D e a r

G L ,

I am nearly offended by your scurrilous attacks on Joyce (not Cary). My wife once read Finnegan’s Wake for fun. (Who would not marry such a person?) And though I would never do so myself, I did once, in the spirit of Lent, teach Ulysses in a Modern British Novel class. (I still limp from the experience.)

HOWEVER, his short stories

are masterpieces, beautifully written. You would be hard pressed to find a better writer.

Next week's assignment: Pound's Cantos.

JMJ, Dr. C

p.s. Piers Plowman rocks.

St. Martha, pray for us!

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Patriotism: a Thoughtful Response & Critique When I first signed on to write for the Gadfly, I swore I would NOT write about politics. And here I am. Never let it be said that God doesn’t have a sense of humor. Yet in order to rescue my pride a little, I will be talking about good argumentative style as well as politics.

Mr. Pyles in his article is concerned about “clear reasoning perspective” and how this relates to the issue of patriotism. He also questions how one reconciles the life of a devoted Catholic to the bickering of political life and how one can take pride in one’s country. (At least, I think that is what he’s saying). I have great sympathy with him on this issue. I have often said that I am a Catholic first and an American second. The main problem with Mr. Pyles’ article is its lack of definitions.

We cannot even discuss this issue until we define our terms. What is nationalism? What exactly is patriotism? It is left up the reader’s imagination. In reality, nationalism is defined as an ideological force which combines peoples’ political and cultural ideas for the formation of a nation-state (cf. Nationalism, Kohn). Others define it as an ideology that “places the nation at the center of importance and emphasizes people subordinating their other interests…to the ‘common good’ of the nation” (The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Political Thought).

Furthermore, nationalism is divided into two types: territorial-political and ethnic-traditional.

Territorial-political nationalism comes from Rousseau and concentrates on the rational individual’s consent to a political organization and the control of the state’s physical property. However, ethnic-traditional nationalism is not a political ideal, but an expression of cultural identity. It is a “spiritual and moral concept”. In this nationalism, there is no hierarchy, merely an appreciation for diversity.

Okay, that was dry, but it was necessary. The definition of these terms have actually redefined the conversation and how we have to proceed. I can’t review everything Mr. Pyles said—the article would be too long (and thus my editor would kill me) — but I will try to address his main points.

Mr. Pyles is right to be disturbed over nationalism. Territorial-political national-

Don’t be Squished.

ism has almost always incorporated ethnic-traditional nationalism. That is, the politics of a nation make an appeal to the culture. In America’s case, it creates a phenomenon known as American exceptionalism (yes, more definitions). It is the attitude that America is God’s gift to the world and all other nations are inferior.

This phenomenon of American exceptionalism often blurs the distinction between nationalistic sentiment and patriotism. It blurs it even for good Catholics. Nationalism can quickly evolve into Have your say. disordered love of one’s country. It can advance the cause of a nation “at the expense of other countries and without regard to other values such as the avoid- notestothegadfly@gmail.com ance of bloodshed, respect for international law, or the maintenance of international co-operation…”(The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Political Thought).

This should be very disturbing to a good Catholic! That is where the virtue of patriotism comes into effect. Yes, the virtue of patriotism. Patriotism is defined as rightly ordered love of one’s country. Patriotism “respects the principles of justice set by right reason” and “may require the patriot to give his life to defend his country’s liberty, but never to give his life to conquer or dominate other countries” (Viroli, For Love of Country: An Essay on Patriotism and Nationalism). This is very Aristotelian. It is love of country in moderation, not in the extremes of burning American flags or degrading other flags.

Nationalism develops an overweening regard for the state and places the government as the center of authority.

The nation loses its sense of justice. It fails to recognize God as the highest source of authority. Patriotism, however, prevents this because patriotism is moderate. It is patriotism that leads people to criticize America. As stated in the Catechism of the Catholic Church, “The exercise of authority is meant to give outward expression to a just hierarchy of values in order to facilitate the exercise of freedom and responsibility by all” (2336). Patriotism knows that it is important to maintain a “just hierarchy of values”. Patriotism seeks to preserve this “exercise of freedom and responsibility”. Ultimately, true justice would give

Professor Quotes of the Week:

You can deal with a broken rib. You can’t deal with dead guys. ~Dr. Miller

Continued on page 4

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then sexual morality ought to be something freely chosen, encouraged by the university but not forced, and 3) this policy is not uniformly enforced on and off-campus.

The student handbook states that the Open House Policy: “Encourages healthy interaction between all the residents of our campus community”, in opposition to policies that do “encourage inappropriate intimacy”. However, last time I checked a dorm is just a dorm and two people in a dorm are just two people in a dorm. I think most would agree there is nothing inherently wrong with either item. The temptation to commit a sin comes from within and so it is there that should be protected against, and not circumstances involving couples and rooms. So although a closed dorm could allow one to act on these temptations it is ineffective to defend a person’s chastity by restrictive visitation policies. (Never mind the rigid standards to which the policy is enforced, to the extent that my mother could not even help me unpack without a policy violation. Instead she Continued from page 3

God His due as the supreme authority and the all-just judge. There must be careful vigilance lest nationalism loses its true focus of authority and the nation experiences a breakdown of the just political order. And patriotism is the guardian of just political order.

Now, the second misconception that is implicit in Mr. Pyles’ article is his confusion of “the State” and “Politics” with America herself. Mr. Pyles has remarked, “I personally have no idea how one can remain loyal to the State after everything that has happened as a result of its reactions.”

We are not loyal to the State, but to America. The difference between the two is similar to the difference found within the Church herself. (Now please, I am not

St. Etheldreda, pray for us!

became well acquainted with a common room while I unpacked alone.) Cameras are even installed on high school buses now to prevent illicit conduct from being carried out there. This is sickening to reflect on but exemplifies that a couple desiring to commit unchaste actions will succeed despite a restrictive environments. Even if the physical deed is never carried out they may still be unchaste. Matthew 5:27 states: “You have heard that it was said, ‘Do not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to desire her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” If secluded areas are denied to couples on campus they can just as easily find areas off campus and furthermore if they are that willing to be unchaste then as scripture implies they have already sinned, thus rendering the Open House Policy obsolete in defending chastity. So in order to preserve sexual morality, it is clear that a person must be made clean through their mind first. On this ground I believe FUS performs admirably. The community here is very centered on Jesus Christ and his teaches and as a result peer pressure for once encourages healthy relationships without the threat of “being caught”.

The bottom line is college students, as young adults in a strong Catholic community, ought to be treated as such. In 4 short years we will be truly on our own beyond the “Franciscan Bubble” and subject to the temptations of life. The university’s open hour policy is furthermore unfair to me because it is not evenly enforced across campus. Students in Assisi Heights are allowed into each other’s apartments excluding the bedroom however the remainder of the apartment is no less secluded than a closed door dorm and honestly how often would you reckon an RA comes round to check if not. In Austria open hours exist every day for longer than the two days here. Does the University simply expect us to become more mature in a foreign country? Brother and sisterhood is important and I support separate gender resident halls to foster this, however as my friends demonstrate at their various secular colleges, it is very feasible to practice chastity even in a closed dorm because as the cliché goes, “Jesus is always watching”, and that should be enough.

Gregory Andrews

equating the Church with America; there are too many differences. However, I am trying to draw one analogy; just keep in mind that no analogy is perfect.)

The Bride of Christ is not a Church that consists only of saints. Church politics are nasty; our bishops fight and our priests dislike each other. Our Church has seen scandals which would shock Hollywood—we have had priests sexually abuse children, popes who have had affairs with their own illegitimate children (true story), greed, corruption, exploitation of power, and apathy. How can we remain loyal to the Church after all of this? Because we know who She is beyond all of these horrors. Because we know that these things are not the Church. Because we know that She truly is the Bride of Christ and the Safeguard of Truth.

It’s a little bit like that with America. We see beyond the politics. It

is as if she was our mother who has grown very sick. We remember who she once was and love her for that. We also have the virtue of hope which encourages us to fight to make her whole again.

It is true that God did not promise that the gates of Hell will not prevail against America. I feel very passionately about this too, Mr. Pyles. I am a Catholic first and foremost. Yet this identity should help us keep our priorities straight—not abandon our country, even if it means dealing with her politics. The Christian life is harder than extremes, for the Christian life is one of moderation, and it always a struggle to walk the middle road.

A.P.

St. John, pray for us!

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see students fall into is that they allow themselves to feel judged – a frequent and self-projected assumption. A few months ago, I was talking to a friend about daily Mass attendees. He was saying that he feels people go to daily Mass for attention or to convince themselves they are the good Catholics they would like to be.

He also said he felt judged because he does not attend daily Mass. I know a lot of people share these thoughts of judgment and feelings of inadequacy. Yet, in love, let us assume that all students who encourage others to frequent the sacraments do so because of their own profound experience and dependence on Christ’s love and not in judging others. We feel judged for other reasons too. Sometimes I feel judged, believing others assume that I am a bad Catholic because I was not on a mission team and I do not have a daily holy hour.

Guess what? These are all LIES! True, a person SHOULD put aside a substantial amount of time for prayer each day. This does not mean that each person NEEDS to have a holy hour (though I cannot deny that it would help everyone – prayer is a universally good thing). If we allow God time in our day, He will illuminate His desires for us, revealing how we should act and what we should choose. We need this conversation time with our Lord so that He can gain entrance into our hearts and show us where He wants us.

Should we assume that every person is called to do the SONLIFE mission and/or abortion clinic ministry, we are then also to assume that every person is being called on the same path to holi-

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ness. And this is just not true.

Like all the individual saints, we are each called on our own path of individual holiness; therefore, we are not to let others’ judgments about how we live out our spiritual lives affect us if we have discerned that our choices coincide with God’s will. Next to God, people are very little. This does not mean that people will not be used by Him as instruments for truth and that they can’t give us good advice (because they often do). However, people should not hold power over us. I challenge each person who reads this article to focus on what God wants for you and let all other opinions fall as meaningless when compared to His. In fact, the only way we should worry about others is to approach them with those “love goggles” on. I know that sounds cliché and slightly hippy, but let’s face it: we respond to hippy, cliché things on this campus and I am convinced Jesus would appreciate it. Did he not even say “And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love” in 1 Corinthians 13:13? We are called to look at others and act toward them with charity. After all, people are important and we cannot ignore their existence just because we deny their control over us (which we might be imagining in the first place). When we deal with a person, we should only concern ourselves with how best to love him or her. If we are preoccupied with deciding how that person is wrong or flawed, how he could be judging us, or decide that we have the right to know why a person acts the way he

does, we are missing that opportunity to shower Jesus’ charity on him. Again, loving someone does not mean we give someone constant affirmation and never call him on; but that is needed a lot less than it is given. “Calling people on” in love is an entirely different topic that I will not delve into, except to advise my fellow students to take the concern before the Lord in prayer before any words are said.

Although the “law of love” is good, it must be practiced in its entirety. If one aspect of this “law of love” is neglected for another, it becomes ineffective. For example, we cannot ignore the opinions of others while also ignoring God’s will. Should someone actually judge us, we are called to look at them through those “love goggles” and not worry what they think about us. This law does not permit us to yield to insecurity; it is more important to take courage and trust in God, along with His love for you and everyone you encounter, and then carry out His will that has been discerned. If everyone follows these simple guidelines – to first, go to God and ask Him how to live your life and then place His word above others’ opinions – we will find a whole campus of free and holy people, striving only to love one another and to better themselves to obtain eternity.

Kate Paulmann

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St. Thomas Aquinas, pray for us!

Let’s Talk About God In this first of a two-part series, I am going to provide several ways of demonstrating the existence of God. The general idea is that I am going to follow, across two Gadfly articles, the two arguments against God’s existence, as described by the Angelic Doctor of the Church, St. Thomas Aquinas, when he sought to prove God’s existence. Certain people, according to St. Thomas in his Summa Theologica, Part 1, Q 2, A 3; object to God’s existence saying “It seems that everything we see in the world can be accounted for by other principles, supposing God did not exist. For all natural things can be reduced to one principle which is nature…”

Dr. Stephen Hawking, a worldrenowned physicist, for example, writes in his book, The Grand Design, that all the laws of nature, such as gravity, magnetism, or evolution, can account for the existence of our universe. Dr. Stephen Hawking provides what appears to be the best argument for the atheists’ position. Dr. Hawking’s book purports to remove completely the need for God to explain our world. He focused especially on the origin of the world.

On one hand there are those who believe in the Fine-Tuning cosmological theory of God and the world. They usually reference the scientific fact that the strongest, most fundamental forces in the world, like gravity, magnetism, (or the desire to play a Halo or a Call of Duty game,) are so fine-tuned and pitch-perfect that only a designer, the Designer, could have so intelligently ordered the universe since its inception.

Dr. Hawking, on the other hand, turns this argument upside down. He thinks that since we know gravity exists, we should seek the simplest possible explanation for its origin. This principle of logic, seeking the simplest explanation, is called Ockham’s Razor. (Personally, I think razors should only ever be used for shaving, but since Ockham was one of the sharpest

thinkers of his time, let us just go with it.) Dr. Hawking uses a ridiculously advanced, obscure theory of mathematical physics called MTheory with the law of gravity to say that gravity could only have taken the form it has now as soon as the world began.

Because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing. Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist. It is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue touch paper and set the universe going.

Hawking writes, in other words, that gravity is so strong that it literally pulled apart the universe, like an atom being split, from nothing to one cubic centimeter to one cubic mile to one cubic light-year.

Hawking implies that a force of nature is strong enough to create nature, and that he should be believed based solely on his authority and expertise. 2,000 years ago, however, the Greek philosopher Parmenides wrote down an exceedingly sane, simple thought in On Nature: the logical axiom that only nothing can come from nothing.

Another Greek philosopher, Aristotle, wrote in the Metaphysics about a First Unmoved Mover without whom any movement throughout the whole universe is impossible.

Every motion, according to Aristotle, has a starting point. There must be a first mover, however, because, according to logic, motions, in the physical universe, cannot go back to infinite, otherwise there would be an infinite distance; this is logically impossible because an infinite distance inherently would take an infinite amount of time to cross, meaning time would never reach us.

Some Christians, including St. Thomas, would reference Aristotle

and say that God is the First Unmoved Mover. These two men would have agreed that God, being the First Mover, was the metaphorical spark which set off the Big Bang, if they had been able to hear of such a theory.

Building on Aristotle’s insights, Aquinas was able, as Pope John Paul II described it in his Papal Encyclical Fides et Ratio, to go deeper and used faith and reason to ascend using “two wings on which the human spirit rises to the contemplation of truth.” In doing so, he gives one of the best and by far the simplest refutations to Atheism ever devised. In the Summa Theologica, Part I, Question 2, Aquinas writes: In the world we find there is an order of efficient causes. There is no case known (neither is it, indeed, possible) in which a thing is found to be the efficient cause of itself…Now in efficient causes it is not possible to go on [back] to infinity. Now to take away the cause is to take away the effect. Therefore, if there be no first cause among efficient causes, there will be no…[other] cause…Therefore it is necessary to admit a first efficient cause, to which everyone gives the name of God. If I type the word “effect” on the laptop keyboard, I am causing there to be an “effect” on the screen in front of me. What, however, brought me to this point; what, in other words, caused me to be here? I am here because of my parents. But what caused my parents, or their parents?

The physical universe and its causality in and of itself cannot stretch back to infinity or there would be no beginning, no first cause. There must one uncaused cause, you see, a very special type of cause, for all other causes and effects to exist. This is the First, Necessary, Un-caused Cause, “to which everyone gives the name of God.” J.H.

St. Teresa of Avila, pray for us!

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Awake from your slumber, Arise from your As final exams approach many of us will have trouble having enough time to do all the things we need to. Often people cut time out of studying, or even worse hangout time. There is a simple solution to all your time troubles: cut out sleep. The time we waste sleeping totals thirteen years of our lives. College students are often misled into thinking that sleep is our friend. However this is not the case. How many times have you slept through a class or something else important? There is also biblical backing why sleep is the enemy.

As the Passion draws nears, we are reminded of the Agony in the Garden. When Jesus returns from praying, he tells the sleeping Peter, “Could you not spend one hour with Me?”. How many times have people said that they are too busy to pray or say “I would love to go to that holy talk, but I’m working on stuff”. But how much time do we give ourselves to sleep? More than an hour I guess. There is another bible quote that says, “Be alert for you do not know when the Lord is coming.” How can you ready for the Lord when you are sleeping? You are just lying there like a log on the ground. Sleep is

probably one of the most selfish things you can do. The only person you are helping is yourself. This attitude is very relevant to our culture.

Overcoming sleep is a matter of self-control. The monks in Austria only slept for four hours per day. If medieval monks can only sleep for four hours a day, what excuse do we have? Sleep is something that us Franciscan students can and frankly must overcome. It is well-established fact that sleep is a harmful thing, so here’s some practical advice for overcoming the enemy.

First off, caffeine is sleep’s best friend. Crashes lead to sleep. Also when it is late at night, it is good to listen to upbeat music. Music and Sleep and are like Night and Day, they hate each other. Basically always be active, idleness is the devil’s best friend.

Once you conquer sleep you will have so much more free time. You will realize all the great things you are missing. TV does not run twentyfour hours a day for nothing. There is non-stop shows and advertising that are de-

signed to please the senses. There are all the old great shows and movies that are not shown during “prime time.” You can also search the Internet. When you are wasting your time sleeping, Franciscan Internet is actually fast, a.k.a. you don’t have to wait for the red bar when watching Youtube videos. The fastest times are from 3am6am. You can that watch that Friday song or twin babies talking without interruption.

When it comes down to it, sleep is the one greatest threat facing college students today. We have been brainwashed into thinking that something so destructive is a good. In order to have more time to do to what we wish and to become a better person, sleep must be eliminated from our daily routine as much as possible.

Even conservatives, liberals, and libertarian distributist monarchists can come together on this issue. With sleep out of our lives, just dream of the possibilities.

Ian Ladner

Pop Culture Seminar Quote: One morning as I shot an elephant in my pajamas, how it got in my pajamas I’ll never know.

Duck Soup (1933)

j|Çx? j|à tÇw jtzzxÜç A Random Reference to Godzilla As some of you may know, I am not on Facebook. Usually when I tell people this, they ask me why? Well, I shall now reveal all!

First of all, when I was a tender callow freshman, I met a man who we shall refer to as Beardy because he had rather remarkable facial hair. Anyhoodles, he told me he had once sunk six hours of his Friday night into Facebook. He could have told me that Facebook ate people alive and I would not have been more terrified.

Also, what is the point of Facebook exactly, pray tell? Is it really to keep up with friends or is it to creep? Why is there this thing called an “info” section? If you really were “friends” with this person, shouldn’t you know already that his favorite books are the Bible and Lord of the Rings? Really you should just know that by the fact that he goes to Franciscan.

Is this a typical scene: (Steve looking at his girlfriend’s page) “Wow, her

favorite movie is Gladiator too? I think I just fell in love with her all over again!” I’m betting this does not happen.

What actually happens is this: “Hey, does this Gill LaMuro person who edits the Gadfly have a girlfriend? Because I want to have his babies. Let’s look him up on Facebook.”

Yes, I broke a lot of hearts when I was a sophomore because, just to clear up matters, I am a girl. I will not apologize. But enough of the tragedy of having an unusual Welsh girl’s name that looks masculine to the non-Welsh, Facebook is not for friends, but for strangers!

This results in what I like to call the “Facebook photo opportunity syndrome.” This is what happens when you take a camera with you when you participate in absolutely anything from a checker game to a friend’s dinner so that you can document it and put in on Facebook and make it seem like you have a life to people you don’t know, but who might be looking on your page. My brother does this.

There merely has to be two organisms in the same place

for him to pull out a camera. He also photographs every meal he has in a restaurant just in case he gets food poisoning. He’s odd and I don’t think cameras have been good for him.

By the way, ladies, he’s almost exactly like me, and he’s single. And Chinese. Which all equals a good time, am I right?

So what have we learned? That Facebook is basically a giant radiationmutant lizard that attacked Tokyo? No, you weren’t paying attention. You get F. No, we’ve learned that I am not on Facebook because I am paranoid of creepers, I have a brother who will never ever read this (but if you want his number, I can be bribed), and I have no life. And I am okay with that.

G.L.