Interesting Stories of the Week

Yay love!

Using brain scans, researchers at Stony Brook University in New York have discovered a small number of couples respond with as much passion after 20 years together as most people only do during the early throes of romance, Britain's Sunday Times newspaper reported.

I really thought this story was interesting. It's kind of funny to note how long people I know are generally in "long" relationships (about a year and a half at the longest) before they break up. My parents, as silly as they can be, are still in love the same way today as they were five or six years ago when they first started going out.

This English town is starting to ban "rude-sounding or unflattering names like Hoare Road and Cracknuts Lane." I can understand where they're coming from, but that's kinda silly. By acknowledging that those names are dirty, they're going to cause more of a problem than exists right now methinks.

And why is it scary to be four years old right now?

Lil William Nelson was able to give enough details that the police have arrested a suspect in his mother's killing.

They said he told them a strange man had entered the home without knocking and shot his mother. His account, including his home address and parents' names, led to the discovery of Nelson's body.

"I began asking him questions, and he told me that a stranger had come into his house without knocking," Mike McConnell said from Baltimore. "And I said 'Well, where was your mommy?' And he said 'He shot my mommy."'

Explaining how the little boy was able to give specific information to authorities, Nelson said: "He's a very sharp kid. He's like a sponge, he just soaks everything up. My wife, especially, insisted that we work on him learning his address, learning the phone numbers, just important things ... a lot of things people would take for granted, and it saved him."

This lil girl was not so lucky. A reclusive and mentally unstable man was found to have her dismembered body in his fridge.

"He said that human meat was in fact delicious," Chinese media quoted a neighbor as saying, recounting comments the suspect allegedly made while watching a film depicting people being killed in battle.

And if you need some cheering up after that, check out the new X-Men movie trailer. I know I'm excited.

And one final exciting note: I'm working on a post to help explain more about JRA, so if you're interested in that, stay tuned!

Surf or Sex?

I might have problems, but I'm wondering exactly who would give up sex for two weeks in order to have the internet in their home? Almost half of women, and less than a third of men apparently would.

I'm guessing either these people aren't in a relationship or don't get jiggy with their partners/friend's partners/random people that often. Now, maybe it's just me, but I fail to see the benefits of this. I mean, sure, a lot of people need the internet for work and such. It's an interestingly sad commentary on our society that people are more interested in their jobs, facebook, and internet porn than spending some love time with their significant other.

On the other hand, intimacy is the important thing, not the sex.

Now, here goes my [not so] wholesome image... and Theron's (sorry hun).

I love Theron with all my heart. We have a wonderful relationship. I'm pretty sure that the internet could never match the intimacy that we share, with or without sex. The sex isn't important, but the intimacy is. Still, I think that picking the internet over Theron is the wrong way to go in any situation.

Maybe it's just because I'm a romantic hippie, or because after almost a year and a half I'm still crazily head over heels for him, but love should be the most important thing in our lives. Can anyone imagine how the world would change if that were the case? If we all actually started practicing the teachings from all the great religious figures {The Buddha, Jesus, Muhammed, etc}? I think we could actually have a good chance at world peace if people stopped looking out for their best interests and started looking out for others.

So if you were asked, what would you do? Pick the person you're supposed to treasure or the internet that seems like it gets in the way enough already?

L Is For The Way You Look At Me

Yesterday we were talking about love in one of my religion classes. I really like Dr. Vance - he's a great professor, but in general he's an awesome guy. But I digress...

We were talking about the difference between being in love with love itself and being in love with the person you think you're in love with. Augustine said that the bishop's curse is to be in love with the fact that he loves God, not actually loving God himself. But I began to think that this curse could be applied to romantic love as well. This led to a HUGE epiphany for me - and right in the middle of class too!

It made me think of my past relationships. In high school, I was really in love with love and the fact that I was 'loved.' And even some of my more recent relationships seem to be the same thing. As much as I loved Adam and Nando both, it seems like I was still in that phase. And it seems like most of my insecurities and anxiety/separation issues stem from that problem. I never knew when the love was gonna wear off, and I was so scared it would be the second we were apart.

But with Theron... it's completely different. While I don't like that we don't get to see each other all that much right now, I'm okay with it. I can honestly say that I want the best things in the world to happen to him and for him. Hopefully, our happily ever afters match up and the best things for him involve me. As sad as it would be if they didn't, I love him so much that I will just be grateful for the time that I've gotten to spend with him. I really am in love with him, and it feels so amazing.

:)

EDIT: I decided, since I got a camera now, to post this as a video - my first vlog! ZOMG!

One Whole Year!

As of tomorrow, Theron and I will have been together for a whole year.

It's funny to think of how much my life has changed in the past year. When I look back at my life before Theron, I just take for granted that he was there somehow.

I haven't seen him since move in day (almost three weeks!) but he's coming down today to spend the weekend with me. :)

That said, unless I see something ridiculous, I will not be online that much this weekend, much less posting bloggings about crazy stories... so have a good weekend everybody!

The Beauty of Love

Love can make us jealous, whiny, annoying, clingy, bitchy, and just downright stupid...

But, love can also help us to endure the hardest of the hard & the worst of the worst. It can force us to be selfless in an otherwise self-centered world.

This is the only news story that I want to share today. This woman is in a coma in order to reduce the amount of pain that she is going through from her terminal strain of hepatitis. She was brought out of it long enough for her bedside wedding to her long time partner. She is only expected to live a few weeks longer.

I can understand that she must be in terrible pain if they have decided to keep her in a coma. Maybe it's just me - that I'm a hopeless romantic, that I'm so head over heels still after a year that I can't imagine being by Theron but not really being there, that I can't stand not seeing him for more than a week without getting amazingly lonely - but I can't imagine wanting to be in a coma - no matter how much pain I'm in - for the last few precious days and weeks of my life instead of staying awake with the people I love. Because of my health problems, I've thought about many of these types of scenarios and what I would do. I could understand if my husband didn't want to see me in pain so much - I would certainly sympathize. But I wouldn't want to be asleep so long before I die.

Even if I had to be in bed the whole time, if I had to eat through a tube, if I had to be pumped full of mega strength prescription meds, I would stay awake. I think I would suffer more to know that I was in a coma, going to die, and not spending time with someone that I love so much.

Love

Yet another post spurred by a friend's myspace bulletin. She posted a survey about her love life, and it got me to thinking. It was about the little things - money, food, chores. We're always so quick to talk about the everyday idiosyncrasies that we love and hate, but somehow that makes us lose track of the big picture, the best things - the way they make us feel.

Everyone is guilty of this. Some of us get too attached, others not attached enough.We all get too short with our loved ones, and don't apologize sometimes when we should. And I know that a lot of us who have been hurt in the past have a hard time trusting those we love and worrying that we're not good enough, not perfect.

I think that if we could step back from the everyday snippy comments, insecurities, and annoyances, and look at why we feel in love with our sweethearts, we would appreciate them more. Love isn't easy, but it is worth it. It is a part of the hierarchy of needs for a reason.

I'm sure that first when we analyze we'll see the physical things that we like. Theron's smile just threw me overboard. His eyes are amazing, but the way they light up when he smiles... it's indescribable. The day I met him, that's what immediately attracted me physically.

Then we'd probably move on to the next thing we notice - more than likely a (lack of) sense of humor and personality. For most people, we need someone enough like us that they dorky, silly things we do don't make us feel stupid. Someone who can understand the things we've been through, who we can relate to. But we also need someone different enough that we get along well. Theron and I have led different lives by far, but our interests are similar, we understand each other, and we can look past the other stresses in each other's lives to see the real person and his/her feelings.

If my past relationships have taught me anything, it's that the first month of one is so easy -- figuring out the easy boundaries, discovering the other person... honestly, it's more infatuation than love. But true love isn't always easy, but is hard and a difficult journey. If we work hard enough, maybe, just maybe, we can get past the mundane anger and frustration and truly appreciate the people close to us.
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In other news, I got a car. Well, my mom got a different car and I get hers rather. I have most of this week off, which will be nice for reading and catching up/getting ahead on homework. And I think I'm starting to get over being sickly. My arthritis is being crap lately, but that's to be expected with more humid weather.