Rudolph Online

I confess that I look for my google stats on a regular basis, and check to see which articles are being looked at and published online. This morning I was happy to see that my Rudolph Before Title Nine piece (which can be read on www.berendemotier.com) has been republished on a number of sites, spreading the news of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer's amazingly dated bigotry and gay allegories.

However, it also spreads my own bigoted/insensitive/assumptive faux pas. The morning after I hit "send" on the article, I realized that it should have begun "Like many red-blooded, middle class, American lesbian families" etc, instead of "like any red-blooded, middle-class, American lesbian families" because obviously there are legions (many of them lesbians with kids) who don't celebrate any version of Christmas and will be offended that I'm satirizing holiday activities while insinuating that everyone takes part. Further irony being that I'm a dyed-in-the-wool atheist, happy for others who enjoys a religion, whether practiced or merely cultural, as long as they don't use it to promote hate.

So far the hate e-mails haven't started coming in. I just really wanted to write about Rudolph.

On the laptop: No projects...
On the easel: Azul in progress, oil pastel aids coming in the mail
On the art table: Unused Christmas crackers (the English kind, not the edible kind)
On the nightstand: The Perfect Paragon, How to Write a Damn Good Mystery
On tape: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
On my mind: Art Supplies from Daniel Smith, garnet earrings, mystery writing, getting off my duff during the holiday mood, whether Amy is coming from Seattle, the ice melting in Canada, obese preschoolers, explaining Gerald Ford to our fifteen year old.