Thursday's Thirst Quencher
No blood today. No alcohol either (please! still recovering from yesterday's happy-hour-gone-awry). Let's just quench our thirst for knowledge, shall we? Ooh, and after that, our thirst for peace of mind (who doesn't want peace of mind?)

Sorry, I missed yesterday's Wacky/Wacko, but decided late last night, while watching Shaun kick it on the half-pipe (love that kooky karrot-top) that watching the Olympics with my boys was way more important. So glad I did, what a show! Actually, with reference to yesterday's post, we could go ahead and call Mr. Passan, the yahoo that writes for Yahoo Sports, this week's wacko. Yea, that works.

So.....knowledge? Who wants some? Me, always, even though the knowledge I often seek is useless and doesn't really make me a more valuable member of society.

Random tangent, shared for no particular reason - when I say the word knowledge outloud by itself, I always say it like the priest in The Princess Bride would say it (i.e. nah-widge)



Speaking of marriage, did you know that there is a form of marriage called Polyandry, whereby a woman gets to have multiple husbands? I didn't, so I decided that I need to know what that's all about. My first inclination upon discovering this was, of course, how great would it be to have five husbands, all with different functions, reasons for being, and ways to make me happy? Then, I took it a bit further and thought about the maintenance it would require. Not that kind of maintenance - as usual, your minds go straight to the gutter. I'm talking about the cooking, cleaning, keeping-'em-happy part. And if I had five husbands, would I have to have fifteen kids?

Before we get back to Polyandry, I need to digress (Warning: sharp left ahead) and share an excerpt from a fantastic book I received recently from a girlfriend. The Sweet Potato Queens' Book of Love is a must-have for every girl's library. It's a mindless beach book, but very funny. There are actually five or six Sweet Potato Queen (SPQ) books in the series. The target audience is middle-aged women (note: I'm not there yet), but their words of wisdom benefit all of us. Another of my favorites: The Sweet Potato Queens' Field Guide to Men: Every Man I Love Is Either Married, Gay, or Dead. There are more than 6,000 chapters of SPQs around the globe, including one in Saudi Arabia. Bonkers. It's like a cult. If you get a sec, check out the SPQ website: http://sweetpotatoqueens.com/

Anyhoo, integral to SPQ doctrine is this...

"The Five Men You Must Have in Your Life at All Times. A very wise woman told us this once, and we really took it to heart: There are five different kinds of men that you must endeavor to have in your life at all times in order to have the equivalent of one completely satisfactory man. She explained that it is clearly not possible to find all the required attributes in one single man, and we should not expend needless energy by even looking for him - we'd be damn lucky to find the five separate men. In her valued opinion, trying to live one's entire life without, say, dancing just because your man doesn't like to dance - well, you might be able to manage, but is this really something you want to spend the next fifty years doing?

The Basic Five are these: (1) a man who can fix things, (2) a man you can dance with, (3) a man who can pay for things, (4) a man you can talk to, and (5) a man to have great sex with. As I said, this is the rudimentary team you need to form, according to our sage adviser. Certainly other functions can be added to suit your more refined tastes, but with this starting lineup, you can at least avoid abject misery."

Makes perfect sense to me. Only catch, as I mentioned before, would be figuring out how to hold up my end of the bargain whilst juggling all those boys.

Back to Polyandry, the practice of having more than one husband or male mate at one time. This is not a practice that's really held up through the ages (it's illegal for the most part, as is polygany, except in a handful of places). It occurs among populations where there are fewer women than men, or as a result of geographical conditions or economic problems. Some forms of polyandry are associated with a perceived need to retain aristocratic titles or land within kin groups, and/or because of the frequent absence, for long periods, of a man from the household.

Fraternal polyandry is a form of polyandry in which two or more brothers share one wife. When there was limited land for usage in Tibet, a group of brothers all married the same woman.
By marrying the same woman they were able to produce fewer children and avoid a split in their future inheritance. Can you imagine, having to marry an unruly band of Tibeten brothers?

Polyandry occurs or has occurred in Tibet, the Canadian Arctic, Zanskar, Nepal, Bhutan, Ladakh, the Nymba, and Sri Lanka, and is known to have been present in some pre-contact Polynesian societies, though probably only among higher caste women. It is also encountered in some regions of Mongolia, among the Mosuo people in China, and in some Sub-Saharan African and American indigenous communities. In other societies, there are people who live in de facto polyandrous arrangements that are not recognized by the law.

While we're here, let's visit Polyamory, the distant, but way more fun cousin of Polyandry. Polyamory is the practice, desire, or acceptance of having more than one intimate relationship at a time with the knowledge and consent of everyone involved. It's also described as consensual, ethical, or responsible non-monogamy. Hmmmmm...there's a conversation starter for the dinner table tonight. Crazy stuff. I've never even come across it, but it's big. An estimated 500,000 Americans live a polyamourous lifestyle. Found an interesting Newsweek article that sheds more light on this kookiness. http://www.newsweek.com/id/209164 . If it's in Newsweek, is it safe to assume that this is a fairly mainstream concept? Again...hmmmmm...


Peace of Mind - Sharon Moss, Quenching People's Need to Have Their Affairs in Order, One Saved Soul at a Time
Switching gears (and vehicles, and galaxies), a friend of mine shared this today and I had such a giggle, no...a full-on pee-your-pants kinda laugh, I just had to pass it on. For those of you who are polyamorists, or participate in other hedonistic lifestyles, this won't apply. For those of you waiting for The Rapture who have pets, take note. Sharon Moss, in Westfield, Indiana, has set up a website to take care of your pets when Jesus comes back to get you. For a mere $10/month, you can protect up to three of your furry friends from being abandoned when you head to the Promised Land. Hello????? What in God's name is going out there? Are you fricking kidding me???? See for yourself: http://www.aftertherapturepetcare.com/. She takes PayPal, and you can follow her on Twitter - https://twitter.com/rapturepetcare. You can't make this sh*t up.

On that note, time to make like the Red Sea and part. xo.