This is a chat transcript from a conversation on my company’s internal chat system. As becomes obvious, it is a chat from the “Catholics” community. While reading this, I thought of two things:
- I used to be a member of this discourse community, and even being an “ex-member,” I find it somewhat silly. I can’t imagine what people who have never been a member of this discourse community would think of it.
- Is this seriously what people think G-d means for us to be doing? It seems to me more like a classic case of not being able to see the forest for the trees.
For non-members of this discourse community:
HDoO = Holy Day of Obligation (i.e., you have to go to church this day)
HD = Holy Day
HAGD = Have a Good Day
VatII = Vatican II
The chat was initiated by this question:
My wife tells me that Ash Wednesday is NOT a HDoO. T/F? Cheese Ravioli with plain tomato sauce tonight.
[16:14:08] jake it is a day of fasting though
[16:14:22] tim Fast AND abstinence?
[16:14:22] maringol no meat then?
[16:14:23] tim Didn’t know that.
[16:14:25] adam correct . .
[16:14:26] barbie no…but, we should get ashes…and a day of fast and abstinence.
[16:14:26] timothy No meat I knew.
[16:14:26] rob one meal
[16:14:26] Mark You mean abstinence from meat, correct?
[16:14:27] rob no meat
[16:14:33] Mark 😉
[16:14:33] liz just meat 🙂
[16:14:33] maringol 2 late…
[16:14:34] harry I had also heard is was not a HDoO.
[16:14:35] Manny My wife says the same
[16:14:36] alphonse not a HD of O
[16:14:37] fred not
[16:14:44] paula_jean true, it’s not a day of obligation
[16:14:44] maringol 🙂
[16:14:51] fred wife is always right,,, unfortunately 🙂
[16:14:51] paula_jean but it IS a dayu of fast and abstinence
[16:14:53] alphonse no meat though
[16:14:54] gary absolutely bo meat and ni inbetween snacks
[16:14:54] henry No meat to be safe
[16:14:57] jake is is a day of fasting though
[16:15:01] barbie fasting…1 meal unless health requires more than one meal…maybe just reduce portions..
[16:15:01] rob bless me father..
[16:15:02] jake fasting
[16:15:10] alphonse uh-oh
[16:15:18] jake not just abstaining from meat
[16:15:25] maringol i thought only no meat rule on Good Friday…
[16:15:34] adam ah – most just dont eat meat . .
[16:15:34] liz every friday in lent
[16:15:37] jake no meat is for fridays during lent
[16:15:40] barbie no meat every Friday during Lent
[16:15:41] davidf what’s HD stand for?
[16:15:43] adam and of course give something up
[16:15:46] alphonse Day of Fasting Rules
[16:15:49] adam then Fridays is no meat
[16:15:50] harry HD= Holy Day
[16:15:51] gary u get one meal the other 2 meals should not equal more that one
[16:15:56] adam no red meat
[16:16:01] iand Small meals allowed but not big enuf to equal another full meal
[16:16:15] gary yep
[16:16:17] maringol fish is ok then 4 2day?
[16:16:21] henry yes
[16:16:21] rob no land animal consumption
[16:16:22] barbie lent is for not just giving up…but, for sacrifice…do something to better ourselves in prep for his resurrection…a time for new beginnings.
[16:16:23] gary yes
[16:16:25] adam yes
[16:16:41] harry Except cabybara.
[16:16:46] malone no red meat, , or no any meat? How about Chicken?
[16:16:47] adam 🙂
[16:16:51] gary not but u can eat land shark
[16:16:51] harry Oops, I think that is capybara
[16:16:54] henry chicken is meat
[16:16:58] gary :-S
[16:17:05] maringol white meat
[16:17:07] barbie i thought chicken was poultry?
[16:17:11] ned gave up pizza… tomorrow dept is having first pizza party 🙂
[16:17:14] henry right, but it counts as a meat for lent
[16:17:15] rob land animal
[16:17:16] adam You safe with Fish on Fridays.. hense all the Friday Fish Frys
[16:17:17] alphonse hmm…still meat
[16:17:23] harry Poultry is meat
[16:17:31] malone chicken is poultry, but for lent, ,I think it counts as meat, , but I wanted to make sure.
[16:17:35] barbie ok. thanks…i’ve been confused on chicken for a long time.
[16:17:46] rob if it swims all the time you’re good!
[16:17:53] malone lol
[16:17:54] adam lol
[16:17:55] barbie pork also, right? not allowed.
[16:18:03] adam nope
[16:18:05] gary no pork
[16:18:06] iand I don’t swim if your eating it
[16:18:07] maringol white meat as well
[16:18:07] barbie lol …if it swims, it’s aok.
[16:18:33] barbie thanks all…
[16:18:34] alphonse shellfish are ok too I think
[16:18:41] ned mmmmm… blue whale blubber for dinner
[16:18:42] henry shellfish are ok
[16:18:42] alphonse (clam chowder)
[16:18:49] barbie yes clam chowder
[16:18:56] matt forget the pork or chicken, i’m still interested in this abstinence thing 😉
[16:18:58] henry as long as the soup does not have a meat stock
[16:19:12] alphonse I keep a can on the shelf for these things when I forget they are coming
[16:19:19] barbie oooh…meat stock..hadn’t thought about that…
[16:19:20] gary abstinence is no meat
[16:19:35] barbie today is safer to not eat at all…just liquids.
[16:19:37] gary fasting is eatly less but u can have meet
[16:19:58] matt i knew that0:-)
[16:20:00] gary I wished I could tyope fast and speel too
[16:20:02] paula_jean FYI: technically, we’re still supposed to attempt abstinence from meat on Fridays even outside of Lent, but the abstinence from meat can be “swapped” (if you will) for a different sacriffice
[16:20:06] alphonse HAGD folks
[16:20:22] paula_jean that was the change in VatII, but most people just took the “good” part of that 🙂
ENG 508 was okay tonight. Dr. Dicks broke us up into groups of four for a semester project, which includes three deliverables: a usability test plan, test materials, and a final report. I’m not even going to go into it. Will, you know what I’m talking about.
I read the readings for Thursday’s ENG 519 class.
<whining>I’m just overwhelmed by this class at the moment. This is what’s going on in there right now:
- We ended Tuesday night’s class with a start to an assignment to read 3 or 4 blogs (and we have to read enough of them to get a “feel” for them, do an analysis, and have it ready to present at the next class. (This is enough work to do alone, much less trying to coordinate with three other people outside of class, with only one night between classes, on which at least half of us probably have another class, and at least three of us with full time jobs during the day.)
- We have this “movie identity webpage” we’re supposed to be working on and have something to present at the next class.
- We have three readings to do for next class, which are not trivial reads at all, and questions about the articles to answer by the people whose articles they were.
- We have a genre analysis paper that we need to start working on “in the background” soon.
There is just no way all this can be done in a quality manner. It’s just overload, and I don’t have a good sense of prioritization for them.</whining>