Weekend Wrapup

I was just reading here on the Angry Asian Man site about the Rosie O'Donnell incident on The View (a show I'm not familiar with at all), in which she used "ching chong" language to mock Chinese people. This is so upsetting to me that I can't even force myself to watch the linked clip. She acknowledged the language on her website but hasn't apologized. I was thinking about writing a blog post in the form of a letter to her TV show on exactly how it's upsetting and why it's such a nasty slur on all Asian people. When I was little I remember being surrounded by kids yelling those words into my face, and I've gotten into physical altercations over them. I could describe the feelings I had then as a young girl, and ask her if she ever wants her kids to feel that way, or to let them make other kids feel that way. But I have too much stress in my life right now to dredge that all up and order it neatly in writing. Instead, later this week I'll contribute somehow to a campaign asking her to apologize, which I hope someone will organize shortly. Ugh.

I haven't had time to see Apocalypto yet. Hopefully, I can make it this week. I read this viewpoint from an archaeologist -- Is "Apocalypto" Pornography? -- that discusses the details of some serious flaws that one would expect in the movie. The costume design is apparently as good as it seems in the trailer, though. I do take issue with how the reviewer wraps up by saying that Braveheart is a good movie. That kind of destroys her credibility as a film critic for me, since I think Braveheart was overall a boring, bombastic piece of crap interspersed with a gratuitous nasty homophobic subplot and about 20-25 minutes of awesome battle scenes.

I feel like I'm ending the weekend on a positive note... that is, as long as no one kills off any of my favorite characters on tonight's season finale of The Wire. The reason is that I've managed to create the optimal flexible timetable for adoption versus conception! It's got the family seal of approval, and now I just need to run it by the agency worker on our first homestudy appointment.

Stage One: Prep. My dad gets his ankle operation done in January, recuperates for 6-10 weeks and then departs our extra bedroom to return to Japan by April 2007. Our homestudy, which should be written by then, gets activated as soon as he clears the bedroom, but matching will almost certainly not begin right after that.

Stage Two: Waiting. We will be either waiting for matching or in the process of matching or committee, and also in a parallel attempt to conceive. I am willing to try some measures my gynecologist might suggest, but not anything on the scale of IVF or that involves a high risk of multiple births.

Stage Three: Pregnancy Deadline. I get pregnant. I call the agency, let them know what's up and say we need to go on hold within a month. If we happen to get matched before that month is up (although this isn't really likely) then great! We will be able to give the adopted child 100% of our attention for 8 months until I give birth.

Stage Four: Waiting Again (with a baby). I get pregnant without matching. We keep our application on hold until the baby is one years old, and then update the homestudy and go active again. Alternately, I could have a miscarriage, which sends us back to Stage Two to start over again. A friend of mine recently had a miscarriage so I know I shouldn't discount that possibility.