Lisa Lisa is an armchair that can only be operated by a trained professional!

Okay, I'll come clean. I sleep with a bear. Mr. Bear, to be precise. Yes, I have a woobie. So, last night it stormed a bit. It stopped, I thought it was done and ran out to pick up something from the store. I made the mistake of not checking the weather first. Round two blew in while I was gone. Naturally, my son didn't want to run the errand too. Therefore, he was home alone when it hit. The NOAA radio was going off, and I think that freaked him out. Off to the basement he went, with the dog in tow. What I didn't know is what else he carried down with him. I crawled into bed last night and reached under the pillow for Mr. Bear...Not there...I looked under the bed...Not there. Where-could-he-be?! I was starting to freak out a bit at this point. B walked down the hallway and asked Ian, "Where's the bear?" He knew exactly what she meant. He traipsed down to the basement, where he'd taken the bear earlier to save him from any potential tornado. He's a sweet boy....

I'm alternately intriuged and repelled by these gnomes. So, of course, I had to have one!

All my digital photos are on here. I have not backed them up. If my Vaio crashes, I'm toast.

Why It's Okay Being A Gay Republican To some people, being a gay Republican seems like an oxymoron. We disagree. The Republican Party's founding principles and core beliefs represent a powerful tool that should be used to defend liberty-not attack it as the radical right has done. Their dogged campaign to block gay and lesbian civil rights goes against the party's core principles of smaller government and personal freedom. They use values as a veil for hate. The radical right's influence on the GOP can be diminished one voter at a time, by making the case for fairness. That is what motivates the Log Cabin Republicans to lead today's most important battle for the civil rights of gay and lesbian Americans. Even those in the gay community who disagree with our politics should realize our value. Here is why it is okay being a gay Republican: 1. Gay and lesbian Americans who believe in limited government, strong national defense, lower taxes, personal responsibility, and free markets belong in the Republican Party. Democrats who favor big government, higher taxes and more regulation don't represent our values and beliefs. That means leaving the GOP is not an option for gay Republicans. We can be true to our conservative principles while working to make the GOP more inclusive and tolerant. 2. Defeating the radical right and transforming the GOP will allow gay and lesbian Americans to achieve full equality much sooner-decades sooner. The radical right represents the last obstacle on the path to full equality. Defeat them in the grassroots of the GOP and all of us can enjoy the benefits of liberty much sooner. 3. The party will change only from the inside. Pressure from the outside, from the far left won't work. The GOP must be transformed one person at a time, across America on the grassroots level by gay Republicans and their fair-minded allies. Across America, gay Republicans are shattering stereotypes and educating rank-and-file Republicans about the importance of fairness and equality for gay and lesbian Americans. This is the right path to progress. 4. Achieving total equality will take decades longer unless our community has strong allies in both parties. There aren't enough votes in the Democratic Party to achieve sustained legislative victories. Even if all gay Republicans left the party, the GOP would still be there. That is why we reach out to fair-minded Republicans-making the case for fairness. 5. We are doing important work to the transform the GOP, bringing about the same grassroots change that happened in the Democratic Party over the last three decades. We applaud the gay and lesbian activists who worked so hard to change the Democratic Party-making it more inclusive and tolerant. 25 years ago, had gay and lesbian members left the party, then the Democrats would not be where they are today on issues of equality and fairness. We are now doing similar work in the GOP. 6. The history of the Republican Party makes it a natural ally of equality. In 2004, the Republican Party marks the 150th anniversary of its first national convention. Looking toward history can help the GOP chart its future course. The Republican Party rose to power because it embraced the ideals of equality imagined by our nation's founding fathers. When President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, he created a new birth of freedom. So it can be again. Nearly 150 years later-the GOP has another chance to choose fairness over discrimination, equality over bigotry, freedom over fear.

The academy's director of exhibits Dr. Sarah Brewer said: "The more sex we have the more we want and the less sex we have the more we want."

Melissa Fryrear says she struggled with her homosexuality and lived a decade as a lesbian before the "arduous and extremely difficult journey out" of it. "I started to come to the end of my proverbial rope," she said. "Believe me, I am the most surprised about the transformation of my life." Now, she says, jokingly, she is just looking for a tall, good-looking man who looks good in a kilt. She's taking marriage requests, in fact. " 'Braveheart' changed my life," she said jokingly. Fryrear currently is the Gender Issues Analyst at Focus on the Family, a Christian-based ministry, in Colorado Springs, Colo. The topic of "reparative therapy," or so-called ex-gay camps, has come back to the national spotlight after a teen blogger named Zach wrote in his online diary about being sent by his parents to Refuge, a youth program of Love in Action International. The group, based in Memphis, Tenn., runs a religiously based program intended to change the sexual orientation of gay men and women. Founded in California in 1973, Love in Action moved to Memphis 11 years ago. It is one of 120 programs nationwide listed by Exodus International, which bills itself as the largest information and referral network for the ''ex-gay'' movement. Zach is due to leave the camp on Friday. In an interview on the Christian Broadcasting Network, Zach's father, Joe Stark said he "felt good about Zach coming here." "Until he turns 18 and he's an adult in the state of Tennessee, I'm responsible for him, and I'm going to see to it that he has all options available to him," Stark said on the program. There are mixed opinions about the therapies and whether they are effective. Fryrear says the years in therapy have made her life "fuller and happier," though she describes it as the "most difficult thing" she believes she will ever have to go through. "For me it seemed as if this has been a journey of radical transformation," Fryrear said. "I used to believe that I was born gay. Now I know that you are not born gay. I used to have contempt that I was a woman. I used to hate and despise men and now I respect and admire and am attracted to men." Critics of these programs say they open a person to lifelong problems of guilt, shame and even suicide. Peterson Toscano, who was at the Love in Action adult program between 1996 and 1998, said he felt suicidal during his attempt at transformation from a gay man to a heterosexual man. "At one point, I was standing at the subway platform and I thought 'I need to leap because I am a horrible person,'" said Toscano who lives now as an openly gay man, but spent 17 years in different reparative therapy programs. He performs a one-man play based on his experiences called "Doin' Time in the Homonono Halfway House." On its Web site, Love in Action says its growth has "exceeded 10 percent each year for the past four consecutive years." On Zach's blog, he wrote: "My mother, father, and I had a very long 'talk' … where they let me know I am to apply for a fundamentalist Christian program for gays … I'm a big screwup to them, who isn't on the path God wants me to be on. So I'm sitting here in tears." The Rev. John Smid, executive director of Love in Action, believes people have a choice when it comes to their sexuality. He says he is "ex-gay." The American Psychological Association says there are a number of theories about the origins of a person's sexual orientation, but that most scientists agree that sexual orientation is most likely the result of a complex interaction of environmental, cognitive and biological factors. The APA says homosexuality is not a choice and that in most people, sexual orientation is shaped at an early age. "A lot of harm is done by these programs," Dr. Jack Drescher of the American Psychiatry Association told Good Morning America. "It creates shame and guilt feelings that can lead to suicidal behavior."

Once, there were THREE BLIND MEN who loved to TRAVEL TOGETHER and in one of their travels, they encountered an elephant. Now, they have never come across an ELEPHANT before, so THEY DID NOT KNOW what it was. The first man, touching the trunk, thought the elephant was like a SNAKE. The second man, touching the ears, thought the elephant was like a FAN. The third, touching the body, thought the elephant was like a WALL. Like the blind men, we all encounter the SAME ELEPHANTINE WORLD -- in fact, we ourselves are elephants --and yet we all EXPERIENCE it and each other DIFFERENTLY. How do you SEE the world?

Hell, I'm my own gay childhood icon!

You Are the Very Gay Tinky Winky!

Purple with a gay pride symbol... how could he not be gay? And that red purse is divalicious!

Picture yourself on a boat on a river With tangerine trees and marmalade skies Somebody calls you, you answer quite slowly A girl with kaleidoscope eyes Cellophane flowers of yellow and green Towering over your head Look for the girl with the sun in her eyes and she's gone Lucy in the sky with diamonds Lucy in the sky with diamonds Lucy in the sky with diamonds, ah Follow her down to a bridge by a fountain Where rocking horse people eat marshmallow pies Everyone smiles as you drift past the flowers that grow so incredibly high Newspaper taxis appear on the shores Waiting to take you away Climb in the back with your head in the clouds and you're gone Lucy in the sky with diamonds Lucy in the sky with diamonds Lucy in the sky with diamonds, ah Picture yourself in a train in a station With plasticine porters with looking glass ties Suddenly someone is there at the turnstile The girl with kaleidoscope eyes Lucy in the sky with diamonds Lucy in the sky with diamonds Lucy in the sky with diamonds, ah Lucy in the sky with diamonds Lucy in the sky with diamonds Lucy in the sky with diamonds, ah

• Talking with my son on the drive to school each morning.
• The feeling of fresh, clean and smooth sheets against my skin as I slip into bed at the end of the day.
• That first sip of coffee in the morning, it's mellow and rich warmth washing over my tongue and firing up my brain.
• Learning to appreciate new wines- how they hit on the palate and discerning the different and subtle undertones- tea leaves, ripe black cherry, plum, lilac blossom wrapped in chocolate, raspberry jam...
• Sitting on my deck and just doing nothing for a few minutes but watching the way the sunlight plays through the leaves of my trees.
• A walk in the morning when there's no one else around.
• Sharing a conversation with a witty soul.
• Laughing out loud about a book I'm reading. I did that last night and stayed up way too late reading. No, it wasn't "The Screwtape Letters"- I was busy thinking up about 13 ways of killing myself while reading that bit! It was "Possible Side Effects" by Augusten Burroughs. I can't think of anyone who's funnier, more perceptive or more irreverant. He's not for the easily offended. In one of the chapters his grandmother first tells him about the tooth fairy. She likens her to Tinkerbell, and Augusten is horrified- he thinks of Tinkerbell (and therefore the Tooth Fairy) as a "creepy bug woman with her devil wand, sneaking into my bedroom at night while I was sleeping, and taking my teeth and leaving things under the pillow that shouldn't be there..." So he procedes to pray to keep the Tooth Fairy away- "Although my parents never attended church or mentioned Jesus except when they screamed at each other - and then they used his full name, "Jesus Fu**ing Christ"- they did explain that the was a man who lived in the sky and granted wishes to certain people. People he liked."
• Listening to live music. I'm simply mesmerized by it and have a deep admiration for those who are musically gifted.

1. Yours :: Mine
2. Charcoal :: Grill
3. Platitude :: Aphorism
4. Graduation :: Day
5. Hungry :: Like the wolf
6. Somewhere :: over the rainbow
7. Nurse :: Hospital
8. Freak :: Out
9. Unbelievable :: Astonishing
10. Walk :: Like an Egyptian

My creation, originally uploaded by http://www.flickr.com/people/fleurdelisa/.

IMG_0345, originally uploaded by http://www.flickr.com/people/fleurdelisa/.

IMG_0337, originally uploaded by http://www.flickr.com/people/fleurdelisa/.

IMG_0340, originally uploaded by http://www.flickr.com/people/fleurdelisa/.

IMG_0333, originally uploaded by http://www.flickr.com/people/fleurdelisa/.

IMG_0327, originally uploaded by http://www.flickr.com/people/fleurdelisa/.

IMG_0311, originally uploaded by http://www.flickr.com/people/fleurdelisa/.

IMG_0352, originally uploaded by http://www.flickr.com/people/fleurdelisa/.

A perfect example of why I don't share my camera! I prefer to be behind the camera not in front of it.