Hello!

Hi everyone!

In this blog, I hope to do my part to fight against the phoniness and hypocrisy -- the tartuffery-- all around us and start intelligent, thoughtful discussions on atheism, feminism, science, current events and all the strange and crazy things happening in the world around me.

I am originally from Michigan ( I grew up in Metro-Detroit) and about a year ago I moved down to Durham, North Carolina. It is more different here than I could even imagine. The last year has sparked many interesting conversations dealing with race, gender, homophobia, class and income disparity, fried chicken and collard greens, cultural relativism, discrimination, the American public school system, and the list goes on and on. One of my goals here is to share with you some of the experiences I've had since leaving the familiarity of the midwest and venturing into the steamy south. It's been quite an adventure -- after all I am a part of the most distrusted minority in the United States -- Atheists! An Atheist Feminist Midwestern girl living in the south -- if that's not a recipe for comedy, I don't know what is!

It's certainly been a trying year; I have a sneaking suspicion that my short hair leads salespeople to believe I'm a lesbian and therefore give me poor customer service... Maybe I'm just overly suspicious of strangers here after experiencing a solid session of gay-bashing first-hand, but things just seem odd sometimes when I ask anyone for assistance around here... I suppose Midwesterners really are some of the most friendly people in the U.S. afterall?!?

But alack! Time to turn over a new leaf! I'm thoroughly looking forward to sharing my thoughts on a myriad of scintillating topics with all you free-thinkers out there!

With Love and Squalor,

Laurel