I liked my old theme, but I LOVE the custom menu function in WordPress 3.0, as demonstrated in the navigation bar across the top, below the header.  Hover over “Find Me on the Web” and you’ll see what I mean.  You can use pages, links, or categories to make your custom menu.  Very cool.

I did away with the separate “Politics Page” and will be including those posts on the main blog.  I decided that I don’t want to focus so much on atheism and religion, so I might as well just keep all topics on the front page.

While I was at it, I cleaned up the categories a bit.  When I first started this blog, I didn’t want a religion category, so I put religion posts under a “Thoughts & Reflections” category.  Once I added a Religion category, it became redundant.  Some posts were under one or the other and some were under both.

Now, all religion posts are filed under “Religion & Atheism.”  I added atheism to the category name because I don’t like to file atheism posts under “Religion.”

“Thoughts & Reflections” is now called “Random Thoughts” and includes random posts that don’t fit in any of the other categories.

While I miss my old theme, I am very happy with the new features in WordPress 3.0.  I did use the old header and change the links to orange, so it is still reminiscent of the old theme.  Overall, it is definitely a change for the better.

I just wanted to pop in and let you all know that I’m still here.  I appreciate you stopping by and reading, leaving comments, and e-mailing me.  I promise to get back to posting as soon as I can.

Have a lovely weekend!

Come on by to meet Philip (blogger at Vermont Daily Briefing), hang out with other internet-type people, and enjoy the best coffee drinks in Burlington.  (Seriously, they have the best mocha.)

Here’s the tweetup information page for more info.  You can RSVP there, but you don’t have to.

Hope to see you there!  (So much so that we are willing to bribe you with free pastry.)

When I went to vote, I realized that this is the first TMD in 7 years that I have not been involved with a campaign or with political blogging.  Seven years ago, I actually ran for a city council seat myself.

Seeing all of the people standing outside with their signs, being greeted by the familiar faces of other Burlington pols, and, later, watching the election returns on our local government access channel, where I myself have appeared many times over the years to discuss politics, made me realize something.  I still love politics.  And now that I have taken a much – much! – needed break, I am so ready to get back into it.

So, I created a separate page here at Shatter Nicely, aptly called The Politics Page, where all political posts will show up.  They will not be in the regular RSS feed, nor will they appear on the front page of the regular blog, though they will show up in the archives.

I like what I am doing with Shatter Nicely and I still want to keep that going.  I don’t want to take away from that with the political posts.  But, as the saying goes, once a political blogger, always a political blogger.  No, really.  People say that.  Or, maybe not.

Anyway, head on over and check out The Politics Page.  There’s not much there yet for posts, and most of them are old, but I did some cool tweaks to the PHP to make it different than the main page.  It was fun and educational, and I was actually able to get it to look the way I wanted it to.

That reminds me of a facebook status I read today.

Ah! I just realized I can breathe out of my nose again. I so often take my health for granted. What a good reminder to thank God for every breath!

How do you respond to things like that?  Do you ignore them?  Do you challenge the notion that god is responsible for our breath?

I did reply, having just had the same experience.  The first day that I was able to fully fill my lungs with air, I said out loud how awesome it was to be able to breathe again.  Re: the facebook comment, I just said that I could relate because I just had a bad chest cold.  I just ignored the god part.  This friend isn’t someone I want to go that route with.  (Not that there’s anything wrong with that.)

So, after my chest congestion broke up, it turned into a painful head cold.  Then, just as that was getting better, wait for it, all five of us (husband and 3 kids, for you noobs) got hit with a stomach flu.  Three kids all throwing up at the same time.  Whoopie!

But now, it looks as if we are all on the mend.  I even took the boys snowboarding today.  They go every Monday with a homeschool group, but we don’t actually meet up as a group; we just get the group rate.  We had to miss it last week because we were too sick.

I brought my laptop with me to the mountain, since I don’t ski or board.  I found out that they charge for day use of the wi-fi, but I was able to get the final two installments of my conversion/de-conversion story done!  I guess that’s what happens when one is not distracted by the internet.  I still need to read them over and make any changes, but I plan on posting part four tomorrow.

I’m happy with the way the whole thing came together.  Part one is my back story and how I became a Christian.  Part two is how I got all fundamentalist-y.  Part three is how it all unraveled and I stopped believing in Christianity.  Part four is about how things were for me after I didn’t believe in god anymore.  Part five is the way my new life philosophy is shaping up.

I feel a sense of closure now that I have worked through writing out all the whole story.  There are so many other posts I want to do that explore religion and belief, but I wanted to work through my own story first.  So, I am very happy about sitting down and getting it all done today.

So, now that you’re all caught up on my life, what’s new with you?

I’m heading back to bed.

On a side note, hello, did you know about this lala thing?  What a freaking awesome thing.  I can embed a song on my blog.  How much does that rock?

Back to the apologies.

First up, I am sorry to tell you this, but remember that list of things I wanted to blog about that I posted the other day?  Well, I am not going to blog about them right now.  I know, I know.  They have a name for girls like that.  I’m sorry.  I shouldn’t have set up the expectation if I wasn’t going to follow through.  It’s not really fair to you, dear reader.

It’s just that I felt like taking a little detour and blogging about how I became a Christian and how I came to leave Christianity.  No one really knows the whole story.  I just really feel like now is the time.  I am at a place where I need to put these things together for myself, so I might as well post it for all the world to see, right?

I’ll tell you what, though.  I will go back through that list and add links where appropriate.  Here goes.

• I listened to a great podcast today about skepticism and libertarianism.
• Glenn Beck is a total creep.  No, I mean more so than you thought. (Added: I have to question what is in the mind of a man who got to that quote from that video.)
• Thoughts about the blog, by a woman who left the Quiverfull/Patriarchy movement, that I have been obsessively reading.
• A video a Christian friend sent me and stuff it brought up about my Christian experience.

I will still probably blog about those things, except the Glenn Beck one, which speaks for itself.

In sooth, I will probably not blog about the Mass. election.  What’s there to say at this point that someone else hasn’t already said and better?  The Moran Plant, again, probably not, but hey, at least 99.9% of you couldn’t give a crap, since it’s such a local issue.

I am so totally going to blog about Billy Corgan and Jessica Simpson because (1) I think it’s funny, (2) I ♥ Smashing Pumpkins, and (3) I will eventually want to break up the serious posts with something light.

And, I will publish my currently-in-draft post about dogmatism that uses radical unschoolers as a non-religious example.  But maybe not.  I don’t want to attract too much hate.

I already wrote my first post about how I became a Christian at the age of 28.  I need to re-read it and obsessively edit it and add some bling, but it will be posted tonight or tomorrow morning.

The other apology-related thing has to do with the post, Former Christian Apologizes for Being Such a Huge Shit Head for All Those Years, from My Sister’s Farmhouse.

I have been feeling lately like I need to issue a public apology to homosexuals (and a few private ones to people I know who were personally offended by my beliefs), and probably some other groups, too.  Her #1 totally applies to me word for word.

1.  I apologize to all the homosexuals.  I am sorry that I believed in a religion that condemns you.  I am sorry that for many years I thought that the bible was right in it’s condemnation of homosexuality.  I am sorry that when I no longer thought the bible was right about homosexuality being a sin, I did not raise a gigantic stink about it every Sunday right in the middle of the sermon… week after week after week…  until the church issued a restraining order against me and I could no longer come within a hundred feet of the sanctuary.

Not everything on her list applies to me, but it’s worth reading.

What a wonderful and brave woman to take responsibility for those things.

About a week and a half ago I wrote a post about how I hate this blog.  I talked about having no focus and not wanting the blog to be a deconversion blog.

Then there is this blog.  The random posts of a very confused, de-converting, former radically-conservative Christian.  That would actually work as a blog theme, but that is not what I want for this blog.

Since then, with the encouragement of my friends and readers, but I repeat myself, I have decided that this deconversion thing is such a huge part of who I am right now that I should not shy away from posting about it.

I’m not saying that this will be all apostasy all the time, but I did add a Religion category and a my deconversion tag.

Who knows, maybe I’ll even make “The random posts of a very confused, de-converting, former radically-conservative Christian” my new tag line.

Thanks so much for your support!

I’m going for it.  After taking the summer off from blogging, I decided that I do need to keep doing it.  I am still ditching my three and a half years of blogging cred to start a new blog, but that also was something I needed to do.  I just can’t go on being She’s Right.  Maybe it is that I am getting older, starting to realize that I am not always “right.”  Maybe it is the toxic political environment that makes me want to eschew the right/left dichotomy.  Whatever it is, I am done with it.  It’s no longer who I want to be.

So, here’s the new blog.  It’s not the same old political talk with a new name, though.  It’s a place for me to share the things that occupy my attention.  I think you’ll find there is more to me than just right-wing lunacy.  I can’t tell you what I will blog about.  We will just have to see what comes out.