What's your favorite planet?

Hello everyone and thank you for coming over to the liver blog. It's so nice to have you here. If you are a die hard Coach Speirs care page reader you may remember this celestial conversation from a few months ago. If not, no worries. Either way, it continued last night.

"I like Jupiter because it rhymes with stupider," Aidan told me while tucking in on the top bunk.

"I like Uranus because it rotates sideways," I said. "Like me."

"And Uranus is here and here," Aidan said pointing his finger to two places on his body which will remain nameless; with a 2nd grade grin as though we were riding the school bus together.

Dog gone, we've already been through this. The wrong body parts assigned to "Uranus." Get it? "Your Anus." Not "Your. . ." well, you know. I'm not going to say. But a few months ago I did the right thing and used real language and plainly explained to Aidan what was and wasn't Uranus. And now it looks like he still doesn't have it right.

I didn't write it in the Mama Panda job description to have this conversation. I mean, these are my kids, my babies. Do we really have to talk about Uranus?

And then there's myspace.com. And the whole social networking via the internet. Fine. I mean, look at me and my liver blog. But yesterday I had to tell Amanda what a "pimp" is and why I hate the "B" word more than the "F" word. I had to tell her why her 5th grade friends should not be posting pictures of themselves in bikinis. I had to wonder if she even knows exactly what the "s-e-x" word means anyway. Must I think about all this on a Monday evening?

And I had to think on how to tell all this to my dear 'ol traditional Husband whose parental approach is, "No more computers ever! Amanda and Aidan are grounded for the rest of their lives! Burkas for school clothes!"

There is one and only one thing I know. 1.) Myspace.com is not going away. OK two things. 2.) And we have to figure out what to do with it. "We" being us-parents, us-church people, us-anybody who cares about anything about youth. Because it's h-u-g-e.

I did think of one thing. I inquired with Professor Mary Hess here at the seminary. She specializes in media studies and believes that we should not be afraid of media but should consider it a friend and a tool for ministry, for social change. She imagines Wiki software that challenges us with faith questions. (What's a Wiki?) Anyway, she was kind of enough to engage with me even from her sabbatical. I'll let you know what she says.

So there you go. Question of the day. Can't we just worry about stuff like open heart surgery? Or how about this topic -- Aidan's annual summer shave. Now that's the kind of parenting we like. Haircuts. Much better. Here you go.

Take care everyone!

With love, T