Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Feb 1, 2012, 2:46 pm
This explains my work processes (and why my blogging is so erratic) so much better than anything I could write. http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2010/06/this-is-why-ill-never-be-adult.html
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Jan 30, 2012, 6:54 pm
One of the benefits of having your computer take a crap on you is that in many ways you get to start over.  Most of my life exists in digital format at this point.  I back up the important stuff.  i lost some unimportant stuff, and the process of reloading files from the backup gave me the opport...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Jan 24, 2012, 12:37 am
I've gotten delinquent with the blog again.  I'm very bad at this.  Too many projects.  To much work.  yada yada. On top of which, my computer spectacularly died last week, so as I hastily prepare for the new semester (and an entirely new course, which is part of the reason I've gone back ...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Sep 25, 2011, 12:47 pm
Llywellyn Publications has decided not to accept my manuscript.  However, they did suggest that I set it up as an eBook for the Kindle on my own, which I will probably do.  They are also still open to other manuscripts.  I have a couple small presses I can also approach. It will take me som...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Sep 1, 2011, 3:48 am
Part of the steampunk website is a section of examples of costumes made by myself and others that I break down into individual pieces to illustrate the relative ease of creating such looks.  It can also provide guidepoints for others.  I've just added two new examples, the Man's Casual Attire and ...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Sep 1, 2011, 1:44 am
I've added a new page to the steampunk website, with the rather non-creative title of "My First Costume."  This is geared toward people first coming to the site, particularly because they are wishing to attend a steampunk event but are at a loss who to start costuming for it without spending a bunc...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Aug 29, 2011, 2:26 pm
Today there's a rather mind-boggling post over at patheos.com, entitled "Is Wicca a Christian Heresy?"  I'll just let you read it - and my comments over there - for yourselves.  In short, however, I feel it largely just reversed the tired old "Christianity was stolen from paganism" arguments, poin...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Aug 24, 2011, 10:30 pm
I was shopping for fake flowers in a dollar store today when another woman joined me, marveling at the selection.  She started up idle chatter about the great prices, then told me how she gave thanks to God for the great prices because, as a born-again Christian, she gave thanks for everything. I'm...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Aug 18, 2011, 7:05 pm
...give a crap about lists. Over on About.com I wrote today about the "Real dont..." mentality, entitled "Differences between Definitions and Rules of Religion." This mentality is born of people who want to live a simple boolean existence, where everyone who is a part of "us" agrees on everyth...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Aug 13, 2011, 3:30 pm
http://steampunk.cnberyI've been adding lots of stuff to the new steampunk website, Steaming Apparel.  mostly its examples and some basic tips and tricks for people who aren't sure how to costume for steampunk: either because they aren't costumers, are new to steampunk, or both.  My work over ther...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Aug 8, 2011, 4:30 pm
Got home from GenCon late last night and have caught up on much needed rest.  Photos are up on facebook, although I've set it so everyone can view the photos (I hope.)  You can find them here: http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.2164576746465.2119112.1008025218  If the link doesn't work, let...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Jul 31, 2011, 1:09 am
Last week, Obama said that America voted "for a divided government, not a dysfunctional government."  I have to disagree, Mr. President.  The current debt debacle is exactly what we voted for.  People just weren't paying attention at the time. Every person in Congress was voted in by the Am...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Jul 29, 2011, 5:46 pm
I've been working on a new website, which is now live: http://steampunk.cnbeyer.com.  It's for steampunk costuming, particularly geared toward those who are not very familiar with steampunk and/or not terribly interested in sewing. It is very much a work in progress.  There's lots of stuff I...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Jul 29, 2011, 5:41 pm
August 1 marks the holiday of Lughnasadh for many neopagans. For those following the Wiccan holiday calendar (the four Celtic fire festivals paired with the two solstices and two equinoxes)  is the first of three harvest festivals - the other two being Mabon (fall equinox, around September 21) ...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Jul 22, 2011, 5:36 pm
I don't do public pagan events very often.  I haven't found one yet that was worth my time.  Case in point: the Milwaukee Pagan Pride Day.  I attended a few years ago, and it was mostly a vendor room...and much of what was being sold was fashion, not religious, (Celtic patterned bags and dresses,...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Jul 12, 2011, 5:21 pm
I have reached my breaking point on teenagers and young adults complaining that they are being "persecuted" because they are not allowed to practice Wicca, witchcraft, etc. in their parents' homes. I sort of understand the teenagers' plights.  They're young, they don't quite get it, and until...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Jun 21, 2011, 5:05 pm
Jonathan Dudley, a graduate of Yale Divinity School, recently posted perhaps the most straight-forward argument against condemning homosexuals in his post "Bible condemns a lot, so why focus on homosexuality?" When the Bible-thumpers quote Exodus, the counter-argument is easy: the vast majorit...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Jun 3, 2011, 6:04 pm
There's a bike path near my house that I regularly traverse on my bicycle for exercise.  It runs along a creek and a series of artificial ponds, and there's a variety of plant and wildlife to be found in the area. Yesterday I came across the smallest fawn I've ever seen.  No mother in sight....
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Jun 2, 2011, 5:00 pm
I'm back in Wisconsin and recovering from the World Steam Expo.  It's quite a bit larger than TeslaCon and the various steampunk events I have previously attended: lots of panels, activities, vendors, shows, dances, and just random goofiness. This first image is me rappelling off a platform. ...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - May 19, 2011, 4:25 pm
This is looking to be a good summer.  Classes are done, and thanks to medication I'm neither exhausted nor depressed, so hopefully the next three months will be more productive than last summer. My FAQ has made it through the first round of cuts at Llewellyn Publishing.  Crossing my fingers ...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - May 16, 2011, 6:20 pm
More crazy emails from students.  This time it was fairly simple: "Thanks for the F." No thanks needed.  I didn't give you that F.  You won that F all by yourself.  I merely recognized your accomplishments (or lack of). Students like to give the impression that poor grades are a refl...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - May 16, 2011, 5:39 pm
As more spillways are opened along the Mississippi, I am reminded of what I consider a basic fact: nature always wins.  Certainly we can control and harness it, but only to an extent.  In most years, the levees and sea walls work fine, for example.  But when the water gets high enough, nature...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - May 14, 2011, 9:04 pm
Hanging around on Yahoo!Answers, I come across of a lot of claims that Christianity is pagan, or at least questions of "Is Christianity pagan?" People need to start learning the meaning of words, because no matter where you think Christian ideas originate, claiming that Christianity is non-Chr...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - May 14, 2011, 5:27 pm
I submitted final grades for my students this week, and already one student is unhappy.  The most amazing email showed up in my inbox: "I dont understand how a 75% overall on three tests and a paper equal a c/d grade. thought it was a c. I missed ONE class all semester due to weather. The clicke...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - May 14, 2011, 5:07 pm
China Arnold has, yet again, been found guilty of microwaving her baby to death.  (One trial ended in mistrial, and a second was overturned on appeal.)  She's gone through a whole list of improbable explanations, pointing fingers at various other people but admitting she was so drunk that night sh...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - May 9, 2011, 1:45 am
The Jesus Fish has been a popular car decoration now for perhaps 15 years.  The fish is one of the earliest symbols in Christianity, so it makes sense. Then, someone with a sense of humor gave the fish feet, and replaced "Jesus" with "Darwin."  That was rather cute, although it was under...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Apr 9, 2011, 12:34 pm
I know doorstep evangelists drive some people crazy, sometimes because of particularly bad experiences with them.  I really haven't had those bad experiences, and after having one today, I realize I actually rather enjoy them. The gentleman at my door was advertising the Easter service at...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Mar 16, 2011, 8:02 pm
As the Japanese nuclear reactors continue to potentially burn away their casings, people around the world are calling for reactors to be shut down.  They are asking why reactors aren't made to withstand 9.0 magnitude earthquakes. The answer is: because the world is not wrapped in bubble wrap....
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Mar 15, 2011, 3:46 pm
This is a followup to yesterday's post. It was theoretically an apology.  After getting fired for his incredibly crass remarks, Gottfried put out a statement saying ""I sincerely apologize to anyone who was offended by my attempt at humor regarding the tragedy in Japan. I meant no disrespect...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Mar 15, 2011, 12:41 am
The Aflac duck has lost it's voice: the company fired voice actor Gilbert Gottfried after tweeting such "humorous" lines as "I just split up with my girlfriend. But like the Japanese say, 'They'll be another one floating by any minute now.'" What the hell is wrong with him?  How does he think...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Jan 15, 2011, 11:29 pm
It's been a depressing week news-wise: too many examples of what humans do when they get scared: they get violent, and they jump at invisible enemies, taking out innocents in the process. The world is much simpler when there's something we can clearly blame the badness on.  And if we take act...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Jan 15, 2011, 4:35 pm
The main website has now been moved from wicca.timerift.net to wicca.cnbeyer.com.  I may also eventually buy a catchy URL for the Wicca site and redirect to that location.
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Jan 7, 2011, 4:46 pm
Every fiber of my being groans at the upcoming release of Season of the Witch.  First, it stars Nicolas Cage.  I don't actually have anything against the man himself, but his choice of movies is abysmal.  Didn't The Wicker Man teach you anything, Mr. Cage? As a Wiccan, I expect this will st...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Jan 3, 2011, 6:18 pm
On About.com, I blogged today about How Important is a Prophet?  It was in reaction to a blog post over at ModernGnosis which stated "Aleister Crowley is no more Thelema than Moses is Judaism. The prophet is not the core of the religion. They are merely the mouthpiece for God." As a Wiccan,...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Jan 3, 2011, 1:49 am
Wicca for the Rest of Us is moving to a new server, as timerift will be shutting down in several months. So, the question is...what do I call the new domain?
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Dec 8, 2010, 4:30 pm
Every semester, students get to rate me 1 through 10, and they can write comments about me.  I don't get to read them until the beginning of the next semester. I always face these things with trepidation.  I'm made of pretty stern stuff, and I know that a lot of the negative comments come fr...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Dec 8, 2010, 1:44 pm
I'm still looking for ways to motivate myself to write more regularly.  One of the problems is I have too many projects.  I never have enough time for all of them, and my lack of prioritizing often means none of them really get done.  The problem with writing for this blog is that I'm already blo...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Dec 8, 2010, 1:38 pm
I've been teaching now for two years, and I love it. There's a lot of reasons for this, but it recently struck me just how much I am able to say what I want at this job. Sure, standing in the front of class yelling "bite me, wankers" would probably hurt my career, quite frankly I'm not often motivat...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Sep 13, 2010, 12:20 am
Today I may just have deep-sixed a friendship. Yahoo, being the overly clever thing that it is, started automatically sending me a friend's Twitter posts as status updates. I haven't seen him in a while, but we cross paths every few years. Regardless, I was shocked by the hate this generally...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Sep 13, 2010, 12:17 am
An interview of myself is now available at Real Wicca, a podcast dedicated to stripping away some of the silly myths attached to Wicca. I'm featured in episode 2. It gives some insight as to how I personally got to where I am today religiously.
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Aug 31, 2010, 10:40 pm
So, I was over on Facebook, and I was assaulted with an advertisement for "Free Wiccan Enrollment," which, among other things, promises training from "First to Elder." And I thought, "Oh, this will be good. Is this the Corellian Tradition, or has someone else upped the cheese factor?" Meet the Sa...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Aug 28, 2010, 12:59 am
I gave up thinking of my country, the United States as particularly progressive some years ago.  Today I found one more reason to discount that claim:  South Africa has a Wiccan member of Parliament. Just for the record, the number of Wiccan members of the US Congress is zero. No member ...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Aug 28, 2010, 12:03 am
At the beginning of this month I posted the article The Devil Made Me Do It, concerning a man on trial for murdering his wife, which he claims he did while being possessed. A reader asked if I was actually suggesting that there might be merit in the man's claims. My answer was essentially th...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Aug 27, 2010, 10:41 pm
While I am not a manic depressive, I certainly have a certain minor manicness to my creativity.  I'm in one of those periods now.  I approached this blog today with some trepidation.  I haven't been in the mood to write.  Yet once I started writing, I wanted to continue.  I tend to work like th...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Aug 27, 2010, 7:27 pm
The question was asked of me about a dozen times in the last week:  What is steampunk?  At least twice it was asked by people who were actually AT the steampunk ball.  They heard about the party last minute and threw costumes together with the help of friends, but they still weren't sure what the...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Aug 27, 2010, 6:46 pm
Seven days after surgery, I headed down to Milwaukee last night for a steampunk ball.  I haven't previously been big into the scene, but I can definitely see myself really getting involved. Steampunk, fashionwise, just might be the new goth.  I was a goth back when being goth was an actual a...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Aug 27, 2010, 6:30 pm
I've been absent for the last week or so due to an oophorectomy and cystorectomy.  For those interested in medical details, I went in to drain a cyst on my left ovary that had bloated the organ to a size larger than a baseball.  There was concern that they would have to remove it entirely, which w...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Aug 12, 2010, 3:24 pm
Isaac Bonewits passed in his sleep this morning after a long battle with colon cancer.  He was 60 years old.  Bonewits was a  highly respected member of the neopagan community, where he has been influential for decades...Read more at my Alternative Religions blog.
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Aug 9, 2010, 3:18 am
There isn't actually a punchline here.  I'm just describing last Thursday night. Once I year I attend a huge gaming convention in Indianapolis.  The first night there, I went out for drinks with a tableful of new-found friends.  Most of the time we talked about gaming, but at some point...
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Catherine B. posted an article on To Know, Will and Dare - Jul 26, 2010, 7:57 pm
Got to view the Season Five finale over the weekend, and it left me very, very angry. The show has never been big on clear cut rules of time travel.  But there have always been certain things that they seem dedicated to avoiding just on the grounds of common sense. This weekend, for the...
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