Yes, it’s Wednesday and it’s time for Joyce’s HodgePodge. If you click on the button, you can go straight over to Joyce’s blog to see her answers and the links to everybody else’s posts! And join in if you like…

1. The popular saying, ‘All is fair in love and war’ is originally credited to English writer John Lyly.  Is he right? 

I’d say he was totally wrong. It’s a flippant thing to say to make excuses for bad behaviour. There is nothing, NOTHING fair about war. Whether is dropping bombs on innocent people because some people from their country went the wrong way about trying to get their voices heard, or the kid that is killed in action trying to fight for the freedom of others or the ones that survive – whether they chose to be fighting or happened to find themselves living in a warzone who will be physically or mentally affected for the rest of their life…? Doesn’t seem any fairness in that. As for love, I don’t know if you can tie that into ‘fairness’ or ‘justice’. Love is about giving even when it might not be deserved. But it certainly isn’t about being unfair either. Yeah. I’m not sure where John Lyly was coming from when he made that statement!

2. Are you a cereal eater?  What’s your favourite kind?
I’m not a big cereal eater. My current back up cereal (what I eat when I’ve ran out of bread or can’t be bothered to make pancakes) is All Bran Golden Crunch. I’m a kelloggs girl. I do like Cheerios, but I never buy them because they’re made by Nestlé.

3. A five year old in Pennsylvania was recently given a ten day school suspension for talking with a friend about shooting one another with a Hello Kitty Bubble gun (the gun blows bubbles).  She did not have the gun with her at school.A psychological evaluation was also ordered and the incident was recorded on her permanent record.  The suspension was later reduced to two days and her parents are suing to have the incident removed from her file. Your thoughts?  (If you missed the story click here for details). 
That’s not a story I’d heard about because our newscasters are pushing one story – that it’s SHOCK! SNOWING IN WINTER!!! :O

My thoughts are that we probably don’t know all the details of how the conversation went down or what the tone of it was (and that can make a huge difference, never mind all the reports of kids turning up to school with guns before and since Newtown massacre). The suspension seems totally extreme to me, given that the kid is 5 years old and we’re talking a toy that blows bubbles. A chat about why it’s a serious thing to want to ‘shoot’ one another and a word with the parents about the concerns of playing ‘shooting games’ would be the action I’d likely take in that situation. And maybe thinking about what toys kids should be allowed/not allowed to bring to school and making the reasons for that clear to both children and parents. I certainly feel extremely uncomfortable when I see little kids pretending to shoot to kill and it’s funny (the mock shooting, the mock dramatic death ‘cowboys and indians style’). Well, it’s not so funny when a 6 year old kid brings a real gun to school they found in their uncle’s house and shoots another kid.

4. Whatever happened to_____________________________?
Hypercolour t-shirts and socks. And yo-yos. Remember when you used to have your friends running up to you in the playground and breathing on your clothes to make them change colour? It was kind of gross in retrospect!

5.  January 23rd is National Handwriting Day, billed as a day to reacquaint yourself with a pen and pencil.  Do you like your handwriting? Do you prefer to print or write in cursive?  This date was chosen because its the birth date of John Hancock. What’s the last thing you signed your name to?
My handwriting constantly changes. I tend to have this weird ‘print/cursive’ combo. I can’t stand when I have to write in block capital letters. The last thing I signed my name to was some client notes!

6. Speaking of John Hancock…ever been to Philadelphia? Do you have any desire to visit the city of Brotherly Love?  
Um. I have to admit that I”ve never felt this huge need to visit Philadelphia. I do have some friends who live near Philly, and ya know the Fresh Prince grew up there ‘West Philadelphia born and raised‘ and I have a couple of friends who’ve lived in the really economically deprived areas of Philadelphia. I wouldn’t mind going to visit, but it’s not a huge priority on my ‘to-visit’ list. Sorry Philadelphia

7.  Share something funny you’ve heard a child say.  
It’s hard to beat Mr Teapot’s loud declaration at his Daddy’s Ordaination service ‘Oh no! not the bible!’ You’ve got to love a minister’s kid. Or Elastaboy’s letting me know that my first name is in fact not ‘Laura Anne’ but ‘Auntie‘. And that Mini Kahuna has reached the stage of toddlerhood where everything belongs to him. ‘That’s MY iPhone’ (no I think it’s Mummy’s). I’d usually have some good kiddle stories for you, but sadly I was ill weekend before so missed my trip to Eyemouth to see Elastaboy & Mr Teapot (boo hiss) and over the last week I’ve been so busy with going down to England, work and Guides that I’ve not seen any of my friends in almost 2 weeks (more boos and hisses).

8.  Insert your own random thought here.
There has indeed been a wee bit of snow in these parts, but it has been the most rubbish snow blowing horiztonal into your face instead of falling to the ground to make the world look pretty and white. Boo hiss. The office has been rather chilly this week, I had to wear my ‘Christmas sale’ hoodie over my work clothes to keep warm. Here I am joined by one of our Elmo slipper mascots…

Also, I’m inviting people to guest post in my new ‘Quote of the Week’ series. Every week I choose a quote and write a wee reflection on it, but it would be great to have some more takes on some of the quotes. You can check the first posts here.If you’d like to join in, let me know and I’ll send you a wee e-mail with some quote options!