What Do You Think of That?

This is a question for the readers. Do you find you have to disagree w/ almost everything your mind says? You know all them Pentecostal told me, when I pray I need to also listen to God. I don't buy it. God is not the voice in my head, and now I feel a whole lot better. That voice is out to kill me. It makes a whole lot more sense that God be on the outside. It is another pentecostal lie that says that Jesus lives in your heart. The Word is in our heart, which is Christ in a way, in the way of his mindset, not his actual being. Their is no person on the inside you should be listening to. Due to my previous history of drug use, a gate has been opened and not a ot of good things got through. I sincerely believe that drugs open the mind to the spiritual world, but both sides get in. If you don't believe me, go find some truly burnt out hippies. They have some pretty strange ideas and some satranger behavior. Where do you think that influence comes from? I watched a program on the CNN Book Channel or whatever its called. The man that was speaking had just had a book published called "The God Delusion". He blames the idea of God for a lot of things. I watched his program and find myself disappointed. All his arguments were at best trite. I realized that in myself I'm looking for something, some solid argument, so I could be, "Aha God, yeah he showed you." I don't want to believe in God. I don't want to believe this is the Truth. But nothing else even comes close. In this I realized that God is terrible. This was so refreshing! I don't meant the terrible that is more closely related to awful. I mean the terrible that means great w/ a touch of exciting terror and awe. The kind of terrible that is so jealous and wild that He will destroy your life, your world, just to force you to your knees, to force you to His Breast. A big and determined lover that pursues harder than any Jason or Freddy Krueger, and for some reason that makes me happy.

How Bored Must the Readers Be?

See the whole point I was trying to make yesterday was..... oh, nevermind. You win. I will continue to try to place a few words every few days to appease the masses. I attend an adult youth group. Its the best way to describe it. Those who haven't caved yet to the Sunday Morning Christianity can come Tuesday nights to a relaxed informal atmosphere w/ coffee and movie clips. Its filled with mostly twenty-somethings and its jut as common to hear Stevie Wonder as Mercyme, or as I call them Mercyplz, as in please turn them off. So we just started a teaching on how the world views the church, good, bad, and funny. It is pretty eye opening and I feels like this could lead to something deeper. Last week we looked at the dangers of conforming vs. isolating, and tried to figure out how to balance in the middle. This is the exact sort of struggle I'm having right now in my own life. Where is the line? The best I can say right now is it moves, so follow the Spirit and you'll always be on the right side.

Vacancy

Somewhere in the last two months I climbed back in my head. I was out for about two years, I learned alot, but now I need to mull it over, "overanalyze" it, and I might come out again after that. I sit down to think my great prophetic insights and find I have none. Therefore I feel to write anything is to simply waste your time. My life is not exciting enough to write about, I don't pay close enough attention to the outside world to find anything interesting there, and as aforementioned the brain is on drain. I can make you a pretty nice dovetail joint though. I'm really still struggling to define myself in my new enviroment, I find myself drawn to some of my old habits (cigarettes and video games) and still trying to break the grip of others. I also find myself drifting from others, writing. I finding myself with a stronger desire for God and desire to find something to do for Him, otherwise just treading water, and learning about varnish.

Somewhere in Space

Sorry everybody, I know I just sort of dropped off the face of the earth. My computer has an unregistered version of Windows, so I can't log in, and nothing worth writing about has happened, and I'm just really going through a dark time. I could use prayer, if you do that sort of thing, just that my faith gets strengthened. How is that for vague? Otherwise call me and we can talk about it, maybe. I'm doing better and plan on improving more, its just an uphill battle and I was feeling pretty alone for awhile. Things are getting better, or getting worse before they get better, but they always get better.

Hey, That's My Answer

An unidentified teen was expelled from Thaddeus Stevens today on account of plagiarism. It appeared the student had been taking very detailed notes from the teacher's lectures and from the textbooks provided for the class. The teen had then been studying these notes and using them to answer test and homework assignments, without giving the proper citations to the source material. The student was quoted as saying, "I guess I saw everybody else doing it and thought it was okay. The people who didn't take notes really seemed to be struggling, and I knew I didn't want to be one of them. This was the only thing I could think to do." It would be comforting if this were an isolated case, but across the United States and even in other countries, a pandemic of note taking is undermining the educational system. Many teachers are fighting back and are requiring a no pencil policy in their classrooms. But even here the students have begun to use cell phones to dictate key points.
"I don't want students thinking they can use the information I provide to answer complicated questions. I worked hard to arrive at these conclusions and I don't appreciate some slacker coming along, copying the information, and thinking he has the right to use it." This quote of a local High School Math teacher is the common sentiment felt around the world, a world that is tired of being taken for granted for being smart.

Breaking News

There was an assasination attempt on our president today, our student president. She had become very vocal recently about affirmitaive action in grades. Under the new initiative a certain percentage of the A's would have to be allocated to ethnic minorities. This initiative faced strong opposition from the Math Club lobbies and the Honor Society lobby. This tension exploded today, when the president, en route between addressing the student congress and a luncheon with the ambassador to UPenn, was gunned down by an unknown assailant. As of the hour, the police are investigating the list of potential valedictorians to see if they kind find a suspect to link to the crime. The President is recovering in her Presidential Dorm Room under the watchful eye of Wackenhut Secret Security.
p.s. Penny here is your link to the The Hug Poem.

A Can of Lies

I was first introduced to Half-Caff today. Its created by Folger's and is advertised as the same full taste with only half the caffeine. To be quite frank, I don't trust it. The Half-Caff is spelled with two f's, which is the exact same amount of f's in the regular caffeinated version. If it has half the caffeine, shouldn't it have half the f's? Yeah it should, and Folger's knows that, so it makes me wonder, "Why the two f's?" The answer is obvious, because its actually slightly more than half the caffeine. Oh Folger's, you thought you could fool the regular joe, but I have caught you in your own lies, so for that I'm sticking to the regular joe.

Venn Zen

You all need to check this out at least once, or if you're like me it will go into your growing list of blogs to keep tabs on. Its a pretty funny take on life brought to you in easy (usually) to understand chart form. The dots that are connected in this artist's mind are hilarious and off-kilter, one of my favorite combinations. So don't take my word for it, get to it.

Movies That Move the Masses

This is a list I found. It is a good list, a down-home list. This isn't some elitist, artsy-fartsy, so I look so cultured, list. This is the list of the masses. So check it out, watch them, enjoy them, and see what you think.
p.s. I got the link working now. Sorry.

Politics According to Google

This is just a funny little quirk, or is it? What I need you to do is go to the Google homepage and search the word "failure" or better yet "miserable failure" and check out who you get. Why, you might ask? Maybe because of his lousy performance and maybe because of this. I'll let you decide, either way, its funny.

Because People Need to Know

The boy scouts have an a long illustrious history. They have served Americans throughout the ages in various forms: teaching young boys responsibility, decorating doors in Christmas wreathes, helping old ladies across the street, and selling those wonderful cookies. Wait, girl scouts sell the cookies, but I eat them in honor of the boy scouts. But the best part of boy scouts by far is the earning of merit badges. These small, round little wonders let the world know, that you are not some simple loser, but that you have accomplished something, you are somebody. But alas, all those not active in boy scout-dom have been deprived of the immense joy and sense of accomplishment contained in that small cotton patch. All that is about to change. For the first time ever, I'm offering the everyman scout merit badges. Using the top secret method I can custom make a merit badge, so you can show the world, what you have accomplished. This is going to be the first line of badges:

Watched the Entire First Season of Macgyver Merit Badge

Maxed Out All My Credit Cards Merit Badge

Master Myspace Design Layout Merit Badge

and my personal favorite, Mashed Potato Sculpture Merit Badge

This is just the start of, I hope, a long history of enabling people to proudly wear their accomplishments for all to see. But I need more ideas, so everybody, cough'em up. Tell me what I should make into the second wave of badges. No one is exempt, no accomplishment to small, no reference too vague, lets show the world, I am Somebody.

All Points Bulletin On My Evil Twin

This is warning to all people I know, their is an evil twin out there trying to kill me. She has been trying to get information about my whereabouts, you must not, I repeat, you must not tell her anything. She's crazy and quite possibly emo. She can be recognized b/c like me, she was born on July 26th, and like me, she has an older half-sister, three younger siblings, a mom from a South American country, and a dad from a small town in Wisconsin. She often goes by the alias, Anna Marie Pickled Cucumbers Banana Sandwich Von Crapp and claims to be my daughter, just to get information from unsuspecting relatives. She is very persuasive and often tries to convince others that in fact I'm the evil twin. This is untrue. I was born first and she was cloned from me. Do not believe her story about I'm the evil clone and she was sent back to the past to kill me. Do not be persuaded by her trend setting futuristic style or her knowledge of my family and friends. She is very smart and very convincing. If you have any information regarding my evil twin, please let me know, and for goodness sake, do not tell her I'm living in Pennsylvania, or that my email address is notminebydesign@yahoo.com, or that I have this top secret blog. The results could be catastrophic.

My Legacy

I got into a little trouble today. I think if the officer hadn't understood my confusion, it could have been a lot of trouble. You see, my friend told me that "Children are the future". I thought that was pretty cool and it really simplified things for me in my mind. So for the rest of the day any kid I ran across got a "hertz doughnut" in the arm. Anyone who doesn't know what a hertz doughnut is, its when you punch someone in the arm and say "hertz doughnut". Well I guess their is some law against hitting children, because some over protective mom must have let the authorities know and they were knocking on my door that night. They were a bit confused and surprised by my behavior and were looking for an explanation. I told them about my friend and how had explained about children being the future. I told that I had intense desire to be famous and leave behind a legacy. I guess the long and short of it was, I was trying to leave a lasting mark on the future. They kind of just stared at me with their mouths slightly open and then, shaking their heads turned and walked away.

Ode to Old

I think it says something about old age if you can sport a World's Greatest Grandparents T-Shirt and think you actually are. I think they must, why else would they being wearing it? Maybe it is some sort of competition initiation. If you think your the world's greatest grandparent, buy this shirt, wear it, and when you run into a similarly dressed geriatric, the fun begins. Right out of the gate, they both go for the cheek-pull, it is judged on final distance of the cheek from the face and the longevity of soreness and redness, whining and squirming on the part of the recipient is also duly noted. Next, the elderly contestant attempts to regal us with one of his "back in my day" stories. Points are awarded here for the number of yawns and eye rolls and how quickly the listener remembers he left a cake in the oven or a child down a well. Senior moments are encouraged. If any of the contestants can pull off the difficult maneuver of falling asleep mid-sentence, the victory, is pretty much a given. The final feat of senility is the guilt trip. Here the senior is attempts to convince the listener that they don't visit enough and are entirely ungrateful for the hard work and skillful mastery of raising this family. Tears have become almost mandatory for a competitive edge and anything from threats to bribes have been employed to ensure a swift return. This is always a food time for the grandparent to pull out old skeletons and family secrets, especially hinting at them in front of strangers and in public places. The points are tallied up and the final victor is decided. As a badge for their victory, the loser is stripped of all their world's greatest paraphanelia, this includes key chains, license plates, t-shirts, visors, and fanny packs. These items are awarded to the victor. This and discount coffee with my AARP discount are why I can't wait to get old.

Math is My Friend

Today in breaking news, math has proven once and for all that girls are evil.
The equation as I understand it goes like this:

Girls require time and money.

"Time is money."

So girls are money squared.

Money is the root of all evil.

So girls are evil.


This and other math breakthroughs can be found here.

Whatsamatta U

I'm in my first week of Vo-Tech School. That stands for Vocational and Technical for those of you who didn't know. Trade Schools are kind of infamous for their "bottom of the barrel" student body and I have the perfect example. I am not making this up. These words actually had the opportunity to be expelled from a student's mouth. The question was, "What is a plethora?" The reply? "Oh, isn't that those fake leather pants you buy at the mall?" Three days in and I feel smarter already.

Never Too Old For Cartoons

For some reason I haven't been able to outgrow cartoons. I mean yes some of them have lost their pizzazz and you won't catch me watching Blue's Clues or Arthur. No offenses to those who enjoy the aformentioned programs. But I love Spongebob and Foster's Home for Imagianary Friends. I also love the animated movies of Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli. But the real reason I'm writing this is to highlight the fact that you can watch some of my favorite cartoons on these sites. First off is http://toonamijetstream.com. I go their to watch Naruto. Naruto was a popular Manga in Japan and is now an equally successful cartoon. The main character is an orpan ninja in training and the website has the first five or six episodes. But be quick they will only be up for about a month longer. The nice thing though is they post a new episode every week or so. The second site is http://turbonick.com. This site has tons of winners. they have newbies like Spongebob and Avatar, but the best part is they have classics like Ren and Stimpy, Rocco's Modern Life, and Invader Zim. I love it! So if you got some time to kill and a broad band connection, I strongly reccommend getting your kid on and watching some old school toons. The best part there is little to no commercials, so sweet.

As Diverse as a Box of No. 2 Pencils

This one is more of a thinker, more of that big picture stuff I seem to get stuck in. I'm just got finished with diversity training. So I feel I'm adequately educated to comment on the subject. We were taught all about acceptance of differences. This is diversity. But strangely enough, all of us, being diverse and accepting, are actually not. If I dislike homosexuals or their lifestyle, I'm seen as unacceptable. But why isn't a homosexual seen as unacceptable for not accepting my view? I'm not trying to argue right or wrong. I am strictly talking about acceptance. If I'm supposed to be accepting of women in the workplace, why aren't they expected to except males who prefer women in the home? You could try to carry that over to different skin colors. But if you do, could you be more specific? How dark does my skin have to be before I'm no longer white? If you hate Native Americans because of their skin color, you should probably also hate most high school cheerleaders. They tan so much its the same color. So maybe you hate their culture. This I can understand a little better, but get it straight. Skin color is such a poor indicator of what someone is like. You might as well hate all people who wear baseball caps, at least they had a choice in it. Even here, the diversity proponents perpetuate the cycle by acting as if their is such a thing as ethnicity based on skin color. Ethnicity is based on upbringing. If I was raised in a Asian family, but I'm dark-skinned or round eyed, I'm still Asian. We need a massive rethinking of skin color. It needs to be treated as it actually is, something independent of all other attributes. But that is just a tangent, back to the subject at hand. Diversity in my school, means everybody thinks the same way. We all accept everything and everybody as long as they do the same. As soon as someone has concrete beliefs that disagree with your own, they are intolerant. We all sit in class, and say we need to celebrate diversity. We do this by having no distinguishing differences, and sitting around applauding each other on our ability to accept diverse peoples. I end by saying only the truly diverse and acceptant will even be able to give this a read, without thinking of me as a bigot and hate monger, and in this I rest my point. I actually teach acceptance of all people, though non-acceptance towards specific behavior. The world system wants extremists in all regards. I preach moderation and middle ground. The true balance of a loving and violent God.

The Best Thing Since Sliced Bread....

I found myself traveling across this great land recently. This creates the opportunity to participate in one of my favorite activities, truck stop diners. This of course runs the risk of the crabby waitress. Up until just recently, I found myself often at the whims and fancies of a chain smoking, post-menopausal, retired Dallas Cowboys cheerleader. They would give you that look, expressing their desire to be caressing that cigarette, left still smoking in the break room, and remembering the glory days when Bobby Quarterback use to shell the big bucks just to shake her pom-poms. Instead she in some dirt dive waiting on geriatrics spending their pension checks on senior discount coffee and French onion soup. But my brother and I think we have found a solution. We all know that every waitress is dependent on tips. I mean come on $3 an hour isn't going to get you very far in life. She already smokin' that money up, just to deal with the AARP fan club. So we have created an incentive. When we first find ourselves seated at the booth, we place a "tip counter" on the table in plain sight. The tip counter is a small device with a number amount printed on it, much the same way that an odometer would. The words "YOUR TIP" are printed huge right above it. There are two buttons on the top of the device, one reduces the amount and the other increases it. So the waitress rolls her eyes, I hit the button, you just lost ten cents lady. She doesn't fill my cup with everybody else, that's 20 more cents. I think this helps them visualize in a more tangible way how their behavior is affecting their pay scale. After just a few minutes all you have to do is hover your hand over the tip counter and, you can see an almost magical transformation. It has greatly improved my restaurant experience. If this sounds like something that you need, just drop me a line and we'll send you one for the paltry cost of $10. You easily pay that off in the benefit of improved restaurant service, I know I have.

Too Much Thinking Leads to Too Much Action

I made it. I just finished the last week of Summer School. Anyone who has finished a semester of college has a feeling of the relief I feel. I'm blaming that black cloud of projects and papers for my recent blog inactivity. I'm also blaming anything having to do with chewing gum. I was one step from inadvertent calamity, right at that precipice of disaster, I realized I couldn't walk and chew gum at the same time. I quickly swallowed the antagonistic wad of cud, and tragedy was avoided. I swear I live with way to much excitement. I was riding the Lancaster Metro, this is a small and inconspicuous form of transport in this burgeoning Amish utopia. Even here, I was quickly drawn into a conspiracy for national takeover. Thanks to my photographic memory, I remember it word and am going to transcribe it for you below. It was between two Hispanic gentlemen, they were speaking in Spanish, and thought I didn't understand.
Afortunado para mi­ hablo espanol!
For the sake of clarity, I will refer to them by the name of Pedro and Jose, though I don't know their actual names, also I will right the conversation in English so you can understand.

Jose: Long live the revolution.
Pedro: Yes, long live the revolution and the Holy Mother.
Jose: We are so close to taking over this pathetic country.
Pedro: I know they are so focused on the middle east, that they don't notice as we get our operatives hired in their homes, in their orchards, and mowing every yard across this feeble country.
Jose: Soon we shall takeover all their jobs and force them to be our mindless slaves. I have already been offered the overseer's position in Missouri, but they have offered that to almost everybody. I'm holding out for something a little more glamorous.
Pedro: I already took a position as a slave driver. I'm going to help rebuild the Aztec pyramids in place of the Washington Monument. I can't put my finger on it, I love the feel of a leather whip between my fingers.
Jose: I understand your sentiments. (looking at me) Look at that stupid white boy, completely oblivious to all that is about to take place. Doesn't he look fat and ugly?
(they both laugh)
Pedro: He certainly is more ugly than most. How foolish these arrogant Americansns are, not taking time to learn our language.
Jose: Yes, they can't speak our language so they have done us the favor of already translating everything over to spanish for us.
This will save us a lot of time in the rebuilding. But alas, this is my stop, for the motherland, brother.
Pedro: Yes, long live the revolution, goodbye