Originally posted Friday, January 30, 2009 at 12:35am
So a young man once wished to discover true wisdom, so he traveled far and wide to many foreign lands before he found a remote monastery where understanding was said to be found. He prostrated himself before the monks and humbly begged to be permitted lodging, that he might study with them and learn from them.
"All right," they said, and accepted him into their society.
Upon his first night in the monastery, he noticed a mysterious wooden door with a strange rumbling noise coming from within. He asked the monks what the noise was.
"You must become a monk to learn the answer to your question," they answered, "but when you do, you will learn the key to the meaning of life."
"All right," he said, and retired to his cloister for the evening. However, he could not sleep a wink because of the noise, and tossed and turned all night contemplating the mystery.
"How can I become a monk?" he asked over breakfast. "I must discover the secret behind the wooden door and learn the key to the meaning of life."
"To open the wooden door, you must read every book in the Western literary canon. Then you shall be one step closer to becoming a monk," they said.
This seemed quite strange to the young man, but the monks gave him a reading list, and he set off at once to complete his task. After three long years, at last he was finished, and returned to the monastery.
It turned out that he had only read the Cliffs Notes for "Silas Marner," but the monks forgave him this small oversight and opened the wooden door. Behind it, there lay a mysterious bronze door.
"To open the bronze door, you must first learn to pray in every language on Earth," they said. 'Then you shall be one step closer to becoming a monk."
This seemed quite demanding to the young man, but he set off at once to complete his task. After twelve long years, at last he was finished, and returned to the monastery.
It turned out that the young man could not remember how to pray in Klingon, but the monks forgave him this small oversight and opened the bronze door. Behind it, there lay a mysterious silver door.
"To open the silver door, you must learn to paint with all the colors of the wind. Then you shall be one step closer to becoming a monk."
The young man was not sure what that even meant, but he set off at once to complete his task. After twenty long years, at last he was finished, and returned to the monastery.
It turned out that he had missed a shade, but the monks forgave him this small oversight and opened the silver door. Behind it, there lay a mysterious golden door.
"To open the golden door, you must first count every blade of grass on Earth. Then you shall be -"
"Yeah, yeah, I know," the young man said. "Let's get on with it."
Counting every blade of grass on Earth seemed mildly implausible to the young man, but he set off at once to complete his task, becoming the world's leading agronomist in the process. After thirty long years, at last he was finished, and returned to the monastery.
It turned out that he was off by five, but the monks forgave him this small oversight and opened the golden door. Behind it, there lay a mysterious diamond window.
"To open the diamond window, you must learn to understand women," the monks said. "Then you may become a monk."
This seemed slightly impossible to the young man, but he set off at once to complete his task. He returned to his hometown and married his high school sweetheart, and then began to travel the world, visiting many an ancient library and scouring forgotten tomes for the wise words of the sages. He completed PhD's in psychology and women's studies and became a world-renowned author of self-help books on relationship advice. After forty long years, at last he was finished, and returned to the monastery.
It turned out that the young man had learned nothing, but the monks did not understand women either, so they forgave him this utter failure and opened the diamond window. Behind it, there lay a not so mysterious cellar door. I should point out that "cellar door" is one of the most beautiful phrases in the English language, and you should try working it into your everyday conversations if you don't believe me. Or visit its wikipedia page.
"To open the cellar door, you must correctly guess what the abbot of the monastery is thinking about. Then you shall be one step closer to becoming a monk," they said.
"That's easy," said the young man. "He's thinking about sex."
It turned out that if he had timed his guess either three seconds earlier or four seconds later, he would have been exactly right, but the abbot of the monastery was actually thinking about cars. The monks forgave the young man this small error and opened the not so mysterious cellar door. Behind it, there lay only a brown paper bag labeled "Key to the Meaning of Life." The bag was all the while emitting a strange rumbling noise, not unlike an empty stomach. It was quite apparent that the bag had not eaten for days.
"There are no more doors or windows," said the monks. "Only one thing is needed before you may become a monk. Once you have taken the vows, the brown paper bag will be opened, revealing the source of the strange rumbling noise mentioned at the beginning of this joke, and with it, the key to the meaning of life."
"What is it?" asked the young man, who was by now a hundred and forty-two, and consequently, a little impatient. "Since my youth I have done all that was asked of me. What is the one thing needed before I can become a monk and learn the key to the meaning of life?"
"You must be a Catholic," said the head abbot.
"Darn it, I'm a Lutheran!" said the young man, and he went home.
And so it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a Lutheran to become a monk.
Saturday, June 5, 2010
For lack of a better title
Originally posted Tuesday, January 20, 2009 at 2:12am
Well, another semester is upon us. I wish I had written more over the break, dear reader, but it is what it is, and there seems to be no good comeback to that remark. What are you supposed to say? "No, you fathead, you've got it all wrong. It isn't what it is!" See, it just doesn't work.
I am excited to be back in Oklahoma in most respects. However, I misplaced a book from Bizzell Library last semester, and now I can't find it anywhere. I've already renewed it twice, and I'm running out of options. I just don't know where to turn.
On the other hand, there are several problems with my house. For one thing, the water in the kitchen faucet will arbitrarily turn from hot to cold to hot again, and the garage door has a mind of its own. To get it to shut, you press the button, but it usually opens again, so you must stop it by pounding on the button three or four times in succession, and then pressing the button again, at which point it usually continues going up, and you have to pound on it another three or four times. You have to do that at least two or three times before it closes again, and when it reaches the bottom it usually opens again, and you have to repeat THAT whole routine two or three times before it finally stays down. I blame the poltergeists.
I've been attempting to fill out some job applications for this summer. So far, I'm applying to a Christian summer camp and to a Christian missionary organization to do an internship overseas, but I think I'd like to apply for some real jobs as well to balance out my options. I must say that filling out applications is incredibly frustrating and depressing. I especially hate the part where they ask for references, because I never have that information handy. Maybe I should type it up and store it all in one convenient place where I could . . . hmm . . . refer to it or something every time I needed it.
So I have been doing a fair amount of cooking recently, since I actually had access to a kitchen. The other week I made the most inauthentic jambalaya ever. I must have changed the recipe in five or six different ways. Like, apparently when you make jambalaya you're supposed to use something called filé powder, which comes from sassafras, and it has some kind of special flavor and also acts as a thickening agent. Yeah, so I don't even know where you would buy that because Shaw's didn't have it, so I used cornstarch instead. Now, I'm no logician, dear reader, but the food turned out pretty well anyway, which probably means the original recipe sucks.
Grocery shopping is actually kind of fun. I like to look at all the strange and exotic foodstuffs. The other day I saw a jar of these small red orbs floating in juice. The label said "Maraschino cherries," with a small box below that advertising the fact that they came "with stems." Because clearly, the stems are the most delicious part. In the olden times, our ancestors used ALL of the cherry.
A few days ago I cut my finger on a knife. My knife-handling skills may not be the greatest, but rest assured, I was not playing mumbletypeg or chopping tomatoes or anything like that. The knife was sitting in the dishwasher, and I just bumped my hand against it as I walked past. Fortunately I was unloading the dishwasher at the time, so the knife was probably clean, and I probably won't die of tetanus. (I actually found out the other day that the whole rusty-nail-in-the-foot thing is misleading. People don't get tetanus from rust, but tetanus germs like to live in the soil.)
You know, I really do a lot of stupid things. The other day I went skiing, and when I was done, I was about to get in my car and drive away, when I realized that I couldn't find my keys. I must have looked in my jacket pockets for a good five minutes, and I almost walked back to the ski trail to look for them until I realized that they were dangling out of my car door. And this reminded me a lot of the time at summer camp nine or ten years ago when I bought an ice cream sandwich at the snack stand and for a few moments thought I had lost my change, until I realized it was in my other hand, between my palm and the ice cream. They do seem to be one of the grand overarching themes of these notes of mine, but time would fail me if I were to tell you of all the stupid things I have done. I'd like to be smarter, but I'd also like these notes to be funnier. These goals conflict.
Some people would attribute all of these things to a lack of common sense, but as a philosopher, I know that common sense is overrated. One of the best ways to become famous as a philosopher is to think up something crazy and then believe it. Here's looking at you, David Lewis. Wikipedia calls your theory of modal realism "catastrophically counterintuitive." Somewhere out there in the great blue yonder there is a possible world where you're not dead yet and I'm giving you a high-five right now.
Of course, an even better way to become famous as a philosopher is to actually BE crazy. Hats off, Friedrich Nietszche.
Anyway, I think one of my major problems is that I'm far too self-critical, but I'm sure there are a lot of other things wrong with me as well.
So it occurred to me recently how odd it is that "Good day" and "good night" only make sense as salutations, whereas "good morning," "good afternoon," and "good evening" only make sense as greetings. Now, in the case of "good evening" and "good night," this might have to do with the fact that stereotypically, people meet each other in the evening and then head their separate ways as evening turns into night, but that's not necessarily the case. For example, suppose you are carrying on an illicit love affair with your next-door neighbor and you are meeting them for a 2 am secret rendezvous on a staircase outside a building hidden behind a shrubbery so that you can determine the time and place of your next romantic liaison. You can't greet your neighborly paramour by saying "Good night," because that would sound odd. Instead you must resort to "Howdy," or "Wassup?" or perhaps "Lookin' good, hot stuff."
Incidentally, every now and then I read a book and come across a line or two which are just absolutely amazing when taken out of context, so for your enjoyment I would now like to run together two sentences from "Thinking and Deciding," which I recommend, with two from the novel "The Temple of the Golden Pavilion," which I don't.
"Appointments are a good idea, because they allow people to meet who would not otherwise meet. The long-run harm from breaking a single appointment is difficult to think about.
Presently I came to realize that my conviction - the conviction that I could never be loved - was itself the basic state of human existence. So now you know how I lost my virginity!"
I think they sort of almost fit together, don't you?
Psalm 118:9 It is better to take refuge in the LORD
than to trust in princes.
Romans 12:16 Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited.
Your humble servant,
Tomonthy
Well, another semester is upon us. I wish I had written more over the break, dear reader, but it is what it is, and there seems to be no good comeback to that remark. What are you supposed to say? "No, you fathead, you've got it all wrong. It isn't what it is!" See, it just doesn't work.
I am excited to be back in Oklahoma in most respects. However, I misplaced a book from Bizzell Library last semester, and now I can't find it anywhere. I've already renewed it twice, and I'm running out of options. I just don't know where to turn.
On the other hand, there are several problems with my house. For one thing, the water in the kitchen faucet will arbitrarily turn from hot to cold to hot again, and the garage door has a mind of its own. To get it to shut, you press the button, but it usually opens again, so you must stop it by pounding on the button three or four times in succession, and then pressing the button again, at which point it usually continues going up, and you have to pound on it another three or four times. You have to do that at least two or three times before it closes again, and when it reaches the bottom it usually opens again, and you have to repeat THAT whole routine two or three times before it finally stays down. I blame the poltergeists.
I've been attempting to fill out some job applications for this summer. So far, I'm applying to a Christian summer camp and to a Christian missionary organization to do an internship overseas, but I think I'd like to apply for some real jobs as well to balance out my options. I must say that filling out applications is incredibly frustrating and depressing. I especially hate the part where they ask for references, because I never have that information handy. Maybe I should type it up and store it all in one convenient place where I could . . . hmm . . . refer to it or something every time I needed it.
So I have been doing a fair amount of cooking recently, since I actually had access to a kitchen. The other week I made the most inauthentic jambalaya ever. I must have changed the recipe in five or six different ways. Like, apparently when you make jambalaya you're supposed to use something called filé powder, which comes from sassafras, and it has some kind of special flavor and also acts as a thickening agent. Yeah, so I don't even know where you would buy that because Shaw's didn't have it, so I used cornstarch instead. Now, I'm no logician, dear reader, but the food turned out pretty well anyway, which probably means the original recipe sucks.
Grocery shopping is actually kind of fun. I like to look at all the strange and exotic foodstuffs. The other day I saw a jar of these small red orbs floating in juice. The label said "Maraschino cherries," with a small box below that advertising the fact that they came "with stems." Because clearly, the stems are the most delicious part. In the olden times, our ancestors used ALL of the cherry.
A few days ago I cut my finger on a knife. My knife-handling skills may not be the greatest, but rest assured, I was not playing mumbletypeg or chopping tomatoes or anything like that. The knife was sitting in the dishwasher, and I just bumped my hand against it as I walked past. Fortunately I was unloading the dishwasher at the time, so the knife was probably clean, and I probably won't die of tetanus. (I actually found out the other day that the whole rusty-nail-in-the-foot thing is misleading. People don't get tetanus from rust, but tetanus germs like to live in the soil.)
You know, I really do a lot of stupid things. The other day I went skiing, and when I was done, I was about to get in my car and drive away, when I realized that I couldn't find my keys. I must have looked in my jacket pockets for a good five minutes, and I almost walked back to the ski trail to look for them until I realized that they were dangling out of my car door. And this reminded me a lot of the time at summer camp nine or ten years ago when I bought an ice cream sandwich at the snack stand and for a few moments thought I had lost my change, until I realized it was in my other hand, between my palm and the ice cream. They do seem to be one of the grand overarching themes of these notes of mine, but time would fail me if I were to tell you of all the stupid things I have done. I'd like to be smarter, but I'd also like these notes to be funnier. These goals conflict.
Some people would attribute all of these things to a lack of common sense, but as a philosopher, I know that common sense is overrated. One of the best ways to become famous as a philosopher is to think up something crazy and then believe it. Here's looking at you, David Lewis. Wikipedia calls your theory of modal realism "catastrophically counterintuitive." Somewhere out there in the great blue yonder there is a possible world where you're not dead yet and I'm giving you a high-five right now.
Of course, an even better way to become famous as a philosopher is to actually BE crazy. Hats off, Friedrich Nietszche.
Anyway, I think one of my major problems is that I'm far too self-critical, but I'm sure there are a lot of other things wrong with me as well.
So it occurred to me recently how odd it is that "Good day" and "good night" only make sense as salutations, whereas "good morning," "good afternoon," and "good evening" only make sense as greetings. Now, in the case of "good evening" and "good night," this might have to do with the fact that stereotypically, people meet each other in the evening and then head their separate ways as evening turns into night, but that's not necessarily the case. For example, suppose you are carrying on an illicit love affair with your next-door neighbor and you are meeting them for a 2 am secret rendezvous on a staircase outside a building hidden behind a shrubbery so that you can determine the time and place of your next romantic liaison. You can't greet your neighborly paramour by saying "Good night," because that would sound odd. Instead you must resort to "Howdy," or "Wassup?" or perhaps "Lookin' good, hot stuff."
Incidentally, every now and then I read a book and come across a line or two which are just absolutely amazing when taken out of context, so for your enjoyment I would now like to run together two sentences from "Thinking and Deciding," which I recommend, with two from the novel "The Temple of the Golden Pavilion," which I don't.
"Appointments are a good idea, because they allow people to meet who would not otherwise meet. The long-run harm from breaking a single appointment is difficult to think about.
Presently I came to realize that my conviction - the conviction that I could never be loved - was itself the basic state of human existence. So now you know how I lost my virginity!"
I think they sort of almost fit together, don't you?
Psalm 118:9 It is better to take refuge in the LORD
than to trust in princes.
Romans 12:16 Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited.
Your humble servant,
Tomonthy
And a sword will pierce your own soul
Originally posted Wednesday, December 31, 2008 at 1:40am
I must say, last semester was quite stressful and discouraging in several ways. I had many doubts about my future, and I wasn't sure if I was on right path to do what I really wanted to do in life. Consequently I had a difficult time choosing classes for next semester, particularly after all the classes filled up. Thankfully, it's Christmas break, and I have the opportunity to do a bit of soul-searching. I need to reconnect with my core values and key beliefs, my global vision for the new economy, and my corporate philosophy. I need to figure out what I really want to do. Perhaps I will achieve clarity and discover that I really want only three things in life: to live with Diego, continue painting, and belong to the Communist Party. Now, dear reader, you may be wondering, "Aren't you confusing yourself with the twentieth-century Mexican artist Frida Kahlo?" And my immediate reaction is no, I am not, because I don't have a unibrow, but you know what, dear reader? Maybe I am. But is that so wrong? And really, isn't that the point of being in college anyway? To find yourself, discover who you really are? Or maybe the point is to get a degree or something stupid like that. I'm not sure.
At the end of finals week I was delayed overnight in the Chicago airport because of the weather. The best part about that experience is that I got to see an ad featuring my favorite swimmer, Michael Phelps, talking about how Chicago should host the 2016 Olympics, let's see, about 16,000 times. On the plus side, I did get to see an awesome Tuvan throat-singing band called Alash Ensemble in concert the next day.
Last week I watched a Mongolian docudrama called "The Story of the Weeping Camel." Now, it was not actually a Christmas movie, but I did get to witness the birth of a camel, and not some fake-o animatronic camel either; this was for realsies. And isn't that what Christmas is all about, anyway? Stuff being born?
In the film the mother camel, Ingen Temee, refuses to nurse the baby camel, Botok. Without milk, Botok will die, but the Mongolian people appear to have this beautiful system where whenever there's a problem with an animal, they sing and play music to it to straighten it out. I have no idea how or why that would be effective, but apparently it is. Maybe the music actually doesn't do anything, but they just trick the animal into thinking it does.
The Christmas season goes on at my house. We still have our tree and our decorations up, and we haven't exchanged presents yet. To be honest, I have mixed feelings about Christmas. For one thing, it's sort of a made-up holiday. Of course, almost all holidays are. President's Day, for example, is mostly about sales at car dealerships. Or take New Year's. Let's have a holiday where we'll all get together and party it up for no other reason than that December is turning into January. Or how about this: we can do the same exact thing EVERY SATURDAY NIGHT and call it Next Week's Eve.
It turns out a lot of people already celebrate that holiday. Some of them even start celebrating on Thursday.
Now, don't get me wrong, the birth of Christ is an incredibly important event, and that is what Christmas is supposed to be about. In fact, one of the reasons I feel ambivalent about Christmas is that it's so secularized. I read somewhere that 96% of Americans celebrate Christmas, and if reports that some Americans cannot locate Canada on a map are true, then there are probably a few Americans who have never heard of Christmas, so there is a very small number of people who willingly choose not to celebrate it. The other reason is that Christmas has become a cultural obsession, and it's completely out of control. It influences the food we eat, the stories we tell, the music we listen to, the decorations we put up, and the sweaters we wear. It makes us be nice to other people for no particular reason, just because it's Christmas, but what I want to is this: when does that moment come when everyone subconsciously thinks to themselves, "If it were still Christmas I would cut you a break, but it's not Christmas anymore, so screw you"? In reality, the Christmas celebration has gotten to be over a month long, and I just don't think there's any rational reason to spend one twelfth of our existence meditating on the birth of Christ, much less eating fruitcake and talking about reindeer and Santa Claus.
Listen, I know the birth of Christ is SUPER important, and it should be amazing to us that God became a man, that God entered into His own creation in order to redeem that creation. But frankly, most churches never even use the word "incarnation," and I think their discussion of Christmas ends up being trite a lot of times. There are so many other important theological issues and events in Christ's life we could think about. For example, eight days after the birth of Christ, the Eastern Orthodox Church celebrates the circumcision of Christ.
Now, I was making a few Christmas cards the other day, and I ran out of envelopes. I don't know where I would have found replacements of the right size for the different cards I had, but fortunately I just happened to have an infinite roll of brown paper lying around, so problem solved. Really the only problem with wrapping your Christmas cards with an infinite roll of brown paper is that it takes forever.
Q: Tim, if I receive something in the mail from you, how will I know if it came in a regular white envelope or if it was wrapped in brown paper?
A: You'll just know.
Q: Are you sure?
A: Yes.
Up to this point I have scarcely made any jokes about substance abuse, which I really think are something that my readership has come to expect. And with that being said, I would just like to rectify that situation by wondering aloud, as it were, about what the people of Illinois were collectively smoking when they elected Rod Blagojevich as governor. Honestly, I don't know anything about his politics, but I've heard him address the media concerning all of these corruption charges and how he won't resign from his post even though everyone hates him, and the one thought that has hit me is that this guy really needs attention. Maybe that's what this whole mess is all about. Maybe all of the profanity-laced discussions caught on tape in the governor's office were really just a cry for help.
Luke 2:21
On the eighth day, when it was time to circumcise him, he was named Jesus, the name the angel had given him before he had been conceived.
Luke 2:34-35
34 Then Simeon blessed them and said to Mary, his mother: "This child is destined to cause the falling and rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be spoken against, 35 so that the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed. And a sword will pierce your own soul too."
I must say, last semester was quite stressful and discouraging in several ways. I had many doubts about my future, and I wasn't sure if I was on right path to do what I really wanted to do in life. Consequently I had a difficult time choosing classes for next semester, particularly after all the classes filled up. Thankfully, it's Christmas break, and I have the opportunity to do a bit of soul-searching. I need to reconnect with my core values and key beliefs, my global vision for the new economy, and my corporate philosophy. I need to figure out what I really want to do. Perhaps I will achieve clarity and discover that I really want only three things in life: to live with Diego, continue painting, and belong to the Communist Party. Now, dear reader, you may be wondering, "Aren't you confusing yourself with the twentieth-century Mexican artist Frida Kahlo?" And my immediate reaction is no, I am not, because I don't have a unibrow, but you know what, dear reader? Maybe I am. But is that so wrong? And really, isn't that the point of being in college anyway? To find yourself, discover who you really are? Or maybe the point is to get a degree or something stupid like that. I'm not sure.
At the end of finals week I was delayed overnight in the Chicago airport because of the weather. The best part about that experience is that I got to see an ad featuring my favorite swimmer, Michael Phelps, talking about how Chicago should host the 2016 Olympics, let's see, about 16,000 times. On the plus side, I did get to see an awesome Tuvan throat-singing band called Alash Ensemble in concert the next day.
Last week I watched a Mongolian docudrama called "The Story of the Weeping Camel." Now, it was not actually a Christmas movie, but I did get to witness the birth of a camel, and not some fake-o animatronic camel either; this was for realsies. And isn't that what Christmas is all about, anyway? Stuff being born?
In the film the mother camel, Ingen Temee, refuses to nurse the baby camel, Botok. Without milk, Botok will die, but the Mongolian people appear to have this beautiful system where whenever there's a problem with an animal, they sing and play music to it to straighten it out. I have no idea how or why that would be effective, but apparently it is. Maybe the music actually doesn't do anything, but they just trick the animal into thinking it does.
The Christmas season goes on at my house. We still have our tree and our decorations up, and we haven't exchanged presents yet. To be honest, I have mixed feelings about Christmas. For one thing, it's sort of a made-up holiday. Of course, almost all holidays are. President's Day, for example, is mostly about sales at car dealerships. Or take New Year's. Let's have a holiday where we'll all get together and party it up for no other reason than that December is turning into January. Or how about this: we can do the same exact thing EVERY SATURDAY NIGHT and call it Next Week's Eve.
It turns out a lot of people already celebrate that holiday. Some of them even start celebrating on Thursday.
Now, don't get me wrong, the birth of Christ is an incredibly important event, and that is what Christmas is supposed to be about. In fact, one of the reasons I feel ambivalent about Christmas is that it's so secularized. I read somewhere that 96% of Americans celebrate Christmas, and if reports that some Americans cannot locate Canada on a map are true, then there are probably a few Americans who have never heard of Christmas, so there is a very small number of people who willingly choose not to celebrate it. The other reason is that Christmas has become a cultural obsession, and it's completely out of control. It influences the food we eat, the stories we tell, the music we listen to, the decorations we put up, and the sweaters we wear. It makes us be nice to other people for no particular reason, just because it's Christmas, but what I want to is this: when does that moment come when everyone subconsciously thinks to themselves, "If it were still Christmas I would cut you a break, but it's not Christmas anymore, so screw you"? In reality, the Christmas celebration has gotten to be over a month long, and I just don't think there's any rational reason to spend one twelfth of our existence meditating on the birth of Christ, much less eating fruitcake and talking about reindeer and Santa Claus.
Listen, I know the birth of Christ is SUPER important, and it should be amazing to us that God became a man, that God entered into His own creation in order to redeem that creation. But frankly, most churches never even use the word "incarnation," and I think their discussion of Christmas ends up being trite a lot of times. There are so many other important theological issues and events in Christ's life we could think about. For example, eight days after the birth of Christ, the Eastern Orthodox Church celebrates the circumcision of Christ.
Now, I was making a few Christmas cards the other day, and I ran out of envelopes. I don't know where I would have found replacements of the right size for the different cards I had, but fortunately I just happened to have an infinite roll of brown paper lying around, so problem solved. Really the only problem with wrapping your Christmas cards with an infinite roll of brown paper is that it takes forever.
Q: Tim, if I receive something in the mail from you, how will I know if it came in a regular white envelope or if it was wrapped in brown paper?
A: You'll just know.
Q: Are you sure?
A: Yes.
Up to this point I have scarcely made any jokes about substance abuse, which I really think are something that my readership has come to expect. And with that being said, I would just like to rectify that situation by wondering aloud, as it were, about what the people of Illinois were collectively smoking when they elected Rod Blagojevich as governor. Honestly, I don't know anything about his politics, but I've heard him address the media concerning all of these corruption charges and how he won't resign from his post even though everyone hates him, and the one thought that has hit me is that this guy really needs attention. Maybe that's what this whole mess is all about. Maybe all of the profanity-laced discussions caught on tape in the governor's office were really just a cry for help.
Luke 2:21
On the eighth day, when it was time to circumcise him, he was named Jesus, the name the angel had given him before he had been conceived.
Luke 2:34-35
34 Then Simeon blessed them and said to Mary, his mother: "This child is destined to cause the falling and rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be spoken against, 35 so that the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed. And a sword will pierce your own soul too."
The consolations of philosophy, or, happy Thanksgiving
Originally posted Thursday, November 27, 2008 at 11:56am
Have you ever noticed how if you're talking about your little brother, and you say he has social problems, you probably mean he acts out in class and doesn't get along with other people, but if you're talking about a country and you say it has social problems, you probably mean that everyone there drinks too much?
Incidentally, we all know that alcohol is a poison that kills people, and most of us know that water can kill you as well if you drink too much of it (it's called water intoxication). I know I ask this question a lot, but I've always wondered what ratio of water to everclear you would have to have before the water would kill you first.
You know what I don't understand? Fruit juice = wonderful. Fruit juice, as do most other beverages, consists mostly of water. Water = fantastic. However, fruit juice mixed with water = amazingly terrible. What's that about?
So a few days ago at lunch some of my friends were discussing meth labs. I don't know why. Apparently there are a lot of them in Oklahoma, I'm not sure. But anyway, isn't it odd that a meth lab is a place where you MAKE meth, not where you study it? I mean, if you really think about it, there's probably a lot we don't know about meth. For example, we don't know what happens if you feed it to bears.
Speaking of meth, on Tuesday of last week my philosophy professor asked the class how we enjoyed our weekends. My initial reaction was to say that I didn't remember it, but I don't actually know why I wanted to say this. It isn't even true. I didn't want to give people the wrong idea.
Also on Tuesday, the professor gave us a thought experiment to test the principle of impartiality, which states that we should value our happiness as being no more important than anyone else's. Suppose you are too poor to attend college without a scholarship, but you have been awarded one. Another guy is also too poor to attend college without a scholarship, but he will get your scholarship if you decline. Now, the difference between you is that you are planning to study philosophy, whereas this other guy is going to study engineering or neurology, and he's actually going to be useful to the world. So, the question is, should you decline the scholarship?
Of course, she didn't say that philosophy was TOTALLY useless. She just said that there were already so many philosophers wandering the earth arguing about things that the world wouldn't miss another one. But you know, I really think philosophy is incredibly useful. Already this year in my philosophy classes I've learned how to remove the stain if you accidentally write on a dry-erase board with a permanent marker, and I've actually needed to know that later on.
So the other day I was confronted with the following question, taking from the book "Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs" by Chuck Klosterman: "You meet a wizard in downtown Chicago. The wizard tells you he can make you more attractive if you pay him money. When you ask how this process works, the wizard points to a random person on the street. You look at this stranger. The wizard says, 'I will now make this person a dollar more attractive.' He waves his magic wand. Ostensibly, the person does not change at all; as far as you can tell, nothing is different. But - somehow - this person is suddenly a little more appealing. The tangible difference is invisible to the naked eye, but you can't deny that this person is vaguely sexier. The wizard has a weird rule though - you can only pay him once. You can't keep giving him money until you're satisfied. You can only pay him one lump sum up front. How much do you give the wizard?'
I thought about this question for a while, and here is the answer I came up with. I would ask the wizard how much money I'd need to pay him before random people on the street would stop and think, "Wow! How much money did HE give the wizard?!" And then I would give the wizard twice that amount.
But you know, this whole scenario really just raises more questions than it answers. For example, if $1.00 makes no noticeable difference to my appearance, what would $1,000 do? Would I still look exactly the same, except somehow more attractive, or at some point down the line, would I become a Spanish underwear model? I just don't know.
I'm sure most of us remember the large anti-abortion displays which came to campus a few weeks ago. A friend pointed out that pro-choice people rarely say they are PRO-abortion; they admit that abortion is a bad thing in some ways, but think women ought to have that choice available. So, assuming they want the public to be educated about the nature of the different options on the table, couldn't THEY have run the display? And you know, I had actually been pondering the same thing myself. I would like to see a pro-choice organization come to OU with 12-foot-tall photos of assorted fetuses and large signs saying, "Abortion: See? It's not so bad," and "Don't knock it till you've tried it."
(I recognize one of the pro-choicers' complaints was that the display was really in-your-face. But I'm just saying.)
Also, it's come to my attention that OU is in a three-way tie with Texas and Texas Tech for domination of the Big 12 South. A lot of people have been debating on the Interweb and in the newspapers about who should rightfully be ranked the highest in the BCS. However, I just think everyone is overlooking the REAL question: what if Texas A&M beats Texas, OSU becomes the fourth 10-2 team by beating OU, hell freezes over, and Baylor beats Texas Tech? How will the BCS handle a four-way tie in the Big 12 South?
I hope you are all having a wonderful Thanksgiving and have an opportunity to remember what this holiday was originally created for. We in America have much to be thankful; I, for one, am thankful that I have great friends who are willing to put up with me for a few days. I'm also thankful that I'm not a tax collector. But most of all we are commanded to be thankful in all circumstances, because of WHO GOD IS and because of WHAT HE HAS DONE FOR US.
1 Peter 1:3-5
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,
4 to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you,
5 who by God's power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.
1Th 5:18
give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.
1Ch 16:34 Oh give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; for his steadfast love endures forever!
Have you ever noticed how if you're talking about your little brother, and you say he has social problems, you probably mean he acts out in class and doesn't get along with other people, but if you're talking about a country and you say it has social problems, you probably mean that everyone there drinks too much?
Incidentally, we all know that alcohol is a poison that kills people, and most of us know that water can kill you as well if you drink too much of it (it's called water intoxication). I know I ask this question a lot, but I've always wondered what ratio of water to everclear you would have to have before the water would kill you first.
You know what I don't understand? Fruit juice = wonderful. Fruit juice, as do most other beverages, consists mostly of water. Water = fantastic. However, fruit juice mixed with water = amazingly terrible. What's that about?
So a few days ago at lunch some of my friends were discussing meth labs. I don't know why. Apparently there are a lot of them in Oklahoma, I'm not sure. But anyway, isn't it odd that a meth lab is a place where you MAKE meth, not where you study it? I mean, if you really think about it, there's probably a lot we don't know about meth. For example, we don't know what happens if you feed it to bears.
Speaking of meth, on Tuesday of last week my philosophy professor asked the class how we enjoyed our weekends. My initial reaction was to say that I didn't remember it, but I don't actually know why I wanted to say this. It isn't even true. I didn't want to give people the wrong idea.
Also on Tuesday, the professor gave us a thought experiment to test the principle of impartiality, which states that we should value our happiness as being no more important than anyone else's. Suppose you are too poor to attend college without a scholarship, but you have been awarded one. Another guy is also too poor to attend college without a scholarship, but he will get your scholarship if you decline. Now, the difference between you is that you are planning to study philosophy, whereas this other guy is going to study engineering or neurology, and he's actually going to be useful to the world. So, the question is, should you decline the scholarship?
Of course, she didn't say that philosophy was TOTALLY useless. She just said that there were already so many philosophers wandering the earth arguing about things that the world wouldn't miss another one. But you know, I really think philosophy is incredibly useful. Already this year in my philosophy classes I've learned how to remove the stain if you accidentally write on a dry-erase board with a permanent marker, and I've actually needed to know that later on.
So the other day I was confronted with the following question, taking from the book "Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs" by Chuck Klosterman: "You meet a wizard in downtown Chicago. The wizard tells you he can make you more attractive if you pay him money. When you ask how this process works, the wizard points to a random person on the street. You look at this stranger. The wizard says, 'I will now make this person a dollar more attractive.' He waves his magic wand. Ostensibly, the person does not change at all; as far as you can tell, nothing is different. But - somehow - this person is suddenly a little more appealing. The tangible difference is invisible to the naked eye, but you can't deny that this person is vaguely sexier. The wizard has a weird rule though - you can only pay him once. You can't keep giving him money until you're satisfied. You can only pay him one lump sum up front. How much do you give the wizard?'
I thought about this question for a while, and here is the answer I came up with. I would ask the wizard how much money I'd need to pay him before random people on the street would stop and think, "Wow! How much money did HE give the wizard?!" And then I would give the wizard twice that amount.
But you know, this whole scenario really just raises more questions than it answers. For example, if $1.00 makes no noticeable difference to my appearance, what would $1,000 do? Would I still look exactly the same, except somehow more attractive, or at some point down the line, would I become a Spanish underwear model? I just don't know.
I'm sure most of us remember the large anti-abortion displays which came to campus a few weeks ago. A friend pointed out that pro-choice people rarely say they are PRO-abortion; they admit that abortion is a bad thing in some ways, but think women ought to have that choice available. So, assuming they want the public to be educated about the nature of the different options on the table, couldn't THEY have run the display? And you know, I had actually been pondering the same thing myself. I would like to see a pro-choice organization come to OU with 12-foot-tall photos of assorted fetuses and large signs saying, "Abortion: See? It's not so bad," and "Don't knock it till you've tried it."
(I recognize one of the pro-choicers' complaints was that the display was really in-your-face. But I'm just saying.)
Also, it's come to my attention that OU is in a three-way tie with Texas and Texas Tech for domination of the Big 12 South. A lot of people have been debating on the Interweb and in the newspapers about who should rightfully be ranked the highest in the BCS. However, I just think everyone is overlooking the REAL question: what if Texas A&M beats Texas, OSU becomes the fourth 10-2 team by beating OU, hell freezes over, and Baylor beats Texas Tech? How will the BCS handle a four-way tie in the Big 12 South?
I hope you are all having a wonderful Thanksgiving and have an opportunity to remember what this holiday was originally created for. We in America have much to be thankful; I, for one, am thankful that I have great friends who are willing to put up with me for a few days. I'm also thankful that I'm not a tax collector. But most of all we are commanded to be thankful in all circumstances, because of WHO GOD IS and because of WHAT HE HAS DONE FOR US.
1 Peter 1:3-5
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,
4 to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you,
5 who by God's power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.
1Th 5:18
give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.
1Ch 16:34 Oh give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; for his steadfast love endures forever!
Your body, but not your choice
Originally posted Friday, November 7, 2008 at 11:04pm
I don't usually do this, but I wanted to write on a controversial topic in response to the anti-abortion display on the South Oval this week. I am pro-life, but the purpose of this note is not to convince you to be pro-life too. I have neither the time nor the medical knowledge to do so effectively. Nor is my purpose to villify women.
Rather I seek to debunk one argument used by some pro-choice demonstrators, which can stated in various ways: "My body, my choice." "If you don't like abortion, don't get one." "Don't impose your beliefs on me." In any case, the argument states that the moral status of abortion is a personal decision and none of anyone else's business.
This is a rubbishy argument. Let me explain . . . .
1. Government has the responsibility of protecting people's rights, including the right to life; hence it must prevent murder. I assume the right to life to be the most basic and fundamental of all rights.
2. Government has the responsibility of determining who possesses rights; hence it must decide what constitutes murder.
3. The issue with fetuses is to decide whether they have the right to life, when they acquire it, and whether it is more or less important than a woman's right to use her body as she sees fit (i.e., by choosing not to remain pregnant). Personhood is a philosophical term denoting special moral or legal status (such as the possession of rights).
4. Virtually everyone opposes murder, so if one believes that abortion constitutes murder, it is perfectly reasonable to oppose abortion publicly and politically.
5. Slogans such as "My body, my choice!" "Don't push your beliefs on me!" and "If you don't like abortion, don't get one" only make sense if you ALREADY agree with the pro-choice position. To deny the truth of 4 is to deny me the right to act in a manner consistent with my beliefs.
6. Some people argue that faith should have no bearing on politics. This is inherently unfair, as I attempt to demonstrate below, because it would force me to base some of my political views off a worldview that I disagree with.
A person's views on abortion will be influenced by their philosophical and theological views (whether theistic or atheistic). For example, I believe all humans have a soul, and that human life is sacred, and therefore apply personhood very broadly. Others might base personhood on the possession of consciousness, which potentially raises thorny questions about the status of fetuses, newborns, brain-damaged or senile individuals, and profoundly retarded individuals.
Of course, my strategy in arguing over this topic would not be to try to convince you that fetuses have souls, but to discuss what fetuses look like at various stages of development, how different techniques for performing abortions work, potentially harmful effects for women, etc., in an attempt to make you view abortion as an inhumane procedure.
I don't usually do this, but I wanted to write on a controversial topic in response to the anti-abortion display on the South Oval this week. I am pro-life, but the purpose of this note is not to convince you to be pro-life too. I have neither the time nor the medical knowledge to do so effectively. Nor is my purpose to villify women.
Rather I seek to debunk one argument used by some pro-choice demonstrators, which can stated in various ways: "My body, my choice." "If you don't like abortion, don't get one." "Don't impose your beliefs on me." In any case, the argument states that the moral status of abortion is a personal decision and none of anyone else's business.
This is a rubbishy argument. Let me explain . . . .
1. Government has the responsibility of protecting people's rights, including the right to life; hence it must prevent murder. I assume the right to life to be the most basic and fundamental of all rights.
2. Government has the responsibility of determining who possesses rights; hence it must decide what constitutes murder.
3. The issue with fetuses is to decide whether they have the right to life, when they acquire it, and whether it is more or less important than a woman's right to use her body as she sees fit (i.e., by choosing not to remain pregnant). Personhood is a philosophical term denoting special moral or legal status (such as the possession of rights).
4. Virtually everyone opposes murder, so if one believes that abortion constitutes murder, it is perfectly reasonable to oppose abortion publicly and politically.
5. Slogans such as "My body, my choice!" "Don't push your beliefs on me!" and "If you don't like abortion, don't get one" only make sense if you ALREADY agree with the pro-choice position. To deny the truth of 4 is to deny me the right to act in a manner consistent with my beliefs.
6. Some people argue that faith should have no bearing on politics. This is inherently unfair, as I attempt to demonstrate below, because it would force me to base some of my political views off a worldview that I disagree with.
A person's views on abortion will be influenced by their philosophical and theological views (whether theistic or atheistic). For example, I believe all humans have a soul, and that human life is sacred, and therefore apply personhood very broadly. Others might base personhood on the possession of consciousness, which potentially raises thorny questions about the status of fetuses, newborns, brain-damaged or senile individuals, and profoundly retarded individuals.
Of course, my strategy in arguing over this topic would not be to try to convince you that fetuses have souls, but to discuss what fetuses look like at various stages of development, how different techniques for performing abortions work, potentially harmful effects for women, etc., in an attempt to make you view abortion as an inhumane procedure.
Where thieves break in and steal
Originally posted Tuesday, October 28, 2008 at 3:53am
I had my last performance in the opera chorus for Lakme on Sunday, and I am finally done with it. I mean, like, on a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 one being not even started yet and 10 being totally done, you can't even imagine how done I am.
Actually, I'm probably about a 9. I still need to go to the music library, look up an English translation of the opera, and figure out what we were singing this whole time. I'm hoping it was something good.
You may be wondering to yourself, "But Tim, didn't you study French in high school?" And the answer is yes, I did, but you are overlooking four factors, 1) operatic singing is inherently hard to understand, 2) I never had the libretto for the entire show, 3) I'm incredibly lazy, and 4) total depravity. I'm not sure how that fourth one factors in there, but I think that it probably does.
So it has recently come to my attention that there is an important presidential election going on in the United States. I actually cast my absentee ballot on Monday for this election. And I just think it's interesting how writers with different political leanings can put a completely different perspective on things. For example, I read one pro-Sarah Palin article that referred to her as the governor of the largest state in the U.S. (by land area). I also read one anti-Palin article, which described her as the governor of a state with more reindeer than people.
Speaking of reindeer, I recently spoke with my good friend Christopher concerning the subject of unicorns. And because I apparently take requests now, I will yield to his demand and paint you the picture of our conversation. You see, dear reader, we had commented on the fact that the word "unicorn" literally means "one horn," and so I decided that that's really the most appropriate name for a unicorn horn, and if I were a unicorn, what I would do is basically sort of canter about goring people I didn't particularly care for with my keratinous protuberance, and then be like, "You just done gone got impaled by my unicorn! What now. Oh snap." And if I were a unicorn, that is exactly how I would talk.
Now, as we all know, at a university, a lot of buildings and things get named after people who make sizable donations to the university's treasure coffers. In fact, just the other day I heard that the college of education at OU had been renamed after some woman who shall here remain nameless because I don't feel like looking it up. Now, I've often thought about the passage in Matthew 6 where we are instructed to do acts of righteousness in secret, so that we can have our reward in heaven and not before men, and its implications for this sort of phenomenon, and really what I'm trying to say is that if, in your travels, you should ever stumble upon a very large, very opulent Christian cathedral named after me, I didn't do it. And also, thinking back to another philosophical conversation I had with Christopher about whether a vodka bottle would remain a vodka bottle if I emptied it out and filled it with ketchup, I would just like to say that should Chris ever stumble upon a small mountain of ketchup bottles stacked outside his office door, I didn't do that either.
Speaking of philosophy, my history of ethics class is just starting to read Kant's "Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals." In fact, I might be reading Kant right now if I could adequately understand Kant at 2 am, but I believe I am quite unable to do so. Although a towering intellect and a huge figure in philosophy, he is not known as a bastion of clarity. When I remarked in a previous class that I thought he was a good writer based on what I had read so far, the professor and graduate assistant promptly informed me that I had not read enough Kant.
Lastly, dear reader, I would like to share with you a slight paraphrase of something my RA friend Cody said today after finishing up with an RA event: "I'm going to check and see if I have to do anything else, and if not, I'm going to do something else."
Matthew 6:1-4
1 "Be careful not to do your 'acts of righteousness' before men, to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven.
2 "So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. 3 But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4 so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.
I had my last performance in the opera chorus for Lakme on Sunday, and I am finally done with it. I mean, like, on a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 one being not even started yet and 10 being totally done, you can't even imagine how done I am.
Actually, I'm probably about a 9. I still need to go to the music library, look up an English translation of the opera, and figure out what we were singing this whole time. I'm hoping it was something good.
You may be wondering to yourself, "But Tim, didn't you study French in high school?" And the answer is yes, I did, but you are overlooking four factors, 1) operatic singing is inherently hard to understand, 2) I never had the libretto for the entire show, 3) I'm incredibly lazy, and 4) total depravity. I'm not sure how that fourth one factors in there, but I think that it probably does.
So it has recently come to my attention that there is an important presidential election going on in the United States. I actually cast my absentee ballot on Monday for this election. And I just think it's interesting how writers with different political leanings can put a completely different perspective on things. For example, I read one pro-Sarah Palin article that referred to her as the governor of the largest state in the U.S. (by land area). I also read one anti-Palin article, which described her as the governor of a state with more reindeer than people.
Speaking of reindeer, I recently spoke with my good friend Christopher concerning the subject of unicorns. And because I apparently take requests now, I will yield to his demand and paint you the picture of our conversation. You see, dear reader, we had commented on the fact that the word "unicorn" literally means "one horn," and so I decided that that's really the most appropriate name for a unicorn horn, and if I were a unicorn, what I would do is basically sort of canter about goring people I didn't particularly care for with my keratinous protuberance, and then be like, "You just done gone got impaled by my unicorn! What now. Oh snap." And if I were a unicorn, that is exactly how I would talk.
Now, as we all know, at a university, a lot of buildings and things get named after people who make sizable donations to the university's treasure coffers. In fact, just the other day I heard that the college of education at OU had been renamed after some woman who shall here remain nameless because I don't feel like looking it up. Now, I've often thought about the passage in Matthew 6 where we are instructed to do acts of righteousness in secret, so that we can have our reward in heaven and not before men, and its implications for this sort of phenomenon, and really what I'm trying to say is that if, in your travels, you should ever stumble upon a very large, very opulent Christian cathedral named after me, I didn't do it. And also, thinking back to another philosophical conversation I had with Christopher about whether a vodka bottle would remain a vodka bottle if I emptied it out and filled it with ketchup, I would just like to say that should Chris ever stumble upon a small mountain of ketchup bottles stacked outside his office door, I didn't do that either.
Speaking of philosophy, my history of ethics class is just starting to read Kant's "Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals." In fact, I might be reading Kant right now if I could adequately understand Kant at 2 am, but I believe I am quite unable to do so. Although a towering intellect and a huge figure in philosophy, he is not known as a bastion of clarity. When I remarked in a previous class that I thought he was a good writer based on what I had read so far, the professor and graduate assistant promptly informed me that I had not read enough Kant.
Lastly, dear reader, I would like to share with you a slight paraphrase of something my RA friend Cody said today after finishing up with an RA event: "I'm going to check and see if I have to do anything else, and if not, I'm going to do something else."
Matthew 6:1-4
1 "Be careful not to do your 'acts of righteousness' before men, to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven.
2 "So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. 3 But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4 so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.
I'll always be happy and never have trouble
Originally posted Sunday, October 12, 2008 at 7:11pm
So lately I've started taking some piano lessons, as well as rewarding myself by playing Tekken in the Adams game room after I've finished practicing each day. Those two plans are really helping keep me motivated, and if all goes according to plan, I will not only get really good at playing piano, I will also get really good at playing Tekken.
About a week ago maybe I was putting my dollar in the change machine to get some quarters out, but you know how there's that black box with a slot for your dollar to go into? I kind of missed that slot completely and somehow put my dollar into the crevice between the black box and the rest of the machine. It turns out the machine doesn't give you any quarters if you do that.
I ruined a paper clip trying to get my dollar back out, but to no avail. Now I kind of want to dismantle the machine to get my dollar out, plus any other dollars that should happen to be there, but I'm just worried that Housing and Food wouldn't take that in the best possible way.
I was thinking about how if you spilled a cheez-it on the floor and wasted it, you probably wouldn't feel sad. But if you spilled an entire box of cheez-its on the floor and wasted ALL of them, you'd probably feel at least a little bit sad. So I was wondering where my cheez-it threshold was. I think this would make for an interesting psychology experiment, but I'd feel bad about wasting all of those cheez-its. And I don't even like cheez-its that much.
I have had three classes since the beginning of my college career in which we have read a certain prose poem called "Women and Honor: Some Notes on Lying" by a certain Adrienne Rich. The third time this happened, we were introduced to the distinguished authoress with the following words: "Adrienne Rich is a poet, essayist, feminist, and lesbian." Now, it's not terribly confusing to begin with, but the sad part is that that helps you understand the poem better.
It occurred to me recently that if you say, "What's the matter?" or "What's wrong?" to a friend, then that will probably be interpreted as a show of concern, but if you add the words "with you?" to the end of either of those questions, it suddenly sounds super rude. However, if you're talking to a second friend about our first friend, we'll call him Little Billy, who obviously has something wrong with him and needs our help, and say "What's the matter with Freddy?" or "What's wrong with Joey?" then it probably sounds concerned again, unless you say it in a nasty way. Your second friend might think it odd that you're calling Little Billy by all these different names when clearly his name is Little Billy, but who has time to worry about that? Little Billy's probably fallen down a well by now!
On Thursday night I played an awesome game with some friends of mine called Sardines. In case you've never heard of it, it's a super fun game where one person hides and everyone else looks for them. If you find them, you hide with them until only one person is left wandering around in the dark, miserable and alone. Let me tell you, what better way is there to get to know the people you're with than to look for them in the dark while they hide from you? I certainly can't think of one. So anyway, we set the boundaries way too big in the first game, and I was the unfortunate loser who searched for 45 minutes without success. In the second game I was hiding, and we shortened the boundaries considerably, but I somehow got confused and hid outside of them, which was not terribly conducive to being found. The change machine doesn't give you any quarters when you hide out-of-bounds. Now, the third game, my friend Amber hid on a staircase landing six feet off the ground hidden behind a bush, and I was once again the poor sap who found everyone last, although half the people that beat me only did so because they got helpful text messages directing them to the secret rendezvous spot. So you know, when I went and looked I didn't find nobody, and when I went and hid ain't nobody found me, so pretty much nobody's finding nobody when I play. On the plus side, I now know of a great spot for secret rendezvouses.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that Sardines is a GREAT game that should be played by EVERYONE.
There's a scene in "Batman: The Dark Knight" where a bunch of ordinary citizens, acting as vigilantes, dress up as Batmen in an attempt to fight crime. After the real Batman comes in and thwarts both the dastardly criminals and the foolhardy vigilantes, one of them asks, "Why do YOU get to fight crime if we can't?" Or whatever he says. I saw this movie like three months ago. And Batman replies, "I'm not wearing hockey pads." All of which is to say, I don't know, sometimes I feel like I've been wearing hockey pads my whole life.
Psalm 10:4
4 In his pride the wicked does not seek him;
in all his thoughts there is no room for God.
So lately I've started taking some piano lessons, as well as rewarding myself by playing Tekken in the Adams game room after I've finished practicing each day. Those two plans are really helping keep me motivated, and if all goes according to plan, I will not only get really good at playing piano, I will also get really good at playing Tekken.
About a week ago maybe I was putting my dollar in the change machine to get some quarters out, but you know how there's that black box with a slot for your dollar to go into? I kind of missed that slot completely and somehow put my dollar into the crevice between the black box and the rest of the machine. It turns out the machine doesn't give you any quarters if you do that.
I ruined a paper clip trying to get my dollar back out, but to no avail. Now I kind of want to dismantle the machine to get my dollar out, plus any other dollars that should happen to be there, but I'm just worried that Housing and Food wouldn't take that in the best possible way.
I was thinking about how if you spilled a cheez-it on the floor and wasted it, you probably wouldn't feel sad. But if you spilled an entire box of cheez-its on the floor and wasted ALL of them, you'd probably feel at least a little bit sad. So I was wondering where my cheez-it threshold was. I think this would make for an interesting psychology experiment, but I'd feel bad about wasting all of those cheez-its. And I don't even like cheez-its that much.
I have had three classes since the beginning of my college career in which we have read a certain prose poem called "Women and Honor: Some Notes on Lying" by a certain Adrienne Rich. The third time this happened, we were introduced to the distinguished authoress with the following words: "Adrienne Rich is a poet, essayist, feminist, and lesbian." Now, it's not terribly confusing to begin with, but the sad part is that that helps you understand the poem better.
It occurred to me recently that if you say, "What's the matter?" or "What's wrong?" to a friend, then that will probably be interpreted as a show of concern, but if you add the words "with you?" to the end of either of those questions, it suddenly sounds super rude. However, if you're talking to a second friend about our first friend, we'll call him Little Billy, who obviously has something wrong with him and needs our help, and say "What's the matter with Freddy?" or "What's wrong with Joey?" then it probably sounds concerned again, unless you say it in a nasty way. Your second friend might think it odd that you're calling Little Billy by all these different names when clearly his name is Little Billy, but who has time to worry about that? Little Billy's probably fallen down a well by now!
On Thursday night I played an awesome game with some friends of mine called Sardines. In case you've never heard of it, it's a super fun game where one person hides and everyone else looks for them. If you find them, you hide with them until only one person is left wandering around in the dark, miserable and alone. Let me tell you, what better way is there to get to know the people you're with than to look for them in the dark while they hide from you? I certainly can't think of one. So anyway, we set the boundaries way too big in the first game, and I was the unfortunate loser who searched for 45 minutes without success. In the second game I was hiding, and we shortened the boundaries considerably, but I somehow got confused and hid outside of them, which was not terribly conducive to being found. The change machine doesn't give you any quarters when you hide out-of-bounds. Now, the third game, my friend Amber hid on a staircase landing six feet off the ground hidden behind a bush, and I was once again the poor sap who found everyone last, although half the people that beat me only did so because they got helpful text messages directing them to the secret rendezvous spot. So you know, when I went and looked I didn't find nobody, and when I went and hid ain't nobody found me, so pretty much nobody's finding nobody when I play. On the plus side, I now know of a great spot for secret rendezvouses.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that Sardines is a GREAT game that should be played by EVERYONE.
There's a scene in "Batman: The Dark Knight" where a bunch of ordinary citizens, acting as vigilantes, dress up as Batmen in an attempt to fight crime. After the real Batman comes in and thwarts both the dastardly criminals and the foolhardy vigilantes, one of them asks, "Why do YOU get to fight crime if we can't?" Or whatever he says. I saw this movie like three months ago. And Batman replies, "I'm not wearing hockey pads." All of which is to say, I don't know, sometimes I feel like I've been wearing hockey pads my whole life.
Psalm 10:4
4 In his pride the wicked does not seek him;
in all his thoughts there is no room for God.
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