neurological dryer lint

now this perked my eyes up. or something. tycho from PA got Wild At Heart for Christmas from his mom. his reaction was predictable.

i won't say that he's wrong. because clearly not everyone - even Christians, to whom the book is less-than-subtly-aimed - likes the book, or Eldredge's theories on the 'problem' with men. it's not my place to judge his opinion. it's hard to relate to a book that demands a certain priority of things in life when you don't carry those same priorities. much in the same way that i probably wouldn't enjoy a book by the Dalai Lama on how to improve things, because we don't share the same ideas on what's true and what's important and whatnot.

here's the thing, though. and be forewarned - i consider WaH to be one of the most significant, moving, powerful books i've ever read, and contemplating the ideas it presents with my close friends has changed the course of my life's ship to a new heading. so i guess i'm biased, if you want to call it that, although who isn't biased about anything?

anyway, that thing i was talking about. Allow me to summarize in the best way that i can Eldredge's main point in the book: men are essentially wired to be a certain way. not all men are the same, but we have the same programming, the same OS if you will, and we all have certain tendencies that we share. living from this programming, from our nature, makes life just work a little better, makes things fit together a little more solidly. in fact, the reason we do everything is because of the things we want out of life, the things we're hard-coded to desire. doing them makes us happy and satisfied and fulfilled. not doing them makes us unsatisfied and discontent. we have also been hurt by life and the people around us. allowing those hurts to be repaired (which Eldredge contends, and I support, can only be done by the God that made us, as we are incapable of fully 'repairing' ourselves) will get us back into action and allow us to begin to live the way we're wired to.

now it makes sense for someone who doesn't really think God's relevant to anything to read His name in a book and immediately disregard it - but it doesn't sound like that's what Tycho's done, although it'd be pretty easy to concoct a complaint with the core ideas of the book and attribute your attitude to those complaints, when it really just comes from avoiding God. which is something everyone does, be them a follower of Christ or not, to some extent. but i keep seeing more and more evidence that every man on this planet suffers from the same problem, the one that reduces us to 'dry and damaged husks', as Tycho calls it. no one's really very happy or satisfied. a small minority of Christians, maybe, but on the whole, we are all screwed up. to deny that is to lie to your own face in the mirror, to reject reality. maybe you don't feel as damaged as you think others are, and well, that's your right. but can you say you're as satisfied as you could be? there's nothing missing? the battle, the adventure, the things that Eldredge claims we're wired for - you don't see those desires in your heart? as a gamer, it couldn't be more obvious to me that i long for those things.

and i guess what it comes down to is this - Tycho says that Eldredge suggests a 'template' for the right way to live. i guess you could call it that. maybe it is a way that works for some and not for others, and it happens to work for me. it doesn't claim to be that, though. the priorities in my life, the way i live, the things that are important to me, that 'template', is based on a model. that model, Jesus, claims that the 'template' works for everyone, that there isn't a single person on this planet that wouldn't be in a far better place following him, with their life bound to his. he says he's it, he's the one, and that everything else in this life is garbage compared to a life with him.

now that's a hard theory to test without actually trying it, to be honest. it's really an all-or-nothing decision. there's no beta, you can't test-drive or try an evaluation version. you jump in with both feet and never look back. well, that's really not true. you can look back. you do. but the other path, the alternative, the disaster my life would be without Jesus, makes me laugh to think i'd ever go back. thing is, a majority of people that 'sign up' don't ever see the full potential of their new life, kinda like getting a $5000 workstation for free and using it to play Solitaire. i like to think i'm making good use of my life, but none of us really do it justice. Jesus was the only one that did. we're not the 'template' - he is. he's got more to offer than any book or any set of ideas or morals, and it's better than any person can describe. but there is significant risk in handing the reins to someone else - the fear of that is usually what stops people.

that is, they say, the rub.

i just spent 40 minutes removing a ton of spyware from my CFO's machine - manually, mind you, as ad-aware wouldn't find it - and it just left me disgusted. that a company's name would receive any positive reinforcement in the consumer's eyes from annoying, frustrating software installed without knowledge or assent on a system - it's just a ridiculous idea. there's no way at all their search pages and pop ups and stuff can be of ANY benefit to ANYONE. it puts money in the pocket of the guys who create it by making advertisers think that consumers will care about their ads... and it puts money in the pocket of the fools who bundle it in their software (kazaa, realone, etc) because they think consumers will benefit.

although i have a hard time believing they really think consumers will benefit - and that's even more frustrating. they're getting paid to annoy their customers. and they do it happily. it's just weak.

oh yeah, check out mikey's new blog and the triumphant return of hamrick's blog. tasty.

heh. great news from the city of port clinton, ohio (where we dock the boat) - they're still having walleye madness tonight, complete with the walleye drop at midnight.

frickin wackos.

well we'll be at the callahans drinking the 'wine (thanks to steve bragg and mom & dad) tonight, watching ATHF hopefully. :)

www.wegotussomemedicalwaste.com - featured in the excellent aqua teen hunger force episode Total Re-Carl where they try to reattach Carl's head to different bodies. they get the 'all eyeballs' body from that website. as funny as www.yzzerdd.com but not as annoying. :)

speaking of - apparently there's an ATHF spinoff called spacecatrazz with emory and oglethorpe (from space conflict from beyond pluto... "emory the melon's on fire") and the mooninites ("your jambox is now his... by way of our actions"). and also apparently it's going to premiere during the new years eve marathon. rock rock.

i KNEW it was fake. :) kind of an ingenious way to do it, splicing video clips of different runs though different levels. took whoever did it far longer to edit that thing up and make it perfect than actually play through and enjoy the game. but despite the fallacy, it's still a work of art.

ok i know i was unfair about marvin. he did a good job, and i don't doubt the entire team felt let down far, far more than i ever would. emotional response after watching a really intense game. sorry marvin.

i guess we've got next year. but did you see what corey dillon said on channel 5? HE was ticked. and kitna, man, he still represented despite probably feeling like crap. jon, you're my hero. rock out.

i don't think i've ever been so disappointed in my entire life.

what the (@)*&#^* do we need to do to stop lee suggs? hire a sniper? pick him off from the grassy knoll? because obviously OUR DEFENSE IS COMPLETELY USELESS YET AGAIN.

i take back everything i said about marvin lewis and coach of the year. i think i would have rather had a losing record and another pitiful year than an enormous letdown like that, where my hopes were up so high... i think given the opportunity i'd push leslie frazier into oncoming traffic right now. did you SEE the defense against the Chiefs? did they just forget how to do their jobs?

ergh. don't talk to me right now.

back from boonville, indiana. things were pretty easy out there - it's a nice little town in the middle of a state route, lots of farmland. renee's family was highly cool - very, very hospitable. you know how you picture those sitcom families getting together for the holidays, around a huge table filled with food - that was it right there. food all the time. i got to 'impress' some people with my 'amazing electronics skill' (i.e. i hooked up a PS2 and a DVD player).

i was challenged a bit in stuff i wasn't really ready for - namely, bowling (thank God i didn't fall in front of the whole family, my falling-while-bowling streak is broken); singing christmas carols (easy to fake singing when you're around 20 other people who are singing loud); and dealing with little kids - renee's two young cousins were excited to see a new face and wanted to play all the time. but in all that i feel like i handled myself well. my allergies were killer tho, and i was half comatose on actifed for the whole week.

then i got home, and the post-holiday-dang-i-spent-a-lot-on-gifts-whoa-look-at-all-the-bills blues set in. i need to go win the lottery so i can just finish up school and stop paying for it. and i need to stop being sick so i don't have stupid frickin medical bills. and i need to stop driving anywhere so i can stop paying for repair bills on my car.

*sigh* listen to me complain. i'm looking around my room at everything i have. i'm gonna shut up now. i'm ridiculously blessed.

OK no more spending money, ever. :) gonna go watch the bengals spank the browns at renee's.

over at x-entertainment they got a gathering of lots of old xmas commercials. including my favorite, the fabled santa mario commercial. because it featured the new "gameboy" that possessed my dreams at the age of ten. i remember opening that christmas morning and playing tetris in a haze of joy for hours. for a few months i think it was akin to the One Ring to me :)

speaking of... the most excellent gift ever, from my brother - a full size map of middle earth, framed. it's a sight to behold.

bout to leave for indiana for a few days, so you all have a wonderful christmas and take care of things til saturday. :)

sometimes your words just hypnotize me

go here NOW NOW NOW and vote marvin lewis NFL coach of the year. he's pwning everyone else right now. keep that going people :)

oh and big ups to ben dawg for nudging me back to SW:KOTOR after not playing it for like almost five months. i gave up on it back in august or something.

a statement about my attention span with video games - with any given game (barring the exceptions of old NES classics that i can pick up at any time) i have to keep myself at redline excitement about playing, otherwise i tend to lose interest pretty quick. the last few games that happened with include Medal Of Honor, Jedi Outcast, Double Dash, KOTOR, Crimson Skies... it's like the ball that you keep airborne in the tube by blowing into it - you have to keep a steady stream in there to maintain high altitude, and the more you let it drop, the harder it is to get it back up to where it was. yeah my brain is broken or something.

anyway. i finished Crimson Skies and Call Of Duty over the weekend and decided to give KOTOR another shot. after a couple of speed bumps i was back in the rhythm of things, and i played for a solid six hours yesterday. i haven't done that on ANY game in forever. it was wonderful :)

bakerq, sorry bout that. you are, as always, mastermind behind all things. :) i stand in awe of quentin and john and their excellent idea. i got an email from scott 'rastamon' saluga today sayin he was down. awesome :)

i also realized i left big jason diegmueller off that list. he wasn't around in the later days but he was instrumental - nay, crucial - in getting that department to the level it was. and he was a blast to work with. and a wonderful human being. he's in LA now making the big bucks and i miss him terribly. if he flew back into town for the grillout, well i'd just cry like a happy little girl.

well it looks like i'll only be in indiana w/renee's family til saturday morning. the news dropped my blood pressure down a bit about the whole deal. i'm still kinda nervous but not as much as i thought i'd be. hopefully i can impress them with my tech savvy, like some powerful ruler of machines from the future. if not, crap, i have some trivia knowledge, and i can cook a mean hot dog. that's pretty much all i got.

been a few days here. the weekend was spiffy, except friday *grrr* the stupid snow kept me from taking renee up to pyramid hill to look at xmas lights, cuz the roads suck and i'm a bad driver. but we hung out and got our lebowski on. saturday was the extended family xmas up in troy. and then the stupid bengals game yesterday.

but the real good news is john wilger had an EXCELLENT idea - an old school onenet CS reunion grillout. we could get a huge crew together, it'd be a blast. so if any of y'all are reading this, shoot me an email and let me know what you're up to, if you're interested, etc. this means you: flux + tausha, brian + shannon mcdonald, jeff + beth crowder, joe_e, mike wilson, paul 'crack some heads' kramer, adam, bryan g, ben, chuckie, all the steves, jimmyd "falotn", john, scott saluga, big brent foster, TJ, andy wizzaltz, derek 'tsc' lucas, kai 'mp3 daddy' verspeek, jay PLEASE DON'T KILL ME WITH YOUR KNIFE, bwallace, paul "stress ball" troescher, fred krause, karin, frank boyd, greg 'night crew' jordan... man... i miss all you guys... we had some awesome times.

blwells, pimpin it up in the bahamas, fly into town. hamrick, well, you just need to get your butt back into the nati.

lots of reminders of days past at onenet (now de-funked) today - got a call from a guy who's recruiting big hamrick. i got to hype hamrick's "skills", lie about how he was a good CS rep (just kidding king donko, you were the man)... and then i find my boys quentin and john's blogs and read up on how they've been.

there's links to their blogs on the left now. hamrick, you need to start yours up again, tell us about the perils of parenting and living with jeri. mikey, you need to fire one up and use it as your sounding board for complaining about how many women are pimpin you up.

bout to go xmas shopping with renee for a bit. woohah.

oh yeah quentin - don't die :)

one word: perfect.

endings always affect me. especially endings to big stories i get attached to. especially my favorite fiction book ever. so naturally seeing it done in film, perfectly, has transformed me into an emotionally unstable little girl. i cried (insert embarassingly large number here) times during the moving, on the way home, thinking about it in bed... and now this morning, sitting at work exhausted and listening to frickin Lifehouse i'm about to tear up. it's bordering on ridiculous. no, it's crossed that border.

in other news, renee and i have been together three years today. and it just keeps getting better. you don't think it can and it does. it's remarkable. she's remarkable.

from fark: "Old and busted: SMB3 in 11 minutes. New hotness: Megaman2 in 28 minutes." now this one's clearly done w/a gamegenie, you can tell in the first couple of minutes, as dude goes through the Airman stage, and he kills the guys on the floating cloud platforms in one hit. can't do it. and he kills Quickman with about half the hits it should take. and runs into Quickman several times and doesn't get hurt.

but once again, it's cool to watch. :) and speaking of cool to watch, i'm off to the trilogy w/renee to cry my eyes out. :) (and i'm not bringing the GBA, she talked me out of it, for all y'all that were hatin on me).

i'm glad you're with me, sam, here at the end of all things.

"I got crunk before (the game), and throughout. When my teammates saw how crunk I was, how (the knee) wasn't affecting me, it helped them." - Levi Jones

"Join in his crunk. Can you dig it?" - Paul Daugherty

Does Paul even know what crunk means?

i put up pictures from pokernight two weeks ago here. its a little goofy :)

saw that i missed a week or two ago that warp pipe came out - it's the gamecube-over-internet proxy software that almost got shut down. they released a working beta. i've been wanting to play some more LAN-based mk:double dash since the excellent four-on-four action from last month. now all we need is someone else to play against.

did anyone else think that the bengals' win over sf felt, i don't know, like retribution for 1989? granted we've lost many, many games to them since then... i even own a 49ers jacket, from the peak of my disillusionment towards our nfl team.

i kinda wanna burn it now :) thank you rudi for 174 yards, you're a pimp.

artie pointed out to me that objective christian ministries is, in fact, a hoax.

so after saddam's capture, that's two HUGE sighs of relief this morning :) i guess i'm so used to seeing stupid stuff on the net written in the name of Jesus that i'll buy into something that obviously ridiculous. shows i'm still very jumpy to point the finger.

but they got saddam, so hey, that's frickin coolness. :) so what should i do today? i'm not driving anywhere, as i'm sure they aren't going to clear the roads in Clifton for another week and a half. i might just sit around, play Call Of Duty and watch some Smallville.

except for the shoryuken hat. cuz, uhh, i just bought it myself. :)

no, i canceled the order, CRAP CRAP CRAP why does self-restraint tend to kick in when you absolutely don't want it to?

ok i don't know why i've never found this site before... remember thinkgeek from a couple days ago? it's that, for gamers. you could pretty much buy me anything off this site for christmas. especially the girl's babydoll shirts because i'd TEAR THROUGH THEM LIKE THE FRICKIN HULK. :)

for example, the Shoryuken Hoodie. (it's a street fighter reference, renee :) excellentness.

if i had seen The Last Samurai before i wrote the entry yesterday about best movie of the year... it'd look different.

wow, people.

the full impact of that movie hasn't registered yet, and i don't think it will for days. there's just some stuff in life that we forget about, that we're so eager to kill off. the old school. i for one have always been a proponent of technological advancement at any cost. and you never stop to think about the cost of progress.

but more than that... tom cruise was brilliant as a man haunted by what he's done, someone tormented every waking hour by his past. the self loathing and bitterness and disgust was something i think i've tasted but clearly not to the depths i'd once thought i had. the journey he makes in the length of the movie made my heart sit up and sigh. to quote mr. graham at the end - 'captain algren possessed a peace that many seek and few find.'

oh yeah, also. car of the year: Infiniti FX35. saw another one on the road today, it's SO beautiful :)

the CiN weekly interview i mentioned before is online here: CiN Weekly - The long haul.

they certainly made me sound like the most irresponsible idiot in the world, though. i'm not ancitipating getting fired for missing half a day to see the movies, but i don't wanna broadcast that to everyone in the world. oh well. no one reads this anyway :)

drumroll

ladies and gentlemen, i give you... the first annual justin likey in 2003 awards. shout outs to my favorites of this past year.

so here we go.

• best album of the year: How To Start A Fire - Further Seems Forever. not an overly long album, but long enough. it gets its point across well - and i LOVE listening to it. my mood or whatever genre i'm feeling like that particular day is irrelevant - i always enjoy listening to this, and i can pick it up at any point in the album, any second of any song, and just dig. that's rare for me. and it always makes me think, and think about something different every time, and usually about aspects of relationships i have. i like that.
  
  runners up: Who We Are Instead by Jars Of Clay, Sing The Sorrow by AFI, De-loused In The Comatorium by The Mars Volta.
  
  
• best song of the year: The Sound - Further Seems Forever. i find myself singing parts of this song to myself at least once a day. every time it comes on the pod or on a stream i'm listening to, i have to listen to it at least three times. i'm still waiting, i'm still waiting, for your graaaaaaaaaaace... gives me chills :)
  
  runners up: Trouble Is by Jars Of Clay, This Celluloid Dream by AFI.
  
  
• best movie of the year: Return Of The King. needs no explanation. i haven't even seen it yet and i know. the greatest work of fiction ever concieved.
  
  runners up: Pirates Of The Caribbean, The Recruit.
  
  
• best tv show: Smallville Season 3. kept me on edge for months, with more-risky-than-before storylines. they're finally doing it right, IMHO.
  
  runners up: ST: Enterprise, Mythbusters, Aqua Teen Hunger Force (which would have been the winner were it longer)
  
  
• best video game: Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker. not only is it a Zelda game, you sail. the cel shading ended up rocking, swordfighting Ganon in the end was amazing... things were just cool, they just worked out perfectly in this game. Miyamoto's a genius.
  
  runners up: Metroid Prime, Crimson Skies.
  

dude, thinkgeek (great geek store) supports amazon-style wishlists. hey, i made one.

yeah, that was subtle, i know.

last night i threw in one of my favorite all time albums, bad religion's excellent stranger than fiction. there's still something remarkable about listening to it - it's kinda like sitting in a room with a younger, fifteen year old version of myself, and listening to his thoughts.

i remember the first time i heard Slumber. in itself it's a very peaceful, mellowing song, as i'm sure they meant it to be. the opening lines: "so you're feeling unimportant, cause you've got nothing to say. and your life is just a ramble, no one understands you anyway." - i heard those and thought, yeah, that's me, i know that feeling. maybe these guys can tell me something about life. maybe they have an answer.

listening to the end of that song, though, and the process that Graffin (BR's lead singer) takes the listener through as it progresses... it's mirrored in so much other stuff he writes, in the things he says in his letters on his website, etc... well the end of the song says "i'm not too good at giving morals, and i don't fear the consequence. if life makes you scared and bitter, at least it's not for very long."

man... that was all the hope i had when i was fifteen. i sat and listened to those words and i nodded my head in assent.

now it makes me sad, almost to the point of tears. fortunately that kid got tracked down and pulled out of the pit. he got led down a very unanticipated trail over the last nine years to now, where i don't lay awake at night and get shivers at the thought of death. i don't want to cry because i'm so scared of the end and the darkness that awaits, the eternal slumber.

maybe that's the most significant transformation my life has seen since i started following Jesus. i'm not frightened anymore - i think of the end of my mortal life here, i guess you could say with curiousity. or wonder. kinda like the way i'm thinking about how Return Of The King is gonna be - i KNOW it's going to be sweet, totally excellent, i only have a vague idea of how it could play out. i've had it described to me before, i know what the 'facts' are, i just can't PICTURE it, the thing that really makes it real to me, i don't KNOW what it's going to look like, what it's going to be like.

i'm not scared for the end anymore. it's a burden that's long been lifted from me, and i can say that with assurance now. i didn't lift the burden, either, i don't have any idea how i would have done it. it got taken from me. i'm grateful to God for that.

Graffin would say i'm deluding myself. i've got myself convinced of lies and i'm just following the crowd and there is no God, only something i've convinced myself of. i "cling to my hopes as i drop to my knees," to quote No Substance. i'm a foolish sheep.

and i can say in reply, no, Greg. i'm not a sheep. i've investigated, i've checked, and more than that, i've experienced things in my life that i can explain in no other way, besides that it's the work of something greater than me. the existence of God - and His passion and love for me - is as real to me as the shoes i'm wearing and the keyboard i'm typing on.

and what hope do you have, Greg? if life sucks, at least it's only 70-80 years long? even if i'm delusional and everything i know is fake, at least i'm happy, content, satisfied. my life is good and complete. but you think i'm living a lie? it's more important to admit the truth and live in reality and be miserable, and i'm simply living in my fantasy world? at least you're honest with yourself? really?

don't pity the dead, you say. look at all the living and ask yourself why. we're all better off in the ground? as you say, "a smile on the lips and a hole in the head"? i don't ever want my life to be that bleak. i feel sad for the man who would say those things and mean them, who lives with no hope. and the lies and delusions that i call my faith, well, who knows. maybe there's more truth to them than you know. i hope someday your closed mind cracks open a bit and you're willing to admit the existence of something that you cannot explain. that something is waiting for that day with the eagerness of a heartbroken father, staring out the window, looking through the tears for his lost son who's run away.

geez. i got nothing to write about.

well kind of, check out this week's CiN Weekly for a riveting interview with yours truly about why i'm going to Trilogy Tuesday next week. well actually i dont know if its going to be a full interview or just some sound bites. or even if i'm going to be mentioned at all. but they asked me questions so i'm gonna hype it anyway. it comes out on wednesday.

i really wanted to buy a ski pass this year so renee and i could go all the time, but with all these stupid car repairs it doesn't look like its gonna be in the books anytime soon. maybe next year i'll be able to buy a pass, chances are i wouldnt have been good enough this year to really enjoy it anyway :)

check this story out. a guy sticks it to the po trying to bring him down using his cell phone and the net. someday i wanna do this.

started playing call of duty last night. three levels and i'm emotionally attached to that game. i feel lonely when i'm wandering through a dark field in a french village all alone. i feel safe when i'm behind a wall taking fire from germans, but my squad is next to me. i feel remorseful when one of them gets gunned down next to me too. apparently the multiplayer is stunning as well.

as someone who is a follower of Jesus, I'm going to apologize to the planet for us on behalf of Objective. although i don't honestly know if these people can be lumped in with the 'follower of Jesus' category, because honestly, someone following Jesus wouldn't ever see Him put up a website like this.

so in the great Linus Torvalds tradition,
**irritated mode = "Full Blast"**
i think a lot of people read Jack Chick's tracts and anymore they just laugh - poor old man, he's stuck in a past age where reading a tract like this wouldn't make people want to saw his arm off. i pity Jack more than anything else now because he's too stuck in the old way of things. he's unwilling to admit that his tracts are ineffective and pointless. there are maybe a handful of people in the world that they would positively affect. now it's possible my cynical-college-student-gen-x lenses are coloring that perspective. i may be wrong about Jack and his mission, but i doubt i am.

now here we have the Objective folks. why they're calling their mission that, i don't know. maybe it's talking about a goal, not the opposite of 'subjective', either way, it's ironical.

but i'm so unbelieveably offended by this site, it makes me physically sick. these people are doing DAMAGE to the world and to the name of Jesus who they're claiming to herald. i pity them in that who the heck knows what Christ has to say about the things they're printing. fortunately the Messiah is merciful and His intense love can pardon even this trash, just as it pardoned my evil heart. but the issue here is not how bad Jesus will yell at them about this when it's all over. The whole 'love keeping no record of wrongs' thing is a spiffy hookup.

the issue here is what the heck causes the people that create drivel like this to think that it appeals to anyone, and will (1) help any person grow closer to God, or (2) improve the quality of anyone's life. normally I try to defend some mega-Christian™ stuff as beneficial to some, mainly because I'm not all-knowing and don't enjoy pointing fingers, and I can't see all ends, and I know that just because I think something is ridiculous doesn't mean it can't be good for some people. Who knows, maybe Bibleman and bumper stickers have done some good somewhere. i won't promote them but i won't call their peddlers evil and terrible.

maybe it's because i saw this site on Fark and the person who posted the link used the SICK tag. which it is. maybe it's because there's more negative propaganda on this site than positive. maybe it's because i cannot fathom the existence of a person who would WILLINGLY put something like this up for public viewing, and then ADVERTISE it. something about it just makes me absolutely furious.

let's look at some examples of highlights:

http://objective.jesussave.us/kidz.html: kids, avoid the athiests, they have diseases! I do like the Kanga-Jew though. That cracked me up.

http://objective.jesussave.us/zounds.html: Jesus is the only one who rocks! Check out the lyrics to the Wacky Wacky Wicca Chick song. It's the most offensive thing I've read in a while.

http://objective.jesussave.us/pastorscorner.html: let's freak out and start a campaign about HOW MANY FRICKIN NAILS THEY USED ON JESUS, WHO ARE YOU PEOPLE??????

http://objective.jesussave.us/mallmission.html: Objective: Mall Mission. And I quote: "J.C. Penny - The J.C. makes us think of Jesus Christ, thus associating our Lord with the lowest monetary value, the penny (even Judas valued Him at 30 pieces of silver!)." Or how about: "Sears - What the flesh of the damned does in Hell. It also sounds like "seers", Pagan mystics who engaged in occult premonitions." (Renee, you worked there, you must be evil). And the BEST: Next to a picture of Darth Maul: ""Darth Maul": Commercialized symbol of evil whose name sounds like "mall". Coincidence?"

i guess all i can say is that if i ever resemble anything like this, sound like these people, etc... hit me with a brick. i don't ever want to be this out of touch with reality. i'm GOING to judge these people because what they have done is clearly wrong, according to the standards they claim to share with Jesus. i'm going to point the finger. i'm going to say, if you are not a follower of Jesus and this site offends you, let them have it. i would love to try to do the 'loving' thing and instead of criticizing them, educate them. try to explain why they're going to turn more people away from God than towards Him with this stuff. how Jesus was more about acceptance than segregation, that He sought out the athiests instead of telling children to run from them. that He claimed reconciliation with God was simple, more simple than we can imagine, and didn't have any prerequisites like going on a Christian Music Diet.

that we miss the point when we stare at the cross and instead of allowing ourselves to be enveloped in the love we were longing for, the love we were created for, we start counting nails.

but i doubt they'd listen. if i called them up or wrote them a letter, i honestly doubt they'd listen, as the doors of their Christian™ fortress of solitude are probably welded too tightly to allow anything resembling a rational thought inside.

**irritated mode off**

and now i've become a finger-pointer, someone who lays the blame on others. i'm sorry, i don't mean to cause strife, because i can be quite a bit more effective in living my life how i believe it should be lived, than by telling everyone else how wrong they are. i'm sure there are better ways to address things like this. maybe i just leave them alone and hopefully the less people link to their page, the less anyone will ever see it.

if anything else this is just another reason for me to watch what i say and do, and keep myself from (hopefully) ever sounding like these people do to anyone.

saw on wwdn that wil's got a publishing deal w/oreilly. awesomeness. listened to an interview from a convention he did, and i thought it was worth mentioning that he made a sweet few good men reference: he says "it was a real 'give santiago the code red' move"... congrats to wil on his deal, i can't wait to read his book dancing barefoot, it's been sold out for a while, but now its gonna get real distribution. and being the startrek geek that i am, his new one coming out next year just a geek sounds like it'll be even more entertaining.

my cbell phone finally got switched - but i'm still not getting text messages via email. not sure why. gotta call them. yay.

so i started playing impossible mission last night for a little bit... it definitely sucked me right back in, i played it for half an hour without even knowing it.

it's so chilling and scary and creepy - no music, just the sound of your echoing footsteps and the robots. i remember always being terrified that i'd run out of time faster than i thought and the dude would start laughing and surprise me. geez. and as for the difficulty - it wasn't just that i was in third or fourth grade when i started playing it, the game's frickin HARD as CRAP. i found some screenshots of the ending, and it's totally not worth it at all. maybe i'll keep going on it.

played some wizard of wor last night too and ROCKED that game. i was pwning little blue and yellow and red monsters left and right. capped the warlock and the wizard. double dungeon score. GET OFF ME.

back at work. so far cbell still hasn't switched my number to my new phone, but someone's supposed to call me back this morning after getting it fixed. yeah.