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29 February 2004

Thoughts on "The Passion" and anti-Christian Jewish Propaganda

Went to see "The Passion" again. Not because I was dying to see Jesus slaughtered again, but because someone who hadn't seen it called and asked if I would go with him. A few passing thoughts on the second viewing:

1) The origin of certain Catholic traditions and myths totally blow my mind.
2) It's a shame Gibson made such a half-hearted attempt to capture the spiritual significance of Jesus' suffering and death, and instead wasted so much run time on Mary's emotional experience -- which none of the Gospel writers found sufficiently relevant to even mention.
3) What was the symbolism of that scene in which the devil was holding a very bizarre-looking child? That camera shot left me completely miffed. Must be another Catholic thing.
4) Why would Mary feel the need to wipe Jesus' blood off the ground? Is that kinda like Jackie Kennedy picking up a shot-off piece of JFK's head?
5) I don't have a real problem with Gibson using artistic license and adding scenes that were not in the Gospels. After all the Gospels are not Tolstoy novels. If you're making a movie using only the Gospels as source material, you're going to have to fill in a lot of blanks. But Gibson made poor use of his artistic license. Most of the extra-Gospel additions contributed absolutely nothing to the movie. Why did we need to see the flashback scene of Jesus making a table and Mary walking out to have a look at it? How did that make the movie better?
6) I'm sick of hearing that Passion plays caused the holocaust. That is bunk. And it's a lie. Nazi ideology caused the holocaust. Nazi ideology did not arise out of religiously motivated anger that the Jews killed Jesus. It sprang up because German Jews were so notoriously unpatriotic during a time of war and so heavily responsible for the internal revolution that forced Germany out of WWI.
7) I'm fed up with the idea that Gibson's film will "cause" the deaths of some Jews. Strictly speaking, movies do not force people to take any action. People are responsible for their own actions. Movies are not.

02:05


27 February 2004

The Greatest Crime in History?

Rand Simberg wrote a post mocking the notion that the crucifixion of Christ was the greatest crime in history. It was an ill-informed and poorly thought-out piece. I was also disappointed by his responses. No one seemed to get it.

Simberg's take:

I respect the faith of those who do believe and accept the story of Christ--they are clearly, for the most part, sincere. But it's one that has never had any resonance to me--it simply makes no sense, and I am bemused by the bizarre notion that I had anything to do with an event which, if it happened at all, happened two millennia ago. Sorry, no, we didn't all kill him. I accept no responsibility whatsoever.

I also have trouble getting my head around the notion that (as some have stated over at the Corner) this was "the greatest crime in history." Greater than the Holocaust? Greater than the Cultural Revolution? Greater than the deliberate starvation of the Ukrainians? Really?

Only if one accepts the premise. (And no, please don't try to persuade me, or others, of the truth of the Gospels in my comments section--there will be no sale, and it just wastes my bandwidth and disk space--in fact, I will delete any preaching or witnessing--providing a forum for others to proselytize on subjects of little interest to me is not the purpose of my web site).


I posted a response in his comments section that is also pasted below. It remains to be seen if the post will be deleted or not.

None of you understand. You are all wrong.

The crucifixion of Christ WAS the greatest crime in history -- greater than the holocaust, greater than all of Mao's and Stalin's economic disasters.

You might all continue pointing to such great injustices of history. It seems to be common among atheists and agnostics to point to one profound injustice or another as evidence that no righteous God can exist. And I find that they frequently heap scorn on the God they don't believe in and cry out in righteous indignation for vengeance on the perpetrators of great crimes.

The problem is that, though none of you realize it, we are all great sinners. None of us deserve the life that is given to us or the many good things that all of us have. Each new morning we wake up is a testament of God's abundant mercy, to which none of us have rightful claim.

All the horrible things that might happen to us in life -- all the seeming injustices -- are quite truly much more merciful than the eternal damnation we deserve. How can those who deserve to be cast into hell charge God with injustice while they live?

But there was one grave injustice that did take place. There was one innocent man who lived and had many bad things happen to him. And he was the only of us who deserved none of it. And this innocent man was crucified for sinners -- for guilty criminals.

The answer to the question of who killed Jesus is not, "We all did." The answer is "God did."

And now if God can ever be accused of injustice, the only valid case one might point to with some vindication is that he sacrificed Jesus for you and I.

Forgive this long post. I feel strongly about this. Perhaps some of you saw Gibson's movie. Remember the scene in which Barabbas, the insurrectionist and criminal, was made to go free while Jesus was to be crucified? We did not all kill Jesus. But we all stand in the place of Barabbas. We are criminals granted freedom at the expense of a righteous man.

I challenge any of you to name a greater injustice.

02:40


Red Ink

My visit with the dentist went badly.

Kreliav: 11 cavities?!
Dentist: Well you have 28 teeth in your mouth. So 11 cavities out of 28 leaves you with 17 good teeth -- which really isn't too bad.
Kreliav: (laughs hysterically)

On my way out to the Mavericks game, I wrecked my car. Actually somebody else wrecked my car. I was on a busy Dallas freeway during rush hour, and had to come to an abrupt stop -- a common occurence at that hour in Dallas. And I stopped in time with room to spare. But not enough.

Some lunkhead behind me (typical woman driver) slammed into my bumper knocking me into the car in front of me -- to which no damage was done. But it (a Chevy Tracker SUV) had a small hook on it's bumper that left a large gash in my front end. My bumper also has a good number of minor dents and scratches, which is much better than what I had expected to find on getting out. It was quite a jolt, and I initially suspected my bumper was completely smashed up. Dad said we're looking at a few thousand dollars in damage.

Eleven cavities and a car wreck. If I were supporting myself, I might say it was a disastrous red-letter day for me.

The Mavs' game was great. We handed San Antonio (the division rival) their worst loss of the season. Dad said he reminds me of his dad because I'm rather merciless to fans of the visiting team when my team is on top.

A photo of Griffey and me:




00:39


26 February 2004

The Passion of the Christ

I've seen it. Now for the scoop.

Positives:
*Solid acting
*Good directing
*Good music
*1st century Judea recreated in very lifelike, detail-rich fashion
*Largely faithful to the Gospel accounts (some speculative scenes and details added)

Negatives:
*Very little theological nuance
*Catholic-style depiction of Mary
*Very little emphasis on who Jesus was, what he did, why he had to die

It was pretty much what you would expect -- a movie that focuses very narrowly on Jesus arrest, trial, torture, and death. Very little effort went into spelling out the theological background of why Jesus' death was so necessary. His teachings, his miracles, and the other significant events of his life receive no extensive treatment here. Even his resurrection is limited to a brief closing scene. Jesus suffered and died for the sins of the world. Gibson's aim was strictly to show his audience the brutal physical nature of just all that is implied in that statement.

At the beginning of the movie in the Garden of Gethsemane, Satan is shown tempting Jesus, asking him how one man can take on the whole burden of sin. This, of course, did not happen in the Gospels. But it is one of the few scenes in the movie that attempted to give the audience a feel, in theological terms, for the scope and profundity of Jesus' sacrifice. The film could have used much more of this.

Given the vast difference between my own beliefs and Gibson's, I have to be pretty pleased with this movie. But if I had made it, it would have been a bit different.

02:48


25 February 2004

Going nowhere and taking my time...

It rained all day. It's still raining. I can't really think of much to say, but I've resolved to write a post anyway. Of late, my days have consisted of trying very hard to get a job that I'm sure I'll hate, reading news stories on subjects I don't care about anymore, watching mildly entertaining basketball games that I also don't care about, and trying to lose myself in an alternative fantasy reading world so that I do not have to think about any of the things that I used to care about such as God, America, and my future. At night, my sister and her fiance get home (they aren't home during the day because they have jobs). They are full of personality, and I can laugh and act myself around them. They didn't much like it tonight though when I took my lightsaber and started beating them with it. I've taken to occasionally walking the dog in the afternoon. He's not much good at walking yet. He's still only a puppy and has a habit of wanting to stop to smell something every ten yards or so. I end up having to drag him along with me sometimes unless there is another dog in the nearby area barking at us -- in which case he wants to run away as quickly as I can keep up with him. Faced with a larger barking dog behind a nearby fence, I believe most cats would respond in a more courageous fashion than Griffey. The mere sight of another dog, no matter how friendly or unthreatening, is enough to prompt him to put his tail between his legs and cease to move.



CaptainKIL (11:30:49 PM): are you going to see "The Passion" tomorrow?
Brother Shaft (11:30:55 PM): no
Brother Shaft (11:31:00 PM): probably in the next week or two
Brother Shaft (11:31:03 PM): I'll wait tell it dies down
CaptainKIL (11:31:07 PM): I am.. I ordered my tickets a week in advance
Brother Shaft (11:31:56 PM): Dallas... must suck to have to order a week in advance ;-) here in Lawrence you can do it 3 hours in advance and still get a great seat
CaptainKIL (11:32:10 PM): nah
CaptainKIL (11:32:15 PM): we actually have decent theaters here
CaptainKIL (11:32:20 PM): theaters that were built after 1980
CaptainKIL (11:32:34 PM): and it's no hassle having to order in advance.. that's what the internet is for
Brother Shaft (11:32:53 PM): ah ha! we have a 16 screen theater built 4 years ago! we're so freaken cool!!!!
CaptainKIL (11:33:10 PM): I have two 24-screen theaters within two miles of me
CaptainKIL (11:33:22 PM): and they all have super large screens and stadium seating
Brother Shaft (11:33:48 PM): We have a 1200 foot house-in screen in Lawrence, you can watch it all over town for free
Brother Shaft (11:34:07 PM): and everythings in 3-d
CaptainKIL (11:34:15 PM): we have a screen that's five miles wide.... you need binoculars to see half of the screen
Brother Shaft (11:35:06 PM): here in Lawrence the movies literally come to life and murder people, I saw the Braveheart cast take over city hall for 3 days
CaptainKIL (11:35:16 PM): hehe
CaptainKIL (11:36:15 PM): yeah I can't come up with anything to beat that;-)
Brother Shaft (11:36:28 PM): I would hope not... it's terrifying

02:57


23 February 2004

Shadows

There is a little green light on the edge of my computer. You can see it even when the screen is closed. And at night when all the lights are out and I'm sleeping, it casts a dim green glow on the wall overlooking the entry way to my bathroom. I usually make sure there's no light in my room when I turn in, but I never thought to do something about this light. It's much too small to bother with.

But last night, something odd happened. I lay in my bed staring aimlessly and unfocused in front of me, lost in thought. Then it occured to me that shadows had moved across the dim green light reflecting off the wall. At first I thought it was my imagination.

But it happened again. I very clearly saw it. The light on my computer had not simply been blinking. The glow remained as the shadows moved swiftly across it. It happened repeatedly. I remained dumbfounded and didn't know what to make of it. It could not have been a bird outside my window or the lights of a passing car on the outside street. My curtains were shut and my window overlooks the backyard in any case. There was surely no one and nothing else in the room, for my room is small, and my ears are sharp, and I would certainly have realized it if I were not alone.

I thought that whatever it might be, it was likely the mechanical process of some moving device in my room that would keep repeating itself. But it didn't. I continued to look thinking the shadows would continue to appear, but they did not. They stopped and I did not see them again.

I still don't know what to make of it. But the only possibilities I can imagine are these: 1) There was a ghost in my room; 2) A small, shapeless insect repeatedly crawled back and forth across the green light on my computer more quickly than I have ever known any insect to move; 3) I am delusional; 4) this analysis is wrong.



Some conversations are so full of creative nonsense that they are worth saving. It was my original intention to put this one on my tagboard, but some of the IMs are over 200 characters long, so I will post it here.

JoeyDie5 (5:13:20 PM): if i had half the brain you had i'd make a shoe and throw it to jupiter
CaptainKIL (5:14:20 PM): if I had half the capacity for chaos that you had, I would unleash a pack of monkeys on top of ents and fling them to the stars until great dragons fell to the earth in flames of silver, causing great earthquakes as they strike the ground
JoeyDie5 (5:16:30 PM): pfft if you only new the chaos i'm on a completely diffrent lvl than that take a shoe rip off the sole and tape it on your back lspo strap a few sticks of TNT and hide them under your shirt make some substance that would burn and light a fuse when a foot struck the sole then BOOM! there goes the capital building because of a mean guard ;P
JoeyDie5 (5:17:17 PM): now thats smarts and chaos
CaptainKIL (5:18:52 PM): you fool! There is no word in elvish, entish, or the tongues of men for the level of chaos that underlies a pack of wild monkeys falling from the heavens with TNT strapped to their backs until they hit the ground and strike it hard with an aftershock that shakes the heavens and dims the light of the stars and all the world falls under shadow
JoeyDie5 (5:21:04 PM): what if the monkeys had there inerlings dangling out exploding from the mass Gs then a giant buffalo the size of mars ate them in mid air and then the monkeys blew up at the exact mean of geometrical amout to do the most amount of damage then a planet formed aound the buffalo and a new giant earth came down and it happened all over again thats life i guess
CaptainKIL (5:21:29 PM): hehe
CaptainKIL (5:24:28 PM): yeah but that's nothing compared to the chaos inherent in the sudden formation of giant robots from meteors that hail from all corners of the distant galaxy that strike the earth and instantly morph into a robot ninja monkey which instantly strikes the earth and shatters it until the core is exposed and all the earth begins to crumble before it as night falling until it comes without a star...and then umm...a herd of giant wild buffalos overruns them and trampels them before falling into the rift in the earth and leaving the fate of the planet in the hands of Hitler -- who will have dominion over all life on earth even unto the ending of the world
JoeyDie5 (5:25:06 PM): OH YEAH WELL>>>
JoeyDie5 (5:27:58 PM): what if i took a toothpick and stabb4ed the ground next to a brand new cloner warehouse and people like george washington and such would come out renewed and would fall into the hole and i would dig a hole with toothpicks until we suffcated and eventually all these clones would turn into a primortial ooze pit and the earth would all fallapart and we would be struck by lightning and a giant ape would come from are ooze pit and would eat the earth in 5 hole bites over 700 million years

There's more, but the creativity waned from here on out, and it's not really worth reading.

23:17


22 February 2004

HTML and Air Hockey

I wasted away the afternoon at my computer trying to figure out how to incorporate Iframes into this weblog. After making a great deal of progress, it looked like it might work. Then I hit a wall. I could not figure out a way to fit my archives into the new Iframe-based format. So I spent another several hours trying to think of loopholes to get around this. Alas, there are none, and though I spent the day trying to improve my blog, I still have the same blog to show for it.

Dad and I went to the arcade to play air hockey. Playing air hockey with Dad isn't quite like playing with just anyone else. When we play, we take it to a whole new level of intensity. It's the difference between a hard run and a walk in the park. We hit the puck as hard as we can. We hit it so hard it periodically flies off the table and across the arcade. For us, an air hockey game is an occasion to take off your jacket and roll up your sleeves -- for you will surely break a sweat while playing. And when watching others play, we can't help but be filled with disdain as they play entire games without a single decent bank shot or an off-the-table shot. It's really sickening.

01:44


21 February 2004

The Failure of European Diplomacy

Some weeks ago, Libya agreed to voluntarily give up all of its WMD programs, thereby providing a level of unqualified vindication for the Bush doctrine. There are a few holdouts among liberal media types, most of whom hold no significant foreign policy expertise, who still suggest that Libya's capitulation resulted primarily from a intensive, patient diplomatic overtures. That the negotiations began as U.S. troops were poised to strike Iraq and ended the week Saddam Hussein was found in a spider hole, they argue, is mere coincidence.

When it comes to solving the WMD proliferation issue, advocates of carrot-heavy diplomacy must now grapple with another case study: Iran.

You know something is fishy when notoriously liberal editorial pages start calling for the employment of more forceful US diplomacy. In a Friday editorial the Washington Post detailed at length Iran's blatant flouting of an agreement, still only months old, with European governments. The Post had this to say about the success of European-led diplomacy in disarming Iran:

In a reluctant concession to the United States, the Europeans agreed to a statement that "further serious Iranian failures" would lead the board to consider all actions permitted by its statute, including the referral of Iran to the U.N. Security Council for possible sanctions. The board and its European members must now face up to that language -- because the promises Iran made to the foreign ministers of Britain, France and Germany have proved to be nearly empty.


The forceful measures the Post recommends seems to lead to a referral to the U.N. Security Council for possible sanctions. I'm not sure what good this will accomplish. Sanctions will not make Iran's nuclear program go away.

At the beginning of The Two Towers, Frodo tells Gollum, "There's no promise you can make that I can trust."

The logic applies here. It is no longer safe to rely on carrot-heavy diplomacy. There is no option left but a forceful response. Being one of the leading oil-producing countries in the world, Iran has no need of nuclear power of any kind, and all their protests to the effect that their nuclear program is for peaceful purposes is hogwash.

Are U.S. air strikes on Iran's nuclear facilities in our future? Very possibly (though not this year -- it's an election year). One thing is certain: if the U.S. does not take forceful action against Iran, Israel will. And that is a risk that the U.S. cannot allow if it does not want to risk a war in the greater Middle East.

01:57


20 February 2004

The Vortex of Middle Earth

Someone once remarked to me that she had become sucked into Tolkein's universe when her own world had become too painful to live in. She needed an alternate life to live. And she found it in Middle Earth.

My life pretty much sucks right now too. I'm not so sure the same thing is happening to me.

But with each passing day, I find myself living a little more in Middle Earth and a little less in reality. Initially, I thought it was only filling a vacuum left by disappointing Star Wars prequels and a shortage of new Harry Potter books to read. But it's gone further than that. Having something of a history of weakness for engrossing sci-fi/fantasy epics, I really should have known something like this might happen. But I indulged myself anyway. I went to see The Two Towers five times, bought the DVD, watched it 10-15 more times, then bought the extended version (I've not yet memorized the cut scenes from TTT, but I will have done so shortly). I went out and saw Return of the King five times (it probably won't be long before I succumb to a sixth). Today, I bought new copies of all three books with bright, shiny pics from the movies adorning each of the covers. I'll have read them all within a month.

After finishing all three books and thoroughly memorizing Two Towers Extended, I'll probably run out and purchase The Silmarillion or one of those LotR video games on PS2. I can remember being a Star Wars freak as a kid and enjoying any Star Wars video game that came out solely because of the Star Wars license. Average, mediocre action/shooting games were a blast to play if the enemies were storm troopers or tie fighters. The same concept applies here. I don't usually enjoy video games anymore -- I played them too much as a teenager and became jaded. But I'll be more than happy to overlook sloppy gameplay if I can play as Legolas and pick off wargs in the hills of Rohan.



I did have some time for reality today. I turned in a job application at Barnes&Noble, though I don't expect to ever hear from them again. I plan to look for a job elsewhere tomorrow. But having gone to some 20+ places and been turned away at almost all of them, I'm starting to lose my determination. I'll probably won't even dress up for it tomorrow. I'm getting lazy. My room is a mess all the time now (whereas I'm usually very tidy), and I seem to have developed a habit of neglecting to change my shirt for weeks at a time.

01:26


19 February 2004

Two Towers Extended; Job Hunting

It really eats me up that the DVD player on my computer doesn't work very well. I recently picked up the extended version of The Two Towers. I spend a lot of time sitting at my computer indian-style on my bed, and I would love to be able to pop in my new movie and play any random scene from it whenever. My favorite of the added scenes:

Legolas: Final count: forty-two.
Gimli: Forty-two? That's not bad for a pointy-eared Elvish princeling. I myself am sitting pretty on forty-three.
Legolas fires an arrow into the Orc carcass under Gimli
Legolas: Forty-three.
Gimli: He was already dead!
Legolas: He was twitching.
Gimli: He was twitching because he's got my ax embedded in his nervous system!

They should never have cut this scene. I can understand the other cuts. This one should have stayed.



I'm still looking around for a job. In the last two days, I've visited a Barnes&Noble, two Gamestops, two candy stores, two movie retailers, a Target, a Kay-Bee Toys store, FX (video game retailer), and probably a few others that I can't recall right now. Barnes&Noble said that they were hiring but seemed to already have a large pool of applicants from which to choose. The kid working at FX promised to see to it my resume finds its way into the hands of his manager and told me that they might be hiring in a month or so. Those were the brightest prospects I encountered. At every other place I went to, I was politely told that they are not hiring and that I should take a hike.

Desperation is slowly settling in with every passing day that I remain unemployed. Not that I need the money. I just need to get out of my room and have something to do. Tomorrow I'll see if the local Krispy Kreme is hiring. But I'm running out of ideas and I'm afraid that I may be stuck in my room with nothing to do for some time yet.


02:28


16 February 2004

The Passion: What Are Jews Really Afraid Of?

I should say first that I've never harbored any ill feelings toward Jews. I'm a supporter of America's pro-Israel foreign policy approach. I hold to no secret conspiracy theories about Jews controlling the media and financial institutions.

But now I'm mad at them. In fact, I positively resent Jews now. And it's all their fault.

I've been anxiously anticipating Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ" for some time now. Not being an enthusiastic supporter of most of what Hollywood churns out, I was excited to hear that something targeted at Christian audiences was in the works.

But then various Jewish groups and the liberal media declared open season on the allegedly anti-Semitic film -- before they had even seen it. When first becoming aware of these charges, I was dumbfounded. How, I wondered, is the story of Jesus' crucifixion anti-Semitic? Jesus is Jewish. His disciples were Jewish. Christianity is originally a Jewish religion. Are these people serious?

"Who Killed Jesus?" reads the cover of a recent Newsweek article. This is what all the fuss is about. In ages past, anti-Semitism in all of its violent manifestations was given this justification: the Jews killed Jesus. The primary concern of Jewish leaders then, allegedly, is a resurgence of anti-Semitism as a result of the resurrection of the charge that the Jews are mostly responsible for the death of Jesus. I have problem with this. This concern on the part of the Jewish community strikes me as particularly disingenuous and raises the question of just what it is about Gibson's film that makes them feel so threatened.

Gibson's film is said to closely adhere to the Gospel accounts of the events surrounding the crucifixion, and this is why the charge of anti-Semitism isn't very convincing. If Gibson's film is anti-Semitic, are the Gospels then anti-Semitic? It would be hard to answer yes. The Gospels are studied closely at most every church in America on a weekly basis. If Jewish leaders are to be taken seriously, then the real question is how to fight the flames of anti-Semitism that are fanned every week at America's churches. Given America's high proportion of Bible-reading Christians, you would think that this would be one of the more flagrantly anti-Semitic nations in the world. But Jews have always been welcomed here and accorded the full rights of citizenship. America is Israel's biggest supporter, and fundamentalist, Bible-reading Christians are among its staunchest backers. Are Jewish leaders really afraid that American Christians, already familiar with the Gospels, will suddenly adopt Third Reich attitudes because of this movie? What are they really afraid of?

It's enough to make one wonder if the real source of the conflict here is Christian anti-Semitism, or if it's anti-Christian Jews. I somehow doubt that Gibson's depiction of Jewish culpability in the crucifixion is what really disturbs the Jews. After all, they don't accept Jesus as their Messiah. And if Jesus was not who he said he was, then his crucifixion was deserved.

It's Gibson's depiction of Jesus as the Son of God that they find so unsettling. They feel threatened by the proposition that their Messiah has come and that they killed him. But this is the heart of the Christian religion. And they realize this. Their real problem is not with Mel Gibson and the issue at hand isn't anti-Semitism. It's the Christian message -- Jesus Christ and him crucified for the sins of the world -- that they find so offensive. Their problem is with Christianity itself. But they can't very well say this. And so they play the anti-Semitism card.

Adopting a pose strikingly similar to that of the atheist left, Jews seem to feel perfectly comfortable when Christianity is kept behind the closed doors of private churches on Sunday morning. Only when the profound truths of Christianity are combined with the powerful artistic talents of Mel Gibson and flung into the public realm for all to see does Jewish intolerance begin to manifest itself.

15:44


14 February 2004

Russian Snow Goons

We were supposed to get a few inches of snow. That's pretty rare in Texas. I didn't really believe the forecast. When it started snowing, I didn't think any of it would remain snow when it hit the ground. But I was wrong on that too (at least it didn't melt if it fell on grass).

Early in the afternoon, Dad became excited. He said it was the perfect kind of snow for rolling up into humungous snowballs. I've seen that done before (I saw some kids do it in Ames when I was at ISU), but I still wasn't really sure how it was done. So Dad and I went outside and he showed me how to do it. It was great fun! Especially when the snowballl became really huge! And the novelty of it didn't wear off after just one. We had to do it again!!

So we wound up spending a good portion of the afternoon making humungous snowballs -- and then stacking those up into snowmen. We made two snowmen on either side of the front walk. We put Russian hats on them, and gave one of them a gun. I tried to make a third snowman on the walk, but every time I made my second snowball, I made it so big that it crushed the first one when I set it on top. So I tried to make the unorganized pile of snow into what I wanted to be a dead snowman lying flat on his back -- which would have looked pretty cool in between two Russian snowmen with guns. But that was too hard, so I shoveled most of it back onto the grass.




I also made giant snowballs in the backyard. I wanted to see what happened when I rolled one into the pool. They turn into floating ice bergs for about 20 minutes after which they melt.



I'm usually not a very careless person. But I did something really dumb yesterday. Really, of all the boneheaded things I've done before in my life, this is certainly one of the worst. I was getting ready to take my sister out to get some fast food and to get her car picked up. I got into my car, put the car in reverse, and backed up right into the garage door. I had neglected to open it. Fortunately, I wasn't going very fast, so neither the garage door nor my car sustained significant damage (only a small scratch in the bumper). No real harm done. It was just a mind-blowingly stupid thing to have done. My sister and her fiance had a good laugh at my expense.



Rumors (and they do appear to be true ones) broke today that the Rangers are shopping A-Rod to the Yankees. I will now summarize how I feel about this:
%@#!!%! DIE TOM HICKS!!! DIE!!! $@!##%$^%



Defend Your Castle is the coolest internet flash game I've ever played. I've made it to level 16. GRRRR!!! Why can't I get past level 16?! %@#$^

20:25


13 February 2004

AIM Fun

The internet is a wonderful invention. It opens up a whole new world of possibilities for twisted individuals like myself who enjoy few things more than screwing with other people's minds.

I have some 15 AIM screen names. I have two buddies who both have their own similarly extensive collection of screen names. Today, using Dead AIM (a program that makes it possible to log onto more than one screen name simultaneously), we all logged onto all of our names and then joined a single chat room with every last name. You can begin to imagine the rich possibilities.

The primary advantage of this is that it makes it possible to win any argument and to confirm any absurd assertion by virtue of consensus. One poor soul in the chat room found it futile to dispute the assertion that France started WWII. When he indignantly declared that Hitler had been responsible for the outbreak of the war, some 7 or 8 other "people" declared him mad and shouted him down.

In this chat room that had some 35 users (and about 5 different people), rationality and common sense were turned squarely upside down. Hardly a comment was made not intended to confuse the targeted unsuspecting chat room participants.

I found a personality test somewhere as I was browsing. The results are below.

Advanced Big 30 Personality Test Results
Sociability |||||| 18%
Gregariousness |||||| 14%
Assertiveness ||||||||||||||| 46%
Activity Level ||||||||||||||| 42%
Excitement-Seeking ||||||||||||||| 46%
Enthusiasm ||||||||||||||| 42%
Extroversion |||||||||||| 34%
Trust ||||||||||||||| 42%
Morality ||||||||||||||||||||| 66%
Altruism |||||||||||||||||| 58%
Cooperation ||||||||||||||||||||| 70%
Modesty ||||||||||||||||||||| 66%
Sympathy ||||||||||||||| 42%
Friendliness |||||||||||||||||| 57%
Competence ||||||||||||||||||||| 66%
Neatness ||||||||||||||||||||| 62%
Dutifulness ||||||||||||||||||||| 66%
Achievement |||||||||||||||||||||||| 74%
Self-Discipline |||||||||||||||||| 54%
Cautiousness ||||||||||||||||||||| 66%
Orderliness ||||||||||||||||||||| 64%
Anxiety |||||||||||||||||||||||| 78%
Volatility |||||||||||||||||| 54%
Depression |||||||||||||||||||||||||||| 82%
Self-Consciousness |||||||||||||||||||||||||||| 90%
Impulsiveness ||||||||||||||| 42%
Vulnerability |||||||||||||||||||||||||||| 82%
Emotional Stability ||||||||| 29%
Imagination ||||||||||||||||||||| 62%
Artistic Interests |||||||||||| 34%
Emotionality |||||||||||||||||||||||||||| 82%
Adventurousness |||||||||||| 34%
Intellect |||||||||||||||||||||||| 74%
Liberalism |||||| 14%
Openmindedness ||||||||||||||| 50%
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