The Wanderer

Coffee Making Curriculum

2012-02-11T19:29:00.005-07:00

All of us over at Timmy Ho's have been handling the new 24 ounce XL size fairly well. It's not really that confusing, in theory. Even four-and-a-half-year-old habits aren't that hard to break so long as you have a multitude of visual reminders strategically placed in every nook and corner.

There really is a kind of order to our thinking, but thanks to the fact that our store is only partially through the process of upgrading to resized paraphernalia, and has always been a bit of a malfunctioning ghetto, we aren't currently able to express that ordered thinking in standard Tim Horton's lingo. We function just fine, but suppose we suddenly got a newbie with no prior Timmy's experience?

His name would be Franz (like one of those five babies from 2010. Not like the one from Fire Emblem). Suppose he's an eager-to-please high schooler with blond hair and big, wide blue eyes. It's his first day on the job.

Customer: I'll have a large double-double and a medium hot chocolate with one-and-a-half milks, please.

Me: Franz, please make us a large double-double.

Franz: Right away.

Me: Use the second largest cup.

Franz: And I put in two sugar and two cream.

Me: Yes, except you put in the wrong amount of sugar.

Franz: I hit the button for the second largest portion twice.

Me: I know, but the machine disagrees with your reasoning. To make a large with two sugar, you actually need to use the button for the one that looks like an extra-large portion twice. If you were making an extra-large, then you'd use two small and two medium shots of sugar, which are labelled as medium and large on the machine.

Franz: Oh. Then why do you call them small and medium?

Me: Because that's what they are. But not with the cream. For the cream, you use the second largest portion, unless you're using the machine for counter. Then you use the largest potion for for a large and two each of the second largest and second smallest, which you can call either small and medium or medium and large.

Franz: Um... ok. Start again, please. What do I use?

Me: I'll show you. Since we're standing at the drive-thru, for a large double-double, we use two of the apparently extra-large sugars, and two large creams.

Franz: Isn't the second largest cream for the large coffee?

Me: Yes.

Franz: Then why did you use the middle one and the largest one?

Me: Because I hit the wrong button first, so I offset the smaller size by using the largest.

Franz: Oh, this helps me be not confused.

Me: WELL I CONFUSED MYSELF AND MADE A MISTAKE, OK?

Franz: No need to yell, Carla.

Me: Sorry.

Franz: So here it is? One large double-double? Now it needs to be stirred.

Me: Good. And put a large lid on it.

Franz: It won't fit.

Me: That's because you need to put a lid that says "XL" on it.

Franz: Doesn't that mean "extra-large"?

Me: It used to, but now it means just large. The smaller ones that don't say anything are the true extra-larges.

Franz: Go figure.

Me: And now the medium hot chocolate with one-and-a-half milks.

Franz: That's the medium sized cup, right?

Me: Of course. What else would it be?

Franz: Is the milk as complicated as the cream?

Me: No. Just one medium milk, and then one extra-small milk. Unless you're using the counter machine. Then you don't use the machine.

Franz: How does that work?

Me: You just eye-ball it.

Franz: Ok. How's this?

Me: Too much.

Franz: This?

Me: Too little.

Franz: Now?

Me: Too much.

Franz: Arrrgh!!

Me: Just a smidgen less, really. Don't get upset.

Franz: I am so not getting the hang of this.

Me: But you're almost done! Just fill it with hot chocolate, now.

Franz: This hot chocolate looks funny.

Me: Oh yeah! I forgot to tell you that to get hot chocolate you need to dispense from the English Toffee machine.

Franz: What?!

Me: You get English Toffee if you dispense from the hot chocolate spout.

Franz: Who decided that?! You mean I have to make it again? *begins to sob*

Me: No, no, Franz! Don't cry! I'll do it for you. Here, just mark me a medium lid.

Franz: *sniffs* Fine.

Me: Um, that's a small.

Franz: *wails*

Customer: Oh, wait! I meant a medium coffee and a small hot chocolate!

"If you put sugar in my coffee, I will throw it in your face!" Nasty Lady at Tim's today

Baby Naming Girls

2012-02-07T12:57:00.000-07:00

Here is the girl-baby naming data from Alberta 2010. As a general rule, the girl names seem to follow a pattern: 1) find perfectly good name 2) add something that sounds like "ee", "lee", "lynne", or possibly "ann". Take a look at the list if you dare. You will never want to see lyn or lee tagged onto the end of a name ever again.

In the end, girl names in general tend to be a mass of cloyingly sweet mix-n-match variations of a few names, overdone with vowel sounds. Naturally, with so many similar names they're mostly quite forgettable, but also generally a little less patently absurd than some boys names.

For example, there were fourteen babies named Rose in 2010. Then there were also four named Rosalie, two named Rosaleigh, one Rosalyn, one Rosa-Lynne, four Rosannas, two Rosannes, and one Roseanne. There was also one Rosia, two Rosies, one Roslyn, and one Rosslyn. In this case there was also one Rosaline, one Rosaleeta, one Rosalia and several variations on Rosemarie. This is a name that's traditionally adaptable, so it's not half bad, but it's pretty much the pattern with most girl names now.

How about another name? I still like this name in theory, but it's been so overdone I hardly want to hear it anymore:

3 Shay
1 Shaye
1 Shayanna
1 Shay-Linh
1 Shaye-Lynn
6 Shaylee
2 Shaylyn
1 Shaya
1 Shayelle
26 Shayla
1 Shaydance
2 Shayda
1 Shayla-May
1 Shayla-Rae
4 Shayna
1 Shayma
1 Shaynah
2 Shayne
1 Shazia
3 Shea
1 Shea-Kaya
1 Sheala
1 Shealyn
1 Shada
1 Shadae
1 Shadayia
1 Shaden
1 Shadlin
2 Shae
1 Shaela
1 Shaelin
5 Shaelyn
1 Shaelynn
2 Shaelynne
1 Shae-Lynne

It really does seem that people think that just adding a cute suffix-name to the end of something else makes it a perfectly respectable girl name. But unfortunately some names just aren't quite so conducive to the mixing. How about Scottlynn? Seantyanna? Maybe Drazzlyn? Elektra-Lee? Harllie-Lyn? How about Clementine-E? I don't know what's with this cultural "ee", "lee", and "lyn" fixation.

It's even worse when they add kre8tiv spelling on top of it all. For example, one little girl was named Heavenly. Except she's Heavon-Liegh instead. Jaydyn-Lyn? Someone liked the letter y. And after all those x-lyn names, we have exactly ONE plain Lyne and ONE Lynn. No Lynne at all, and one Lynnette (which is pretty much the only version I like).

On the less cloyingly sweet side, I'm surprised by how popular Addison is for a girl (there were 104, not counting kre8iv spellings). And also a bit disappointed. The more popular they are, the sooner they'll be "lynn and lee-ified" and then I'll get sick of them. Still, Addison so far has remained a favourite of mine (but only spelled "Addison").

Even less sweet, there were six babies named Agatha. I thought that name was far in the distant past.

I'm intrigued with the 16 named Ember. I've played with this one in my head for quite a while, as an alternative to Amber, and I've liked, but I didn't really expect it to "take off".

And yes, girls are named strange things, too. How about Feather? Finnaveer? Gooday? Icey? Imunique? Has that one seriously not been done? What the heck is Learnie? Two girls named Navy. Notoria? You WANT your kid to be Notoria? And Phallika? Oh, dear me... Serenirty (that's not my typo). We also have Serenedy and Serennity-Lynne. I'm not sure what to make of Landry, which made the boy's list, too. It's probably pronounced with a Lan like Can, but it looks so similar to Laundry that it just can't be worth it. Five baby girls were named Princess, and one Princes. I assume that was a typo on the parents' part. Psalm is interesting. And Real must be a protest against Cosmic Humanism and the New Age movement. I think Rea-Lee could be pronounced Rhea-Lee (either Raya-lee or Reeya-lee), but I wouldn't bet on it.

Rolica sounds like a fun baby. Maybe she's Stoic's sister. How's Maxophena for pretentious? Pemberley (Mr. Darcy, anyone?). One Scout (yay Harper Lee!)

There were two girls named Alberta. Maybe they're the twin sisters of Canada and Kanada. At least Alberta is a genuine person-name. After places, there were also two named Bethlehem (and one Ephrathah). Hmm... say what you will, I kinda like those.

Hagley, on the other hand, I think is just awful. Depending on how you pronounce it, it starts off with either "hag" or "hog", and if you pronounce it with a soft a, it rhymes with "ugly".

And we have another few couples that just couldn't make all the in-laws happy. Louisa-Nora-Ivette, anyone? Isabella-Coral-Tiana? Oh, yeah!

Forty-two were named Brianna exactly (my sister), and 3 were named Carla (and 4 Karla). Two were name Kiki, like my gerbil. Thankfully I didn't find any named Scamp, after my sister's gerbil.

And the single longest un-hyphenated name of either gender? Kamakaleiimalamalamaiaikanaau. I'd love to know what it means.

No baby Sibylla anywhere. :-( Not even a Sibylla-leigh!

“I don't care what you say about me. Just be sure to spell my name wrong.” Barbra Streisand

Baby Naming Boys

2012-02-02T13:12:00.001-07:00

Here is the boy-baby naming data from Alberta 2010. You may be interested in some of the more... interesting... names.

Someone in Alberta just over a year ago named their baby boy.... Baby. Now, there are plenty of parents that call their baby "Baby". Hey, I even call people's babies "Baby", regardless of whether I know their names or not. But I have never heard of someone naming their baby "Baby". Maybe nine months just wasn't enough time for the parents to find a name they liked.

The parents of Elmer-Charles-Rylee must have had the opposite problem. They couldn't figure on a name they didn't like. I wonder how many middle names this little bopper has.

Moving on six babies were named "Corny", which is doubtlessly a diminutive of Cornelius, but STILL, people, please. Next you'll be naming him "Cheesy".

One baby was named Barabbas. Yes, after the murderer in the Bible, I assume. And somebody had the guts to use "Zerubabel". (And my relations think I have crazy biblical name tastes. At least I make an attempt to spell them correctly.)

We also welcomed into our midst a little Beowolf. No, not "Beowulf", but "Beowolf". So much for coming off as educated literature geek parents.

There's also a Ding, Bing, Bang, and Boomer born among us. The first three could quite possibly be ethnic names, but I still find it interesting. Actually, it's sometimes difficult to distinguish between perfectly respectable ethnic names that just sound goofy to an English speaker and names that are genuinely bizarro-weird. Yet I'm pretty sure that "Gixxer" falls into the latter category.

A lot of baby boys were given noun name. The most patriotic of these was Canada (and one Kanada). There was also a Dragon (and Dragan), and a wee little Leviathan. Maybe he was such a fat baby that his mother was convinced that's what he was as she delivered him. Also, Duramax and Dynamite. But besides Coven being a pagan name, isn't Wicca also primarily a female religion?

The two little babies named Coy were offset by the one named Courage. And how about Stoic? Lots of parents name their baby after a trait they hope the baby to show, but I guess these parents must really have been hoping for a quiet, easy baby. On the other hand, the parents of the 3 babies Tiger were probably hoping for something else. I'm not sure what the parents of Daedric were wanting, except more time to play Oblivion and Skyrim.

And then someone named their son Hades. WHAT THE? Sigh. There's Riddick, too, which isn't QUITE as bad as Hades, but leaves more room for teasing. Riddick-ulous! And Heartheaven? Mydnite? Despite naming your kid a sentimental noun like Midnight, it's still not unique enough that you have to do it with a kre8iv spelling?

There's less kre8iv spelling going on with the boys than with the girls, but there's still enough to make you shake your head. "Jheirred" for "Jared"? So what if Jared is popular? If you love it, use it, but I assure you that randomly altering the name to make it impossibly difficult to spell will not garner your baby any more respect from anyone. At least Xzavier and X-Zavier leave no question as to their pronunciation.

And dare I ask what was the purpose behind the 11 babies "Trystan" and "Trysten"? We do not need double entendres in baby names, thank you. I don't understand why the letter Y is so popular with parents right now.

On the slightly less aggravating side, someone used Strider (yay, Lord of the Rings!), plain V (V for Vendetta, anyone?), and Valen (Babylon 5, yes, yes?)

I like Augustus, but it may sound too pretentious in our culture. Still, I'm happy to see it used. I was intrigued by the 6 named Orion. I've been contemplating this name for quite a while, but I'm not sure I could ever use it.

For my personal favourites, there was unfortunately only one Ephraim (and one Efrem, but that barely counts). There 5 Enochs (and one Enock), 4 Gideons, and 2 Corins. And a full 25 named Griffin.

Fifty-six boys were named after my brother, Justin, and 5 after my dad, Arthur. Four were named Heinrich (plus a few others of various Heinrich/Hendrick composition).

I know I've used this before, but it's just so pertinent:

"Even the most obedient and adoring of Nazis might have had difficulty saluting his Fuehrer with a crisp 'Heil Schicklgrober!'" The Concise Biography of Hitler

Love Thy Neighbour

2012-01-30T14:19:00.000-07:00

This film was played at an animation showcase my siblings and I recently attended. We fell in love with it, if only because of how thoroughly horrific the last few minutes are. It's a stop-motion short film that was made by Norman McLaren in 1969. You will go to jail if you can't guess the moral of the story.

“You must not kill your neighbor, whom perhaps you genuinely hate, but by a little propaganda this hate can be transferred to some foreign nation, against whom all your murderous impulses become patriotic heroism.” Bertrand Russell

Cream Goes Boom

2012-01-27T15:30:00.012-07:00

Given that I've worked at Tim Hortons for almost five years, now, I've survived so long remarkably unscathed. My arms are not crisscrossed with burn marks from the toaster. My hands have never been cut with breaking coffee pots. The piping hot tea water has never attacked me. And up until this morning, I've never been the one to detonate a creamer.

Today was my first shift with the new 24 oz XL cups. I'm working on getting my coworkers to call them the "Big Momma" size. Nanda, at least, seems open to it. "Big Momma, double double," she said, trying it on for size.

If you order a Big Momma triple triple, you have more cream in that sucker than you have coffee in an XS black. We have always gone through cream fast at Timmy's; needless to say this new cup size hasn't helped the issue. (It hasn't helped the drive-thru times issue, either. Did you know that we have to hit twelve separate buttons to make one XL triple triple?)

So yeah, my cream dispenser ran out of cream at 6:45 am. And I went to change it. One of the supervisors mentioned to me a few weeks ago that whenever she changes creamers, she changes them over the garbage just in case they break open. That way, rather than draining all over the floor, they drain into the garbage bin. It seemed a smart thing to do, so this morning I followed suit.

BUT I HARDLY TOUCHED THE FRAGILE PART.
Nevertheless, as I dropped the cream bag into its metal cradle, I heard a splurt noise. So I looked down. And shrieked. And then I jumped backward in an attempt to evade the surging dairy liquid, but my legs were already casualties. I kid you not. It's like white paint.

I didn't even have the brains to pull out the garbage bin to catch the outpouring cream-stream. You know, the whole reason I had been switching cream bags over the garbage in the first place? It was Soon who did that. As I jumped to... well there was no safety, but farther away from the flood, Soon heroically dived in, pulling out the bin, thereby mitigating any further damage.

Meanwhile, two male customers standing at the counter were confused and working out with each other what had just happened. "Look at her!" one of them laughed to the other.

"No, don't look at me!" I whimpered.

My two wonderful coworkers both began damage control, trying simultaneously to serve two lines of customers and mop up the lake on the floor. And to do so without slipping and smashing their bones. Even the Esso guy helped out, but not before handing me the key to the bathroom.

At least the bathroom was working. All last week, it was shut down because they had no running water. And I ask you, what would I have done if there were no water with which to rinse out my pants? I mean, there are the Timmy's sinks, but there's no way I'd rinse my pants there in front of the cameras. It'd be a crazy time trying to wring pants out again without taking them off.

So I went to the bathroom and made my pants even wetter, but less white. Meanwhile, I hear a new voice over the headset, taking orders. It turns out Debbie had arrived fifteen minutes early. Finding the back door open (bad!) she thought she'd sneak in undetected to demonstrate how easily someone could have stolen all our purses.

"Won't they be surprised?" she thought.

"But," she said to me later, "I was the one who was surprised!"

She graciously jumped into the fray despite being technically not on-shift yet just because she's awesome. And she changed all my creamers for me for the rest of the shift. That's one thing I like about the Esso. Nobody gets mad at anyone for making disastrous boo-boos. They just try to make you feel better. :-D

Eventually everything got mopped up, cleaned up, and I did eventually dry out, smelling not too strongly of curdled cream. But what with the Esso being just too small to fit the new XL cup sizes and everyone having Friday-brain and all, the chaos continued throughout the shift.

I enjoyed it all. Except for the bit about putting wet pants back on. That is not fun.

Ivanova: Ambassador. Do you really want to know what's going on down there right now?
Londo: Yes! Absolutely!
Ivanova: Boom. Boom boom boom. Boom Boom. BOOM! Have a nice day!
Londo: Aah! You can never get a straight answer from anyone around here!

Don't Think Too Hard

2012-01-26T10:31:00.000-07:00

I was browsing through some philosophy essays I wrote during my first year of university. I think 2006-2008 was the epoch of my academic writing career. My style was both colourful and interesting without being too casual. Most of the time.

In a discussion about the pitfalls of over-thinking things, I wrote,

"There are so many variables that, in an extreme case, a person [who is trying to consider them all] might eventually find him or herself to be caught so deeply in thought that nothing would ever get accomplished, and the person would simply appear to become an atrophied blob of breathing, thinking flesh."

While I don't think he took any marks off for it, my professor scrawled in the margin, "Carla, I really didn't need this image!"

I probably wouldn't try to use that word-picture in formal writing nowadays.

"Pay no attention to what the critics say. Remember, a statue has never been set up in honor of a critic!" Jean Sibelius

Merlin: Alternative Script

2012-01-25T06:04:00.002-07:00

This is how Merlin Series 4 should have gone:

Arthur: I tried to use magic to heal my father. He died.

Merlin: It wasn't his fault. Gaius found an enchanted amulet on him that reverses the efforts of magic. The fact that he died so quickly means that the wizard was actually doing a good job. We think Morgana put the amulet on him.

Arthur: Oh. How did Morgana get the amulet on him?

Merlin: We're not sure, but we know for a fact that it doesn't belong to Uther and he wasn't wearing it before. Someone's a rat.

Arthur: Hmmmm.....

Gwen: Arthur, when Merlin came back from his disappearance in the woods, we found a thing in his neck.

Arthur: A what?

Gwen: A magic thing. It seems to be controlling him and turning him homicidal. Perhaps he should be locked up until Gaius can figure out what needs to be done about it.

Arthur: Ok.

Gaius: Now that the creature has been put to sleep, let's discuss this with Merlin.

Merlin: I can go back to Morgana's hut and kill the motherbeast.

Arthur: You know where Morgana's hut is?

Merlin: Yes. She didn't think to knock me out and drag me to the bog herself, she just told me to leave. I remember the route perfectly.

Arthur: Wonderful. I'll come along, too, and run her out of Camelot at the very least.

Gaius: Take a few more knights along just in case Merlin goes bonkers, and it sounds like a good plan.

Arthur: I think so, but I want to know one thing. How did anyone know where we were going to be in order to kidnap Merlin to begin with?

Merlin: I think we have a rat.

Arthur: Hmmmm...

Arthur: Agravaine, now that we've run Morgana out of Camelot, I've been thinking about this whole "rat" thing, and I think it's you.

Agravaine: What? I never!

Arthur: Well, have you any other ideas?

Agravaine: Gaius!

Arthur: Except that I'm pretty sure Gaius wouldn't betray Merlin. Or kill my dad. He's been our one faithful companion since before I was born. As much as I don't want to believe it's you, I'd hate to think it's Gaius even more.

Agravaine: But I would never betray your mother!

Arthur: I didn't even know you existed until you showed up after my dad went looney!

Agravaine: But I wouldn't ever hurt you!

Arthur: Because I have no solid proof, I'll buy your feeble defense for now. But be careful; I'm watching you.

Agravaine: I'll prove it was Gaius!

Merlin: Gwaine, could you please tell me if you know what this is?

Gwaine: It's iron ore. As far as I know, it's only found one place in Camelot. Where did you get it from?

Merlin: Agravaine's boots.

Gwaine: Why are you stealing dirt from Agravaine's boots?

Merlin: I have a hunch that he's framed Gaius and kidnapped him.

Gwaine: That's a pretty serious accusation, my friend.

Merlin: It is serious, but I have good reason to suppose that's the case. Since you've trusted me and supported me wonderfully with everything so far into our friendship, will you help me discover whether this is truly the case? I'd rather not get myself into trouble or damage an innocent man's reputation.

Gwaine: Of course, Merlin. You know I'd do anything for you.

Gwaine: Agravaine! It was you!

Agravaine: No! I followed you here!

Gwaine: ....and got here ahead of us? Right. Just to be safe, I won't kill you, but why don't you go sit in the corner while I help Gaius?

Arthur: Who kidnapped you, Gaius?

Gaius: Agravaine. He wanted to frame me.

Arthur: Are you sure?

Gaius: Yes.

Gwaine: I caught Agravaine trying to kill Gaius before we could rescue him.

Merlin: Plus, I may or may not have seen him visiting Morgana's hut in the wood when I was homicidal.

Arthur: And you didn't tell me?!

Merlin: Well, I was scared of how you would react.

Arthur: You ninny! Nincompoop! Thanks for the heads up!

Merlin: Sorry.

Gaius: No good deed goes unpunished, my lord. Morgana has lost all of her character complexity and is thoroughly bent on revenge. She's come back into Camelot, despite your warning. Somehow, she has an army.

Arthur: Fine, we'll have to kill her this time.

Merlin: Do you think we can hold her off?

Arthur: Her army, yes, no problem. I think a highly trained army in a castle built for sieges can withstand a few motley mercenaries. Now that our rat is gone, no one is leaking sensitive information to her, like the location of the siege tunnels. But Morgana herself has magic and may be hard to kill. It's too bad we don't have anything to personally counter her with.

Merlin: Well, um, *cough*

Arthur: What? What did you say, Merlin?

Merlin: I said, uh, if you did have some magic to counter her with, would you automatically assume that the magician is evil and has it in for you?

Arthur: Well, no.

Merlin: In that case, my king, I present to you, myself.

Arthur: Finally.

Merlin: What?

Arthur: You must really think I'm a blockhead if you believed you were actually fooling me these last three-and-a-half years. How blind do you think I am?

Merlin: Well, um....

Arthur: Can you handle Morgana if my knights fend off her slip-shod army?

Merlin: Yes.

Arthur: Good. In that case, I'm supposed be getting married today. Gwen!

Gwen: I love you, Arthur.

Arthur: I love you, Gwen.

Author's notes: The storyline could have been covered in half the time it actually takes, because certain incidents wouldn't have even happened had the characters (or writers) bothered to think things through.

I mean, I can understand them not wanting to kill Morgana, and according to tradition she does have to live longer than Arthur himself, but they way they neglect to deal with her is just ludicrous.

And Merlin had the nearly perfect segue to discussing his magic with Arthur. I mean, really, what else is he waiting for? The exact line, "Well, Merlin, I really wish one of the two of us had magic right now, preferably you"? Maybe, "Please, Merlin, now would be a wonderful time for you to tell me you've been keeping secrets from me... magical ones"?

Sigh.

"What are you waiting for? Another shade of green? This one isn't good enough for you?" my dad, when we don't notice the traffic light has turned green.

The Lost Book of Hezekiah

2012-01-23T10:45:00.015-07:00

I found it! My closet holds many mysteries, but I wasn't expecting this: several ancient manuscripts of the NTBOH* version of the Book of Hezekiah! In case you aren't aware, Hezekiah is that book of the Bible that everyone quotes but can never find (except for me, that is). Using my special powers of super-glasses and intuitive interpretation, I've written out the translation of some of the more interesting bits.

Hezekiah 1:4-14

4. In the fifth year of the reign of Hezekiah, son of Ahaz, when Georgios the servant of the LORD slew the mighty dragon, the land of Judah rejoiced for a prophetical word received for them by their king.

5."Let us gather the people together, that I may tell them the word of the LORD," said Hezekiah, and lo, the people were gathered that he may tell them of his vision.

And when they were gathered, 6. Isaiah stood on the balcony and addressed the crowd, saying, "I tell you today, take heart! For the LORD has seen your suffering and sends word that it shall pass. 7. Your grief and distress you have caused for yourself will disappear, and your hunger pains shall be no more. 8. Just as your years of slavery in Egypt were numbered, and your days of wandering in the desert were limited, 9. this, too, shall pass. 10. For the LORD is merciful and does not smile upon the hardships of His children. Those who profess belief in Him will live to be as Methusaleh; old and full of days. 11. They will not want for anything, neither food nor song, 12. and shall live in peace and unity with their wives and sons and daughters, even their cattle and oxen and slaves, maidservants, distant acquaintances and the elders of the village. 13. The LORD will shield them from harm, giving them the desires of their hearts, and they shall be happy all their days. 14. Even in the end days, they shall be spared the wrath and tribulation of the LORD. They will sing in green valleys, as the lion will lie down with the lamb."

Hezekiah 2:7-18

7. "My people are prone to evil deeds, for in the beginning the devil, who is Lucifer, grew prideful and decided in his mind to make himself God. 8. Though the LORD cast him from heaven, there was a great battle, and Lucifer corrupted one-third of the angels, that is, the demons, and fought the LORD.

9. "The LORD said to him, 'Lucifer, you wicked serpent, your name is now Satan. 10. May you grow the horns of a goat and be banished to the bowels of the earth, lest you again seek to overthrow me and wreak destruction in heaven.'

11. "And so the devil is on earth and always tempts people, enticing them to fall prey to the seven deadly sins, which the LORD hates: gluttony, greed, sloth, lust, vanity, envy, and wrath. 12. It is the devil that tempts you to do these things, for the soul of man is such that it wants to do what is good and right, except when battling the evil one. 13. Do not be timid, for the demons are but dogs to those who are saved, and can do no harm to those who rebuke them. 14. Be confident in yourself, for having prayed the sinner's prayer, you are a child of God, 15. and once you are saved, you are always saved. 16. Fear not the trials of this world, for all those who say the LORD is their Father are saved, 17. even should they continue to stumble and not serve the LORD, as they were sincere when they desired the forgiveness of their sin. 18. For God is a loving God, and does not judge."

Hezekiah 3:14-15

14. When the child did not step into the chariot to calm the stallion as the king had asked, Hezekiah addressed the crowd again, saying,

"Thus says the LORD, 'Follow your dreams, and to your own self be true.' 15. For the LORD helps those who help themselves. God cannot steer a parked chariot."

Hezekiah 6:28-31

28. All in the land of Judah were glad, for a Messiah had been promised to them. They danced to the sound of the lyre and the tambourine and drank juice made from grapes. Isaiah the prophet approved of this revelry. 29. While he was dancing, he received a word from the LORD, and so looked for Hezekiah to speak it to him.

"Hezekiah," he said, "I have a word from the LORD regarding the Messiah."

30. "Isaiah, prophet of God," Hezekiah replied, "Though you are drunk with grape juice, speak it, for while I have received a word from the LORD myself, it has not been tested as the word which you have received."

31. So Isaiah said, "Thus says the LORD. The Messiah which shall be born to you will have a wife, of the region of Magdala. He shall release her from the grip of demons and then he shall marry her and have children with her, for it is the role of all godly men and women to raise children."

Hezekiah 12:4-9

4. Maher-Shalal-Hash-Baz was playing in the dirt, making fortresses out of mud. 5. When Isaiah saw his son, he grew angry and picked his son out of the dirt, saying, "Now, my son, you must wash in the river, both your body and your clothes. 6. For you are filthy, and cleanliness is next to godliness."

7. "But father," replied Maher-Shalal-Hash-Baz, "there is a woman with a washtub there at the market. You shall pay her a coin and I will wash there, rather than in the river where it is cold and swift."

8. "When you are a man, you will be destitute, my son, for a fool and his money are soon parted. 9. Why should anyone pay for water, though it is contained in a vessel, when anyone can access it without cost?"

*New Totally Bogus Often Heresy Version

“It ain't what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you know for sure that just ain't so.” Mark Twain

New Year Report

2012-01-13T12:14:00.003-07:00

Now that it's half-way through January, let's take a look at how the new year is shaping up.

1. Apparently two-thirds* of the Tim Horton's coffee-drinking population made a new year's resolution to cut back on coffee or to brew it at home. Or perhaps they were just reeling from Christmas spending and decided to budget better in general. In any case, most of them lasted exactly one week into January. Some of them held out for nine days. Good job, folks. That's at least $12.53 you saved this year!

2. My hairbrush is oozing goo.

3. The price of transit ticket books went up again.

4. The USA no longer follows the rule of law. And if you think that the act will only affect terrorists or people that look like terrorists, well, I hope you're right but believe you're wrong. Perhaps this is an appropriate post for Friday the 13th, after all.

"Now the night rolls back on the West and the night is solid.
Our fathers and ourselves sowed dragon’s teeth."

Stephen Vincent Benét (Litany for Dictatorships)

*This statistic is not made up. We track numbers.

I'm Officially in Love

2012-01-10T17:12:00.004-07:00

....with Lewis Carroll's Cheshire Cat. I've never really seen either the Disney or Tim Burton's version of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, but I just finished reading the books.

Disney, for whatever reason, originally classified the Cheshire Cat as a villain, so I started off reading the books with this expectation, but really, the Cheshire Cat is perfectly pleasant and good-natured. Just horribly creepy while he's at it.

And, as Flippers says on Hoodwinked, "We don't arrest people for being creepy."

Maybe it's the juxtaposition of creepy and perfectly decent that I like. Maybe I like that, despite the cat's own claims to the contrary, he is seemingly the most sane of all the inhabitants of Wonderland. All his dialogue is well-worded and clever. I'm not sure why I love him, but I do, which is causing me to pine after a Cheshire Cat mug from Amazon that I stumbled across. When you put something hot in the cup, the cat fades away, leaving only his smile behind, just like the cat does in the story. Unfortunately, the mug is from the .com side, rather than the .ca side, so I'm debating whether it's worth it. The Disney Store has a Disney Cheshire Cat mug, but it's the original cat I'm in love with.

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland has been, on the whole, confusing but pleasant. I appreciate Carroll's wordplay and some of the philosophical themes he highlights. Unfortunately, it's rather difficult, at least in a culture so different from his own, to identify what he meant as pure nonsense and what he meant as a statement, or whether he distinguished between the two at all.

I wouldn't let young kids read it, though. The Queen of Hearts is positively terrifying!

Here's a taste of my new feline friend, straight from the book:

"Cheshire-Puss," she began, rather timidly, as she did not at all know whether it would like the name: however, it only grinned a little wider.

"Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?"

"That depends a good deal on where you want to get to," said the Cat.

"I don't much care where---" said Alice.

"Then it doesn't matter which way you go," said the Cat.

"---So long as I get somewhere," Alice added as an explanation.

"Oh you're sure to do that," said the Cat, "if you only walk long enough."

Merry Christmas Comeback

2011-12-18T14:53:00.005-07:00

I discovered something else that makes me feel happy inside: people saying "Merry Christmas". I've been hearing it quite a bit lately.

It's surprising, actually. My friends and people at church quite naturally say "Merry Christmas" a lot, but I'm hearing it everywhere. Customers at Timmy's are saying it, and they're not merely responding to me but beating me to the punch. The clerks at Shopper's yesterday also wished me several Merry Christmases. But the one that really had me scratching my head was the little coffee newspaper that's distributed for free at various fast-food stops. It's a one page deal, half-full of advertising. Of the remaining space, approximately 1/3 of it is taken up with horoscopes. But there, in bold type, just beneath the horoscopes, this little paper proudly asserted:

"Merry Christmas! Celebrate Jesus, the reason for the season."

Something is happening, here. Perhaps Calgary as a whole has gotten fed up with the political correctness of the past few Decembers and having rejected that, is embracing tradition again. And it is tradition; although there are other festivals celebrated at this time, they have little history in Canada and are observed by far fewer people here. By the predominance of "Merry Christmas", it seems that the population may be admitting that fact, after trying vainly to be inclusive with "Season's Greetings" and "Happy Holidays" for the last few years.

Thus far, I don't remember a single "Season's Greetings" or "Happy Holidays" this month. They're out there, yes, but mostly in print (and not in all printed things, obviously!) People aren't saying them to each other; at least they haven't been to me. It's Christmas, and we're not ashamed of it! That makes me very happy.

"I'm not politically incorrect, I'm just euphemistically challenged." Gilbert E. Detillieux

Who, What, Where?

2011-12-16T19:33:00.006-07:00

Sigh. It happened again. Except this time, it was much worse. And this time my supervisor heard.

It was the middle of the afternoon at the Distress Centre and perfectly quiet. Well, mostly quiet. I was reading. The other three volunteers were doing something or other to keep themselves amused. Then the clocks struck three o'clock.

I'm telling you, some really incredible TV show must have ended at three o'clock or something, because the lines went from perfectly calm to insano-nutso in a matter of a couple minutes. Next thing you know, all four of us were on calls. Next thing you know after that, all four of us were juggling calls. Then we started forgetting where we parked each call and we still had more calls coming in.

It was during this mayhem, as my mind was trying to keep track of multiple things simultaneously (and I'm not particularly good with multi-tasking) that I made my error. Part of my brain switched off and fell back onto that tried, true, and over-used greeting:

"Hi there, welcome to Tim Horton's. My name is Carla; what can I get for you?"

Yes, the caller got confused. So did I, because I didn't actually remember what I had said, and was wondering how the caller knew my name. I generally use an alias and don't offer it up in the first breath. So I briefly debated denying what I thought maybe I said then opted instead to ask the caller what I had said my name was. Eventually I admitted that I was named Carla, but I'm not sure the caller believed me at that point because I sounded so uncertain. I mean, I was pretty sure by now that I had my name correct, but I was still hoping vainly that I hadn't also said this was Tim Horton's.

Trying to recover, I asked the caller how I could help them. Came the reply:

"You're the one who needs help if you can't even remember your own name."

Perhaps they're right. I seem to be having trouble remembering where I am and to whom I'm speaking lately. At Timmy's this morning I took the order of a customer at the counter and told her, "That'll be six-forty-five at the window."

She just gave me a look and replied that she could throw the money at the window if I wanted, but that she sure wasn't going outside in this weather.

Bah. At any rate, after I got off the phone at the DC, I turned around and asked my supervisor if he had heard how I started that call, as I still wasn't quite sure how badly I'd messed up. My supervisor seemed a bit uncertain at first, too, but when I admitted that I thought I may have used my Timmy's greeting, he immediately broke out into laughter.

"Yes!" he exclaimed, waving animatedly. "You did! I heard it, but I thought, 'No, she couldn't have said that!' But you did! You did!" By this point he was holding his stomach and definitely not helping anyone focus on their tasks at hand. And it was no less funny when, two hours later, my shift finished and he doubled-over in laughter all over again.

I don't know whether I'm reassured or not that several other volunteers then told me that they occasionally answer their cell phones with "Hello, Distress Centre."

Ah, me. Whoever said that the Distress Centre is all serious?

Just goes to demonstrate that you don't need to worry overly much about saying the wrong thing to a suicidal person. I'm pretty sure my blunder didn't kill anyone, though I may have died a bit on the inside, myself.

“I'm not saying anything. I didn't say anything then, and I'm not saying anything now.” Dukhat from Babylon 5

Executive Directors and Spontaneous Combustion

2011-12-14T19:35:00.008-07:00

I got a job thingy at the Distress Centre for a few days this month. Like, I actually get paid. A bit. Nevermind that that it is mind-numbingly dull. But this job does have a few upsides:

1. I get to see and feel a bit about how the paid DC runs, as opposed to the volunteer side of things, which I'm already used to. Put faces to names and jobs to faces and such.

2. Perhaps, just maybe, I get my foot in the door a little bit?

3. I get to sit all day at the Executive Director's desk, in the large Executive Director's office.

She's gone on holidays or something, so no one's using it, and her computer is one of the few that's been set up with the database program I'm working with.

Over lunch, one of the staffers who works in the phone room and knows I'm just a lowly volunteer mentioned that she had walked by the office earlier that morning.

"Wow," she quipped, "Carla's sure moved up!"

And at one point a pick-up/delivery boy stopped in to pick up a couple of chairs. My supervisor showed him to the office and pointed out the chairs, but when he pulled out his clipboard to be signed, he offered it first to me. Ha!

Yes! Power trip! Executive Director at 22? And no! I'm not grown up enough! Do I look grown up enough to be that important?

Ah, well. I should enjoy it while it lasts.

And it has nothing to do with anything, but I was reading A Christmas Carol this week - the real, unabridged, Charles Dickens version - and ran across this quote. It has got to be one of the most awesome quotes from an old, dead author ever:

"[Scrooge] was sometimes apprehensive that he might be at that very moment an interesting case of spontaneous combustion, without having the consolation of knowing it."

I can't imagine how awful it would be to spontaneously combust without realizing it.

My sister was choking once, and my brother was getting concerned. "Don't die, Brianna! Because that would be really sad!" he exclaimed. Then he added after a pause, "But if you do die, could you at least spontaneously combust? Because that would be really cool."

Thankfully, she didn't do either.

BBC's Merlin

2011-12-07T09:31:00.009-07:00

I have been watching BBC's Merlin series and figure it's time for a review post.

First season - great!
Second season - intense!
Third season - interesting...
Fourth season - ....not so much.

Basically, it started out strong. The first season was new and exciting and for the most part, tasteful. Some of the "special effects" made me cringe, but the story itself seemed pretty carefully crafted. Morgana's dresses were beautiful and Gwen looked like a servant girl.

The cut of Guinevere's dresses and Arthur's shirtless escapades in the second season made me roll my eyes, but other than that, season two had some interesting character developments. The last few episodes in particular were wham episodes and the story itself was progressing.

It felt like the ball was dropped with Morgana in season three, and the blockheadedness of Arthur (and Uther, but especially Arthur) was starting to get hard to ignore. Gwen's dress was about the same as season two, but Morgana's dresses got (literally) breathtakingly tight. Arthur was parading around topless even more. Still, there was enough new stuff and developments to keep things interesting.

But season four? Despite the supposed changes and new (or promoted) characters, the status quo has remained the same. Unfortunately that status quo doesn't work anymore. The entire first three seasons were full of "When Arthur is king, things will be different and Merlin can reveal his magic to him". Yet Arthur is king and Merlin is still keeping secrets. In fact, he's keeping an awful lot of secrets that really seem pretty counter-productive to keep. It's just dumb.

Morgana is the main protagonist, and she's lost the character complexity that first made her interesting (though I am interested in why she bothers with the green eyeshadow every day). Agravain is boring, mysteriously lacking a motive, and not even handsome. Having supermodel characters seems ridiculous in some contexts (eg. Morgana/Morgause scenes) but if the character has nothing else going for him, at least make him nice to look at. In addition, this season is featuring more identifiably occult magic with which I am not comfortable.

Arthur's knights are interesting (Gwain is my favourite), and the reappearances of old-guy Merlin are as funny as his debut in season three, but it's not enough to redeem the nonsensicality and repetitiveness of the rest of the show.

The writers are clearly pandering to the goofy fanbase that wants Merlin and Arthur to be a couple, as evidenced by the number of "awkward" situations between the two of them. Gwen's dresses are so low and tight she's lost her "wholesome girl-next-door" credibility. If I'm not mistaken, next episode will feature Gwen in something like a crop top. Arthur's shirtless scene repertoire is through the roof (and the knights are joining him) and we actually had one episode where's he's completely naked.

Here's hoping things turn around pretty fast, because if Merlin continues on this trajectory, season five will feature Gwen strutting around cleaning the castle in a bikini top and Arthur will just decide that clothes are for cowards and doff his shirt permanently. Merlin will be functionally mute, despite all the rapport and trust he's earned from Arthur previously. Honestly, I'm losing interest. As of now, I'm hoping season four wraps up the series because I don't want a season five like this one.

Famous Merlin quote from episode one:

Arthur: I should warn you, I've been trained to kill since birth.
Merlin: How long have you been training to be a prat?
Arthur: You can't address me like that!
Merlin: Sorry. How long have you been training to be a prat, my lord?

Makes Me Happy

2011-12-06T00:46:00.009-07:00

It's so easy to be cynical, but every now and again something happens that makes me warm and happy inside. Most recently it was a little fuzzy moose Christmas ornament I bought that holds a sign saying "Merry Chrismoose". And sometimes the things that make me happy are a little more significant.

Tim Horton's requires you to record the drive-thru window times during the peak hours every day. Designated for this purpose at my little Esso location is a white-board tracking sheet thingy. We do use it to track drive-thru times, but we also occasionally leave each other notes. They stay up for a while, then get erased to make the place look clean.

On my last shift before I left for camp this summer, I wrote "Have a great summer, everyone! Love Carla". I then left for camp and promptly forgot about it. Yet when I showed up for work again come the fall, my note was still up there. Apparently my well-wishes were important enough that nobody wanted to erase it until the summer was over. After I had worked a few shifts, it finally disappeared. It made me happy that they had left it up the whole time I was gone. I think it probably won second prize for note longevity.

But it's the first prize winner that makes me happy inside. One of my Timmy's coworkers suffered a personal tragedy. I'll change her name for privacy's sake, but someone wrote on the board to encourage her, "Bianca rocks!" and decorated it with a smiley face and hearts. Then I added "We love her!" and someone else wrote, "She is super-woman!" Following this, someone-who-shall-remain-nameless *cough* Madeleine *cough* wrote "Bianca is my lover," but I promptly erased that one.

That was almost two years ago. Bianca still sees it every time she comes in to work, and despite the numerous people who work at the Esso, it's never been touched. It's like it's become sacrosanct. It's an unspoken agreement; we didn't all get together and decide to leave it up forever. Nobody wrote "P.L.O." beside it. We erase around it and touch it up if a part accidentally gets scratched out. And it stays there. I don't know if Bianca still feels encouraged every time she sees it, but I do. Some people do care. For a long time. And I'm glad to work with them.

“Because while I do not know who the enemy is any longer, I do know who my friends are, and that I have not done as well by them as I should. I hope to change that. I hope to do better.” Londo from Babylon 5, which is probably my favourite show ever.

Hello Hewlitt-Packard

2011-11-30T16:53:00.007-07:00

I finally bought a new computer this October.

My old one will be in the trash as soon as we bother to film it's farewell video. Don't buy Dell; it's cheap junk. The scroll bar stopped working, the touch-sensitive keys along the top stopped working, the left mouse clicker stopped working. The real mouse plug-in stopped reading. The monitor kept flickering, eventually degenerating into a black screen of nothingness. Due to the cheap build and my constant fiddling with the monitor to make it work, the hinges broke and exposed the wiring. The battery failed completely, so the power cord always had to be duct-taped in (It was about this point in time that I covered the Dell logo on the machine with duct tape and a drawing of a barfy-face). It was barely three years old.

Also, it ran with Vista, which I wasn't a fan of, but that's hardly Dell's fault. And it got several viruses, but that arguably wasn't Dell's fault, either. Probably my own.

Suffice to say, it was time to switch to something that didn't make me want to huck it out the top floor window every time I tried to use it. So I have a new one, an HP. So far, things are better. I mean, the DVD drive didn't work, so I had to have that replaced, but at least it was covered by warranty.

I spent over an hour on the phone telling the HP techie that there was a hardware problem with the disc drive. His thick Indian accent contributed to the length of the call, with one or the other of us asking "Pardon me?" after almost each sentence. And I don't know how long it can possibly take to write "CUSTOMER IS CALLING AND STATING ODD IS NOT READING DISC. CHECKED WITH DIFFERENT DISC STILL SAME ISSUE. RESEATED THE ODD STILL SAME ISSUE. HENCE SHIPPING THE ODD," but apparently it can take the better part of 15 minutes. Even the "hardware supervisor" seemed surprised by how long I'd been on the line by the time it was transferred to him. Oh, well. They did send me the replacement part in the end, which works just fine. And it shipped here in just over a day (almost less time than the call itself!)

Though I'm laughing that they STILL spelled my name wrong, despite my using the NATO alphabet multiple times to spell it for them over the phone. Yay Indian accents and computer help lines!

"It is difficult not to wonder whether that combination of elements which produces a machine for labor does not create also a soul of sorts, a dull resentful metallic will, which can rebel at times." Pearl S. Buck

Castle on a Keg

2011-11-21T23:50:00.007-07:00

I've wanted to write a life-changing novel for a long time. Today I tried to outline the plot. Instead, this happened. No, I have no idea what it is. And no, I don't fancy that it has a deeper meaning. It's just weird.

* * * * *

“You mustn't ever light a fire here,” says Sergeant Quinn. “In fact,” he clarifies, “You musn't ever light a fire within a league of here. And pick up your feet when you walk. Don't drag them along the carpet, now.”

Sound advice, when the imperial palace is perched on top of a powder keg. Ingo, son of Monterick, picks up his feet and carefully crosses over the shag carpeting of the gatehouse. Most people from other nations, upon hearing that the Krossinger Palace is sitting atop a powder keg, assume that the political situation is an extremely tense one, and that the slightest misstep could result in a massive war of some kind. They find it rather odd when they are informed that actually, the political climate is rather warm, it's not a metaphor, and that the palace is literally built upon a massive barrel of black powder.

All Krossingese castles and palaces have been built on explosive foundations since King Ulim-Hankor six hundred years ago. Some of the more modern castles have been built on sticks of TNT or nitroglycerin tubs instead of black powder, and the law requires that one in ever five new castles use a propane tank as the base. And the infamous renegade King Pommosam build his country villa on a stink bomb. Most castles, however, are still built on black powder.

Ingo is glad this is the case. All the statistical analyses say that black powder foundations result in fewer explosions than the other bases. His friend Jingo had gone to perform for some troops at Hopstead Fort. Hopstead had been built on propane, and it exploded when Jingo came in wearing a new sweater made of pashmina goat hair. Pashmina goat hair sweaters had since been outlawed in all of Krossinger due to their static-electric properties, but it was too late for Hopstead and for Jingo.

Another one of Ingo's friends, or distant relatives, rather, a messenger boy, had been sent to the northern border, where most of the TNT and nitroglycerin foundations exist. Had he arrived any earlier, he would have died, but he had been lucky. The castle to which he had been headed exploded without any apparent reason when he was but a stone's throw away. Some scientists attributed it to the natural instability of nitroglycerin, and though the government has issued several statements assuring everyone that nitroglycerin is just as safe as black powder, Ingo has his doubts.

“Well, Sergeant Quinn, sir,” Ingo says, glancing quickly about the guardhouse. For today, the flint rock doorstops hold the steel doors open wide, a safety precaution. He's heard stories about how sometimes when the doors are closed, people fling them open too fast, thereby striking the doors against the flint rock doorstops that are haphazardly left lying around behind them. Ingo feels a little more secure knowing that pains have been taken to make sure the doors stay open to preclude this possibility. “I'm a professional dancer, sir, and I'm looking for Prince Rangulf. I've got these summons, see?”

“So you do,” says the sergeant. “I wonder what all this is about. I'd be careful if I were you. Everywhere he goes seems to crackle with tension lately.”

“Yes sir, thank you,” says Ingo. He walks in the direction Sergeant Quinn has pointed. It's a beautifully illuminated corridor, decorated with thin tissue-paper like drapery and numerous strings of incandescent lights. A few doors down, he comes to a giant ballroom, tiled entirely with more flint rock.

“Ah!” says Prince Rangulf, looking up from where he is seated on the ground. “Are you Ingo, son of Monterick?”

“I am, sire. How can I be of assistance to you?”

“Have you ever learned to tap dance, Ingo?”

Ingo has, in fact, learned to tap dance, but he prefers the artistic quality of ballet. Nevertheless, he responds to the prince that yes, he has learned to tap dance.

“Wonderful!” says the prince. “My betrothed wishes me to learn for her, but I have had poor luck in locating a teacher. A captain of a friend of a patron of a merchant that goes through your town said that you might be able to help me.”

“You wish me to give you tap dancing lessons, sire?”

“I do,” says Rangulf. “I fear that she may break the engagement if I cannot tap an impressive jig in short order. I've had this dance floor specially made, but it's of little use if I can't use it.”

Choosing not to comment on the prince's tautology, Ingo puts on the best smile his gritted teeth will allow and agrees to teach the prince to tap dance. As they put on their steel-toed tap shoes, Ingo smells bleach and notices that the ballroom is indeed newly constructed, and being adjacent to the main wing of the palace, is not sitting on top of the powder keg, after all. It's made in the new style, sitting atop of TATP, instead.

He sighs. This is either going to be the longest day of his life, or the shortest.

* * * * *

Don't ask. I really have no idea.

“The problem with having a cat is that if you die and no one checks on you for four days, your cat will eat you.” Miranda Lamoreux

On the Contrary

2011-11-08T17:48:00.006-07:00

Certain religions and philosophies really open themselves up to jokes, or at least raised eyebrows, due to their inconsistent views. For example, relativism's ostensibly true claim that there this is no such thing as truth - that's a joke in and of itself. And tolerance's cry that we must tolerate everything... but jump viciously at the throats of anything hinting of intolerance? It's laughable, certainly. Extreme feminism, which advocates women's right to abort unwanted pregnancies, simultaneously heralds the importance of educating and keeping safe little girls in developing countries. When atheists talk about morality, my head starts spinning because their entire monologue collapses on itself.

Islam really makes a show of being inconsistent. Remember the incident where a nun was murdered by some Muslims because the pope offended them? By saying that Islam shouldn't be violent? Oh, that makes sense. Prove you have the right to be offended by proving the pope's point exactly? I've heard many Muslims claim that Islam is a religion of peace, but the killing the people who disagree doesn't exactly help their case.

Now, I know that not everyone who identifies as an atheist or Muslim falls prey to these issues. Some atheists acknowledge that ethics and atheism cannot coexist. And some Muslims are really nice and share many of the same principles I do. And, though I try to avoid it, I'm sure that some of my beliefs are at odds with each other, too. Or at least appear to be.

This summer, for the first time, I actually heard the words to a popular Christian kids' song that I've been singing for at least a decade:

"And the God of peace will soon crush Satan underneath your feet."

What?! Are we seriously tripping up on this? Is this actually a quote from the Bible? Sounds like it should be from the Qu'ran, if you ask me.

No, not really. I don't actually consider this a contradiction. "Peace" in Biblical terms doesn't quite mean "lack of fighting", but a wholeness, a oneness with God. Basically, it means peace with God, not a ceasefire with evil. And Satan is just that - evil, certainly not another human being. We can take non-human chickens grind them into little pieces between our teeth and most people don't consider that an act of violence. If God grinds non-human Satan to dust beneath our feet, what's different from the chicken scenario? First, we won't eat Satan, though his death will still serve a very functional purpose, and second, Satan is purposefully evil rather than good-and-evil-less. Oh, and third, feet vs. teeth, but that's just getting pernickety.

Still, I can see how an "outsider" would think this is utterly ridiculous. And my chicken comparison and rationalization may not be the most rigorous defense, but I don't feel like writing a theological treatise at the moment.

Suffice to say, the main point of this post, which may have gotten lost, is that Christians say some pretty goofy-sounding things sometimes. We shouldn't think we're beyond that. And perhaps some of the goofy contradictions in other belief sets aren't quite so goofy when you understand them more fully.

Mark Twain seems to suffer from the opposite problem: “The more you explain it, the more I don't understand it.”

Hit List

2011-10-29T16:15:00.004-06:00

The number of things you can fix with a good smack is pretty impressive. At Tim Horton's, if the sugar machine gives you too much sugar, you hit it. If it's not giving you enough sugar, you hit it. If the hot cap machine gets clogged, you hit it. If the pin pad goes blank, you hit it. With all the corrective hitting going on among Tim's employees, I suspect we could make a notorious mercenary group. With all the aggression going on it's almost a wonder we haven't tried.

Elsewhere, if your blue Dell laptop computer monitor is on the blink, you hit it. Gently first, then more angrily as it becomes increasingly useless. If a remote control isn't working, you hit it. If your flashlight stops shining, you hit it. If you get water in your ear swimming, you hit it (or slap yourself across the face, if you happen to be my sister).

Most people seem to think that if your microphone isn't working, you hit it, but I wouldn't recommend that one. Anyway, I believe my point is made.

"Don't hit at all if it is honorably possible to avoid hitting; but never hit soft." Theodore Roosevelt

Dream Life

2011-10-28T13:18:00.005-06:00

Last night I dreamed that I was stuck in an elevator. It was throwing me and tossing me around its interior, but I wasn't actually going anywhere. Several floors beneath me, where I had embarked, I had accidentally left my purse behind. Several floors above me, where I was trying to go, was a convention full of various displays and sales I wanted to view. As the useless elevator continued to flip me around, I eventually hit the panic alarm button.

And what an incredible metaphor for my life it is just now. I wonder if my dream is trying to tell me something.

I consider working a loathsome 9-5 job just for the sake of making money "beneath me" and not something I want at all. And there's a wide variety of things I would be interested in doing and seeing, but don't really have the means to do them or see them. I'm neither here nor there. I'm a lump around the house and not going anywhere, and it's getting more distressing.

There was, of course, more to the dream that I'm not quite sure how to understand. My work supervisor, my siblings, and a random guy from church all showed up and started morphing into each other. We had a conversation about Christianity and science and "Toph machines", which by the way, are something my subconscious brain made up. Plus, after I hit the panic button a voice came over the intercom to talk to me (and eventually a drop-down video monitor so I could see him). The guy on the other end was the minister from the British political sitcom "Yes, Minister", except during my dream I thought he was from a show called "Top Gun", which my brain also made up. Yet when I woke up, it was definitely the elevator part I remembered best.

Finally I got out of the army barracks where the convention was and went to leave for home. I promptly got lost... though with a bit of logical thinking I was able to remember the route out. At least the dream ended on a happy note. Giving the metaphorical nature it seems to hold, I find that encouraging.

"All the things one has forgotten scream for help in dreams." Elias Canetti

Dinosaur Hunt

2011-10-19T13:36:00.009-06:00

Happy birthday, Justin! I am glad to have you for my brother.

Changing gears, one of the questions I was asked most often at Dallas Valley by my campers was, "Well, if all this stuff is true, what about dinosaurs?" Please note that hardly anyone asked about Evolution. They just wanted to know about dinosaurs. Anyway, I would answer that there are various popular views on this:

1. Dinosaurs are a hoax (generally not a good stand to take).
2. Dinosaurs and people coexisted. People survived the Great Flood, dinosaurs did not.
3. The days of creation weren't actually 24 hours days, but long eras. The dinosaurs lived in the "day" they were created and were dead by the time people were created.

In all these cases, dinosaurs are now dead, because textbooks tell us that they went extinct. I wish to propound to you now a different idea. Maybe dinosaurs AREN'T DEAD. And no, this is not a round-about way of insinuating that my brother is a monster.

My cousin brought up an interesting point on the loooong drive from Regina to Sylvan Lake. If iguanas were extinct today, we'd call them dinosaurs. Little herbivorous dinosaurs, maybe, but that's not the problem. The problem is that iguanas are still alive. Dinosaurs are bones in rock strata. Ergo, iguanas cannot be dinosaurs - at least, not until we kill them all. But if a dinosaur is just a "terrible lizard", dead OR alive, then an iguana pretty much qualifies as a dinosaur. Look at them:

And let's not forget about our friends the Komodo Dragons - given the way they devour their still-conscious prey, if anyone qualifies as a "terrible lizard", wouldn't it be them?

Well, maybe that wasn't the most terrifying picture. But you get the idea.

But let's shift gears again. If we assume that dinosaurs are not dead by definition, then do we have any evidence of living 70-million-years-ago-style dinosaurs, like the t-rex or triceratops? Brontosaurus, stegosaurus, plesiosaur, pterodactyl?

Well, yes. Granted, there's nothing undeniable. There have been claims of "dragon" sightings all throughout human history, well before the term "dinosaur" was coined and paleontologists told the world that giant lizard things ever existed. The Bible talks about the leviathan and the behemoth. Chinese history claims that their land had to be cleansed of "dragons" so that they could live there without fear of being eaten. Though apparently the inhabitants drank dragon fluids and such from time to time themselves. Fantastic myth or actual history? Their neighbours the Japanese caught what appeared to be a plesiosaur carcass about thirty years ago. However, there's supposedly a lot of evidence that it was just a decomposing shark. And nobody has proven the existence of either Nessie or the Ogopogo, or the many other purported lake monsters all over the world.

Dinosaur sightings and footprints in Africa don't seem to be exceedingly rare, but photographs of them are. Plus it just seems a little odd that animals the size of Mokele-mbembe could live without leaving more of a trail. And how long could a lake monster survive by itself? Wouldn't there have to be a whole family in there to keep themselves from dying out? Could a single lake really house that many without giving up any proof of them?

Or maybe there is proof, and it's just hidden away by the scientific community. When the line has been that dinosaurs all went extinct millions of years ago, it would be a blow to the ego to have to say "we were wrong". Not to mention, since dinosaurs are already extinct, no one tries to hunt them illegally, so cryptozoologists have motivation for keeping it all a myth.

Clearly, dinosaurs do not exist today in the numbers they once did, if they exist at all. But it does seem possible. The grandfather of a friend of mine was a trapper (or was it a hunter?) in BC. One can assume that he probably has quite a bit of knowledge regarding animal skeletons and carcasses. Yet, when, as a young man, he found a fresh but headless skeleton deep in the bush, he had no idea what it was. He did, however, find himself spooked enough that he told a ranger and tells people about it even now. Apparently it had plates all along its spine. And he's certainly not the only one in the BC/Alaska area to report unfossilized skeletons of what appear to be dinosaurs. Wouldn't that count as evidence?

While I myself have not seen a living dinosaur, I have found what I am convinced would be a wonderful dragon cave. I love dragons.

As a final aside, though some believe it would, I do NOT believe that the existence of dinosaurs today would in any way disprove or be evidence against modern scientific dating techniques. Finding living dinosaurs would not cast doubt on an old earth, only on the honesty of the scientific community in reporting all dinosaur finds. A few living dinosaurs now does not mean that a whole lot of them didn't die around the time scientists say they did.

"It does not do to leave a live dragon out of your calculations, if you live near him." J. R. R. Tolkien

Fate of the Blue Jay and Mormons

2011-10-18T15:44:00.009-06:00

It turns out that the dead little blue jay was killed by pneumonia. But fear not, I myself do not yet feel like keeling over and heaving my last breath - in fact, I think I'm almost better. Maybe it's due to the yogurt. In addition to antibiotics, I now have to consume large quantities of yogurt on a daily basis, or else fear the wrath of a "growth in my gut". At least I've finally learned how to swallow pills.

Anyway, now that you know all about the state of my personal health (didn't you want to know?) I can move on to other topics. Like....

After several weeks of watching TV and generally lying around being a blob, I pulled a bunch of books out of my closet and spent time browsing. One of the books I pulled out happened to be the Book of Mormon, which some missionaries dutifully made sure I had. I didn't actually spend much time reading it, but it got me thinking again about the similarities and differences between what I believe and what those in the LDS church believe.

For the most part, there's a lot of agreement between "standard" Protestants and Mormons. There's a lot of variance in the details, sure, and the Mormons add a lot of extra stuff, but there's a lot of variance in the details between different Protestant denominations, too. As far as I'm concerned, I don't think God really cares if you mess up with the doctrinal details. Does it really matter if you believe that God is literally three-in-one or just one with two good buddies? I used to think it mattered. Maybe I was right then and wrong now, but currently I think that the main thing is how you react to God, not what you know about Him. Yes, it would be very nice to have all the details correct, but I can believe that the Mormons really don't know what they're talking about, and still not be concerned that they're good as doomed for all eternity.

Doctrine will forever be a point of contention, but I don't see that it should be much of an issue unless it affects the way you serve God. And that's where the fundamental difference between Mormonism and other "brands" of Christianity exists. I believe that the main point, the main goal, of following Jesus is love. Yes, we avoid condemnation and we obtain our freedom through grace, but if the basic point of someone's testimony is "I'm a Christian because I don't want to go to hell," well, that concerns me. It's not about doing whatever you have to in order to obtain a get-out-of-hell-free card. We were created to love and worship God, and sin came between us to rupture that relationship. By God's grace, we are restored to a place of communion with God, able to and called to love God and to love others as God loves us. And that's the main point. By God's grace, we can be filled with selfless love. God saves us because He loves us, and we follow Him because we love Him.

So far as I can tell, the main point of Mormonism isn't love, but ambition. Ambition, to me, is an ugly word. It brings to mind arrogant university presidents, psychopathic empire builders, and the traditional story of Satan desiring to be better than God and getting kicked out of heaven for it. Hear me out, I am not implying that Mormons are basically Satan. All I am saying is that I have a healthy distrust of ambition. Now, so far as I understand it, Mormons are completely on board with the idea that their own ambition won't get them very far. It's only through Christ's sacrifice that anyone can receive salvation, and Christ's sacrifice isn't something they earn. They are called to love and serve and probably do love God, but that's not the end goal. The end goal is their own godhood, their own deification. Thanks to Christ's sacrifice, they can maneuver their way into the Celestial Kingdom and eventually be granted planets of their own to be gods over.

In both cases, reaching the end goal requires grace, but it seems to me that the reasons someone would want to accept that grace are really quite different. Grace so that you can become more like God, in that you become more and more filled with love? Or grace so that you can literally become God and be elevated to a place of enormous power? The end goals are basically opposites. Why does someone ultimately want the grace? And won't that affect the way they relate to God? It seems to me this is the most basic, fundamental difference between Mormonism and what I consider to be the truth.

I'm sure this isn't a totally fair assessment. I know that plenty of generic "Christians" don't think of their relationship with God in such a manner as I described. The whole "safe from hell" thing is pretty popular. And I suspect that a lot, if not most, of Mormons focus more on their relationship with God than on becoming gods themselves, but if you look at the theologies and not the followers, the difference is there. Is it important? Honestly, I kinda hope not, but if any difference in theologies and doctrines does matter, I think this would be it.

And back to being sick, which I am sick of being, I found a sick quote that pretty much agrees with me:

"I reckon being ill as one of the great pleasures of life, provided one is not too ill and is not obliged to work till one is better." Samuel Butler

Work, Work, Work

2011-09-18T21:22:00.003-06:00

Now that the summer is over and I once again have no fulfilling paid job (but I do have several bills, including the newly-instigated rent), I must once again do this thing called "job hunting". Which, admittedly, I have not really done before. Job hunting for me, in the past, has consisted of me telling people I need a job and then waiting for someone to offer me something. I have had 5 formal, legally recognized jobs in my life. Plus loads and loads of babysitting, though that was mostly before this blog.

My first job (which, almost sadly, I still have), was Tim Hortons. The former owners who hired me are family friends. I didn't even have to sit an interview. He just saw it was me and said "Welcome Aboard!"

The summer after Peru, I was hired by our church to plan and run day camps for kids. The position was basically offered to me when I mentioned I needed a job. I did beat out some competition, though. What swung the decision in my favour? I regularly attend that particular church, while the other applicants did not.

The summer following that, I was a respite worker for a family with a special needs kid. I got that job because I mentioned to a particular woman that I needed a job, and this particular family mentioned to the same lady that they needed a respite worker. The deal was pretty much sealed.

Then I skipped a year of summer jobs because I guess I felt like being lazy. But then this summer rolled around and I worked at Dallas Valley. This one happened because I mentioned to my cousin that I might be interested in working at the camp where he lives. The following week, the camp director called me up and asked me come out and work for him. Yeah!

Come to think of it, there is only one job I ever got on my own merit. Even my babysitting got a kick-start because I was the child of the woman teaching everyone's kids. Mom would send the siblings of the kids she was teaching upstairs to be watched (sometimes poorly) by me. And the parents would pay me for it. I never once had to advertise that I babysat. Word-of-mouth, all the way.

But yes, I did get ONE job based on what I knew and how I presented myself, rather than on whom I happened to know. That's right. My own merit and skill. I was an enumerator for Census Canada this summer. You know, before I went off to camp.

I had to apply and pass a (basic) test and have an interview (consisting of four easy questions). I didn't know anybody. And yet I still got the job - and when all was said and done, my supervisor wrote that I "exceeded expectations", which is pretty cool, because I personally had been feeling guilty for not putting in more hours and accomplishing more than I had. Yay homeschooler work-ethic carries the day!

But now, if I want to be choosy about what jobs I take, it looks like I might have to stop waiting for them to fall into my lap. Sigh. So much spent energy and rejection to look forward to...

On a perkier note, I ran my first "role-play" yesterday at the Distress Centre. It was weird, having those people hang on my every word and directing all their concerns and questions to me. I was definitely the youngest in the room. If I were a power-junkie, I'd be on a high right now. As it is, I just feel oddly satisfied. That means I haven't been swayed by the dark side yet... right?

Speaking of work-ethic:
"Always do right; this will gratify some people and astonish the rest." Mark Twain

A Blue Jay Died

2011-09-17T12:11:00.004-06:00

Of the whooping cough.
Well, it whooped so hard,
And it whooped soooo long,
That it whooped its tail
And its head right off.

I'm pretty sure I'm that that blue jay right now. Except for the death thing. I think that's still coming.

I never realized that silly camp songs were meant to be applicable to real-life situations, but no sooner do I arrive back from Saskatchewan than I start hacking like an insomniac blue jay. For two straight weeks, good grief! Body, it's time to get healthy again - seriously!

“You're in pretty good shape for the shape you are in.” Dr. Seuss

Show Reins, Main Camp, Week X

2011-09-06T11:48:00.017-06:00

I'm beginning to notice a preponderance of cabin names that begin with the letter S.

We had only four hours to book it from Conestoga back to main camp, get all set up and ready to go for the final junior week. Or rather, half-week, which was nice. It would be tough to do two straight week with only a four hour "break". Happily, at the last moment the PD realized there was an extra LIT available, and she gave her to me, saying I was going to need all the help I could get with my particular group of kids. I was too busy glorying in the fact that for the first time this summer I had a REAL MATTRESS on my bed to be overly concerned about having seven sponsored, first-time campers to deal with.

And I didn't need to worry. They were all from a tiny but great Christian school and were probably the most "Christiany" of all the campers I've had. I could have handled them all myself. However, I was very glad for my LIT, if only for two reasons - A) The girls all loved Krista to pieces and B) Night times got a bit scary.

The amount of sleepwalking in this cabin was ridiculous. Every morning we'd wake up to find out that at least two girls had been up and about, abandoned their bunk on my side of the cabin and had plunked themselves down nearer to Krista. On the third night, we just slid all the mattresses toward Krista before we went to sleep, figuring that everyone was going to end up there, anyway. It was rather amusing.

The "night terrors" weren't so amusing. There was one on the second night, which woke up people in the next cabin over, and several "attempts" on the third night. I put night terrors in quotations because we're pretty sure there was a demonic element involved, rather than it being a standard sleep disorder. As it turned out, the mom of two of the girls was hanging out at camp as well, and on the third night she had woken up around midnight with a strong compulsion to pray for us. She told us that she had fallen back to sleep around two in the morning, which, interestingly, corresponds with the time period that I was up and praying and generally feeling that it was not a good idea to try sleeping. So much for putting that lovely mattress to good use.

If I have learned one thing this summer, it's the power of prayer and that God does actively intervene in the lives of people. And if you can't do anything else, pray for people and love them. Kids especially are love sponges.

The nights were perhaps less comfortable this week, but the days were great. I genuinely loved these girls, even if they didn't love my singing voice.

I woke them up one morning by singing "Rise and shine, and give God the glory, glory." I was informed by one young lady that she had been dreaming, and in her dream, she had heard something and thought, "What is that awful noise?" at which point she woke up and discovered it was me. "Please don't wake us up with singing again," they politely requested.

And then, when camp was over, everyone went home. It felt weird. As the place emptied out, I gathered my stuff together and wandered aimlessly around giving people hugs. It's awful - as soon as I start getting attached to people we part ways and I'm never sure whether I'll ever see them again. It happened with Peru and it happened again. Sigh. At least I feel somewhat satisfied in knowing that my tears were catching and that I got some other people crying, too.

So how to end a series of posts on camp? I don't really know. It was a very good summer, for lack of a better word. I was there until the bittersweet end. Please pray for everyone I came into contact with these past few months. It would be much appreciated.

After camp, I went to my cousins' farm for a few days, which was awesome, then my sister came to pick me up and informed me that she now has a boyfriend. And now I'm home again, and once I unpack, I guess I can formally say that this summer is a wrap.

Camper, to a tired friend: This is camp, not nap school!

And these guys tally up to 59 campers under my care this summer.

Spindle, Conestoga, Week IX

2011-09-06T10:57:00.010-06:00

I ended up being very glad that I came back to camp. Some kind of wall broke down this week. I feel like all of a sudden, the other staff went from being amiable coworkers to friends. I don't know why. But alas, given the schedule of camp, a week and a half doesn't give you enough time to really make strong enough connections to make it likely you'll retain your friendship from a province over. Hopefully I am proven wrong.

Week nine was another junior teen week at Conestoga. And yes, my wagon name was Spindle, not Spinster. And no, I don't know what "Spindle" means. Presumably it's some part of a wagon.

I crashed the popular group of kids this week. I'm not sure how. Usually I hang with the nerdy kids that lecture the others on the mythical lupine origins of ancient Rome, not with the flirty, crazy, coupled up groups. Yet this week I was aware of most of the interpersonal drama going on because the kids would voluntarily tell me and would include me in their crowded tables during meal times. My "popular" girls in the cabin seemed very open and happy to make conversation with me and one even expressed that she would miss me when she went home.

It was a rather eventful camp. One kid requested I give him a permanent marker "tattoo" all over his arm and the nurse left feminine hygiene gifts for all the girls on their pillows, which my girls were quite entertained to receive. Our wagon's front window was shattered and started spilling shards of glass all over the floor whenever we closed the door. One morning we paraded through the camp with pots and spoons and ululations declaring a "morning game" a full hour before our campers thought they had to wake up (they were mostly not impressed). We swapped guy and girl staff for "Kiss Me Dear", which was educational. I'm telling you, girls play dirty! We also had a most enjoyable dinner theatre, a game of human foosball, and a last minute, impromptu night game of "Star Tipping". And thank you, Jess, for the story about the man with the hook for an arm. Also, all the staff took turns giving their testimony, and we had a really powerful night at campfire where one of my girls rededicated her life to Christ. Plus, cabin devos were pretty good. Oh! And in thanks for all the hours I put in at the climbing wall this summer, I finally got to do one of the elements myself - I got to go rappelling! Yay!

There is one thing I really don't understand about camp. I can be there for two months, going hard every day, and I can have as much energy at the end of week nine as I had on the first day of week one. No doubt this has a lot to do with the prayers supporting the staff, but it never ceases to surprise me how teenagers can come with lots of energy and then be quite lame by day five. We go swimming every day at Conestoga, and by the middle of the week, there wasn't a single kid in the pool. They were all sunbathing or hanging beside the pool, while the staff pleaded with them to come swim. And at least one wide game ended because most of the kids were sitting out. So many didn't want to play that we had to make a rule that instead of running, you had to roll on the ground to your target. The field was too empty to simply run, as you'd be home free before your started. But the new rule pretty much just resulted in me andba few other staff and hardcore campers rolling and flopping around on the ground making strange wheezy noises while everyone else braided grass. Go figure. And the same goes for visiting the nurse. I didn't roll my ankle once all summer. How is it that without fail, at least half my cabin will have had ankle injuries by pick-up time? Oh, well.

This week had some up and downs, but it was probably my favourite of the summer. Rather pathetically, I forgot to take down any quotes from this week, meaning you get an old quote from my dad, which is something I would have liked to have told my campers:

“We are going to go outside to play and we will have fun whether you like it or not!” Art Heinrichs

I fail at Conestoga group shots, so here's one of me on the foosball field.

ETA: I took a bribe this week. An actual bribe. Is it bad that I don't feel ashamed?

Cabin, Sylvan Lake, Week VIII

2011-09-03T20:11:00.006-06:00

Following the end of week 7, my cousins and I packed up and headed west for a mini family reunion. There were seven of us, two on motorcycles, the rest in a truck. I have no idea how we managed the luggage. We left at about 4 in the afternoon.

"We should be there by what, eleven?" said my uncle.

"See you around twelve," my dad texted.

We arrived around three-thirty. How did my family respond to seeing me after an absence of seven weeks? My dad woke up despite the hour, hauled himself out of bed, and came to give me a hug and help with the bags. My brother woke up despite the hour, hauled himself out of bed, and came to give me a hug. My sister woke up despite the hour, grunted hello, and gave me a blanket so I wouldn't freeze to death before morning, when she could properly greet me. My mom woke up and said, "SHHHHHH!" then went back to sleep. But in the morning she was happy to see me.

It was a good week, even if it does seem to be way colder in Alberta than in Saskatchewan. Much fun was had by all 19 of us (in one cabin), through various means such as tubing behind a jet ski, an awesome waterslide park, and a kids' Naruto scratch book my sister bought me in Quebec. :-)

I didn't want to go back to camp at the end of it all, but alas, prior commitments prevailed.

"Friends come and go, but relatives tend to accumulate." Anonymous

Saddle Strings, Main Camp, Week VII

2011-09-03T18:47:00.014-06:00

I was supposed to have an LIT this week, seeing as I had charge of nine juniors, but shortly before camp began, I was informed that my LIT had been transferred elsewhere.

"Oh, well," said the sympathetic assistant program director, "You can hack it."

I'm not sure whether or not to be flattered by this vote of confidence.

However, I did managed to hack it okay, though the first night was a huge pain. I had two homesick criers, one potty run after midnight, and a whole bunch of complaints that sleep was impossible: too much "snoring", it's too hot, it's too dark (this complaint was enhanced with screaming). They were afraid that smoking, swearing boys from Conestoga would break into our cabin at night, and went into giggling hysterics every time someone farted. Several girls had to switch bunks with each other, or flip their head around to face the other way on their bed and it went on and on, well beyond the time when the PD and APD knocked on our door to tell us politely to shut up. I wonder if the APD still believed I could hack it.

I cleverly avoided this the following nights by pointedly ignoring every attempted interruption and complaint while reading them a chapter from a novel each night, until they fell asleep.

Of the nine girls in the cabin, I had some identical twins, several girls that farted in their sleep, one girl I actually still miss, and one girl that I definitely do not miss. Unfortunately, the speaker this week was not terribly good, at least in my opinion. He tended to speak down to the kids and read off a script for everything. It drove my girls (and me) nuts. Neither was his message very evangelistic. Still, we managed to have some good discussions in our cabin. All in all, it was a good week, even with the morning or two where I was trying to hide from my campers.

If you haven't gathered, there was a lot of farting going on, both with my campers and amongst staff. I would come across clusters of cabin leaders (female, no less) huddled together during night games, making farting noises in their elbows and arms. Given my somewhat more reserved nature, Jess Richter cheered the first time I joined in.

Camper #1: We've got a funny cabin!
Camper #2: We've got a gassy cabin!

Me: What was your favourite part of camp?
Camper: I really like the puddle-thingy.
Me: Um, the dugout?
Camper: Yeah!

Probably my favourite complaint of the week:

Camper: "She's stealing my dance moves!"
Me: "It's fine. Your dance moves aren't copyrighted."
Camper: "But it's like the same thing!"

These are the Saddle Stringsters

Tilt, Conestoga, Week VI

2011-09-03T18:03:00.013-06:00

You know you have spent too much time at camp when your idea of "showering" and "laundry" both involved a chlorinated pool and precious little else.

Coming off my week of glorious sleep, I was back in a wagon. Again, none of my kids had much, if any, Christian background. This seemed to be a theme with my kids each week. I wonder if God purposefully arranged it that way. Anyway, this was a fun week, even if it was discouraging how no one wanted to talk during cabin devotions.

There were a number of firsts this week. I had to file my first and only incident report this week. It's heartbreaking to learn about the home situations of some kids... On a much happier note, I saw the aurora borealis for the first time, too. It came while we were at campfire - so incredible!

Night games with junior teens are a lot of fun. My campers dragged me out of the bush and up a major hill during a game of "Counsellor Hunt", so I can honestly say that the behemoth-sized bruises I received in resisting them are battle wounds. And I hadn't yet quite got the hang of ripping off people's flags in "Kiss Me Dear", so I'd just hold out my arm and clothesline them instead. It didn't really work to collect flags, but it sure gave me another impressive bruise. A week after I got my beautiful markings, people were still gasping and inquiring concernedly how I had managed to get so beaten up. They were pretty big bruises.

This week, with the exception of my own girls, all of which I dubbed with Old Testament "E" names (and they called me "Esarhaddon"... or "Ear" when their memory failed them), I knew most kids by their last names only, as I was working the tuck shop window all week. And boys kept getting hurt on the floating dock in the dugout, so I'd have to check their wounds to decide whether to send them to shore or not. Without my glasses this effectively meant waving their feet around my nose. It made an odd picture, though not as odd as the one boy I helped off the barbed wire. He had flipped over it by mistake, and was stuck hanging on it upside-down and backwards. Silly children.

I liked all my girls this week, though not all of them liked the idea of being photographed. Several of my girls would whip up their shirts to flash me every time I tried to take a picture in the wagon, so I couldn't get anything usable. And they'd scream out what they were doing as they did it, so everyone from the fire pit to the boys' side was aware of their plan to sleep naked... Oh the joys of being asked by neighbouring cabin leaders if everything is under control.

Camper #1 to Camper #2: "I don't need your criticization!"
Camper #2: "You mean 'criticism'..."

Thankfully, we managed to get a group shot without anyone flashing the camera.

Grandma's House, Regina, Week V

2011-09-03T17:57:00.004-06:00

Week off!! Blog post cancelled due to extensive sleep schedule.

"The woods are lovely, dark and deep. But I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep." Robert Frost

Silver Spur II, Main Camp, Week IV

2011-07-25T15:16:00.010-06:00

Week 4 and somehow I had the foresight to not haul all my stuff up out of the valley before finding out where I was going to be spending the next week. As it was, the powers that be liked me so well in Silver Spur that they just kept me there. And I didn't have to haul all my stuff back down to the exact same location.

Except this week, they threw me something new. An LIT. For you camp-lingo uninformed, LIT stands for "Leader In Training". Theoretically, your LIT is a younger staff member who will one day be a cabin leader, and who will currently act as a mature second-in-command to help lighten your work load while getting a taste of what's coming. In reality, according to a good number of the cabin leaders that I have spoken to, LITs just make you want to push them off the top of the iceberg. Happily, I had a very good LIT. She will make a good cabin leader.

Week 4 was Junior Week, meaning all my campers were nine or ten. And to make up for the one spare bed I had in all my cabins up to this point, Silver Spur was now overloaded so that my LIT had to sleep all week on the floor. She was a good sport.

Twelve girls living in one room. No bathroom. And still no locks on the outhouse doors. I am starting a campaign (and trekking to the Ranch House for hot showers). In addition to the twelve of us, at least three of the girls had a habit of transmogrifying into the "Sleeping Bag Monsters" Wushy, Bob-She-Mo, and Ducky every single time they had a hint of cabin free time.

I was starting to flag this week, so my LIT really proved to be a lifesaver. For some random reason, my left knee started aching and getting stiff and otherwise acting up, which is weird because I have never before injured it or suffered something like it. Yet for a day and a half I was wrapped up in a tensor bandage, wondering what went wrong. Then it got better (lots of people were praying). Then I got a sore throat and woke up all blah-like. I was sickish all day, but recovered well enough to still have fun with my girls. I wasn't the only one with health issues. On the last night, one of my girls said it was really hurting her to breathe. We took a couple trips to see the nurse, then I stayed up with her outside after lights out, talking with her about brothers, video games, stars, and poop until she felt it clearing up.

That night she dreamed about a rather tragic RollerCoaster Tycoon experience of mine I had told her about. I felt oddly flattered.

The weather was ridiculous. The first two days were humid and hovered around 40 degrees (celsius). The nights weren't any better. Our cabin was supposed to have a fan in it, but what a time to discover it was broken. We finally got to sleep on top of our bedding, half-naked, with the door open wide.

I am immensely proud that we managed to keep all our girls from getting heat stroke and/or sunburns. That is an accomplishment, if I may say so.

The days after that were all very cool (we spent some nights shivering) and interspersed with heavy rainstorms. The MUD! The horse corrals were almost knee deep with grossness in some places. Oddly enough, I was apparently one of the three non-riding staff with the brains to wear rain boots.

By this point, I think I have memorized the entire DVRC repertoire of wide games:

1. Sticks and Stones

2. Kiss Me, Dear

3. Capture the Flag

4. Catacombs

Plus, one "wide game" of free swim. Day after day for weeks without end. With younger kids we sometimes play "Going Bananas", and there's been the occasional new game that a program director will try, but they are few and far between.

The musical repertoire may be stuck on repeat, and the food menu is getting a little slim. I guess that's how camp works, though. Kids remember things from last year and want it the same way the following year. If you change things up too much, it may be fresh and appealing for the staff, but the kids will feel totally disoriented.

I liked all the girls in my cabin, and we had some great devo discussions. And *three!* girls made first-time commitments to Christ! I loved hearing them pray, and the different perspectives with which they understood things. They had so many questions on the technicalities of guilt and forgiveness.

Despite the rougher bits, I enjoyed this week quite a bit. I feel like my girls actually matured a bit through the week, which made me pretty proud of them. And I was super encouraged by the way they all treated my grandma, who was working at the DV kitchen that week. They went out of their way to wave hello to her, and were constantly commenting on how she's always smiling. It made me happy. All the same, I am glad to have this week off. I need the time to recover. Then, back to DVRC again for another 4 weeks!

If I don't post again until September, don't be surprised.

Camper, praying: God, it might sound weird, but thank you for letting Eve sin. It wouldn't have been any fun being like robots all the time.

Camper #2: I'm so glad I came to camp! I'm learning so much - I didn't know these things before! I want to be a counsellor one day!

Waiting for the hayride.

Silver Spur, Main Camp, Week III

2011-07-25T13:46:00.006-06:00

Week 3, and I was back at main camp! Having broken my flip-flops the week previous, I spent my Sunday off boating with my cousins, then bummed a ride on the back of Randal's motorbike to go pick up sandals in the city.

But back to what actually happened during the week, I was this time banished to the boonies of main camp, at the furthest possible girls' cabin, Silver Spur. It's the last cabin at the tail end of the girls' path in the valley. It's a nice cabin, though, minus the fact that the showers you must use have no hot water and the outhouses HAVE NO LOCKS or even any way to hold them shut from inside. You are entirely reliant on every incoming kid to knock before they whip open the outhouse door. Either that, or you can sing loudly while you pee.

I had nine girls instead of my former six, and they were mostly Catholics. I was initially concerned, because I was once again getting a lot of thirteen-year-olds (and one eleven-year-old), but it seems that so long as the kids are at main camp, they understand they're still kids.

One was another sleepwalker (the eleven-year-old), but she made the girl from week one pale in comparison. Here's her sleepwalking schedule:

Monday night: Get up. Climb into the top bunk where best friend is sleeping. Get told by best friend to go back to bed. Fall off the ladder.

Tuesday night: Get up. Walk to next bunk. Grab and pull on the arm of the girl in the top bunk. Make her shriek as she almost falls out of bed. Poke other girl in the eye. Amble back to bed. Get up again. Fall out of bed. Tell cabin leader your pillow is missing when it is under your head.

Wednesday night: Stay in bed all night. Talk in sleep, instead. Sound terribly confused, make everyone amused.

Thursday night: Talk in sleep again. Announce loudly that you are a girl, not a boy. Fall noisily off bunk. Get up, frantically looking for something. Announce the need for a bathroom. Get sent back to bed, despite bed-wetting risk.

Friday morning: Discover huge gash on chin. Realize it must be from the tumble out of bed. See nurse. Be informed by nurse that it should have had stitches.

Friday and Saturday night: SLEEP SOUNDLY

This week was interesting. In addition to the entertaining nights, I had a couple of girls who ate next to nothing. I don't know that either had formal disorders, but it was concerning. Thankfully, I managed to get them both to eat considerably more than they had been, and both mentioned several times that they were eating way more than they did at home, but it was still barely enough food to satisfy a six-year-old.

There was also some boy/interpersonal drama going on. The favourite cabin pastime seemed to be straightening, crimping, and re-straightening hair, or drawing all over oneself with Sharpies. Part of my sanity this week came from one camper who thought they were all nuts but was still well-bred enough to be kind and thoughtful to them regardless. I considered the week a success when her parents informed me that she told them she was both happy but a bit teary to be leaving camp, as that had only happened to her once before.

I had some really good conversations with the girls and they asked some great questions, the topics ranging from dinosaurs, to priests, to how we know we're saved. I also overslept and was late for staff meeting for the first (and thus far, only) time. I was pretty much consigned to the high ropes/climbing wall during skill times for the third straight week, which I'm mostly okay with, though it was starting to get a bit tedious by the week's end.

All in all, though, as far as July goes, I think this was my favourite week.

Definitely the two best quotes from this week are as follows:

"Are you shaving?!" - one of my girls upon hearing and seeing me wave my mini-fan around my face.

And during a game of Capture the Flag, one of the boys asked me to join his flanking strike team to secretly approach through the trees and overwhelm the opposing side at the precise location of their flag. I was the only female in his group of 20+ people, cabin leader or not. As we followed him through the trees, we met up with two enemy groups, and he used the same line on both of them.

"Hey buddy," a couple of male cabin leaders said upon seeing Josh approaching them, "You better run."

"I don't think so," Josh replied, fully confident we had his back. "I brought an army."

Not entirely sure what we were doing here. Yay crazy Silver Spurrians!

Hoop, Conestoga, Week II

2011-07-25T12:07:00.012-06:00

No sooner had I found my footing in main camp than they decided to ship me down the valley to DV's camp for older kids, Conestoga.

"Don't worry," said the program director, aware of my inexperience, "I gave you the cabin with the youngest kids, so it will be the most like main camp."

Uh, yeah. Let me tell you that those two years between eleven and thirteen make a huge difference!

First let's look at the main differences between Conestoga and Main Camp:

-Things dry at Main Camp. They stay damp forever at Conestoga.

-You have to walk long distances at Main Camp. You walk short distances with incredible slope gradients at Conestoga.

-You sleep in cabins at Main Camp. You sleep in "wagons" at Conestoga. If you're lucky, you get a bunk.

Now we can look at the differences between Main Camp and Conestoga campers:

-Main Camp kids are cute. Conestoga kids are pubescent.

-Main Camp kids naturally adore you. Conestoga kids give you attitude.

-Main Camp kids won't shower unless you threaten to hose them down. Conestoga kids ask if they can wake up at five in the morning so they can be ready in time for breakfast at 8:15.

Well, maybe this is a bit unfair. I had some great campers, and they don't all have attitude. And they sure gave up on the five in the morning thing pretty quickly. This week was actually pretty uneventful in comparison to Week I. Having been given a heads-up by a fellow "wagon leader" from the week before, I strategically slept near the wagon door every night to prevent my campers from making any midnight rendez-vous, but it seems to have been unnecessary. I did not need to tie my wrist to the door-knob or set up a tower of pop cans for further security, as the other wagon-leader had been required to do the week before.

Of my six campers, I would say that I became friends with three of them, and had no issue with two of the others. I managed to avoid any angry confrontation with the sixth. The speaker at Conestoga was great, and so was the nurse. As far as the month of July goes, these two were the best yet I've met. They were enthusiastic, entertaining, and made great efforts to get to know the kids and the staff. Oh, also, the speaker spoke about good stuff.

In case you can't tell, I certainly have preferred Main Camp to Conestoga so far, but it wasn't all bad. The cardboard boat race in particular was tons of fun (even though our girl didn't know how to paddle and then sank), and I was impressed by the maturity level of a fairly large number of the boys.

We have an inflatable iceberg at the dugout (which, to my amusement, many of the staff members commonly call a lake) which you can climb up and then slide down. At least, that's the idea. It took a good couple of minutes before I could figure out how to heave myself out of the water and onto the side, and I only figured it out because a helpful camper patiently explained to me where exactly to put my hands and feet. After thanking him for his advice, I managed to scale the rest of the wall up to the top, where I met another problem. It's a fourteen foot drop to the water, so the rule is to go down feet-first. We also have a rule that only six people are allowed on the iceberg at a time.

I was hopelessly tangled when I reached the top; it was certainly not my feet pointing to the water. As I flopped around in a frenzy like a dying fish, trying to realign myself without slipping off, the kids in the water started shouting up at me to let go so they could get on. It was another patient and slightly bemused male camper, perched near the top of the iceberg that yelled back down to them, "Yeah, she's not going anywhere for a while yet."

It was terribly embarrassing, but I remember it fondly.

I also got a reputation for being "smart" this week. During the first chapel, the speaker invited everyone to ask him questions to get to know him, so I asked him his opinion on pre-Adamic man. When, on the second night, he asked us who knew the definition of an allegory and I replied with a dictionary-like explanation, it seemed to seal the deal. Kids (and staff) would come up and quiz me.

Camper: What does "distinguished" mean?

Me: It's being well-known for being good at what you do.

Camper: Ok, what does DNA stand for?

Me: Deoxyribonucleic acid.

Camper: Uh, what does MS mean?

Me: Multiple sclerosis.

Camper: What about Ph. D? What does Ph. D stand for?

Me: Uh, it's Latin. I can't remember what exactly it is.

Camper: Hah! And I thought you were smart...

She made it halfway around the "lake" before the thing got too soggy and folded up on her.

P.S. I am surprised that Blogger hasn't told me "Conestoga" is spelled wrong. I've been trying to figure out what it means all month.

ETA: Apparently it's a type of broad-wheeled covered wagon, which makes sense, seeing as we sleep in wagons.

Martingale, Main Camp, Week I

2011-07-25T11:18:00.013-06:00

First week of camp and first week ever as a cabin leader!

Martingale is a nice little cabin (the smallest at Dallas Valley Main Camp), complete with its own bathroom and shower. All my kids were aged ten or eleven. There was actually a fair bit of craziness this first week. In my cabin, I personally had to deal with:

-One camper who flew into hysterics at loud noises or anything that moves in the dark

-One sleepwalker

-One camper so homesick she refused to participate in activities

-Two physically sick campers (three, if you count the final morning)

-Two campers with rolled ankles

-One camper with a seasonal allergies flare-up

-Six campers from completely unchurched backgrounds

-One (point five?) bouts of interpersonal drama involving an overly sensitive camper

I only had six girls.

The camp as a whole also had to deal with:

-One poolside emergency (everything worked out fine)

-One crazy thunderstorm (remember my camper with hysterics?)

Plus various other dramas going on within different cabins. I also had to storm a noisy neighbouring cabin on the last night, telling them to please be quiet and apologize to us in the morning. I guess my surprise, stern appearance was intimidating enough that they complied with both requests (and the rather harried leader of the cabin actually thanked me for my intervention).

Suffice to say, it was nuts, but I actually enjoyed the challenge. One neat thing about having a cabin full of unchurched girls is that they know nothing, and all the Bible stories are new and exciting to them. You can tell them the story of Daniel and the Lions' Den without them yawning and grumbling that they've heard this a million times before in Sunday School. Every new Bible character that a staff member mentioned they wanted to hear about (and act out the story for with stuffed animals). They were all so eager to learn how to look up verses in their Bibles, and had tons of questions about God's nature.

I might also say that it was in this week that I was put in charge of leading FORC (which stands for Fun Outdoor Recreational Cooking). It could be accurately renamed Bush-Pie Hour. I'm not sure what possessed those in charge to give me this task, seeing as I had never before built a fire in my life, but I think I managed to hide my inexperience. I successfully set aflame a stack of wood (with one match, even!), and proceeded to make sure the kids were well-versed in the usage of hatchets and bush-pie makers.

Also, one of the campers (the homesick one, no less) told me that even though she had only known me a week, it felt like I was her big sister.

One of my favourite quotes from the week:

Camper: This may seem like a weird question, but are you a freakishly tall camper?

No, I am not.

My favourite game of the week was called "Going Bananas".

Jess, explaining the game: You are going bananas, and your campers are going to come sedate you.

Staff member: You mean, like, "Hey, baby..."?

Jess: Noooo.... "sedate"... not "seduce".

One of my campers, after the game is over: I want to play the opposite! Can you imagine what it would be like if the kids went crazy and the counsellors had to round them up?

No. We really have no idea what it would be like to round up crazy campers. Sounds like fun.

"Martingale Warriors" - our motto was "Mud on your face, not a disgrace"

Summer Leave

2011-06-24T18:22:00.003-06:00

Today I head out to Saskatchewan for 2 whole months of wrangling cabins full of hyperactive, homesick kids. Yes, I am headed to camp. Already, my brain is leaking out my nose thanks to allergies and a bad cold. Here's hoping my sanity doesn't leave with it as the summer progresses.

How many minimum wage job contracts have you willingly signed which say, "I understand that I will be required to work overtime and weekends without pay." Perhaps my sanity is already gone. At any rate, due to the time commitment and the lack of computers, it's unlikely that I will be posting over the summer, with the possible exception of once or twice in July.

I'll see you on the flip side (assuming I survive).

“It is a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to. “ J. R. R. Tolkien

Vote of Confidence

2011-06-23T14:57:00.001-06:00

Once upon a time, some friends and I were playing a game called "Imaginiff". One of the questions asked what I would do if someone at work ~~propositioned~~ asked me out. My friend Sarah said that I would probably con a meal out of him, then turn him down.

I was mildly affronted that she believed I would use him like that and take his food.

Recently at Timmy's, an Esso compatriot brought me flowers and said I was pretty. Even I, who generally believes people when they say they-aren't-crying-they've-just-got-something-in-their-eye, could tell that he was nervous to talk to me.

He seems nice (based on the 2 or 3 sentences I've exchanged with him in the past), but there is no chance at all that I am interested.

Yet, for several long moments, I contemplated whether I could just grab the flowers and run.

So, Sarah, I may stand corrected. How did you know I was a nut?

“The mere thought hadn't even begun to speculate about the merest possibility of crossing my mind.” Douglas Adams

Rachel the Roomie

2011-06-18T18:54:00.004-06:00

A couple posts ago, I introduced my pet frogs. I feel badly about introducing my pet frogs before introducing our roomie, Rachel. My family takes on boarders every now and again. Rachel has been here six months already - that's longer than the frogs, and she's probably more important.

23 things you need to know about Rachel:

1) She's 23. Hence the reason for a 23-point list.

2) You pronounce it ra-SHELL, not RAY-chel.

3) She's from Quebec but she's somehow not a separatist.

4) She likes seafood. This makes her sad, because we do not eat seafood in the Heinrichs house.

5) She has three brothers, one of which has kids with names from Star Wars, Superman, the Gilmore Girls, and his own heavy rock band.

6) She's studying for a Masters of Divinity at Ambrose

7) She speaks 3 languages fluently - English, French, and Spanish

8) We're related. Kind of. We're cousins-in-law.

9) She enjoys living in our basement so well (though she strongly dislikes the ants) that she passed up an opportunity to move out with a friend.

10) In her opinion: Music on Hot Rod beats the Movie Hot Rod beats NitroCircus. NitroCircus is not her friend.

11) She can't fly but she does periodically try (just to make sure; you never know when things will change)

12) She's crazy because she has three jobs and is also simultaneously a student. We're not sure if her schedule is a result of her craziness or the cause of it.

13) We wrote each other when we were kids. Here's 8-year-old me on the subject:

Hello! I have a pen pal! She's from Chicotimi, Quebec! Randles cosin! Her names Rachel. We Email to echother! I like her a lot. She nice.

The entry is decorated with a colour-me dinosaur sticker on which I had written "I'M YOUR PEN PAL"

14) She is part Lebanese, part Mennonite, part Pilgrim. She has no actual French blood (maybe that's why she's not separatist).

15) She hangs so much laundry to dry on the bath curtain rod that the whole thing collapses, time and time again.

16) She "still" plays StarCraft

17) She gets all huffy if you call her a "guest" (which is understandable now, but when she'd only been here 10 days?)

18) She doesn't like writing about herself, so I'm doing it for her.

19) She very well may have been to the mountains more in the last six months than I've been in the last six years.

20) Her last name is so long it doesn't fit on the census forms.

21) This is her (maybe she is a frog after all):

22) She's procrastinating her schoolwork by giving me items for this list.

23) She's all-around pretty awesome.

Now I feel confused and conflicted, as I've never formally introduced any of my actual family members. Hey, I barely even introduced myself. It just goes without saying that they're all a part of the household and terribly important.

"A true friend is someone who thinks that you are a good egg even though he knows that you are slightly cracked.” Bernard Meltzer

GRADUATED!!!

2011-06-11T14:05:00.077-06:00

As of June 8th, 2011, I am officially "Carla Muriel Heinrichs, B.A." I have a neat hat, a piece of incredibly important paper, and four point five years of classroom education, among other things.

***

Procrastinator that I am, I've been meaning to get my hair cut for at least six months. You know it's too long when it tries to strangle you while you swim and the first thing your cousins say upon seeing you for the first time in half-a-year is "Whoa! Your hair is long!" Figuring that I'd rather stop procrastinating than spend the rest of my life groaning and smacking my forehead every time I look at my graduation pictures, I finally picked up the phone and made an appointment for 3:45 pm the day before convocation.

When I got there for the appointment, the woman told me that they had mistakenly scheduled me for the next day, instead - which was after the ceremony.

"Uh, that won't work," I said, wondering if Supercuts is worth the risk. Would it be better to look like I have a half-eaten hay bale glued to my head, or to look like I purposely meant to be making a "cutting edge" fashion statement?

"How about 6:45 tonight?" the woman said. "It won't be the same stylist, but it's the first opening we have. I'm terribly sorry."

So I went back to work, came home, said hi to some out-of-town family, and promptly blew them off to go back to the salon. The new stylist was very good, though. I like my new hair. Should have done this ages ago.

***

I got a text from a male friend (the only other person I really knew in the group of 418 that were convocating with me):

One nice thing about this is being able to wear jeans and a t shirt cuz its all under the gown thing lol

I went to pick up my gown and degree before the ceremony, hoping I'd have time left over to get my pictures done before the actual event. Upon putting on the gown, I admired the way my cute shoes went with the outfit. Then I noticed the length of the gown. Knowing he was already on campus, I texted my friend back:

Yeah, the robes don't go down to your ankles, so you might want to roll up your jeans.

He responded rather quickly:

Lol nothing doing I don't want bare legs 

Oh, yeah. Guys and girls are different that way.

***

Before we paraded in, the woman tasked with reading all our names (I have no idea how long she must have practiced!) came down the lines.

"Does anyone have a name they think I might have trouble with?" she asked.

"/hɑjn'ɹıks/," I said, fearing a /hεn'dɹıks/ or a /hɑjn'ɹıtʃ/.

"/hɑjn'ɹıks/?" she replied.

"Yes," I said, "H-E-I-N-R-I-C-H-S. /hɑjn'ɹıks/."

"Ok. I had that one marked," she admitted as she moved on.

It was a class of 419 students, and the ceremony went a little over an hour and half. I somehow ended up being fourth in the academic procession, though I was certainly not fourth to cross the stage. Yet when I finally found myself up there, smiling for the photographer, the woman remembered my name.

"Carla Muriel /hɑjn'ɹıks/," she announced, "With distinction." I was pleased and slightly surprised that she not only remembered Heinrichs, but also pronounced Muriel properly, as /mjǝɹ'iǝl/, rather than with the seemingly standard but incorrect /mʊ'ɹiǝl/. University professors on the whole tend to do pretty well in the name pronunciation department.

And apparently the Chancellor was listening carefully to this woman while he was shaking hands and making small talk, or else he was good at reading the names on the degrees prominently displayed by the graduates gleefully crossing the stage toward him.

"Congratulations, Carla," he said as he shook my hand. "Are you relieved to be done?"

I can't remember what I replied, but I do remember there was a whole whack of other people lined up just off the stage to congratulate me... and the other graduates, of course.

***

The speaker gave a goofy speech about how important it is to be selfish and self-absorbed (she actually used those words) in order to change the world, but the rest of the ceremony was good. The mace-brandishing looked a bit silly, as did the higher-levels of academic dress, but tradition is tradition.

When it was over, we took pictures outside. I handed off my degree to someone for some of the shots. I then proceeded to freak out about five minutes later when I realized that I didn't know its precise location anymore.

"Where's my degree?" I exclaimed, "Who has my degree?!"

"I'm holding it," said my grandma, who had come down from Regina specifically for my (and my cousin's) convocation.

I looked to verify her statement just in time to see a glimmer in her eyes and a sly smile spread across her face.

"Say..." she mused, "I have a degree! It's not that hard to get a degree! I have a degree from the University of Calgary!"

At least she didn't mug me to get it.

***

Just thought I'd mention that mom also made my most favourite salad in the world to help celebrate when we got home - strawberry spinach!

All this to say that I am now an "alumni" of the U of C. It makes me feel distinguished, and perhaps just a tiny bit old. Not to mention a tad miffed that my access to their library is now considerably more restricted. But I'M GRADUATED! I'M GRADUATED! I'M GRADUATED!

For a while, anyway...

As cliche of a grad quote as it may be:

“You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself in any direction you choose. You're on your own and you know what you know. You are the guy who'll decide where to go.” Dr. Seuss

Assuming, of course, that God doesn't zot you with lightning to keep you from choosing incorrectly...

The Animal Liberation Movement

2011-06-02T15:51:00.014-06:00

Many people today would willingly trade freedom for security. My pets would not. In fact, they would laugh in the face of tyranny and take freedom with death any day over security and a (generally speaking) long life. Their never-ceasing escape attempts prove this. My sister's pets, on the other hand, are wusses; they don't try to escape - only mine do.

Kiki the gerbil would make a crazed run for it whenever he managed to somehow escape from the cage. Seeing as he spent most of his time trying to find ways to do this, he did manage a number of times. Brianna's gerbil, Scamp, was never so poorly behaved. Whenever Kiki made his bid for freedom and left the exit wide open behind him, Scamp would merely grow distressed that Kiki wasn't there, curl up into a ball, and stay put.

My Siamese fighting fish, M. Poisson, once made a leap for it when I left him unattended in a cup. He landed on my bedside table, flipped around for a while, then realized he couldn't breathe without water. A tad late for such a realization, isn't it? His attempted escape nearly killed him and it did leave him half brain-dead and bedraggled. Brianna's fish, Finneus, never once made such a stupid decision.

Recently, one of my frogs saw his chance and decided to break free as I was transferring him from a bowl into his cleaned-up and improved water-cube ("aquarium" or "tank" may be overstating the case). Little froggy Less sprang out of the net, onto the kitchen island, flipped himself off the island onto the floor (remember, he's an inch-long frog and the island is about four feet high), then in three swift hops cleared the kitchen. In the end, I caught him, so it accomplished nothing short of making me feel guilty for keeping him in a six-inch cube. Little froggy Much then tried to the do the same, but I foresaw the attempt and DIDN'T LET HIM. I bet you Brianna's frogs wouldn't abandon her, if she had any frogs.

Sheesh. If my hypothetical future kids follow the same pattern, this could bode very well for democracy, but not so well for the survival of the family line. Oh, well. Maybe Brianna will let me borrow her kids.

I don't think I've introduced the African Dwarf Frogs yet: Much is the fat one, and Less is the skinny one. They each get four cous-cous sized food pellets a week. I'm relatively sure that Much is eating at least two of Less's.

“The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve, nor will he ever receive, either.” Benjamin Franklin

P.S. Happy anniversary, Mom and Dad!

A Dinner Conversation

2011-05-27T10:00:00.001-06:00

Snippets of a typical dinner conversation at the Heinrichs table (except that we now have an M. Div student added to the mix - hello, Rachel!):

Mom: Did somebody put something in my water? It tastes funny.

Dad: You mean the plastic cup in the sink?

Mom: Did I just drink CLR?

Dad: Uh...

Mom: WHY WOULD YOU PUT CLR IN MY CUP?

Dad: It was in the sink! And it wasn't much. You'll be fine.

Carla: The container says to call 911.

Dad: Nah, it was diluted. Only a drop or two. She's fine.

Carla: This cantaloupe tastes moldy, but I don't see any mold.

Mom: I know what you mean! It kind of does, doesn't it? It's got that sort of aftertaste.

Justin: Well, I'M SORRY I'M A HORRIBLE CHEF!

Dad: I ate strawberries that tasted like soap today.

Mom: That's because I washed them with dish soap by mistake!

Justin: You're making me hungry.

Carla: Everything makes you hungry. Even watching Naruto eat bugs makes you hungry.

Brianna: I think my friend's dad is dying.

Carla: Hey Justin - who do you think will die next in Naruto?

Justin: Everyone. But then they'll come alive again. I hope Karin dies. I mean, I hope she's unconscious for the rest of the show and is never mentioned again.

Carla: Do you not like death anymore? You still kill people for fun in your video games.

Justin: But I'm not as bad as Mathias. Death is bad.

Dad: Is death inherently bad? I don't think it is. Jeff would say it is. Pastor Murray seems to think it is.

Brianna: It's bad my friend's dad is dying.

Carla: Indeed. That sucks.

Justin: Suckers.... yummmm.

Mom: I took my kindergarteners to swimming class today. Imagine - 15 little naked bodies running around the change room.

Dad: You were all in the same change room?!

Mom: No, we split the boys and girls up.

Dad: You brought the boys in with you?!

Mom: No, we were in the family change room.

Dad: Everyone was in the same change room?!

Mom: No, dear, just the boys and a few parent helpers.

Carla: I should go to Bible study tonight, but I feel like staying home. I want to watch "Merlin".

Dad: So it's Bible study... or ancient witchcraft?

Carla: Well, if you put it that way...

Justin: If God hardened Pharaoh's heart, aren't we all predestined?

Carla: I know I should go, I just don't feel motivated.

Justin: I'll flip a coin! We'll see was God says.

Dad: Don't tell her if she's defying fate until she's acting on her decision. Then we'll be able to see if it's predestined or not.

Brianna: I think I've met that missing girl they just showed on the news. I know where she is.

Carla: Hey Justin - if Kakashi suddenly went missing, do you think Naruto or Sakura would recognize him if he had no hair? It's not like they've ever seen his face.

Brianna: Everything I say you relate back to whatever TV show you're watching!

Carla: Sorry.

Mom: How do you know it's the same girl?

Brianna: Gut feeling.

Justin: Ok. Heads Carla goes, tails she stays.

Brianna: It's kind of a tough situation. She ran away from some horrible stuff.

Dad: Witchcraft is pretty horrible.

Carla: But is magic always unethical? Didn't the prophets of the Old Testament pretty much just get high to receive their visions?

Mom: Ethics aren't always clear cut.

Carla: Is it unethical to assassinate a dictator?

Dad: Maybe something isn't unethical just because it's wrong.

Justin: The coin is flipped!

Brianna: One of my friends got engaged.

Carla: Justin! Do you think Naruto and Sakura will get married? I'm assuming you already know Arthur and Gwen are getting married.

Brianna: You're doing it again!

Dad: Are you going to Bible study, Carla?

Carla: Yes.

Dad: What did the coin say?

Justin: Yes! Twice! She has no free will!

Mom: Which friend got engaged, sweetheart?

....and so on...

Note: This post is based on real conversations and our standard dinner conversational style (Rachel can attest to that), but is not a verbatim transcript.

"If you think anyone is sane you just don't know enough about them." Christopher Moore

Secret Diary

2011-05-25T10:56:00.011-06:00

Hello! My name is Carla. I am 6 years old. Do you now who my BOYfrend is? SCOTT! Hes reilly funny. He is 6 to. And when he does sumthing funny I laff at him then he wood say "What" evin tho he knows. Scott is 10 days yungir then me. Bye!

Hi my name is Carla. I am 6 years old. Soon I, Brianna, Dady, Mom, Justin are gioing to reigina! In reigiana we are gioin to play sneicup!* On the secind paige we tock about Scott? On the next page we will tock about Scott.

Hi agin reemmemder my name? C-A-R-L-A. I am 7 now. Bye agan.

Hi! I am playing Book store. I am 7. I am in a little bit of love with Sott! So is Joy. Bye.

Hello! I have some friends over! Thare names are Kim, Cindy, and Amy. We are playing school. Have a good time! Do you know I snore? Love you! Have a good day!

Hi! Did you know three squirrls came to live our back yard? I named them Peter, Patrick and Whitney. I LOVE squirrls. Do you? We think they came from fish creek park. Do you have squirrls liveing in YOUR backyard?

I'm 8! I love to read the Bible! My favorit movie is eney story keepers! Every person in my family loves God! All exsept Justin, he's only 2. Oh-well.

Olla! (Hello) I know some spanish words. Groseiss (Thank you) De nede (Your welcome). I have been in Mexico (Meheeco) for about 2 weeks. We have no spanish lessons. :-(

Hmph! Today was was bad. The memory is too painful. Bye!

Hi! As you know I am Carla and I am 9. Today was Brianna's birthday party. Gail (the puppet performer) was really funny. I liked Chuckie Beaver, Short-cake + Crumb, the bunny, etc. PAUSE... Sorry about the pause, I had to get my P.J.'s on. Toad on the Road is funny because, Pause... Sorry, I had to clean up. Because, Gail spayed us with water. Well, Bye for now.

If you haven't been able to guess, those were select excerpts from my secret diary, the precursor to this blog. It was a perfumed thing my mom gave to me as a reward for practicing piano when I was six. I loved that little book. It's too bad I only filled it one third full...

I wonder if one day I'll look back at this blog and find it cute and amusing like I now look at 6-year-old me.

Anyway, I pulled out my old secret diary because next month I will be heading to Saskatchewan to be a cabin leader at Dallas Valley for TWO CONSECUTIVE MONTHS, and I figure that a journal with a lock on it could prove strategic. I am going to be bushed by the time September rolls around. Needless to say, this blog will probably not get a lot of attention while I'm trying to inspire and control hordes of hyperactive, homesick, yet fawning kids. Still, I'm hoping to get at least a few posts in before July hits.

Speaking of things kids say:

"I'm all rectangled up, Mommy!" my wee little brother (admit it, it's cute)

*Sneak up [on the grown-ups]

P.S. The friend, Kim, mentioned above, just had her first baby! Welcome to the world baby Jacob!

God's Army in Old-School Music

2011-05-09T12:20:00.012-06:00

Let's take a short trip down music memory lane. Who remembers the old days of CARMAN? I remember running around the living room as a kid with my sister, "dancing" to Sunday School Rock and then later doing a better job of it as a part of Corps Bara (or was it still "Dance Choir" then?) 7 Ways to Praise was the finale my first year at Crossings, and I remember watching other students dance to R.I.O.T. Crossings used a lot of Carman music in the early days, probably because he was one of the few Christian artists with dance-worthy music available at the time.

Recently, on a trip to visit family and poke through old photos in Saskatchewan, I packed a bunch of Carman CDs to help while away the long drive. It was a bit nostalgic and quite enjoyable, with the exception of one track that made me shriek and think my windshield had just badly cracked. I sat there hoping the entire thing didn't shatter onto my lap while I was zipping along the highway for a good few anxiety producing minutes until I had the brainwave to repeat the last song and see if I heard the glass cracking again.

Breaking glass sounds aside, I still appreciate Carman's musicality. You can't really get bored listening to his stuff - there's a wide variety of instruments and styles and each song is distinct from the last. I particularly appreciate his narrative story-style tracks, a style I've never heard imitated before, but tend to enjoy. However, I guess that over the last decade I've become a little more critical of some of the content of his songs. His theology occasionally gives me pause, as in I'm not sure that speaking to demons like dogs is a particularly good idea. And I don't know that his word-picture of heaven is exactly accurate. Also, I can point out places where I would be concerned as a producer that he is possibly going to unnecessarily offend someone, such as when he puts on a thick German accent and plays up German stereotypes as a joke. Being of German descent myself, I'm not offended, but I could see it rubbing some people the wrong way.

Perhaps the most repeated issue that leaves me cocking my head is Carman's heavy use of militant language and imagery. It keeps coming up. Our Turn Now speaks of rising up to take back schools by storm, and Satan, Bite the Dust talks about being "authorized and deputized" to "blow away" Satan and his influence. Again, Revival in the Land ends with a call to do battle against Satan and his legions while Jericho-Shout of Victory follows the theme of war and battle. God's Got an Army and R.I.O.T - well, I don't have to explain the content of those ones, do I? These are just some of the examples. It's not always about the military per se, but the idea of forceful, battle-ready, powerful Christians is easily apparent.

I can't help but think back to some of the sermons our pastor delivered recently on grace. Pastor Murray discussed how we want to have power as Christians, how we want to be a force to be reckoned with. We want to "take back" our world for Christ. He pointed out, however, that this isn't really how it's supposed to be. We come up from underneath, quietly, subversively, with grace. We forgive, we love, we are completely counter-cultural, we don't dictate culture. Scripture itself says we are to be in the world, not of the world. Is it possible for us to rule the world and yet not be of the world? I don't think so.

Emperor Constantine tried to do the whole regulated, powerful Christianity thing, and look at how it cheapened and distorted things. Christianity became a religion, not a faith. It became something you did to be popular, not something you did because you believed. Even if people are successful at bringing back Christian values into the legal systems of their nation, does that mean that any souls have been won? Or does it just mean that we have the legal right to punish wrongdoers? And if we are busy punishing people for not obeying the rules, when will we be able to show them grace? Will they listen?

Again, there is a limit here. I am not suggesting that we abandon people to their bad decisions and let evil carry the day. If the government is trying to do something patently evil, of course we are called to oppose it. If someone is running around killing people, of course we need to stop him. And I'm not saying that Christians shouldn't run for office or should never hold high-ranking positions. I'm saying that the basic tenets of Christianity, that is Christ and His grace, aren't things that you can bean someone on the head with. It just doesn't work.

The Bible talks about putting on the armour of God and no one can claim that Revelations doesn't have militaristic imagery. Elsewhere, archangel Michael was doing literal battle with demons. But is it our job to march into a place, try to take control, and "blow away" evil, top-down? Or are we called to sneak in where no one expects us, stun them by showing grace, and otherwise start a grass-roots, bottom-up movement that just keeps getting bigger and bigger but that never knocks people around? I agree with my pastor that grace is subversive, not aggressive.

Perhaps I would be more comfortable if the militant language in Carman's music were replaced with spy imagery. Oh wait, he did do some of that, too. Mission 3:16, anyone?

Tangentially related to the topic at hand, by means of my trip to Saskatchewan, this year is seeing the most back-and-forthness of the Albertan and Saskatchewanian Heinrichs relatives ever. Our worlds are kind of merging. This is good.

"There will be moments when you will feel perplexed, especially in the presence of human sin. You will ask yourself: 'Must I combat it by force or try to overcome it by humble love?' Always choose humble love, always." Elder Zosima in The Brothers Karamazov by Dostoevsky

P.S. Neither am I suggesting that we try to show grace to demons - I'm just not so sure it's a good idea to being "commanding" Satan around.

Readable

2011-04-30T13:15:00.008-06:00

I have a face that is incredibly easy to read. It also, by the way, tends to make faces while I read. But that's beside the point. The point is that people can usually tell what I'm feeling or even what I'm thinking and they don't have to be particularly adept at people-reading to tell. I can believe I'm being stoic, but it doesn't really work. I have discovered this in many situations with many people over the last few years.

This morning at Timmy's was a gong show - Saturdays usually are. It's busier than the weekdays, but we have one less person on staff. Plus my supervisor is just a teen girl who admittedly tries, but hasn't gotten the hang of handling the whole little store and all that entails. This could have something to do with the chronic under-staffing - I doubt she even knows what a properly running store feels like.

Today we had one kid who has never worked at our Esso before, one kid who moves like she's constantly swimming through molasses, our supervisor, and myself. I was the eldest by at least five years. Needless to say, things weren't running smoothly. I was grumpy. And frustrated. I pretty much took over and started telling people what to do. And if customers on drive-thru didn't answer me when I asked what I could get for them, I let them sit there until the cows came home or they figured something was wrong and said hello. Haha! Sweet vengeance.

About half-an-hour before my shift was over, one of the girls I was working with said, "Carla, how do you manage to wake up to be here by 6 a.m., and be so energetic and cheerful the whole time?"

So I consider this a victory. Today, at least, my negative attitude was not exceedingly obvious. And I kept us all alive. Hurrah!

"If you don't get everything you want, think of the things you don't get that you don't want." Oscar Wilde

Kid Shows for Grown Ups

2011-04-26T12:02:00.007-06:00

If ever by some random chance I end up running my own TV station, I can tell you some of the shows that are going to on the set list. Naturally, Babylon 5 and M*A*S*H will be prime time, but day times will consist of "kid" shows. Namely Naruto (in Japanese - can't stand the English dubs) and now also...

AVATAR: The Last Airbender.

A friend recommended this to me and I polished through the series in a matter of a week or so. Now I'm forcing my brother to watch.

It may be true that you have have to have the maturity level of a twelve-year-old to enjoy a kid's show, but I would argue that it's probably healthier to consume this kind of stuff than the crass romantic comedies and never-ending stream of reality-TV dramas that mostly show nowadays.

The Last Airbender isn't quite so philosophical as Naruto tries to be, but it definitely draws out quite a few laughs. One of the running gags in the story are the hybrid creatures. The only living, sentient beings that appear to be distinctly one species are the humans. Everything else is mix-matched - flying lemur rabbits and platypus bisons or saber-toothed moose lions. The latter one is actually pretty cute.

The first few episodes are a little emotionally shallow - when the protagonist discovers that he slept away the last hundred years and that the world as he knows it and the people he loved are all gone, his reaction is to look sadly at the ground for a moment. But things pick up pretty quickly after that. The dialogue is amusing, especially where Sokka and Toph are concerned, and the character development is well done. This is especially true of Zuko, but most, if not all, of the characters grow and change over time.

Season two sees an eerie tip of the hat to George Orwell's 1984, with the characters entering a city where the citizens are brainwashed and fed propaganda until nobody is even aware that the world is at war (despite the fact that they are the last "free" city standing). It's decidedly creepy, especially once you get past the obvious similarities to Orwell's work and notice that some of the techniques the city rulers use are surprisingly realistic...

Along with other ethical quandaries, season three sees the main protagonist (a technical pacifist) faced with a choice of whether or not to try and kill his opponent to save the world. I was a little disappointed with the resolution, as someone gave him an ad hoc third option at the last moment, meaning he didn't have to make the difficult choice in the end. I would have liked to have seen how the consequences of the real decision played out, as nice, tight third options aren't always easy to come by.

There are multiple crush/love relationships, but I appreciate the way that first and foremost the characters are friends and that they can give each other gifts and do nice things for each other - across gender lines - despite them not being romantically attached. It's refreshing to see. One other thing I kinda liked about the series is the way that all the characters seem to know when to accept defeat. For example:

Sokka: Great. So what am I suppose to do?
Aang: You could clean the gunk out of Appa’s toes.
Sokka (riled up): So while you guys are playing in the water, I’m suppose to be hard at work picking mud out of a giant bison’s feet?
Aang: Mud and bugs!
*beat*
Sokka (shrugs): Okay.

Oh, and being the psych student that I am (was), I have decided that Zuko's sister, Azula, is most decidedly a psychopath.

Definitely a well-done series.

Katara: The King is throwing a party at the palace tonight for his pet bear.
Aang: Don't you mean platypus bear?
Katara: No, it just says, 'bear'.
Sokka: Certainly you mean his pet skunk bear?
Toph: Or his armadillo bear?
Aang: Gopher bear?
Katara: Just, 'bear'.
*short pause*
Toph: This place is weird.

How to Get Happy

2011-04-03T14:56:00.006-06:00

For reasons that have no bearing on this post, I was feeling rather blue and melancholy yesterday. This was not good for two reasons, namely a) I don't enjoy being blue and melancholy and b) I had a shift at the Distress Centre coming up. It's tough to be genuine and compassionate and understanding of distressed people when you're stewing in gloominess yourself. However, you cannot simply cancel a volunteer shift on the fly, as people are counting on you to live up to your commitment. Well, you CAN cancel your shift, but you'd feel guilty and it would put a black mark on your record and would make things more difficult for the other volunteers.

So rather than cancel my shift, I went and told God that He should really think about cheering me up, because I couldn't cheer myself up, and it was primarily other people, not me, that would be at stake if I didn't feel happier again.

God has a sense of humour. Yesterday it snowed and snowed and snowed and turned to slush. My boots are warm but by no means waterproof. And I walked from the C-train to the DC. At least once I put down my foot to find water almost up to my ankle. Do you think this made me more cheerful?

Nobody (as far as I'm aware) likes wearing damp socks. I certainly don't, and I didn't expect damp socks to be the pick-me-up I needed. And technically, they weren't, as they quickly changed from damp to wet to sloshing socks. There's a point where something just gets so ridiculous you forget to be grumpy and laugh instead. For me, it was the moment when I wondered whether other people walking around me could hear the water splashing my toes INSIDE my boot every time I picked up my foot. You know, seeing as the boots were meant to keep my feet dry and all.

So I was standing there, waiting to cross the street, wondering if my feet were going to freeze to the pavement and thinking it might actually be more comfortable to just take my boots off and walk the rest of the distance bare-foot, and I giggled out loud. I didn't laugh in disbelief. I giggled. And I felt a lot better.

Goes to show that even though God does promise to comfort us, He doesn't always use conventional methods to do so.

I wrung out my socks and jeans at the DC and crawled under my desk (to the amusement of the man in the next booth) to put my socks and boots on the heater by the window. I then proceeded to answer the phone line as well as I would have any other day - with just as much empathy and patience. And the man in the booth next to me gave me grocery bags to wear in my boots over my socks on the way home, so my feet stayed dry.

I think I forgot to remove the "DON'T FORGET YOUR SOCKS" memo from the phone booth after the shift was over. I wonder who found it next.

"Everything is funny, if you can laugh at it." Lewis Carroll

Birthday Twins

2011-03-31T09:00:00.001-06:00

Happy birthday to me... AND to my tenth great-grandfather John Eades, who was born on this date 338 years before I was!

John Eades was born in Essex, England in 1651 and at some point in time made the crossing to the new world! Well, to Massachusetts to be exact. He was the son of John Eades, the son of John Eades (I guess name choices were based more on tradition than on creativity). His mother was possibly named Elizabeth Gladwyn, but I haven't found any documents to back that up. Isn't it ironic that we're more likely to record a kid's father, even though the mother is technically much more verifiable?

John married Mary Tufts in 1674 in the USA and proceeded to have children with her. Assuming that the mothers were all honest about the fathers of their children AND that the 300 years worth of historical documents are correct AND that there weren't numerous John Eades running around Massachusetts, my relationship to John Eades the Third goes like this:

John Eades (b. MARCH 31, 1651)
Sarah Eades (b. 1691)
Sarah Wager (b. 1714)
Walter Dickerson (b. 1739)
Noadiah Dickerson (b. 1760)
Daniel Dickerson (b. 1787)
Chilion Ford Dickerson (b. 1808)
Viola Almaretta Dickerson (b. 1851)
Florence Ethel Lovelace (b. 1881)
Mave Hope Waters (b. 1906)
Muriel Joy Klaproth (b. 1930)
Sandra Leanne Meginbir (b. 1963)
Carla Muriel Heinrichs (b. MARCH 31, 1989)

Yeah, it might not be exactly accurate, but it's gotta be close. I love family history!

“People will not look forward to posterity, who never look backward to their ancestors.” Edmund Burke

Bonhoeffer was NOT Canadian

2011-03-29T12:21:00.002-06:00

Yet for a moment I thought he had stood in for my grandfather in some of the family pictures... The one of the far left is either the famous theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer or he's my maternal grandfather, Albert Meginbir.

This one is definitely Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

This one is also Dietrich.

This one, on the other hand, is definitely my grandfather. But no, that is not my grandmother. And no, I don't approve of her smoking. But regardless of who she is and what she is doing, don't you agree that my grandpa could have passed for Bonhoeffer in a pinch if they happened to find themselves the same age in the same decade? Not that he would want to, seeing as Bonhoeffer was executed by the Nazis, but still...

I don't have any quotes at all from my grandfather, as he died when my mom was small, so I'll use a random quote by Bonhoeffer instead:

“It is not only what is said that matters, but also the man who says it.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Pedestrian Power

2011-03-16T18:27:00.001-06:00

There is a one-way street downtown which must be crossed over twice during the course of a day if you happen to volunteer at the Distress Centre and your primary mode of transportation is the C-train. In order to cross this one-way street, a pedestrian has two options: jay walk, or cross legally at the intersection when the walking-man light tells you it's safe to cross.

Which is the better option? Well, usually I choose the latter. However, this one-way street is not terribly busy. Plus, the C-train runs across it, sometimes blocking off all traffic entirely. And even when the C-train is not there, it is still a very simple matter to glance down the street to see whether any moving vehicles at all are in within a three-block range. And the little walking-man light is not in tune with any of these circumstances.

Walking home last week, I was stopped at this intersection, waiting for the light to turn. No cars were coming. There was a couple with a stroller across the street from me, also waiting, and another woman behind them... guess what, waiting. We were all waiting. And no cars were coming. Yet the light still didn't change.

So I glanced around for any police and, seeing none, I stepped off the curb, onto the road. And I strode across the pavement as if the bright orange hand weren't still glaring at me from the light post. Almost immediately, the couple with the stroller also stepped off the curb and began crossing. And so did the woman behind them - even though the light still said DON'T WALK. I had influenced those other people to cross the street.

It was a strange feeling. Usually, when I exert power over others, I am overcome with a sense of glee. This time, however, I didn't feel a sense of glee. I guess influencing others to follow me into crime just doesn't give me the same thrill that exerting more benevolent power does. That's probably a good thing.

"Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power." Abraham Lincoln

Faced with the Veil

2011-03-07T19:33:00.013-07:00

Is it possible to dress too modestly? Or, rather, should anyone be allowed to wear full burkhas with face veils in Canada? I really dislike this picture, by the way.

Ignore for a moment the fact that many women are forced into wearing burkhas, as it probably is true that some choose to wear it of their own free will. In their view, a woman showing her face is immodest and provocative. We generally respond to this with something along the lines of, "You're in Canada now. Your face is fine. Deal with it." As far as I am aware, a woman must show her face in certain situations, like when she is pulled over by a police officer for speeding. He has to verify that she is who she says she is, and she can't demand to show only a female because there may not be a female officer present.

But suppose we head down to the jungle of Ecuador somewhere and we come across a village where the people wear g-strings and precious little else. It is certainly counter-cultural to then wear a standard amount of Western clothing. We would probably be quite uncomfortable taking off our clothes just to fit in with the locals. Yet, what if we were required by law to bare all? Is that fair? What if beaches in Canada required all swimmers to wear bikinis or speedos and nothing else? I suspect there would be some backlash.

Apart from being oppressive and dehumanizing, the thing about face veils is that they can actually prove to be a security risk. For all we know, it could be a man under there using the veil as a way to get into some place he shouldn't be. Or perhaps it is a female, after all, but the not the female who is supposed to be taking the exam or who has the license to drive (naturally, this is only a problem in more Westernized nations where women are allowed to take exams and drive). And I wouldn't be surprised if you could smuggle a bazooka into a school under a burkha.

But then, if we start considering clothing as security risks, things get silly fast. Bulky clothing itself can be a problem, because of how easy it is to smuggle something in under a full skirt or a hoodie. In warmer climates, this problem could be fixed by having everyone join a nudist colony. In Canada, however, we would quickly end up a bunch of naked popsicles. I suspect that the best way to combat this would be to have electrically heated spandex unitards for everyone to wear. I'm not sure if spandex would burn or melt or not, but currently it's my best idea.

Finding the reasonable middle ground may prove difficult, but unless we already suspect that someone may try to smuggle contraband, then it's not really all that bad for them to wear some clothes. And in the vast majority of cases, if not all, there are other ways to make sure people aren't carrying weapons than to strip them naked.

So, if we are reasonably sure that a woman isn't armed and just wants to wear a burkha because she likes wearing them and not because someone will throw acid on her face if she doesn't, should she be allowed to do so? At what point does security trump personal rights? Well, if someone insisted that they should be allowed to wear a balaclava around the mall, how far would they get?

It's not like we're nomads in the desert, where you may need something over your lower face to keep you from breathing in sand and to keep your face from burning off. In Canada, you might need something over your face while you're outside on the coldest days of the year, just to keep your nose from falling off. Beyond that, however, there is no practical reason to wear face veils like that, except to hide your identity. If you don't want an identity, that's your choice, but if you don't care to have an identity then why do you care to be a part of Canadian society?

Your identity isn't hidden at all if you wear western clothes in the jungle. Being modest isn't the issue - the issue is who you are. What you do in your own home is up to you, but I say no to allowing burkhas in public.

Mormon Church: An Analysis

2011-03-07T13:57:00.014-07:00

There's a Mormon church only a couple blocks down the way from where my family resides, so we naturally get hit up by Mormon missionaries on a fairly regular basis. If life isn't too crazy at the moment, my Dad typically invites them and we spend a few weeks trying to get them to tell us why we should be Mormons.

Normally, the missionaries call it quits after three or four discussions and leave us be until the next batch of missionaries arrive. However, after a few years of this, and the Mormon/Evangelical beliefs comparison that blogger friend Cavan and I did, I figured that I really should get around to actually visiting a Mormon church. I can hardly claim to be highly knowledgeable of the religion without paying at least one visit to their base of operations.

So this Sunday we (myself, my sister, and our roommate Rachel) woke up bright and early to hem and haw over whether or not to wear skirts. The only winter skirt I have I made myself when I was fourteen. Whatever. I wore it anyway. Then we piled into the car and began our trek down the road and into foreign territory.

First impression: Nice entryway. Very nice.

One of the missionaries was waiting at the sanctuary door for us and expressed only mild disappointment that our brother hadn't come as well. He was very friendly and ushered us over to some seats on a pew they had saved for us (I had let them know ahead of time we were coming). We had a minute or two to glance around and peruse the bulletins handed to us before the meeting started. I guess I hadn't really expected to see a cross anywhere inside the sanctuary, seeing as how Mormon churches don't have them outside the building, either, but it still felt odd staring at a big blank wall without any sign of a cross anywhere.

Second impression: They have a single adults hotline? And the church is throwing a dance? It's not only encouraging young people to dance together, but it's announcing it in the bulletin? Oy, definitely not Mennonite! And what is this about needing a "dance card" to be able to attend?

Actually, it appears you also need an "ordinance temple card" to visit the temple. This may or may not have been the same thing as a "temple recommend", which seemingly has to be renewed by a member of the bishopric. It doesn't take too long to figure out that the church is extremely hierarchical and regulated.

The churches I'm used to typically require you to be a church "member" in order to vote for the elder board and other occasional big decisions. Also, I've had to have a criminal record check to volunteer with the kids, but that's about as regulated as it's gotten.

So anyway, the service started. All in all, it was different from my church, but most of it still seemed familiar. I would slot it along with the more traditional church styles - hymnals rather than PowerPoint, organ rather than worship team, pews rather than chairs, etc. We passed the bread and water by during the Sacrament (they use water instead of grape juice or wine).

The morning was divided into three parts: Sacrament Meeting, Sunday School, and Women's Relief Society. The Sacrament Meeting, rather than having a single speaker, had an open mic time, where anyone could go up and share their testimony. Apparently this happens once a month.

When the mic was first opened, there seemed to be a semi-awkward lull where nobody went up. I wondered how long it would be before one of our host missionaries would crack and get the ball rolling. As it turned out, only a few seconds. It was also quite obvious from his testimony that he was well-aware we were listening, as it had just to do with what we had been discussing during our prior meetings - how we can know that the book of Mormon is true. :-) I admit that I appreciated how he was attempting to keep things relevant for us. After the first missionary, other people started going up and the whole semi-awkward pause thing died out.

Impression number three: These testimonies feel almost Islamic in a non-Arab way. I didn't know there was a Mormon shahada, but I keep hearing it, almost word for word - "I know that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and Joseph Smith is his Prophet!"

For Sunday School, we were slotted into the Gospel Basics class, with the missionaries and other Mormon newbies. The topic of the day just happened to be "Prophets of God". This surprised me a little bit, although maybe it shouldn't have after the shahada thing. Perhaps it was just fluke that we ended up attending on the one day when the topic was extremely Mormon, but I had been expecting something a little more basic to the Christian faith - say, the death and resurrection, grace, or the Ten Commandments or something like that.

While I'm well aware that Mormons differ from "standard" Christians in accepting Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon on top of Jesus and the Bible, I wasn't expecting it to be so Joseph-Smith-and-Book-of-Mormon heavy. I guess I expected pretty much the standard Christian fare with added bits, but the added bits seem to have stolen the spotlight and become the main emphasis. I definitely heard more about Joseph Smith and modern-day prophets than I heard about Jesus - in fact, barring one testimony that mentioned Christ's atonement, I'm not sure I heard anything Jesus or grace-centric all morning. That was rather disappointing.

The missionaries obviously couldn't accompany us to the third part of the morning, the Women's Relief Society Meeting, but a church member introduced us to his wife, and she chatted with us and was very friendly in their place.

Impression number four: This seems to be a highly emotional setting. People keep crying. It's got the semi-rigid formality of a Mennonite Brethren church, but the spiritual emotionality of a Pentecostal church. What an interesting mix.

The topic of the Women's meeting was revelation and how to get it. An interesting comparison between revelation and radio waves was made, which I actually might use some time. Beyond that, however, I don't think I picked up anything useful, as the speaker said that only worthy people could get revelation, and I'm not really convinced I'm worthy.

All the teaching in the Women's meeting came from the higher-ups, that is, from apostles or prophets or other people of authority. There were a few personal anecdotes to illustrate points, but, to me, at least, it felt like the whole discussion was just parroting others rather than the result of critical thought and Biblical study.

Sunday School was similar in this regard. For example, someone mentioned how the current prophet (or someone close to him) warned the church about the dangers of being addicted to video games, and how this demonstrated that he was receiving inspiration from God. Given that I could have told them to beware video games and yet I don't fancy myself a prophet, it made me wonder whether these particular Mormons weren't thinking for themselves or were just pretending they weren't in order to elevate the church leaders.

Rachel, Brianna and I all agree that the "weirdest" event of the morning was the very last hymn, which came at the close of the Women's Relief Society meeting. Entitled "Families Can Be Together Forever", it was rather reminiscent of "I Love You, You Love Me" from Barney the Purple Dinosaur. The main idea of the hymn was that we love our families so much that we want to spend all eternity with them and that we'll be good so that we can get married in the temple and do just that. Needless to say, despite loving our families intensely, none of us actually sang along with that one, though it was interesting to listen to.

One thing that we really liked about Mormon church was the strong community aspect. There was a lot of interaction between the members themselves and even the speakers and the members. Everyone was involved - it's the kind of place where it would be hard to just go and passively sit and listen. Things are designed so that the community grows together, and everyone seemed to know everyone else's name. The Mormon community was pretty tight-knit, and it's nice to see that, especially when my own background has seen four out of the five churches I've regularly attended fall apart due largely to conflicts within the church (though not necessarily while we were still attending).

People were very warm and welcoming and it's easy to see how investigators could find themselves quite at home. I'm really glad we went. It was a good experience and very interesting. However, I can still solidly assure everyone that I am not a Mormon, nor thinking about becoming one.

Next week: Normal church!

I don't have any particularly good quotes about Mormonism, so I'll revert to quotes from the kids at the Sunday School of my own church:

Val: Do you kids know what the first five books of the Bible – Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy – are called? It starts with a P... Penta...
Boys: PENTECOSTALS!

Mubarak Makes a Call

2011-02-18T10:05:00.006-07:00

When people learn that I volunteer with a crisis hotline, they always want to know what kind of calls we get there. We're trained to handle basically anything. The following is a script for how I might handle a more high-risk call:

Phone: Ring ring!

Me: Hi, this is the Distress Centre.

Male caller: Hi. I'm in distress and I don't know what to do.

Me: Ok, well, can you tell me a bit about what's going on?

Caller: I used to be a dictator, but now millions of people hate me and are rioting in the street.

Me: Oh dear, I'm sorry to hear that.

Caller: I think they're going to kill me.

Me: Uh, oh. What makes you think that?

Caller: Well, they're screaming that they don't want me and they're lobbing molotov cocktails at my bodyguards.

Me: I see. That's not good.

Caller: No.

Me: Is this happening right now? Are they throwing cocktails right now?

Caller: Yes, but they don't know where I am. My window shades are all drawn.

Me: Good. And have you changed the locks on your doors recently?

Caller: Yes. But I don't think they'll hold if the rioters find out I'm in here.

Me: Well, I think you're doing a very good job of staying calm. How is all this making you feel?

Caller: Millions of people hate me. How do you think I feel?

Me: Overwhelmed, maybe?

Caller: That's a good word. Yes, a little overwhelmed.

Me: You know, sometimes when people feel overwhelmed, they start having thoughts of suicide. Is that the case with you, today, sir?

Caller: Uh, no. But I'm scared the rioting masses will kill me.

Me: Have you notified the police?

Caller: Yes, but they're having trouble standing up against the military. The military is onside with the rioters.

Me: Oh. That makes things a bit more difficult. Do you know what happened that made everyone want to kill you?

Caller: I stole about 68 billion dollars from them and generally abused their human rights.

Me: Yeah, sometimes that kind of thing can upset people. Is there any chance you'll be abusing people's human rights today, sir?

Caller: Whose side are you on?

Me: I just want to make sure everyone's safe.

Caller: I think I want to leave this place.

Me: That sounds like a good plan. Will you be able to leave?

Caller: Yes. I know how to fly airplanes. The thing is, I don't know where to go. I can't access my $68 billion, currently. I have no money to set me up anywhere.

Me: Huh. That presents a problem, doesn't it. Do you have any spare change tucked in the couch cushions or something?

Caller: Well....

Me: What about a hatchet? I read a book once where a kid survived on his own in the wild with pretty much nothing but a hatchet.

Caller: I think I have a hatchet somewhere.

Me: Good! Ok, so, here's an idea. How about you grab your hatchet, fly away in your plane, land in an uninhabited desert or a forest somewhere, and live on nothing but your wits alone for a month or two until all this blows over. How do you feel about that plan?

Caller: Could you find me the co-ordinates of the nearest uninhabited forest with a landing strip?

Me: Sure, I can do that for you. Just give me a moment. Whereabouts are you?

Caller: Wait... this is confidential, right?

I wonder how this guy is going to end up. And how his country is going to end up, for that matter. It's weird, really. He goes through so much trouble to accumulate so much wealth and in the end will it help him at all?

It's kind of ironic - probably the only thing that can help him now is far too expensive to ever buy, and yet completely free...

Leave your hurting on the road behind you
Let the wind go with you ‘til morning comes
And your sorrow, it can’t save you
It won’t answer for what you’ve done

-NeedToBreathe (Let Us Love)

Fantasy Cartography

2011-02-16T21:08:00.008-07:00

This is a map of the Fire Emblem world:

Yes, I had to take a few liberties with it, such as adding on to the Nabata desert, and flipping Akaneia on its side so that it can hook up with Sacae, but really... how else was I supposed to make all the continents fit together nicely? Both Ilia and Silesia are up north, where it's really cold, but the deserts are in random places. I don't think there's an equator line anywhere, but then, nobody's ever made the claim that the Fire Emblem world is round, have they?

Given that only three of the six continents are canonically even in the same world, I think this isn't too bad. I'm surprised there aren't more FE world maps online. Am I really the first to make one?

If I were to do it over, I wouldn't have made the water such a dark blue. Oh, and PS - does anyone have any ideas for what to name the island in the SE that I randomly drew in? "Carla's Island" doesn't quite cut it, and "Carlaville" doesn't sound very Fire Emblem worldish.

Cheers.

Speaking of maps: "We're all pilgrims on the same journey - but some pilgrims have better road maps." Nelson DeMille

Dancing and Blog Traffic

2011-02-13T14:53:00.009-07:00

These are pointe shoes:
You may have figured out that I'm trying to boost my blog traffic. It's not entirely dishonest, because, as you know, I was a dancer myself for about eleven years. My teachers and dance-mates did say that I have beautiful feet en pointe (or did at the time). Can you believe that I don't seem to have ANY pictures of my actually wearing them? Gah! All those years of training and nothing to display for it! Granted, I could take a picture now, but my shoes are no longer in pristine condition, I don't have the same gorgeous costumes, and well, such a photo probably wouldn't generate as much traffic as this picture above.

Traffic on this blog has never been highly congested, but I find some of the stats interesting.

The three most viewed posts on my blog are predictable:

Ronon vs. Teal'c

followed by

Dies Irae and I Guess This is Fan Art, which are neck and neck.

The next most viewed, Random Post, is more unexpected. There's not even a picture there. It's just rambling.

The most often used Google keyword that finds my blog is "maple leaf" and "Canada maple leaf". Apparently, once upon a time, I put a picture of a maple leaf on my blog. I had to go on a treasure hunt when I saw how much traffic this picture was generating, because I didn't remember actually using it.

To date, I've had 62 page views from Latvia.

Also, December and this February have seen the greatest dearth of visitors since I started my blog. Interesting how that correlates with the greatest dearth of posts since I started blogging. Or not so interesting. As you decide.

Back to the dance theme for the quote - this one is a paraphrase of a revelation had by former dance-mate Deanna Witwer (nee McLennan) one sunny Saturday morning rehearsal:

"The answer to all of life's problems and questions can be answered by one of two things: God or abdominal strength."

BTW, it doesn't look like either God or abdominal strength helped my sister in this dance. There I am, pleading to God, and she still ends up a corpse...

Really Old Paperwork

2011-02-05T15:33:00.007-07:00

If you love old things, that is, old things relating to my ancestral past, then you'll love this letter. David Loewen, my great grandfather, wrote this to his sister shortly after my Grandma was born.

David and his family had just emigrated to Canada from Russia 3 years earlier, on the Empress of France. Here's my great grandma's passenger declaration (click for a close up):

But now, on to the letter. It's really too bad you have to see it in type instead of in it's original, beautiful Gothic script:

***

Letter written by David Loewen

Translated from German by Erna Heinrichs

Transcribed to the computer and edited by Carla Heinrichs

Words in italics are notes by Erna Heinrichs.

Footnotes by Carla Heinrichs are numbered.

***

Beechy, October 2, 1927

Dear Sister and Brother-in-law!

We wish you peace and joy. Tuesday on the 27th of September, we had the pleasure of receiving your such appreciated letter. I have been busy with feeding children, laundry, and putting them to bed, keeping the rooms in order and taking care of Lena, and that has to be done while the neighbourhood has the threshing machine humming and each teamster collects his $7.00 daily.

But we also received a gift. On Sept. 25, 9 o'clock in the morning we were presented with a healthy, pudgy daughter. She has the name which you, Neta, liked so much: Erna. We are happy our children are healthy and growing. You should see how little Lena runs and makes fun. She doesn't only make the children laugh but adults as well.

We have started to teach the children High German. Henry can speak quite correctly already. Susie said “Aunt Neta should come to Grandma's house and we will visit her.” Come and see how our children play ring-around-the-rosy. Little Lena enjoys it too, although she lags behind in the falling down. It is a joy to have the children, but also much work and cost to keep them nourished and a big responsibility toward our Creator who has given them to us.

Lena is much improved (1). She is often out of bed. (When I was working on the obstetrical ward, the doctors had some women in bed for ten days) Henry and Grandma were here visiting today. (Henry was dad's adopted brother who was only six or seven years older than his son Henry.) (2) She is quite well now. She and Henry have been digging potatoes for three days. Papa had ridden to the church. Elder H. Neufeld, Hiebert and leader Martens from Main Centre were there on visit and to bring glory to the Lord.

Wish you were here. The parents have harvested the summer fallow wheat that was close to the house. It netted circa 1300 bushels. Both we and the Enns have nothing threshed. Our crop had suffered little from the frost, but instead we had rust. The last seeded will hardly pay the cost of threshing. Abr Dyck at the river had averaged 20 bushels on his light land: The Wiens have harvested about 130 acres and from that received 2900 bushels and they still have 70 acres to do. Corn Wiebe (Wiens' son-in-law) also has a good crop. Bernard Nickel will not get much. The grain also has various grades. Fitz Morris had wheat in the wagon and had to cover it so the wind wouldn't blow it away. Of potatoes we expect to get 25 bushels. Carrots will probably amount to 8 bushels. The children and I put them in the cellar. Pigs we haven't any. One cow we have for which I paid $45.00. The other (3)----

***

notes by C. Heinrichs:

His wife, recovering from childbirth. Both David's wife and daughter were called Lena.
That is, the Henry with Grandma is only six or seven years older than Erna's brother Henry.
Unfortunately, the rest of the letter is lost.

***

"We may have all come on different ships, but we're in the same boat now." Martin Luther King Jr.

Saith the Statistics

2011-02-02T11:26:00.005-07:00

Setting: senior high Sunday school, year 2005 or 2006.

Characters: I can distinctly recall only three other girls who were in class that one day, but there were probably more. Our usual teacher wasn't there, but we had a sub.

Discussion topic: the amount of young people that fall away from their faith and walk away from church.

I remember the sub sighed, looked at us all sadly and said that very few of his peers that were raised in church with him were still in church. He said that that a large number of us wouldn't still be Christian by the time we were his age. What a downer. I didn't really believe him, but prayed that day we would prove him wrong and that in thirty years we would all be even stronger in our faith than we were that day.

Of the three girls that were definitely in class that day, I know that one of them has fallen away, suspect that another probably has, and don't know about the third. And it's only been what, five years? How bleak.

One of my peers, who still attends the church and is more in-touch with what has happened to the rest of our former classmates, wrote an article in the monthly church journal. He said that he can remember 18 regular attendees from our age group, and of those, he knows of at least eight that have stopped attending church altogether.

The really sad part? Our church is actually doing pretty well in the area of young-people retention. If you google the stats, you'll get a variety of numbers, ranging from about 61% to an 88% church drop-out rate for young adults. Some eventually come back, and not all of them actually lose their faith, but these numbers are appalling. Granted, I haven't looked at the studies, so I'm not sure of their methodologies. Also, the studies are American, which may or may not mean much for us in Canada. But one thing the studies all agree on is that my peers and I still have to survive another year or two before we've made it past the prime weeding years.

When I was in senior high, the girls' Bible study group was extremely small. There were only two regular attendees, including myself. Last year, we were happy if we got even two girls. This year, however, it's a small night if we've got less than seven girls. Yay!

On Sunday nights, I help lead their Bible study. This last Sunday, we discussed the issue (one of the girls had asked to talk about it). I split the girls into groups to demonstrate what the statistics said about them and reminisced briefly about my former classmates. We discussed why we thought the numbers were so high.

-People disagree with what the church teaches
-People feel judged and not accepted by the church
-The church doesn't teach people how to live - it's irrelevant
-The church is a social group and not terribly worthwhile

We discussed what could stave off the drop-outs.

-Be welcoming and nonjudgmental
-Teach and model practical application
-Engage in deep study of the Bible

So we agreed to call each other out if any of that isn't happening. Who knows? There's always hope. Maybe this time we'll beat the odds. In ten years, I hope to see all the girls still living strong.

"If you examined a hundred people who had lost their faith in Christianity, I wonder how many of them would turn out to have reasoned out of it by honest argument? Do not most people simply drift away?" C. S. Lewis

"Most people already know what they're doing wrong. When I get them to church I want to tell them that you can change." Joel Osteen

I Can See Clearly Now

2011-02-01T13:23:00.007-07:00

New glasses! Yay!

And it's high time. I've had my old frames since I was fourteen, and the prescription had missed an update. This was ok, because I wore my contacts almost exclusively for about seven years, but since the contacts started bugging me, I've been forced to rely on glasses once again (at least until my optometrist says contacts are an option).

Needless to say, I am excited to finally have glasses that look good - and not to mention to be able to SEE again! Thanks Brianna and Rachel for helping me pick them out!

It may be a little self-indulgent to post pictures, but I'm just that excited, and anyway the messy hair counteracts whatever ego boost I get from posting pictures of myself. Compare:

New pair #1: The angle of my head in this picture doesn't quite model the frames perfectly, but I love them. They're black, with a cool white/black stringy pattern on the ear pieces.

New pair #2: These are actually green. They're a little less "formal" than the other new ones - a little funkier. Love these ones, too!

Old pair #1: These are what I'd been wearing for the past two months (or seven years). A kid from church described them as "Arthur" glasses, as in Arthur Read the cartoon aardvark. What do you think?

Old pair #2: Okay, so I haven't actually worn these since I was as kid, but you can see why... Especially given that these ones are bifocals. And half an inch thick.

"I had some eyeglasses. I was walking down the street when suddenly the prescription ran out." Steven Wright

“The most pathetic person in the world is someone who has sight, but has no vision.” Helen Keller

Mysteries of Human Behaviour

2011-01-13T22:30:00.005-07:00

I believe that after two months, a blog is officially considered "dead". If that is the case, I am resurrecting this one. I blame school for my long absence. However, I have now finished the requirements of my B.A. and should be convocating come June! :-D

I was a psychology major. Having spent nine semesters learning about psychology, it seems to be safe to tell you that psychologists often really have no idea what they're talking about. This is particularly true in the case of two specific items.

Item number one: Sleep.

There appears to be nobody alive, psychologist or otherwise, who can say why living creatures need sleep. Oh, sure, we know what happens if you don't get sleep. That's easy. First you get cranky, then you get slowed reaction times. Your brain power drains, eventually you go crazy and finally you die. But nobody can tell you what tremendously important function the brain or the body is performing while asleep that it cannot do while awake. It's a mystery.

There are a few theories out there, but none of them are highly convincing. Memory consolidation? Energy conservation? Regulation of timed behaviours? You have to admit, it'd sure be easier to evolve if we weren't such easy prey while asleep. And given that we spend between one-third and half of our lives sleeping, that's quite a long time to be sitting ducks for carnivorous foes.

My dad had an idea. Maybe sleep, and in particular, dreaming, is when the person (or animal) reconnects with the spiritual realm. The spirit gets "plugged in" to recharge for a while. If people are amphibious beings, this makes sense. Cut off your connection with the spiritual realm for too long, and it seems perfectly reasonable that you'd go crazy and die. Although this isn't scientifically verifiable, it's somewhat logical.

Item number two: Altruism

This is a popular topic, especially in social psychology. Why, in some cases, does selflessness suddenly trump selfishness? Nobody knows why altruism exists. Believe it or not, many psychologists (but not the humanistic ones) try to claim that altruism actually doesn't exist. They say that people will only perform altruistic behaviours because they believe subconsciously that such behaviours will actually benefit them in the end. Perhaps by helping this person, they are making society a better place, and by making society a better place, they themselves are benefited, because they live in this society. Nevermind that if you were an altruistic German seventy years ago, you'd be more likely to get gassed or shot than reap the benefits of making society a better place.

Other psychologists say it's all based on evolution. While sacrificing yourself for the good of others does not bode well for your future existence, in some cases it can prove useful for the species as a whole. For example, a mommy dog will sacrifice her life for her puppies because some innate evolutionary instinct in her tells her that her species must survive, even if she does not. In this case, altruism is just a biological impulse to perpetuate the species.

Still others claim that people are altruistic solely because they want to be altruistic, which means they're actually serving their own desires, and not altruistic at all. This is ridiculous. First, it doesn't account for the spontaneous desire to do something altruistic, and second, this argument would imply that only random behaviour can be truly altruistic. Yet random behaviour can't be altruistic - it's just random. This argument makes altruism an impossibility based on the redefining of altruism, not on disproving the desire to help others.

Psychologists have trouble with altruism, but they shouldn't. I know why people are sometimes altruistic. It has to do with something called the Holy Spirit and a desire to serve something other than ourselves...

Ah, well. If academia knew everything, there'd be nothing new to learn.

“Education without values, as useful as it is, seems rather to make man a more clever devil.” C.S. Lewis

But for the Grace of God...

2010-10-29T23:01:00.010-06:00

"He's an evil man." Recently I've been hearing this sentence pop up more and more. Everyone says it. I say it, but I'm not so sure I should.

I didn't hear it much growing up. As a kid it was "bad guys" out to kidnap me, and as a teen, it was more just really "messed up people, making evil choices".

But now they're evil people. Maybe we've just gotten fed up and tired of being magnanimous. Maybe we're seeing more evil now than we did before. Maybe it's an allergic reaction to too much political correctness. But whatever the reason, we're definitely slotting people into the "evil" category.

Normally, the word "evil" in my mind elicits thoughts of Disney villains, or movie antagonists cackling malevolently as they pet their black cat and lay out plans for world domination. They're completely one-dimensional characters without anything else to them. Sure, they're evil. But real people aren't like quite like Disney villains. Real people have "layers", as Shrek would say.

Take Heinrich Himmler, for example. Sure, Adolf Hitler was the CEO of the Nazis, but Himmler was the one that worked out how to actually kill everyone, and oversaw the operations. Extremely, horrifically evil operations. If ever we can apply the label "evil" to someone and be justified in doing so, surely we can apply it to him.

But he also had a daughter named Gudrun, that he called "Dolly". He'd fly her all over the place so they could spend time together. That's her in the picture, touring a concentration camp with her father. He loved that kid. She loved him. I don't think that means he was a good person, but it does make him seem a little less uni-dimensional. A little more human, perhaps, and a little more relatable. I wonder if he thought of his daughter just before he killed himself.

So maybe he wasn't pure Disney-like evil, even if he was bent of world-domination. He still qualifies for the term "evil", right?

How am I different from him? Well, I haven't arranged for any mass genocides, nor do I plan to. Our life stories and goals are completely different. Yet, aren't our selfish sin natures the same? The only good thing in me is the light of Christ. Without him, I would be as depraved as Himmler. Maybe I wouldn't be quite so hardened as him, or quite so successful as him, but I'd still be an ugly, evil sight. And since I certainly didn't do anything to earn Christ, to claim my goodness as my own would be ridiculous.

Even now, having received Christ, I still do evil things. Of course Himmler was evil. That's a given. Either we're stating the obvious, or we're forgetting that we're all in the same boat, that really, but for the grace of God, that would be us. Can we really condemn him as "evil" without condemning ourselves? Maybe it's better to go back to thinking of people as "unsaved" and "doing evil things". We can call a spade a spade, sure. We don't need to tolerate evil, and we certainly don't want to be blind to it. Let's call out evil when we see it. But perhaps it's better that we let God be the judge of people, lest we call down judgment upon ourselves. And to pray for their redemption as we thank God for ours.

"If people can be taught to hate, they can be taught to love." Betsie ten Boom

The Necessity of Change

2010-09-28T18:53:00.003-06:00

A lack of climate change could kill us. Or at least keep our descendants from evolving. Seriously.

I was in class at the uni today, and a random TA showed up to play us a video in lieu of the professor giving a lecture. There were three possible videos to watch, and the professor had neglected to tell the TA which we were supposed to see, so he asked the class. While most of my compatriots voted to watch "First Steps", the first listed title, I wanted to watch the last of the videos, entitled "Last Human Standing". Which documentary sounds more entertaining to you?

"First Steps" was about the earliest possible ancestors of the human species. One of the claims put forth by the video was that although apes were already walking upright 6 million years ago, their chimp-sized brains flat-lined for about 4 million years and never grew any bigger. That it, they didn't grow any bigger (or presumably more complex), and really didn't become more human-like until the climate in Africa grew incredibly unstable. Huge lakes developed, then dried, then developed and dried, then developed and dried again for about 200,000 years. And that was the catalyst that caused the monkey-men to start adapting and making stone tools and begin becoming more like normal people. Climate change did that. Climate change was responsible for the evolution of the human race. Without it, we'd still be swinging in the trees (albeit, standing upright) and eating ear wax. A steady climate can inhibit your evolutionary growth for four million years.

So I ask you now - does it really make sense to artificially make the climate more steady and thereby stunt our own evolutionary growth? No, I think not.

;-P

“Man is more ape than many of the apes." Friedrich Nietzsche

Out of the Starting Gate

2010-09-21T15:29:00.005-06:00

School has started, and with that my good friend Emily kindly published something I wrote in the Gauntlet's Frosh Supplement... or the Imperial Frosh Compendium, as it was known this year. You can link to it here. My article is on page 18. And I just think I'll point out that the comment under the article's title is so an Emily thing to say. Seriously.

It's going to shape up to be a busy semester, but so far things are interesting, at least. For the first time in many years I have been forced to purchase a day timer. There's not much else for me to say at the moment besides KATE is married! And so is Kim, but that happened in August and so is already fairly late as far as news goes. Oh, and I was part of a "Thriller" performance at Kate's reception. I could seriously plan a wedding just for the dance. That would be an interesting movie plot. A young woman plans her wedding, only for the guests to eventually learn that there is no groom and it is merely a giant dance party...

But I digress. I must now go and read. And read. And read.

An awesome quote from the pastor that married Kim and Jarvis, on why love is greater than faith and hope:

"Faith will become sight, hope will be realized, but love will never end."

Ruling the Rules

2010-08-31T19:59:00.011-06:00

I am dead set on posting three times this month, but since summer, for me, means partial brain atrophy, I am using some musings I jotted out before the summer hit. The question being debated here was whether God follows the rules or makes the rules. Rules, in this case, pertains to the rules and laws of logic, math, and morality.

I actually kinda like the concise, if choppy, format of this, so I think I'll just leave it mostly be.

1. If "rules" exist outside of God, then:
a) Something exists that is outside of God's control (therefore, God is not omnipotent?)
b) Something exists that God did not create (therefore God is not the sole creator?)
c) Something is higher and more fundamental than God (something is more foundational than God?)

How can rules exist without something to govern? Can there be "good" or "bad" if there is nothing to define? This seems nonsensical to me. Rules cannot exist solely as concepts. There must be something they affect in order for them to really exist. If rules exist outside of God, they exist in conjunction with God, and cannot be separated from Him. They did not exist "before" Him or in any way without Him.

What about logic and mathematics? God does [appear to] break the rules of math on several occasions, such as with the two fish and the five loaves of bread. Either the multiplication of the food was not quite so supernatural as is often interpreted, or God was able to break these rules. Could God break rules He did not create and has no power over? God can manipulate His creation, but it seems doubtful that He could change or ignore something He is bound by.

It seems that the rules cannot exist above and beyond God.

But...

2. If God created the "rules", then God could have hypothetically decided that murder was good. This is not a concept my brain can handle. Admittedly, this is not an airtight argument.

Perhaps God created math and logic rules, but is subject to moral rules. God CANNOT break moral rules or else sin would be a moot point. Yet if God is not subject to logic or math, then sin is still a moot point because God is not bound by the concepts of "if...then" or "B therefore C", rendering justice arbitrary.

Can a naturally all-good God create a "Bad"? How can He create something that is completely foreign to His nature? Why would an all-powerful God bind Himself by His own rules? If God created the good and the bad before choosing to embrace only the good, then God is not unchanging and was not always completely good.

General conclusion: God neither created the rules nor obeys rules that exist beyond Him. The rules exist with Him, perhaps as a part of Him, since existing only side-by-side but apart from God still entails that someone or something else is setting the standard. If the rules are a part of God's personality, then God Himself is the source of Logic and the Good, etc., in a fashion after Plato's Forms. God quite literally is Good and is Logic, though Logic and Good are not God. God would be essentially the living form of these concepts, from which everything else is taken and which holds all else together.

I'm not totally happy with this conclusion because it doesn't quite shut down the possibilities of evil being good or pi equaling 7. Suppose that these had randomly been the nature of God's personality. But then again, if God had said that evil was good, would we know any different? I suppose at some point there has to be a self-causing cause, and I don't know what that would be if not God Himself. It might be a little easier to cause yourself if you exist outside of time.

“Anything that happens happens, anything that in happening causes something else to happen causes something else to happen, and anything that in happening causes itself to happen again, happens again. Although not necessarily in chronological order." Douglas Adams

The Perils of Kids Ministry

2010-08-13T22:32:00.006-06:00

This week was Performing Arts Camp at the church. I was the dance coach for the third year running. This afternoon, as I was socializing over tacos with some of the campers, one of the little girls, whom I shall refer to as E, suddenly bounced in her seat and swung an arm over to point at me.

"Aha!" she shouted, "You're in love with someone!"

"What?" I laughed.

She backtracked a bit. "Or something like that. You have a ring!"

At this point, little boy J joined the conversation. "Are you married?"

"No," I replied. "If I were married, my ring would be on my left hand. This was my grandma's wedding ring. I got it for my birthday." This is where the conversation really started to take on a life of its own.

"Is she dead?" inquired E.

"Yes," I said, "She died when my mom was small."

"Was it cancer?" asked J.

"Yes," I said.

J looked down at his plate of taco mess. "I hope I don't get cancer. I don't want to die."

"I hope you don't, too," I agreed.

E shook her head. "You can't get cancer," she said to J. "You get cancer in your boobies."

"Um," I hemmed, "Actually, you can get cancer wherever..."

"You get it in your boobies," E reaffirmed.

J thought he'd clarify the situation. "Those are girls' private parts," he said.

"Ok," I said, "This isn't appropriate. New topic, guys."

"Boys have different private parts," E agreed with J.

"They're called 'nibbles'," J informed her, "and they don't grow."

Ah, yes. The perils of trying to hold dinner conversation with seven-year-olds. Though it's interesting how J's first thought was dead = cancer, and E has clearly heard a lot about breast cancer. I guess cancer is so common now that a lot of kids are somehow affected by it...

On a happier note, I am now reigning champ of the PAC 2010 Air Hockey Tournament. :-D

Speaking of cute things kids say, here's Uncle Dale's daughter, Eden, when someone tried to give her cheddar cheese for her hot dog: "No! I want the plastic cheese!"

One of Those Days

2010-08-06T18:34:00.005-06:00

I was at the Distress Centre on Thursday night, signing up for a shift over the weekend. I was rather surprised and a little confused to see that all of Saturday is split into just two shifts. One shift runs from 2:42 p.m. to 4:42 p.m. The other shift runs from 4:42 p.m. until 2:42 p.m the next day. I don't know about you, but a 22 hour shift, to me, seems to be a bit of an overkill.

While I was pondering the strange scheduling at the DC, a girl walked in. Apparently her boyfriend had signed her up for one of these 22 hour shifts, and she was not at all happy about it. She drew for him a picture of a tuxedo, which was somehow supposed to relay to him her emotions and expectations on the matter. I gave her a hug to help her feel better, but she found it awkward and stalked away.

It was probably better that she did, because my bed was in the room and it was past one in the morning. I really wanted to go to sleep because I work at 6:oo a.m. on Friday mornings, and have my bedside alarm clock set to go off at 4:45. When I had finally turned out the lights and brushed my teeth, I tucked myself into bed and gloried in the feeling of the cool sheets against my legs. I leaned down to put my head on the pillow and was just about to fall asleep when

BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!

Thus my alarm clock went off and I woke up. And I realized that I had just been dreaming of going to bed and sleeping. You know, there's nothing quite like dreaming about a long, monotonous day to sap you of your energy before you even start. I wasn't exactly full of pep come waking.

But now I want to know: if I HAD fallen asleep in my dream, would I have experienced a dream within a dream?

"Sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast." Lewis Carrol

Classical Conditioning

2010-07-26T18:02:00.009-06:00

The first time I put on a headset at the Distress Centre, I knew my many hours at the Tim Horton's drive-thru were one day going to come back to haunt me. I didn't know when, and I didn't know how often, but I realized it was inevitable.

Today it happened.

My phone was ringing at the Distress Centre, startling me out of my reverie. Promptly, like a good volunteer, I picked up the call.

"Hey, there," I said, "Welcome to Ti- ah... I mean Distress Centre. What can I get for you? Uh, I mean do for you... uh, sorry about that... real sorry... uh, oh boy."

Luckily the caller appeared to just be waiting for a vocal cue to start speaking, and barely noticed my mangled greeting.

Now we wait to see when it is that I first start asking Timmy's customers how they feel today and if they're having any suicidal thoughts...

“Whatever you say, say it with conviction.” Mark Twain

Summer Pics

2010-07-20T09:19:00.002-06:00

This summer hasn't been highly eventful, but I have a collected a few good pictures. This first one is from Father's Day, when we all went out to Big Hill Springs provincial park.

I'm thinking of moving out, and Big Hill Springs has some nice stick hut thingies. Here I am contemplating purchasing one as my first apartment. The roof might be leaky, but with the current economic situation, I can't be too picky.

At least it has running water.

We went quadding at a small-group summer wrap-up barbeque. We didn't get muddy until we let the boys drive, but I guess mud is to quadding what scars are to battles...

This picture, ah... as an old friend once said, "Once it was suggested, it couldn't be avoided."

I took a girl from Switzerland to Stampede this year. We opted to watch the rodeo (a first for both of us) Here are the cowboys that made us swoon. Our favourite part of the rodeo was when, after completing their eight second ride, the cowboys had to get off their crazed animal. In order to do so, they would wait until another cowboy pulled his horse alongside, then they'd reach over and wrap their arms around his waist and let the other cowboy pull them to safety. There's something about rough and tough cowboys hugging each other that makes me feel happy inside.

Cowboys aren't the only performers at Stampede with an incredible amount of guts. The high divers were incredible.

This is Nadja, at what was probably the best interactive display ever at Stampede. She's feeling the "calf" inside the mommy cow, just like a vet would do. We liked this display more than the one that put a coop of cute, yellow baby chicks right next to a "From the Egg to the Plate" chart on chicken. There's just something wrong about that.

Speaking of the rodeo: "Nature gave us all something to fall back on, and sooner or later we all land flat on it." Anonymous

Amor Nunca Falla

2010-07-18T20:44:00.008-06:00

If God is love and lives in me, then why, when I hear about people being dishonest and corrupt, is my initial reaction to hate them?

Thank God for grace. I pray that He will give me the strength to extend that grace, and leave some for me in the meantime.

“Nothing that we despise in the other man is entirely absent from ourselves.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Oy Vey

2010-06-28T15:30:00.001-06:00

I peeked into the sugar dispenser at work and found that it was about three coffees away from running empty. "Oy," I exclaimed and proceeded to refill it.

"Oy?" repeated my Filipino supervisor, Debbie. "You say 'oy'? We say 'oy' in the Philippines, too, but it means something different." She gave several examples of when a person speaking Tagalog may use 'oy'. To the best of my understanding, it's the approximate equivalent to the English "Oh!" during a light bulb moment.

At this point Soon broke into the conversation. "We use in Korea, too. In Korea, 'oy' mean 'cucumber'."

I found this fascinating. A Russian family friend has informed us that "oy" is the Russian way to say "ouch", and nearly 400 episodes of Naruto will tell you that the Japanese use "oy" to hail someone or catch their attention, as in "Oy, Naruto!"

My mom and I were also told by a Bible scholar that "oy" in Hebrew is a warning that you're going to be majorly punished if you don't smarten up. It's generally translated as "woe", as in "Woe to you, O Israel!" It's better than "hoy", though. "Hoy" in Hebrew is also translated as "woe", but actually means you're hosed, regardless of whether you smarten up or not. Essentially, "You're dead." As an aside, the freaky "Woe, woe, woe to the inhabitants of the earth," in Revelation 8:13 is "Hoy, hoy, hoy."

Hebrew and the Yiddish, "Oy vey," are pretty closely related. It translates to approximately, "Woe is me."

I wonder what "oy" means in other languages. If someone did a study on this, I'd read it.

There are really no good "oy" quotes of which I'm aware, so you get another taste of randomness today. Said my mother to me over lunch: "What?! How can anyone like the Bourne Identity but NOT like mangos?!"

Bzap

2010-06-24T17:11:00.010-06:00

I was the targeted victim of a cruel attack today. For the first time in my life, I was subjected to the inhumane violence of a thoughtless brute, still in his yellow-and-black-striped prison uniform. It was completely unforeseen and unprovoked.

There I was, lounging comfortably in a cushioned chair in the third floor office of my mentor at the DC. It was a cozy nook, with one wall comprised of windows to let the sunlight stream in. All the windows were entirely shut. The door to enter the office was also shut to allow for privacy during our interview. Naught was to be heard but our conversation.

I shifted in my seat and suddenly felt a tickling sensation on my right elbow. Believing that I had unwittingly brushed up against a frayed piece of fabric or something of the sort, I shifted position a second time. This only made the tickling become rather more painful. At this point in time, my sympathetic nervous system kicked in and I reflexively swung my left hand around to swipe away the problem from my elbow.

It sounded a little like a malfunctioning taser. Bzap. My attacker fell fluttering jerkily down to the ground between my seat and my mentor's. I twisted my arm around to see what damage he had inflicted to my elbow, not yet having processed the situation. What shock to face the unexpected termination of my oft-wondered-at 21 year streak of good fortune! Could it really be the case that after such a good record, this, perhaps my most important sensory organ, had finally been violated? Indeed, it was true.

He should have known - nobody smaller than my fist attacks Carla and lives. My mentor came valiantly to my rescue, grinding the assailant to the ground under her foot. Vengeance was served.

Unsure of whether or not I was allergic to the pollutants so kindly forced into my body by the executed criminal, my mentor found some ice and a tea towel with which for me to compress the wound, in hopes of slowing the spread of the poison. This I gladly took from her. She expressed her confusion over how on earth such a being could have resided in her office without her knowledge of his presence. After apologizing for the damage done to me on her watch, we settled back down and resumed our conversation.

And I did not go into anaphylactic shock.

"It's not the size of the dog in the fight, it's the size of the fight in the dog." Mark Twain