I love Canada. I don’t think that this is a secret, but if it is let me clear up any misconceptions: I LOVE CANADA! “But Craig,” I can hear some of you thinking, “you have to love Canada because you are married to a Canadian”. And to that I say, “true”. I had a ‘like’ of Canada when I visited Vancouver and Victoria while living in Washington State between 1994 and 1998. Then it moved into a ‘like like’ when I moved to Winnipeg for three years to finish up my BA degree at William and Catherine Booth College. There I met my lovely wife (well she wasn’t my wife when we met, the marriage came 3 years after we met) and fell in love firstly with my wife and then Canada.
What do I love about Canada? Well I am a realist so I cannot say ‘everything’ because there are things in any country that I wouldn’t like. For instance: socialized medicine, Blackfly, driving through the prairies, etc. If I had to make a top ten list of my favorite things in Canada it would go something like this (in a somewhat thought out order):
1. Family
2. Corner Gas
3. Friends that I met in college
4. Bob and Doug McKenzie
5. Restaurants (Harvey’s Hamburgers, Swiss Chalet, Tim Horton’s)
6. Coloured money
7. Superfluous use of the letter ‘u’ (flavour, colour, honour, etc.)
8. Eh?
9. Snow
10. Stuart McLean
As I was walking Jasper (the wonder dog) tonight I was listening to The Vinyl Café podcast. Now for most of you this segue sucks, but for the Canadians reading this (Anney and maybe Jackie) this was a brilliant segue, or at least A segue. For those of you who don’t know ‘The Vinyl Cafe’ is a podcast by Stuart McLean (#10 on the above list). Stuart McLean is like Garrison Keillor if Garrison Keillor were funny. Stuart McLean travels Canada giving concerts in which he has musical guests and then tells stories. The stories are generally about one family: Dave, Morley, Stephanie and Sam. Dave is the always comically and lovingly screwing up husband. Morley is the longsuffering, loving wife. Stephanie is the teenage/college age daughter and Sam is the typical preteen boy (and in my opinion the best character) whose friends are hilarious and remind me of some of my ‘friends’ at that age. They also have a dog named Arthur who likes to sit on potatoes. The story that I was listening to tonight was entitled ‘Morte d’Arthur’. I know that this means something like ‘death of Arthur’ and I put off listening to it for quite awhile because I don’t want to think of the words ‘death’ and ‘dog’ in the same sentence. In the story Dave, the dad, is telling the kids about the dog he had had when he was a kid. Long story short: good dog that was hit by a car. Dave is telling the story because Arthur is old and sick and might not live much longer. He dies in the story (spoiler alert) and this brought up emotions in me that all previous dying dog stories/movies have failed to bring up. (‘Marley and me’ tried way too hard to be sentimental. ‘Old Yeller’? Okay, Old Yeller may have gotten me when I was a kid.) Maybe it didn’t help that I was actually walking Jasper as I listened to this, but I got to thinking that he was already two years old and he won’t live forever (20 years at the most). Sofie will grow up with him and as she gets older Jasper will be getting old and one day I will have to explain to her why Jasper had to go live on a farm and why Daddy is a crying mess. Just kidding! I will not take the easy way out and lie, I will be straightforward with the truth. And I have no doubt that I will cry.
Wow, this is getting morbid. How did that happen? Jasper is alive and well and whining at the door right now. I think that it would be easier to think about the future death of a dog if said dog was stupid ( I mean who is going to miss a dog that walks into walls or drinks out of the toilet) but Jasper is a genius…he is way smarter than your dog. Can your dog sneeze on command? Jasper can! This is the one that people don’t believe…as if I could even contemplate teaching a dog to sneeze. But we did. He can also sit, shake either paw, high five, play dead, go right and left, leave it (put a treat in front of him and tell him to wait), go to bed (in his own dog bed) and kangaroo (hop in circles on his hind legs). AND he can do them all (except go to bed) by either vocal commands or gestures.
Do you ever get lost when you are writing? I can’t for the life of someone else remember what my point was. Something that Anney and I always talk about is whether or not Jasper is a part of ‘the family’. I say no, because he is a dog. I ‘love’ him in a master/pet way. But he is a dog. I am proud (as you can tell from the above paragraph) when he learns a new trick. But he is a dog. He isn’t my child. I am not his dad and Anney isn’t his mom (pet peeve # 2,576-when people refer to their pets as their children). When Jasper is sick or limping or throwing up I am concerned, but I wouldn’t get him a kidney transplant or an artificial leg. But I WOULD get him one of those wheelchair things where the dog drags its back legs in a chariot looking thing. Those are awesome.
So in conclusion I ‘philio’ love Canada and my dog and I ‘eros /agape’ love my wife, but that is a story she won’t let me blog about…but we will be parents soon…
Like like,
Craig
Saturday, August 28, 2010
Monday, August 23, 2010
General Larsson please consider this...
In October I will be living every Officer's dream. My wife and I are excused from Officers' Councils this year. Our first child is due the same week as Officer's Councils and I am extremely excited about this. However, I am actually sad that I will be missing OC this year. It is truly (not) a Sophie's Choice. I will not miss the birth of my daughter for any reason (that can be humanly controlled) but I am sad that I will be missing General John Larsson, who will be the guest at our Officers' Councils this year. I am sad because he is a General and he wrote the fantastic book '1929, A Crisis That Shaped The Salvation Army's Future'. I loved this book. It was the last book that kept me up late reading (to the point that my wife made me turn off the light because it was well past midnight) and I would love to hear General Larsson speak about the book. But I am gladly staying home to be with my family as it grows.
This made me start thinking about what I could do to still get to see the General when he and his wife are in Hawaii for our Officers' Councils. The only thing I can think of is to invite him to our Corps on Sunday, October 16. He could speak in the service and also do a co-baby dedication (along with my father) So this is an open invitation...if anyone knows General Larsson I would be forever grateful if you could pass this on.
Thanks,
Craig
This made me start thinking about what I could do to still get to see the General when he and his wife are in Hawaii for our Officers' Councils. The only thing I can think of is to invite him to our Corps on Sunday, October 16. He could speak in the service and also do a co-baby dedication (along with my father) So this is an open invitation...if anyone knows General Larsson I would be forever grateful if you could pass this on.
Thanks,
Craig
Sunday, August 22, 2010
I got Lost in Inception...
Does anyone else think that the new Wonka commercials (Under the wa-ater fall, dreams do come true) are even creepier than that Oompa Loompa in the vastly inferior Johnny Depp version?
So I saw ‘Inception’ last week and someone told me to blog on it…so here goes…
Before I reluctantly watched ‘The Dark Knight’ a few years ago I wanted to hate it because of how they used Heath Ledger’s death as a selling point for the movie. But then I saw it and it was great. It was probably the best superhero movie ever. The exact opposite was true of ‘Inception’. I couldn’t wait to see it and I had high hopes for it, but it left me kind of empty. I found it long and cliché ridden. But it wasn’t all bad.
First, the good:
1. Joseph Gordon –Levitt. Everything he did in Zero G was amazing. He was very dapper as well.
2. The movie treated the audience like it was intelligent and didn’t spoon feed very much. Except the few times that Leonardo felt the need to explain complex dream concepts instead of show us how they work.
3. The numbers in the movie actually meant something…unlike ‘Lost’. Okay I had to work my disappointment with ‘Lost’ into this review because I can’t write a whole review about ‘Lost’ or I will go on for pages. So…Lost sucked-Inception not so much.
4. This movie is probably the closest I will ever get to those cool seats on airplanes that can be made into beds.
Now the bad
1. Leonardo DiCaprio- Terrible actor. Didn’t care about him and couldn’t have cared less if he found his wife and reunited with his kids or not. As far as ‘deep’ acting goes, I think that Leonardo is only a step above Hayden Christensen in the emoting department.
2. For such an intelligent movie ‘Inception’ was extremely cliché ridden. Here is a list of them:
a. Shooting-Guns were being fired by everyone in every direction and very few people were hit.
b. Choking-If you are being choked don’t struggle until you pass out. Just struggle for a few seconds and then fake passing out. That way the choker will stop choking and you can start breathing sooner and not wake up tied to something with a gun in your face.
c. Motorcycles-If you are in a car/van being chased by a motorcycle all you have to do is jerk the steering wheel toward the motorcycle until you hit it knocking the driver off of said motorcycle. This works even if they have a gun. In car versus motorcycle car will win almost every time.
3. The chase/fight in the snow was only one Arctic Monkey swinging in a tree away from Crystal Skull territory. That is not a good thing.
Summary
I like this movie. Not the best ever, but nowhere near the worst either. I kind of liked the ending. I didn’t mind that there were a lot of unanswered questions because the movie never promised any answers…unlike ‘Lost’. The unanswered things in inception made the movie better because it made me decide what I thought. Lost promised a lot and delivered nothing in the way of answers. I HATE YOU LOST!!! (Maybe some Lost therapy is in order) Anyway, despite some faults and a long running time I did enjoy ‘Inception’. I give it a 3.25/5. I will watch it again when it comes to DVD so I can enjoy it with some knowledge of what is going on. Thank you Joseph Gordon-Levitt for making this movie for me.
So I saw ‘Inception’ last week and someone told me to blog on it…so here goes…
Before I reluctantly watched ‘The Dark Knight’ a few years ago I wanted to hate it because of how they used Heath Ledger’s death as a selling point for the movie. But then I saw it and it was great. It was probably the best superhero movie ever. The exact opposite was true of ‘Inception’. I couldn’t wait to see it and I had high hopes for it, but it left me kind of empty. I found it long and cliché ridden. But it wasn’t all bad.
First, the good:
1. Joseph Gordon –Levitt. Everything he did in Zero G was amazing. He was very dapper as well.
2. The movie treated the audience like it was intelligent and didn’t spoon feed very much. Except the few times that Leonardo felt the need to explain complex dream concepts instead of show us how they work.
3. The numbers in the movie actually meant something…unlike ‘Lost’. Okay I had to work my disappointment with ‘Lost’ into this review because I can’t write a whole review about ‘Lost’ or I will go on for pages. So…Lost sucked-Inception not so much.
4. This movie is probably the closest I will ever get to those cool seats on airplanes that can be made into beds.
Now the bad
1. Leonardo DiCaprio- Terrible actor. Didn’t care about him and couldn’t have cared less if he found his wife and reunited with his kids or not. As far as ‘deep’ acting goes, I think that Leonardo is only a step above Hayden Christensen in the emoting department.
2. For such an intelligent movie ‘Inception’ was extremely cliché ridden. Here is a list of them:
a. Shooting-Guns were being fired by everyone in every direction and very few people were hit.
b. Choking-If you are being choked don’t struggle until you pass out. Just struggle for a few seconds and then fake passing out. That way the choker will stop choking and you can start breathing sooner and not wake up tied to something with a gun in your face.
c. Motorcycles-If you are in a car/van being chased by a motorcycle all you have to do is jerk the steering wheel toward the motorcycle until you hit it knocking the driver off of said motorcycle. This works even if they have a gun. In car versus motorcycle car will win almost every time.
3. The chase/fight in the snow was only one Arctic Monkey swinging in a tree away from Crystal Skull territory. That is not a good thing.
Summary
I like this movie. Not the best ever, but nowhere near the worst either. I kind of liked the ending. I didn’t mind that there were a lot of unanswered questions because the movie never promised any answers…unlike ‘Lost’. The unanswered things in inception made the movie better because it made me decide what I thought. Lost promised a lot and delivered nothing in the way of answers. I HATE YOU LOST!!! (Maybe some Lost therapy is in order) Anyway, despite some faults and a long running time I did enjoy ‘Inception’. I give it a 3.25/5. I will watch it again when it comes to DVD so I can enjoy it with some knowledge of what is going on. Thank you Joseph Gordon-Levitt for making this movie for me.
Wednesday, August 11, 2010
Oh Crap...
Most of you probably already know this story, but I don't have time to update my tome with a new writing, so enjoy this 'classic'.
About 11 years ago my brother and I shared an apartment in Phoenix. I had just started work at a new job and the boss raffled off some tickets for a Diamondbacks game (Major League Baseball) and I won. Now gentle reader you must understand that I hate baseball and I only went to see the new multi-million dollar stadium that the oh so generous Arizona taxpayers had given to the owners of the team through corporate welfare. Anyway, my brother and I went to the game on Saturday morning and sat in the ‘just okay’ seats that I had won. I had no great revelations about the greatness of baseball but I did have general awareness that I was hungry. So, in order to break up the monotony that is a baseball game, we headed to the concession stand (ASIDE: why is it called a concession stand. Am I conceding anything? What am I giving concession to? My Hunger?) for some oh so tasty and artery clogging concessions (maybe by eating at a concession stand I am conceding my health). I got some nachos and went to the condiment bar, which had stale looking pickles, ketchup, mustard, etc. But what really caught my eye was the vat of jalapenos resting on the counter before me. For some reason they looked so warm and inviting. Now in my younger days (for this story ‘younger days’ means any day previous to the day this incident occurred) I could have eaten molten lava and the only ill effect would have been some spicy burps. But, as we will discover, that all changed on this fateful day. I took a heaping helping of jalapenos and headed back to the seats to finish off the torture of the baseball game. As I ate my nachos I decided that I didn’t want the jalapenos anymore so I ate around them. What a smart boy am I. But if the story ended there, this post would end here with my happy tummy full of nacho chips and simulated cheese. But the story doesn’t end here.
My wonderful loving brother, who is no great lover of baseball either and was therefore looking for a distraction, said to me, “I dare you to eat that whole pile of jalapenos.”
You now how you can never think of anything clever to say until after the opportunity has passed? Well, I wished I had said ‘no, thank you,’ but all I could think of to say was that famous statement that people who have been dared ask hoping that the reward will be insignificant enough to decline the dare: “what’ll you give me”?
“I’ll buy you dinner at George and Dragon.” Now for those of you who don’t know George and Dragon is an English restaurant in central Phoenix. For some reason, during that time, I had a huge love for British food (I still do to an extent-but I am not nearly as fanatical about it anymore)(now it’s Thai food) and, since I was only making $7.00 and hour at work I couldn’t really afford to go there much. In essence, my wonderful brother had taken a knife and jammed it into my Achilles heal for his own enjoyment.
Still searching for an out I asked, “whatever I want”?
His response was both calculated and, as I look back, caring (wanting to take me out to dinner, but making me earn it in the process)(at least that is the way I choose to remember it. But, who am I kidding, he probably just wanted to see if I could hold down a pile of jalapenos).
“Whatever you want,’ came the reply.
He had me in a place I couldn’t escape from: in between a pile of spicy vegetables (are jalapenos vegetables? Fruits? HMMMM???) and a gourmet English feast (or at least as gourmet as an English pub in central Phoenix can get).
So I did what any man in a similar situation would do (why is it that guys feel that they must take any dare that comes along? I mean I have drank bottles of ketchup, eaten out of camp slop buckets, and eaten out of the food catcher of an industrial dishwasher after washing dishes for 200 campers. Why? This summer at camp I bet a counselor 1 dollar that he wouldn’t drink about a ¼ cup of bacon grease. I knew he would do it, but why? For a dollar? Anyway I am digressing from the story and I don’t want this to become a study of the male psyche) and I ate the mound of Jalapenos. It was a bit warm and burned for a few minutes, but that was that…or so I thought.
We went to George and the Dragon and I had my victory meal. I can’t really remember anything about it, except for what happened afterwards. My brother was in the market for a new car and wanted to drive by car lots on the way home. I was driving and it was fine with me, so we began the long drive home.
For those of you who don’t know Phoenix streets, let me explain a bit. They are set up on a grid. Central avenue divides East from west and (I think) Osborne Street divide north from south. Avenues are on the west side of Central and streets are on the east side. We lived at 59th Avenue and Dunlap/Olive and were coming from Indian School and Central. That is about 10 miles from dinner to home.
Anyway, we were on our way home on the surface streets so we could look at car lots on the way. About 5 minutes into the drive my stomach started gurgling a little, but that is nothing out of the ordinary. We continued along and by the time we were at 19th Ave and Glendale (6.8 miles from home) my stomach started to really grind and started hurting. I told my brother this and he, in his loving older brother way, laughed at me. Roughly 5 minutes later I had a startling revelation: I felt everything from my stomach drop into my bowels. No real warning, no burning sensation, just my stomach saying to me, “you treated me poorly, lets see how fast can you drive”? By the time we got to 35th Ave and Glendale (5 miles from home) I had to go BAD! I swear I gained 4 inches as I sat up straight to try and force it to stay in. There are two more things you need to know before the story continues:
1. I used to have a phobia of public toilets. I would have rather driven home from the mall to use the toilet than sit on a public mall toilet (in fact I did once, only to drive right back). There is something about a stranger going where I would be going that I found disconcerting. We passed probably hundreds of perfectly usable toilets on the way home, none of which my phobia would allow me to use.
2. My car was a manual Ford Festiva. This is very important because when I locked my knees and pinched my cheeks together the pain was bearable, but I couldn’t do this because of the clutch. It was agonizing.
So here I was driving as fast as I legally could to get to an acceptable toilet that was still 5 miles away. I informed my thoroughly amused brother that we would have to forego the car browsing for the evening. He was enjoying the show too much to care. And what a show it was. Every, and this is no exaggeration, EVERY light we came to was red. Not red in an ‘I’ll change in a few seconds red’, but red in an “I am going to change to red as you are just close enough to have to stop and wait a full 2 minutes to continue’ way. This was a mixed blessing because while we were stopped I could clench, but, at the same time, I was losing precious time. I felt like a scuba diver trapped in an underwater cave and Flipper had just left to go get the Ranger and I was watching my air supply/bowel capacity get lower by the second. Flipper couldn’t return fast enough.
Anyway, by the time we were just about a block from home I was giving myself mental high fives for making it this far. But the pain was excruciating. Mixed in with the pain was the pressure of not giving my brother the satisfaction of having something on me AND the pressure of my bowels fighting to finish their job.
I knew that at any second my struggle would be over and my car seats would forever tell the story of that fateful jalapeño day.
I was so happy when we pulled into the driveway that my crying went from tears of ‘oh, no’ to tears of 'elation’. There wasn’t a second to spare. Of course our apartment was at the back of the complex and on the opposite side of the parking lot on the second floor. Anyhow, as we got close to the parking place I told my brother to turn off the car and lock the doors. Just before the front tires came to a stop by bumping the curb, I jumped out of the car and sprinted towards the apartment. I had made it! As I spread my legs to hurdle the first set of stairs, all heck broke loose! It was like a geyser. It lasted for a good 30 seconds. It burned. Enough said. The irony here is that I went straight into the shower and never made it to the ‘safe’ toilet. My pants were ruined, and my gourmet English dinner passed through me so fast I never got to properly digest it.
My intention in writing this was to be kind of an object lesson that you, gentle reader, could learn from. That’s not going to happen. Let this be just one more reason/excuse why most of you will never learn how to drive a stick shift car.
About 11 years ago my brother and I shared an apartment in Phoenix. I had just started work at a new job and the boss raffled off some tickets for a Diamondbacks game (Major League Baseball) and I won. Now gentle reader you must understand that I hate baseball and I only went to see the new multi-million dollar stadium that the oh so generous Arizona taxpayers had given to the owners of the team through corporate welfare. Anyway, my brother and I went to the game on Saturday morning and sat in the ‘just okay’ seats that I had won. I had no great revelations about the greatness of baseball but I did have general awareness that I was hungry. So, in order to break up the monotony that is a baseball game, we headed to the concession stand (ASIDE: why is it called a concession stand. Am I conceding anything? What am I giving concession to? My Hunger?) for some oh so tasty and artery clogging concessions (maybe by eating at a concession stand I am conceding my health). I got some nachos and went to the condiment bar, which had stale looking pickles, ketchup, mustard, etc. But what really caught my eye was the vat of jalapenos resting on the counter before me. For some reason they looked so warm and inviting. Now in my younger days (for this story ‘younger days’ means any day previous to the day this incident occurred) I could have eaten molten lava and the only ill effect would have been some spicy burps. But, as we will discover, that all changed on this fateful day. I took a heaping helping of jalapenos and headed back to the seats to finish off the torture of the baseball game. As I ate my nachos I decided that I didn’t want the jalapenos anymore so I ate around them. What a smart boy am I. But if the story ended there, this post would end here with my happy tummy full of nacho chips and simulated cheese. But the story doesn’t end here.
My wonderful loving brother, who is no great lover of baseball either and was therefore looking for a distraction, said to me, “I dare you to eat that whole pile of jalapenos.”
You now how you can never think of anything clever to say until after the opportunity has passed? Well, I wished I had said ‘no, thank you,’ but all I could think of to say was that famous statement that people who have been dared ask hoping that the reward will be insignificant enough to decline the dare: “what’ll you give me”?
“I’ll buy you dinner at George and Dragon.” Now for those of you who don’t know George and Dragon is an English restaurant in central Phoenix. For some reason, during that time, I had a huge love for British food (I still do to an extent-but I am not nearly as fanatical about it anymore)(now it’s Thai food) and, since I was only making $7.00 and hour at work I couldn’t really afford to go there much. In essence, my wonderful brother had taken a knife and jammed it into my Achilles heal for his own enjoyment.
Still searching for an out I asked, “whatever I want”?
His response was both calculated and, as I look back, caring (wanting to take me out to dinner, but making me earn it in the process)(at least that is the way I choose to remember it. But, who am I kidding, he probably just wanted to see if I could hold down a pile of jalapenos).
“Whatever you want,’ came the reply.
He had me in a place I couldn’t escape from: in between a pile of spicy vegetables (are jalapenos vegetables? Fruits? HMMMM???) and a gourmet English feast (or at least as gourmet as an English pub in central Phoenix can get).
So I did what any man in a similar situation would do (why is it that guys feel that they must take any dare that comes along? I mean I have drank bottles of ketchup, eaten out of camp slop buckets, and eaten out of the food catcher of an industrial dishwasher after washing dishes for 200 campers. Why? This summer at camp I bet a counselor 1 dollar that he wouldn’t drink about a ¼ cup of bacon grease. I knew he would do it, but why? For a dollar? Anyway I am digressing from the story and I don’t want this to become a study of the male psyche) and I ate the mound of Jalapenos. It was a bit warm and burned for a few minutes, but that was that…or so I thought.
We went to George and the Dragon and I had my victory meal. I can’t really remember anything about it, except for what happened afterwards. My brother was in the market for a new car and wanted to drive by car lots on the way home. I was driving and it was fine with me, so we began the long drive home.
For those of you who don’t know Phoenix streets, let me explain a bit. They are set up on a grid. Central avenue divides East from west and (I think) Osborne Street divide north from south. Avenues are on the west side of Central and streets are on the east side. We lived at 59th Avenue and Dunlap/Olive and were coming from Indian School and Central. That is about 10 miles from dinner to home.
Anyway, we were on our way home on the surface streets so we could look at car lots on the way. About 5 minutes into the drive my stomach started gurgling a little, but that is nothing out of the ordinary. We continued along and by the time we were at 19th Ave and Glendale (6.8 miles from home) my stomach started to really grind and started hurting. I told my brother this and he, in his loving older brother way, laughed at me. Roughly 5 minutes later I had a startling revelation: I felt everything from my stomach drop into my bowels. No real warning, no burning sensation, just my stomach saying to me, “you treated me poorly, lets see how fast can you drive”? By the time we got to 35th Ave and Glendale (5 miles from home) I had to go BAD! I swear I gained 4 inches as I sat up straight to try and force it to stay in. There are two more things you need to know before the story continues:
1. I used to have a phobia of public toilets. I would have rather driven home from the mall to use the toilet than sit on a public mall toilet (in fact I did once, only to drive right back). There is something about a stranger going where I would be going that I found disconcerting. We passed probably hundreds of perfectly usable toilets on the way home, none of which my phobia would allow me to use.
2. My car was a manual Ford Festiva. This is very important because when I locked my knees and pinched my cheeks together the pain was bearable, but I couldn’t do this because of the clutch. It was agonizing.
So here I was driving as fast as I legally could to get to an acceptable toilet that was still 5 miles away. I informed my thoroughly amused brother that we would have to forego the car browsing for the evening. He was enjoying the show too much to care. And what a show it was. Every, and this is no exaggeration, EVERY light we came to was red. Not red in an ‘I’ll change in a few seconds red’, but red in an “I am going to change to red as you are just close enough to have to stop and wait a full 2 minutes to continue’ way. This was a mixed blessing because while we were stopped I could clench, but, at the same time, I was losing precious time. I felt like a scuba diver trapped in an underwater cave and Flipper had just left to go get the Ranger and I was watching my air supply/bowel capacity get lower by the second. Flipper couldn’t return fast enough.
Anyway, by the time we were just about a block from home I was giving myself mental high fives for making it this far. But the pain was excruciating. Mixed in with the pain was the pressure of not giving my brother the satisfaction of having something on me AND the pressure of my bowels fighting to finish their job.
I knew that at any second my struggle would be over and my car seats would forever tell the story of that fateful jalapeño day.
I was so happy when we pulled into the driveway that my crying went from tears of ‘oh, no’ to tears of 'elation’. There wasn’t a second to spare. Of course our apartment was at the back of the complex and on the opposite side of the parking lot on the second floor. Anyhow, as we got close to the parking place I told my brother to turn off the car and lock the doors. Just before the front tires came to a stop by bumping the curb, I jumped out of the car and sprinted towards the apartment. I had made it! As I spread my legs to hurdle the first set of stairs, all heck broke loose! It was like a geyser. It lasted for a good 30 seconds. It burned. Enough said. The irony here is that I went straight into the shower and never made it to the ‘safe’ toilet. My pants were ruined, and my gourmet English dinner passed through me so fast I never got to properly digest it.
My intention in writing this was to be kind of an object lesson that you, gentle reader, could learn from. That’s not going to happen. Let this be just one more reason/excuse why most of you will never learn how to drive a stick shift car.
Thursday, August 5, 2010
A thought I probably should have left in my head...
Do you remember those old fantasy movies/books 'A Thief in the Night' and 'Left Behind'? While sitting through our first childbirth class this week I had a terrifying thought brought on by these movies. I know that in the book of Left Behind there is a scene where a woman is giving birth and then the 'rapture' (Ed. note: blogger does not ascribe to this theory) happens and her stomach deflates and the Doctor can't find the baby. Poof, it is gone. Well my terrifying though was this: What would happen if Damien Omen's (from the movie 'The Omen) saved mother was giving birth and the 'rapture' occurred? Would the mother disappear and the baby be left behind? And if so how exactly what would be left behind? Just the bloody baby? Or would the umbilical cord be left as well? What about the placenta?
I know that this is a ridiculous scenario because how can Damien Omen be born at the start of the rapture when he is supposed to be the Anti-Christ. The rapture would have to go 30-some years while Damien learned how to be evil, and the Bible (?)clearly(?) states that it would only be 7 years. Maybe some further eisegesis is necessary.
So convinced I kid,
I know that this is a ridiculous scenario because how can Damien Omen be born at the start of the rapture when he is supposed to be the Anti-Christ. The rapture would have to go 30-some years while Damien learned how to be evil, and the Bible (?)clearly(?) states that it would only be 7 years. Maybe some further eisegesis is necessary.
So convinced I kid,
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