February 2007

An awesome short film about some really, really dirty used car salesmen.

http://www.youtube.com

LOL. This photo needs a caption.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/tiarescott/60221303/

Yesterday, I was supposed to go into Philly to meet some folks, but something came up. So, for the first time, I went and explored my little town on a bright, clear Saturday afternoon, and this is what I saw.

view slideshow

Two career drunks were extremely thirsty one Saturday night and decided to go to the store to get some cheap booze. In the store, the first drunk says, “All right, I have 87 cents; how much do you have?”

His friend replies, “I have a dollar. What can we get for $1.87?”

The first drunk spots a big Italian sausage on the rack for only $1.80 and has a great idea. “Hey, here’s what we can do,” he says. “We’ll buy that sausage there and put it in my pants. We’ll go into a bar and order drinks. After the drinks are gone, I’ll pull out the sausage and you start sucking on it. They’ll kick us out of the bar and we won’t have to pay!”

The second drunk agrees and they head off to the bar. They walk in and order two beers and drink them down. When the beer is gone, the first drunk whips out the sausage and the second starts sucking on it.

“What the hell are you doing? Get out of my bar!” says the bartender, and the two run out laughing.

“That was great, and it didn’t cost us a cent,” says the second drunk. “Let’s do it again!”

So off they run to another bar for a repeat performance. This continues through the night.

At the end of the night, after about the 20th bar, the second drunk says, “Man what a great night. All this drinking is making me hungry. Hey, pull out that sausage and let’s eat it.”

“Sausage?” says the first drunk. “I ATE the sausage about eight bars ago!”

Why does this not surprise me?

http://www.canada.com

I’m not sold on global warming or climate change. Yes, I believe the earth is warming up, and that weather patterns are becoming more volatile. But it doesn’t seem true that humans ’cause’ global warming. You cannot say that X causes Y unless you have isolated all other potential third causal factors. We can, however, say global warming and climate change are associated with more energy use, more people, cattle, industry, etc.

Global warming is a political phenomenon. It’s a way to get votes, to control and transfer wealth, or to develop new industries where there were none before. It’s a way for humans to take charge of their own destiny, when in fact, the universe is out of our control. I’m sorry folks, but the universe is out of your control. Cutting a few tons of energy use here and there isn’t necessarily going to stop global warming. But it’ll help you make yourself feel good about it, and isn’t that what life’s all about? Feeling good you could put your bucket of water to Rome while you watched it burn? Oh well, you tried, right? Unlike those other plebians who ran in fear as the city burnt to the ground.

Global warming a way for us westerners, the pallbearers of global virtue, to excercise our assumed right to tell other, less rich countries how to manage their resources properly.

What if global warming were a symptom of a much greater issue at the cosmic level? Can you really say human energy use causes global warming if you have not controlled for outside influences such as sunspots? I’m no expert on the matter, that much is evident to me. But, to isolate one cause, you actually have to control for all other potential correlates.

If I were to look for a third causal factor, I’d be looking at the cosmic or galactic level at stuff like this galactic plane. The following is a video from the Horizon Project. Sure, this is probably junk science, but no more or less so than what the global warmists are peddling. Have a view of this video and see what you think. Every group has its explanation for “the end”, anyhow, just pick any explanation that makes the most sense to you, be it the rapture, global warming, an alien invasion or the Mayan 2012 calendar.

So yesterday was the infamous 3/23, the day Jim Carrey’s movie, 23 opened in theatres.

Here in West Chester, the local Wawa is right by the sign for the #322 Freemason’s lodge.

(click the pic to enlarge)

I’ve blogged about my 322/23 stuff before.

So I go down to this Wawa, right, to get a cheesesteak.

Oooo. Spooky.

Did I mention this is the second time I’ve gotten order #23 at the Wawa? The second last cheesesteak I bought was also order #23.

Its funny how every sect, every church has its own monopoly on ‘truth’. I think truth is out there, but most often we are just watching the same sunset, wearing different colored lenses, arguing about the hues we see in the clouds.

I have been reading a very interesting book from my MySpace friend Dave. It’s by a guy named Frank Schaeffer, the son of the great Christian author, Francis Schaeffer. In it, the son describes how he came to Greek Orthodox faith. It seems that most of the time, there’s this huge squabble between the Catholics and the Protestants, where the Catholics call on the Proties to return to the Mother Church, and where the Proties call her a Whore of Babylon and tell her to go pump some Vatican artefacts. What’s interesting is how people forget that the Holy Roman Church is a splinter off of the Orthodox church.

I like how Schaeffer describes how every religious sect follows this process of some ‘rebel’ fighting against the established traditions of the prevailing, dominant ideology, and usually, it’s about one little point of doctrine.

Think that the Sabbath is on Saturday? - Join the Seventh Day Adventists.

Think you should be able to keep your wife’s heavenly name for her so she can get into the pearly gates, and promise, promise never to ever use it as a tool to manipulate her? Want to keep the non-whiteys out of your church? - Join the Mormons.

Think Jesus is best experienced when you flail around on the floor, praying in tongues? - Join a Pentecostal Church.

Every denomination has a statement of belief, what they think The Truth is, and it’s always about something unrelated to Jesus. It’s always about what you eat or don’t eat, who you associate with, how you talk, what days you take off, whether or not you get baptised with fire or water . . . and if you don’t toe their line, you’re going to hell. If you don’t see truth as they do, adopt their mindset, interpret The Word as they do, your salvation is incomplete.

This is the Pharisaical attitude Jesus railed against. If you don’t meet the bar, you are loved less, your salvation is not complete, and you might not make it into Heaven. I think this is bogus, because it ignores the only two laws Jesus said to submit yourself to:

1. Love the Lord your God with all your Might
2. Love your neighbour as yourself.

I think people can’t love themselves unless they make up all these criteria they must meet, so they project that onto others. They worship a God who loves them less if they don’t perform.

I don’t like it.

Good to have you back, bro.

http://www.mkbraaten.com/