The Preacher from the Black Lagoon

And another week begins... I'm ready for it, I think. Glad this past week has... uh... passed. It was a whirlwind, that's for sure...

Double church duty today, as is my custom (such as it is). I made good on my threat to teach Sunday school this morning. After a goodly amount of goofing around and discussing various student's highlights for the past week, we talked a bit about Isaiah 59:1.

Isaiah 59:1: Surely the arm of the Lord is not too short to save, nor his ear too dull to hear.

My class is 4th thru 8th graders; it's a tricky age. They're too old for the standard story-time, draw-me-a-picture type lessons, and too young to hit deeper issues with any... uh... depth. So the trick is to try and find things that are relatively fresh to their developing minds (lol) and hit it quick and interesting and on their level, since attention spans at that age are brief, to say the least. And actually, there's quite a disparity in development between your average 4th grader and your average 8th grader, so there's that about it too.

I don't like giving tests/quizzes, etc. My philosophy is: these kids have to deal with school all week long, and really, these kids have to come to Sunday school - they don't really have a choice. So they're "schooled out" when they get to me and they have no choice but to attend. So I try to make it very informal, allow some chatting and laughing, and sneak in a quick and (hopefully) effective mini-lesson, dressed up in "fun".

Anyway, the idea that it doesn't matter where you go, or what situation you're in, good or bad, God is able to reach you and help if needed... that's a comforting thought to most. But not all. I taught a similar quick-lesson once, on a similar verse about how God's eyes go everywhere - there's no place you can go that God cannot see. I thought it was comforting, but one student of mine in particular was very unnerved by that idea. He didn't like the idea that God could see him all the time. He wanted his privacy, it turned out, so he could do what he wanted without being bothered. Made sense, in a way. Everyone has such a different idea of what God is, or is supposed to be, etc., this kid assumed God was trying to catch him sinning, like a Big Brother kind of thing, it made him paranoid. To me, it was opposite - it was comforting to know that wherever I went, God was able to help and hear if needed - I could never be cut off from Him and His help.

I saw it as a protective watching, this other kid saw it as an all-seeing eye of doom trying to monitor and restrict his fun, quick to punish.

Well, anyway, God's arm isn't too short to save/help, and His ear isn't too dull or busy or plugged to be able to hear us when we need to talk to Him. Pretty cool, I think. Then again, I'm a goof...

OK, enough churchy talk.

Gotta finish uploading all the "abandoned rugs for sale" tonight. I'm hoping that the cart will be "live" on Monday sometime. The last word from Josh was: "I'll be calling you [Monday] sometime with a final set of details... I'm 98% done with the first pass!!!" I don't know if that means we can go live, or if there are more "passes" to be done first. I'll find out tomorrow.

I really hope we can dump a lot of these "abandoned" rugs - we certainly priced them crazy-low enough, and they are all decent rugs. Not great, but definitely decent. I hope it works.

Funny Picture Break: Anthony showed this to me tonight, I love it...



Isn't that awesome? I wish I would have done it. If you're too young to recognize the photo, it's the famous photo of Jack Ruby shooting Lee Harvey Oswald the day after Oswald killed JFK. Someone photoshopped it to look like a concert. I especially find the "Dead Kennedy's" graffiti on the wall to be amusing. It makes me want to find ways to photoshop other classic photos - I may give it a shot after finishing the next Wagnervana strip.

I'm resisting the urge to introduce new characters into the strip already, as opposed to further developing the set I have so far. I'm afraid I'm at a (hopefully temporary) point of "paralysis by analysis", whereby I let too many options prevent me from picking a direction to go.

I know! Another wierd video!

That... is insane.

I've been so tired all day today, it's odd. I took a long nap between services, went to church in the evening feeling awful, had a Iced Mocha, didn't help, almost fell asleep behind the wheel on the way home. I thought I'd come home, pop an ibuprofen, update the blog quickly and go the heck to bed. I did most of that... but as of right now, I feel great. Headache is gone, soreness gone, wide awake... I don't get it. I wonder how much is psychosomatic?

I noticed there was a marked lack of comments on yesterdays post (5 extra points to Bob for leaving the only comment!), and I'm fishing for an explanation. The most likely answer is people were busy and didn't read it - being Mother's Day and all. Also likely is that I wrote too much and people didn't have the patience to wade through it. Another explanation is I'm getting too juvenile with my humor - there was an abundance of fart/butt/poop jokes in yesterday's post, which I'm sure gets old to readers after a while. I'll try to rein it in a bit on that front. Another possibility is that I'm trying too hard to be entertaining instead of just winging it as I usually try to do it. "Swing and a miss" in other words.

It might have been the barely-veiled F-word in the U2 concert article.

It might seem odd for a dude like me to be crude and weird and random, then wax religious and all that as well... I don't know what to say. Like everyone, I'm a multifaceted guy, and all of this is who I am. I certainly don't want to unnecessarily offend anyone. As I've said before, I never really go into these posts with an agenda - I literally start the post and roll with it. Free association blogging. And all the nonsense I write about just comes lurching out of one of the disparate parts of me. I certainly don't expect you all to read every day - I'm cool with you dropping in now and then to see what's up. Of course, I love it when you read and comment, and I'd love to have a huge audience (who wouldn't?), but I'll be here every day whether you read or not.

It's all good. I shall assume you're all doing well, and are busy with fun and interesting lives. I envy you! In fact, go start a blog! I'll read it and live vicariously through you!

Todayve In History: May 11
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- May 11, 1858: Minnesota is admitted as the 32nd state. (That reminds me: Go away, Al Franken! You're a massive tool! May your next vacation find you in the company of famished, non-finicky cannibals!)

- May 11, 1927: The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is founded. (Isn't that an oxymoron?)

- May 11, 1981: Bob Marley died. (He shot the sheriff, but he swore it was in self defense...)

I suppose that's it for now. Here's to a great week for all, eh!

Until tomorrow, remember, the early bird may get the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese...