I'M GONNA GO BMV!!!!!!

In case you couldn't tell, I had a bad run-in with a Government Agency we affectionately know as the Bureau of Motor Vehicles. I love going in to wait in a line outside in 45 degree weather at 8:40. I was there actually about 8:20 waiting... the place opens at 8:30 I reassured myself, looking at the sign on the door. I can imagine the enjoyment of the 20 some odd fellow human beings who waited with me. I fgured, renewing a license plate sticker is a snap! I just need my registration card.

I get inside and I'm the first one who requires a number. No problem. A couple minutes later, I am helped by a young gentleman who informs me I need my policy number for my insurance. I didn't even get that in the mail yet... "Oh, you need to change your address? Do you have your license?" "Well, I have nothing on my person that qualifies that, sir, seeing the BMV commissoner and his associates are taking a fine time processing my license on account of my immigration status." "Well, you need to come back with your policy number and your address change document."

My blood pressure assumes a healthy 145/70 range in the run of life. At this point it is about 160/79.

I drive back. Get my piece of paper the BMV issued me as a temporary permit to drive. "Hey! It has my address! They gotta take it!" Called the insurance place, got my Policy number, no problem.

I return to the BMV building to be asked at the desk, "what are you here for, sir?"

"I need to renew my registration"

"Will you be changing your address?"

"Yes ma'am and here's a piece of paper one of your officials issued me a month or so ago."

"No sir, that won't do. We need an electronically issued bill."

185/82 "WHAT!?! ... I'll be back..." I utter through clenched teeth and thoughts of going on a ballistic rampage.

I left so mad. I thought, the next epidemic in America is going to be irate vehicle owners who have to put up with the shit they call BMV protocol. I cleverly thought to myself, "instead of going postal, I'm going BMV!"

I need air. I need time. I need to cool my jets lest I make an ass of myself in public (not an uncommon occurance regardless).

After some wise counsel, I tried the machine at the grocery store. Why, the machine doesn't need proof of my residence... it doesn't need proof of anything. If I can rattle off my SS# and license plate, I'm golden! Five minutes and $32.00 later, I have a new sticker for my plate!

God bless America! We have machines to make life easy! And on top of that, you just need to be an idiot to work at BMV. You have to be fleixble too, cause it takes quite the agility to be able to stick your head up your ass. Am I bitter? Not anymore!

Unbelieveable!!!

The Game of Life

I love the fact we don't know erverything. I was just talking to Maves today. I was hoping to talk to Ross too. Those are a couple of my favorite guys. I guess this whole life thing is more like a journey about things we know nothing about except how we like to like things and how we should think that people like to be liked too. I guess this is entirely theoretical or something and I'm sure I make no sense because words don't come to me that describe this journey at all.

It's almost like all the things Christianity lobbies for to the detriment of making an ass of itself are not what I stand for at all. Sure, there are wrongs in the world. It's a messed up place. I certainly do not think that we're coming that close to end times. In fact, I'm beginning to approach Scripture less as an answer book and more like... a history or a portrait... something that reveals something about the very nature of redemption and the continual reminder that nothing has changed.

Humanity has this tendancy to choose less than the best and in turn produces what we call evil. This has been the way it's always been and I think our job as followers of Christ are to be catalysts for redemption. I've fully embraced that redemption is not about tell gays they're going to hell, but it's more coming alongside and telling them that they're the same as everyone else, but with a different issue and that being gay is the same in God's economy as guys who lust after other women, or marrieds who divorce.

To properly be an anti-abortionist is to proactively adopt and come alongside a confused hurting carrier of a fetus who hasn't really known love perhaps and is in this state of trying to find love through giving her body to guys who don't really love and as a result they create life. On top of her confusion and guilt, Christian lobbyists protest, perhaps laying the whole "You're going to hell" deal instead of listening to their fears, guilts, etc. should they so divulge.

In fact, I would daresay, I'm a Democratic Christian (but being a Canadian, I really don't adhere to an American Left or Right, but I'm certainly more left than right) but my saying that is mostly an expression of my against the grainness.

During election time last November, I found it interesting how the Christian sect supports the Bush administration. Why? Because:
1) They are Pro-life
2) Against Homosexual Marriage
3) On a mnission to wipe out "infidels", I mean... terrorists.

Response by one guy, namely myself:
1) I have already asserted my post-colonial view of an apporach to Abortion.

2) I have kind of asserted my position about loving gays into the kingdom but to allay fears that I support gay marriage, I will say this. Gay marriage is not the issue. This is the product, perhaps, of shunning a group that wants some acceptance and rights the same a hetero-sexual couples do. I do believe marriage to be the union of one man and one woman for LIFE unless for reasons such as death or infidelity. So, if a group who loves Jesus and people really wanted to make a difference, I would daresay, share your imperfections and that Christ came to reattach this broken world, really. There is so much hurt that leads to sin and evil. Our job is not to lobby, but to labor... in love... selflessly.

3) I understand the events of 9/11 to be tragic. It seems that the terrorism rooted in Afganistan under direction of Osama. Hey! has anyone heard from him these days? Nope. He remember George sr.? Yeah, I think 'Desert Storm' occured in his regime... yep. It did. Hey! What happened to the 'War on Terrorism'? Oh, it's still there with new title 'War in Iraq'. Would this have happened if the hornet nest wasn't stirred? Hard to say. Too much looks like in my mind the recovery of the unfinished work of the Senior's administration.

To anyone I've offended, remember, this is my opinion and I'm not lobbying against the administration. I'm hoping to challenge everyone's worldview. I'm not suggesting I'm right. This is my opinion. Of course I think I have some correctness, but everyone who has an opinion likes to think it's correct. Please, let's learn to learn... not take things for fact because it's been presented to us by the Church or media that "This is the way it is". I think in any case of polar opposites, there is good and bad in any extreme.

Now I will go into hiding...

Hulkamania and painting

Do you remember Hulk Hogan? I'm sure he's still alive today. Do you remember how he would always rip his shirt when he came into the ring? He was one bad dude.

Today Aram and I, mostly Aram, are going to rub down the surfaces we're going to prime and paint. So of course I needed a rag. I saw two towels (hopefully they were supposed to be rags, I saw them in the garage) and decided, "Hey, I'll rip this one in half! EEEEENNNNNRRRRRGH!" Well, you can't rip through seams that good, so I snipped the seam. From there, it was Easy Street (there is actually an Easy St. down the road from me) until I came across the other seam.

Hulk Hogan didn't have any seams or collars on the shirts he ripped. So... was he a real bad dude after all? Probably not.

And that my friends... are my words for today.

Being proven wrong

My good friend Lynn Erskine has a blog and I posted a comment in response to the fact that he has two Lynn Erskines in his family now. One is a man. I said I couldn't imagine because Ryan is exclusively masculine. It is Irish for "little king". Well, in one day I've experienced being proven wrong, not once, but twice. Gwyn Crowther told me she knows some girl named Ryan in her youth group. I thought that was weird. I then watched the Biggest Loser (only because I have three channels and there wasn't much to watch) and a girl has the name Ryan. So it could be, in fac t, that there could be two Ryan Sweeneys in my family and no homosexuality would have to be involved.

Let's give it up for unknowingly unisex names!

The unfinished life

I met Brian McLaren today. I went to a very insightful conference of his about the Unfinished Congregation. I loved it! My heart just resonates with what he's teaching. I think very much the spirit of our present age is shifting. Everyone is into social justice so it's almost as if people are standing for things and being active with those less fortunate. Look at Bono and Lara Croft in the recent expeditions over the past while with third world countries. It's like people have this drive to make their lives count. Yet it seems as though the Christianity that clings to absolutism of the modern age, just isn't what people are looking for. Christianity seems synomymous with Anti-homosexuality and exclusive, and hypocritical. Certain Christian individual may not be that way, but we have to get out of our mould and allow this shift in age to bring us up to date and maybe even being catalysts for change for the future.

I, myself have been very influenced by this shift in spirit. My heart yearns for no more hypocrisy, no more walking by the opressed and poor. It's time to get off my ass and do something. And often times I may put too much burden on myself and say it's too BIG but I believe very much our responsibility is to take on those big things as a collective unit.

So much to think about. I don't want to invite people to church because God isn't there. We lean so heavily on experience. We want a tangible God, and the thing is is that God is tangible and experienceable. And anbother thing is that people want to be heard, not told how God is, or what to do to fit into a mould. I guess I'm venting a minute stream of frustrations with the way things have been done. Sure, I'm half cut right now... well, not really, but I guess I'm wanting to let the world know we need to make disciples not converts. It may be a long painful process but hey, it's worth it. Christ didn't die so we ould commercialize Christianity or to sit on our ass everyday of the week.

Those are my words for today.

Whatever you do... don't look down!

The other day I was working on the house down the road. I don't mind ladders, in fact, I kinda like them... you know, those folding ones that you can sit on the top even thouigh they have the picture of a stick man sitting on the top and there's the red circle cross thing suggesting "Don't do what Donnie Dont does" (old Simpsons reference). But when it comes to a foot wide aluminum platform spanning across the greatroom of the house, I don't feel as secure. In fact, I take walking on it very slow. If that beam was only a mere 4 or 5 feet above the ground, it wouldn't be so bad. But it's 12 feet up. And the funny thing is, if you look down, you freak yourself out! Isn't that funny?

I wonder if I have a fear of heights, or a fear of falling. Maybe the height induces the psychological reaction of, "Oh, if I fall, this is going to suck." But if I'm on a boat, I don't have a fear of falling into the bottom of the lake. Weird huh?

What sort of things freak you out? Is it logical?

The following is a list of other things that I despise:
Fingernails (and the scraping thereof onto fabric)
Toenails (same classification)
A Paintbrush rubbing alongside painter's tape on doors or window frames

That's about it for now.

Back to Mega man!

Of Tommy Lee and Mega Man 3

Don't you hate interruptions? It's kinda like... you're in the middle of a dook and someone knocks on the door real loud and scares you! They don't scare the crap out of you, in fact it's almost like it's scared back into you.

That is not the topic of discussion this morning but the feeling of being interrupted whether you're doing something and the desired result doesn't come to pass because you were startled, or maybe you're watching a movie. It is soooo good and then there's this twist and then the movie sucks all of a sudden. The sudden suckiness takes place of what was to be a catharsis. Take, for example, The Village. The movie builds itself up to make you believe it's set in some small village in the 1800s. And then it turns out... it's not! That was one of those kind of movies. There are others for sure.

So I'm watching TV last night, we only have three channels. Of course all that is on is more updates on the aftermath of Katrina. The stark reality of this is disturbing. I'm watching all this and seeing all the people without homes and the dead bodies and the dogs that are stranded, it's real sucky. And then the news ends. What comes on next? Tommy Lee goes to school. That was an interruption. I was feeling all subdued and this clown comes on and it just blows my mind at the American stupidity called reality TV. I shut it off. This is not a slam on Reality TV. I agree with an other scholar who stated that instead of complaining about it don't watch it. It can't bug you if you're not watching it. All in all this is just an observation of the human psyche in its emotive involvement in entertainment. Quite a profound thing.

What sort of things make you feel interrupted?

I think I'm also longing for the days when I had nothing to do but play Nintendo. Not the case cause I have a job now and a family (and school work...YIKES! ). I'm playing Mega Man 3 on an NES emulator.

What were your favorite NES games of all time? I'm liking Mega Man because I always anxiously await the new level of Stinkoman on h*r.

And that my friends... are my words for today

You always have time for Tim Horton's... Unless you live in Indianapolis

In my last episode I posed the question "If you could do anything you wanted and not be inhibited by what other people think of what you're doing." The responsed ranged from being a bounty hunter in Ireland to living in a mushroom with windows eating only Applebee's boneless wings and dying shortly thereafter. Come to think of it, those responses both came from the Brothers Jews.

Unfortunately I didn't pose my question specific to one's burning heart's desire to change the world like Christ intended. So if there are any thoughts on that, I will gladly hear them. I think we just need to start doing selfless acts regardless of what others think. You may be surprised at the results. Of course don't go for results so much as allowing such a change in your life to be that of character development.

So I had a dream last night I was at Tim Horton's. It may have been Yarmouth, it may have been a small inland town in New Brunswick. Regardless, I think I miss Tim's coffee. We have overpriced Starbuck's will is in the market of experience, not coffee. I have experienced much bad coffee and a hurting wallet to boot. I even thought of starting some Tim Hortons in Northeastern Indy. It could work. But unfortunately, no one would have time for Tim Horton's. Well, let me rephrase that. I don't feel that people have the lags in time that allow them to congregate at any place for hours on end. You can't do anything spontaneously around here! Am I complaining? Probably in some remote way, but I feel like I am just stating the shift in culture. It's just busy busy busy. It's not seriously easy going like Jamaican rum and yes, there is NO time for Tim Horton's.

But with everything we miss, we wouldn't miss it if we never had it in the first place.

What sort of things do you the reader miss? What would your life be like without it? What do you think life would be like if you never experieneced the thing you presently miss? What things have you never experienced that you think you would miss?

I would probably not anxiously await the new levels of Stinkoman from week to week if I never started playing on h*r in the first place. I would probably have more time to finish or think about finishing my school work. I never experienced the canyons in Utah and Arizona. I might miss that... except for the scorpions and rattlesnakes.

And that my friends... are my words for today

Well isn't this fancy?

Well, here it is. Nothing special really. I did sign up for a blog a long time ago but I never really used it. Maybe I will from now on? Who knows. I usually have some deep thought but gets lost by being replaced by other thoughts.

So here's my first deep thought that I'm sure every one really thinks about. If you could live life without being influenced by what you think everyone else would think of you, what would you do?