Myths and Lies

I am beginning to understand how the mythology that surrounds real history is created. It's started by liars like me.

As a cruel and distasteful experiment, I told some people that there was an untold story to the World Trade Centre tragedy. There had been a swimming pool in one of the towers. When the towers collapsed, there were people who had been swimming who couldn't get out.

There was no swimming pool in the World Trade Centre. It was a complete fabrication. But people believed me. I corrected them with the truth. But if I hadn't, they could have passed this lie onto others and a myth would have been born.

Life's Art

"God is really only another artist. He invented the giraffe, the elephant and the cat. He has no real style. He just goes on trying other things." - Pablo Picasso

Surgery

Plastic surgery is pretty horrid. Perhaps, one day, we will look at plastic surgery and see it as barbaric and as stupid as foot binding, or so said Angela Montenegro, a character in the TV show Bones.

According to the latest tabloid magazine, Ashley Simpson had a whole bunch of plastic surgery. She got rid of her trademark nose for a more generic one, even though her nose made her unique.

Screw genetic science. We don't need advances in genetic science to all be born generic beauties. As children, we should all be sliced up and reconstructed to look ideal.

What's a little mutilation for beauty?

Schizophrenia

"Writing is a socially acceptable form of schizophrenia." ~ E.L. Doctorow

Jesus H. Christ

I have been doing some deep thinking lately about the expression "Jesus H. Christ." What does the H stand for?

For lack of anything better to do, I looked it up.

According to some, it stands for "Harold" or "Howard," as in "Our father, who art in heaven. Howard be thy name." Or Harold be thy name?

Some say the H stands for "Jesus Holy Christ" and was shortened to "Jesus H. Christ."

There is another theory out there that says it stands for "Haploid." The haploid is the number of chromosomes found in the gamate of an individual. Whatever that means. I hate biology. Maybe, since Jesus had no biological father, he was shortchanged in the chromosome department.

Others say the H refers to the IHS logo found in Christianity. IHS is an abbreviation of "Jesus" in classical Greek characters. The Greek pronunciation is "Iesous," with the E sound being represented by the character eta, which looks like an H. When the symbol passed to Christian Romans, that eta became an H, which was an H to them.

Or, perhaps, the H comes from the Latin inscription INRH that was tacked on the cross by Roman soldiers: "Iesus Nazarenus, Rex Hebrei" (Jesus the Nazarene, King of the Hebrews). Although that inscription may have actually been INRI: Iesus Nazarenus, Rex Iudaeorum (Jesus the Nazarene, King of the Jews).

Who knows? Those are just theories I came across.

Drought

I've been going through an e-mail dry spell lately, which is pretty sad.

Over the last few days, I log on and the inbox says zero messages. Even my spam bin reads zero.

C'mon people, what's with the no junk mail? Am I suddenly that despicable that I don't even deserve junk mail? Normally, I get a ton of spam. Lately, nothing. The world must be coming to an end. No junk mail.

Sigh. Okay, I guess I can handle the no junk mail part. I really don't need any new psychiatric drugs or whatever else the junk mail sells. Really, I don't.

Awaiting revenge.

"After scolding one's cat, one looks into its face and is seized by the ugly suspicion that it understood every word. And has filed it for reference." - Charlotte Gray, Canadian historian and author.

No Talent

One thing I find when watching shows like Canadian Idol is that my taste is completely different than the rest of the nation. The people I tend to dislike, the country loves.

I take that back. Perhaps, my tastes don't differ with the entire nation. Rather, it differs with the 12-year-old girls who call in and vote. Girls who wouldn't know talent if it bit them in the butt.

Look what happened with the Much VJ search. Everyone knows Erik Bartik should have won, but alas the teenage girl vote went to the stuttering and shy Tim Deegan. Since when did stuttering and shy become valued qualities in a TV host?

Laziness

Why is it difficult to break a pattern of laziness?

I used to be really good at waking up at 6 a.m., for instance. And now I always need to sleep in until 8 a.m. It seems impossible to wake up at 6 a.m. now, even though I could use the time in the morning.

Getting used to it.

You think after a lifetime of being excluded one would get used to it, but one never does.

Even when you know you don't fit in with the group, and know they know too, it still hurts to be excluded.

The same goes for not fitting in. You think one would get used to having a mutated personality that makes it difficult to make friends.

But, alas, no. You never get used to it.

Fame and Fortune

I wonder if celebrities are insulted when we don’t recognize them.

Throughout my life I’ve encountered a number of different “famous” people, some of whom I would not have known until someone told me who they were.

I’m particularly bad with professional athletes and country singers, because I’m just not that interested in what they do. Therefore I do not keep up with what is going on in their industry unless I get hit in the face with it. For instance, I did not know who the Dixie Chicks were until they insulted George Bush. I can’t name many other performers in the country world, let alone know their songs. Even with the Dixie Chicks, I probably wouldn’t recognize them in the street.

Once I had a conversation with Vinnie Jones. Since his name meant nothing to me, I didn’t really make much of it. I’m sure there would be people in Europe who would be stunned at my ignorance. I still don’t think it was a big deal.

In my experience, celebrities are like everyone else. Some are nice. Some are jerks. So they’re millionaires, big deal.  

Self-indulgence

What I love about blogs is that they are so self-indulgent. Anything goes.

You are always right. If someone makes a comment you don't like - delete.

You can write complete crap if you want.

Make up your own language. Yeah, you might not have regular readers if you do that.

But it's your blog. You can do what you want.

Lost cause.

We all take the cards in our wallet for granted until the wallet goes missing.

Not only can people charge up your credit cards, but what will they do with your driver's license? Can we say "identity theft?" Look it up some time. People can do some scary, scary stuff with your ID.

And if your keys disappeared with your driver's license, is someone going to be able to find where you live and someday walk right into your house?

Do what you can to protect yourself. Because, yeah, you don't think it can happen to you. But it can happen to anyone.

Believe me. I know.

A nervous tick.

My sister and I went for our first hike of the season through a marshy grassland area. It was windy and cloudy and it looked like it was going to rain, but we went anyway.

On the drive home, we were just coming into the city, when I saw a black spider crawling over my hand. I asked my sister to take it off and she freaked out. It was a wood tick.

We pulled up to a nearby pizza place and took off our sweaters and shook them out. Four more ticks.

Then, over lunch, I found another tick, so like any good responsible citizen would do, I flicked it across the restaurant. I should have put it in my salad to get a free meal.

On the drive home from the restaurant my sister found another tick on her hand, so she rolled open the window and stuck her arm out, shaking her arm and screaming. The guy who was standing on the street nearby found this funny.

We found three more wood ticks at home. I threw them outside for the family dog to pick up later. Wood ticks are virtually impossible to kill - have you ever tried stepping on one?

Coincidence?

Do you ever notice your bathroom items run out all at once?

So you find yourself at the story buying dental floss, toothpaste, shampoo, conditioner and soap all at once.

Whenever I end up at the store buying these items all at once I have to refrain from telling the cashier: "I'm not new to personal hygiene. I've had showers before. Honest."

Drowning

I watched the David Blaine: Drowned Alive special and have since been pondering the phrase “drowned alive”

To drown one must be alive and in need of oxygen. You cannot drown if you are dead, so you would drown alive.

And to be drowned is the past tense of drown, in which case you would be dead. So it is impossible to be drowned and be alive, unless you are almost drowned. And David Blaine did not almost drown.

Drowned can also mean to be completely submerged in water, but that is no great feat. I can completely submerge myself in water if only for a moment and be drowned alive.

Also, the title is close to what he titled a stunt back in 1999 called Buried Alive, which was never really a creative title.

His other stunt titles could also be scrutinized: Vertigo, Frozen in Time and Above and Below.

Deconstruction is fun.

Foreshadowing

Sometimes I wonder if life, like movies and books, has foreshadowing events.

Like on Saturday afternoon I watched the First Daughter, which is a fluffy movie about the President’s daughter having a romantic relationship with one of her secret service officers.

Then, that evening, I got an impromptu invitation to go to The Sentinel, a movie that I knew nothing about. I agreed to go anyway.

As it turns out the movie was, in part, about a secret service officer who has an affair with the President’s wife. It was another fluffy movie.

Watching the First Daughter foreshadowed how I would spend my evening, but I did not heed the warning and ended up watching two very mediocre movies.

Association Games

It’s weird how television can influence our thoughts.

I’ve been making my way through the TV series Buffy the Vampire Slayer for the first time recently. There is a popular musical episode called “Once more with Feeling” about a demon that makes people dance and sing until they are so worked up they burst into flames.

In one scene, a dancing Buffy is spinning around so fast that she is literally starting to smoke.

So anyway, I was at a men’s figure skating event. While watching the skaters spin faster and faster, a weird thought walked across my mind: “The figure skaters could spontaneously combust doing those spins.”

I shook the thought out of my head.

It’s weird how our mind makes connections. It’s not so much word association as concept and image association. And it’s funny how and when those associations work.

Cops

Sometimes I wonder if cops get frustrated when they are driving.

The police might want to speed a little. You know, go 10 kilometres over the speed limit like the average driver does.

But the people driving in front of the police are deliberatly driving slower, because they fear getting a ticket.

Meaning police likely always have to travel 10 kilometres slower than the speed limit, because of people terrified of getting a ticket.

A New Taste

Peanut butter and pickle sandwiches—Yep, apparently there are some people out there who eat them on a regular basis.

And they think it’s normal.

Now I’m a regular consumer of the peanut butter and banana sandwich. And, occasionally, I will have peanut butter and jam. I would also not be above peanut butter and chocolate chip sandwiches.

But the thought of peanut butter and pickle sandwiches literally makes my stomach turn. It’s just wrong.

That said, I’ve met two people now, who work in the same office, who claim to love peanut butter and pickle sandwiches. They are how I learnt that such an abomination even existed.

One of those people brought in such a sandwich for me to try. You can imagine my horror when I saw the sandwich sitting on my desk.

I stared at it. It stared at me. I had to at least try it. It was made for just me.

I held it up to my mouth, and then put it down. I held it up to my mouth, and then put it down.

I finally took a very tiny bite. I tasted peanut butter and followed by pickle.

I contemplated the taste. It wasn’t horrible. But still my stomach was turning in discomfort.

I took another tiny bite. Again, not horrible, but my stomach, at this point, started screaming: “NO!”

I listened to my stomach and threw the sandwich in the garbage.

I tried, but my stomach just couldn’t do it.

Besides, perhaps the whole peanut butter and pickle thing was just a cruel joke, because no one really eats peanut butter and pickle sandwiches. Do they?