Ambivalent One

An article about my favorite religion. Here is an excerpt of the article care of citizen-times.com writer Jordan Schrader:

“I feel like my First Amendment was violated,” Killian, 16, said. “Freedom of religion and freedom of expression. That’s what I tried to do, and I got shot down.”

Freedom of religion?

Yes, Killian says, his “pirate regalia” is part of his faith — the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

The parody religion, whose “Pastafarian” members worship a sentient, airborne clump of noodles and meatballs, originated in a letter to the Kansas school board urging it to add the religion to its plans to teach evolution and intelligent design side by side.

It became an Internet phenomenon, spawning a belief system that holds pirates to be divine beings and blames global warming on the disappearance of the buccaneers.

When asked of my religious views I will say atheist or on some days I'll say agnostic. But I consider myself to be a Pastafarian... I keep that to myself out of fear of religious persecution for my beliefs. One day my Pastafarian brothers and I will be able to be open and proud and have our children learn about FSM in school. When making decisions always ask yourself WWFSMD.

Posted by Sean at 3/29/2007 09:14:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

It's been exactly one years since we took possession of our house! Our lawn was put in and we have a tree now. We still don't have a driveway... or laneway... or whatever you call it. We are expecting it late spring or early summer. Well, that's what we hope anyways. Unfortunately they are still finishing off the street so there is still mud everywhere. This photo is the last time my car was clean.

We've been fortunate. We will be having our year end inspection done and it seems that all the stuff we need fixed are purely cosmetic issues. Which is good. But it's inconvenient. We'll likely have to have a ton of different contractors come in and do the needed work. Obviously we have to take time off to be there when the work is done.

We are still extremely pleased with the house but we did notice that Valecraft changed the design of the basement in the updated version of our model. It adds two hundred square feet to the house's usable space. It's a small thing but it would have made the family room enormous!

Posted by Sean at 3/28/2007 10:34:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

1.0 Sweat bee: Light, ephemeral, almost fruity. A tiny spark has singed a single hair on your arm.

1.2 Fire ant: Sharp, sudden, mildly alarming. Like walking across a shag carpet & reaching for the light switch.

1.8 Bullhorn acacia ant: A rare, piercing, elevated sort of pain. Someone has fired a staple into your cheek.

2.0 Bald-faced hornet: Rich, hearty, slightly crunchy. Similar to getting your hand mashed in a revolving door.

2.0 Yellowjacket: Hot and smoky, almost irreverent. Imagine WC Fields extinguishing a cigar on your tongue.

2.x Honey bee and European hornet.

3.0 Red harvester ant: Bold and unrelenting. Somebody is using a drill to excavate your ingrown toenail.

3.0 Paper wasp: Caustic & burning. Distinctly bitter aftertaste. Like spilling a beaker of Hydrochloric acid on a paper cut.

4.0 Pepsis wasp: Blinding, fierce, shockingly electric. A running hair drier has been dropped into your bubble bath (if you get stung by one you might as well lie down and scream).

4.0+ Bullet ant: Pure, intense, brilliant pain. Like walking over flaming charcoal with a 3-inch nail in your heel.

Sources:
Wikipedia
BoingBoing

Posted by Sean at 3/25/2007 02:38:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

Nice. End-users never change.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRBIVRwvUeE

Posted by Sean at 3/23/2007 05:08:00 PM | Permalink | Comments

So, following up on my previous DDR post... I've determined that I absolutely LOVE this game! Christine and I have been playing DDR Ultramix 4 and I must say that I didn't think I would like it so much. It's almost unholy to be honest. The first and second night we played for 3 hours on each night. Then I took a day off to let my legs recover so I biked for an hour instead. It's low impact.

I had been doing an hour and a half of exercise every second day in an effort to get back in to better shape so I decided to step it up to every night. I have been getting bored with the stationary bike and weights so when Christine expressed an interest in DDR I thought it would be a great way to do cardio and mix up the routine until I can start jogging outside. The area is still under construction so there's mud everywhere... actually that's bullshit... I hate the cold and will avoid it if at all possible unless it's for skiing.

Since I started daily exercise I've lost about fifteen pounds. I'm now around two hundred pounds and the "healthy" weight for my height is apparently a hundred and eighty-five pounds. However when I was that weight before some people told me I looked too skinny. Which made me want to hit them... Anyways. My goal is to be at a reasonable weight by the start of summer and have riply muscles by the end of summer.

I'm using this body mass index calculator as a rough guide on my progress:
BMI calculator

I'm also using the new Canadian food guide to help me make better food portion size choices. If you know me I'm not big on fast food and I eat healthy stuff. I just ate too much of it and my job is sitting on my ass for 8 hours. Ugh... But I digress. Food guide link:
Food Guide

Posted by Sean at 3/17/2007 12:00:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

http://www.youtube.com/v/dGvw6WpHSF4

Posted by Sean at 3/16/2007 03:50:00 PM | Permalink | Comments

Went for bubble tea and Pho last night with Christine after work. I've never had bubble tea before.

I got the Kiwi flavour. They have every fruit on earth as an option. I went with what I thought I knew. It consists of kiwi juice, green tea and tapioca blobs. They give you what is essentially a pipe to use as a straw.

It was easily the tastiest weird drink I've ever had. Think of it like those Orbitz drinks they used to have except bubble tea doesn't make you want to vomit yourself to death. It's right across the street from Barrymore's. If you've never had bubble tea or even if you have you should check it out.

Posted by Sean at 3/13/2007 12:16:00 PM | Permalink | Comments

Is this look better?

Posted by Sean at 3/13/2007 06:34:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

I was having trouble falling asleep so I decided that trying a different template might help me drift off. No such luck. Still wide awake. Let me know what you think of this look. All two of you that read my page... I love you Christine and Mom!

Posted by Sean at 3/09/2007 01:13:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

Christine had expressed an interest in trying DDR so I bought the dance pads on Ebay for really cheap. She then sends me this as motivation. I have no doubt that this guy will forever be better than me.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Hz8gQlkiFA

Posted by Sean at 3/05/2007 03:10:00 PM | Permalink | Comments

Bev Oda. Canada's copyright Czar. She is supposed to regulate the music and movie industry and she accepts "gifts" from the industries she's supposed to be regulating. I can't think of a better definition for conflict of interest. She should be fired.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vjeoc2sDf1k

Posted by Sean at 3/01/2007 08:16:00 AM | Permalink | Comments