good chai

thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you, God!!! You gave me good chai finally!!! :-)

Ding! (Fries Are Done!)

the final bell has sounded, the votes have been cast, the results tallied. thanks to all of you who voted (and especially to our tie-breaker from Valinor), your help is much appreciated.

so now the only thing left to do is wait for my super-duper-wonderful wifey to make the background to match this nifty new name my blog will be getting soon. wonder how long that will take... haha...should i take a vote? ;-)

in other news, we're currently saving up to buy me a nifty powerbook from kevin (ok technically it's from hock international, but i got first dibs cuz i'm good friends with their business manager - hooray for kickbacks! woo!!) haha. well ok technically we'd be able to get it now, we're saving up so that buying it doesn't leave us with no extra money in case something should happen. but that's basically the same thing.

oh, one last thing before i go... THE ONLY PLACE TO GET GOOD CHAI IN AMERICA IS NEWGROUNDS COFFEE HOUSE! WFT PEOPLE?! HOW HARD IS IT TO MAKE SOMETHING THAT ACTUALLY TASTES GOOD????

Another Tract...

soo...
beth came home from work today with another tract someone had left her at work. it reads (the parts in curly braces {} are my comments, they're not actually printed):

Thank You! {then it opens to say} Thank You! We say it so often...{gives examples} Sometimes we show as well as say our thanks...{gives examples - and one of them is "when we leave a small tip" - remember this later} I'd like to show my appreciation to you by telling you something that is of far greater value. It is simply that the greatest gift in the world can be yours for the asking. That give is the friendship of my best friend -- Jesus Christ. He took away my sin and guilt and gives me joy and peace. I serve him with loving obedience and find in Him my life, my hope, my everything!

and then it has a bible verse and another line or two about how this is the best thing the person who left the tract can do to say thank you to the one receiving it.

at first glance this one seems much nicer than the last one. none of that fire and brimstone type of outreach. (that's soo 1600's) but look a little deeper - the person straight up says that a 'small' tip is a great way to say thanks. so they think a larger tip isn't? or just that less money means they liked your service more? (remember, beth is a waitress...) honestly i think most people would disagree. a 'small' tip generally means they DIDN'T like the service you gave and are just leaving a tip cuz it's the right thing to do, not that they want to say thank you. a tip of 15% or more is what is generally considered a 'thank you.' especially since the VAST majority of a waitress' salary is made up of tips, n'est pas?
it also says that leaving this tract is the best way the person could say thank you. OK...show of hands: who out there really thinks a single sheet of paper 5" square saying basically "Jesus loves you" is the penultimate way to say thank you? even the tract AND a tip would be better. or if you don't want to leave a tip at all, what about actually TALKING to the person you're trying to outreach to? be interested in people. ska albums notwithstanding, quality really is job one - not quantity. and even if quantity really is job one, what good is it to tell someone Jesus loves them without giving them any help getting to know him? the closest comparison to handing out a tract is:

~you're walking down the sidewalk in town and someone with out of state plates drives up and asks you how to get to a store in town. you reply "go to the library. they have maps" and walk away.~

now, yes your response was slightly better than ignoring the person. and there very well may be maps at the library... but how can they even find that? telling a person to become a christian does no good without AT LEAST pointing them in the right direction to make that happen. it's much better to actually walk with them and HELP them on the way.

oh did you also notice that in the tract, when 'he' and 'him' referred to Jesus, sometimes it was in caps and sometimes not? inconsistency is dumb. just like misspelling. grr.

several things to talk about in this post: my blog, taxes, computers, fish, and a secret mystery surprise.

let me just say right up front that you people suck. i got only three votes for my new blog title and each of them was for a different name:

• Annuminas - 'West-tower' or 'Tower of the West'
• Echad i Sedryn - 'Camp of the Faithful'
• Tirion - ...ok this one doesn't actually mean anything, it is just the name of a city in heaven.

so if i couldn't choose between them to begin with, how am i supposed to now? grrr... alas, the person i would normally ask help from in making a decision has already voted and is therefore no longer impartial, and the only other person left to ask (the only other person i know with the same tolkienian disposition as myself) is 3,000 miles away and thus unavailable to help as well. i guess i'll just have to make a decision myself...
________________

tax season is here again. joy of joys. [shudder] at least we're basically done with them now. it took me about three hours this morning (this is after my aunt, who is a CPA and does taxes professionally, spent who knows how long actually figuring everything up and getting it ready for me) filing taxes for beth and i with both the federal and state governments. state was actually MUCH easier than federal. to file federal taxes i basically had to re-do all the work my aunt did in preparing our forms to begin with. that sucked. with the state e-file, however, they had an option to just type everything into a .pdf version of the form. so since i already had a paper version, all i had to do was copy. that one, at least, was simple.
so, in conclusion: taxes = bad. being done with taxes = good.
____________________

i don't want to tell you about this one actually... ask me yourself if you feel inclined :-)

___________________

ooh..the fun part of the post! we have fish!

so the other day (actually almost a week ago now) we went to the pet store to get a mouse to feed indy. while we were there we decided to look at the fish and fish tanks and whatnot, having already decided it would be cool to get a betta to have on the coffee table or kitchen table or something. so we walk in with plans to pay $2.35 for a rodent and spend some time LOOKING at fish and their various accouterments... an hour later we leave the store with $285 worth of fish accouterments, and no rodent. i still don't understand how. oi. well several days later once the water was ready we got some actual fish. not many, just a few to get the nitrogen cycle going in the tank and we're gonna add more in a few days or weeks. it actually looks really nice and i'm glad we have it cuz i love to watch them swimming and the sound of the water (our filter is the kind that acts about like a waterfall. kinda like the one in Finding Nemo) is relaxing. the downside is that we now have pets i can't cuddle. and, a week later, i'm still not sure how it happened.

(as i know beth has informed you, she is now banned from Petco because of this)
__________

did you get it? :-)

The Million Dollar Question:

so i found a million dollar bill in the drawer of my coffee table (no, i don't know how it got there. not sure what Beth is doing to earn that kind of money...) and found this printed on the back:

~~The million-dollar question: Will you go to Heaven? Here's a quick test. Have you ever told a lie, stolen anything, or used God's name in vain? Jesus said, "Whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart." Have you looked with lust? Will you be guilty on Judgment Day? If you have done those things, God sees you as a lying, thieving, lasphemous, adulterer... The Bible warns.. you will end up in Hell...~~

ok, seriously folks... wtf? when, in the history of christianity, has a tract ACTUALLY WORKED?!!? the whole "Sinners in the Hand of an Angry God" motif went out years ago. and honestly i doubt it did much good then either. Jesus also said "if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off." tracts drive people away from christianity (seriously, after reading that up there, would YOU wanna go be cuddly with the person who gave it to you?), not help them. therefore, for a christian, giving out tracts is a sin too. so... CUT IT OUT!! it's just annoying. stop it. go home.

It's Been A While...

so... it's been quite a while since i posted on here last. sorry about that, in case anyone actually reads it. then again if they did, i'd probably have had people asking me why i don't post any more. and i haven't so you must not. that's ok though, i can deal.

anyway, the point of this entry... gonna change the name of my blog, since this name was simply the only thing i could think of when i made it. so if anyone out there actually reads this, any ideas?

well here are my ideas, let me know which one(s) you like. if you know what they mean, great. if not, just go by sound. :-)

Laurelindorenan
Akallabeth
Annuminas
Echad i Sedryn
Karningul
Tirion
Annuuniaun
Iaunnuumin


$10 says no one comments on this...

yes, ok, you commented. thank you. no, i won't pay you. OH, and by the way, you can ignore Laurelindorenan, i won't be naming it that...so don't vote for that.

http://www.blogger.com/img/gl.italic.gif

as expected, it has been forever since i last informed anyone on here of the goings-on
of my life. since i last updated, i have gotten married, gone on a honeymoon, moved
into a house, and gone back to work afterward. i only regret the last.
the wedding itself went off without a hitch, except that we canceled the dancing at the
 reception. after we cut the cake, half the people left within 10 minutes so we just
threw the bouquet, threw the garter, and left. oh i almost forgot... we almost didn't
get to go on our honeymoon because Dawn (Beth's maid of honor) decided she wanted to
drive away with Beth's purse in her car. luckily, though, we got a hold of her before
she got all the way back home and she was kind enough to bring it back. the day was
saved.
our honeymoon was fantastic, and FYI, if anyone is considering visiting Ravenwood
Castle, go for it. just so long as you like lots of good food and don't like lots of
people around bugging you all day long. just tell them i sent you. no, don't do that.
they won't remember me anyway.
the house looks great, stop by and visit us sometime. any time actually. just call or
something to get directions. if you don't have my phone number then stop stalking my
blog.
anyway, now i'm back at work and getting stressed already. figures, eh? and i am
apparently unemployable in my field of choice... do you know how scarce entry-level
computer jobs are? at least in my area. none whatsoever. at least not for me. a week
after refusing to hire me, a company in the area hired instead a girl two years
younger than me with no computer training at all. WTF??!!? have you ever had one of
those days when you just wanna stay at home? or one of those weeks? or months?
at least at home, i'm happy and feel fulfilled and feel like i have a purpose. at
work, though... that's another story entirely. i'm always either bored or stressed
or both; i feel like i'm surrounded by idiots (mainly the customer but a few of my
co-workers as well); i work as hard as i can and for my efforts just get heaped with
more responsibilities of cleaning up after the people who do nothing and i'm expected
to do it without anything extra – no raise, no promotion, nothing. don't i remember
there being a fairness clause when i agreed to this 'life' thing? or does being
wonderfully happy at home exclude me for some reason when i'm not AT home?
oh well... as i always say: (ok so i never say it and this is the first time i've
typed it...but that just doesn't sound as good) “there's more than one way to skin
a reekoo.”