Atlas Hugged

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August 15, 2006

Curious Longevity of the Bubble Skirt Trend

Now, I don't know about anyone else, but when I see those bubble skirts I can't help but think of things like:

Addendum:
I've edited this entry to include the modern comparison because it seemed appropriate. Also, I recently received some criticism since this post was "just a picture." However, I believe that my pithy observation says just the right amount, and I feel no compulsion to wax further on the matter.

Posted by heidi at 1:31 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

August 6, 2006

8675309

i have decided that i have had quite enough of this bluetooth sensation that is sweeping the nation. and as such, i have gone out to my local sporting goods store and purchased a mid-sized baseball bat which i now carry with me everywhere i go. and yes, it was a difficult decision trying to decide between the satisfactory thud a solid piece of wood would supply and the ping of an aluminum bat. in the end i went with the aluminum because while the thud might have been satisfying i see this new calling of mine as a mission of mercy to the public at large and as such i feel the need to broadcast my message in a way that only the ping would allow.

so from now on, whenever i'm walking through a mall or winding my way toward a restaurant bathroom and see the dreaded earpiece i will hold aloft my trusty bat and give the offending party a solid whack sending the bluetooth (and who knows maybe even some whiteteeth as well) skittering across the floor where it will be sought out and smashed to pieces.

you might wonder where all this animosity comes from - is it any of my business if a person chooses to use the latest and greatest technology available? after all it is a free country. but i would argue that i have a difficult time enjoying my freedom when half the people i come into contact with look like they just walked off the set of star trek. and seriously, is there a phone call so important that you have to put that ridiculous thing in your ear everywhere you go? would it be so difficult to hold an actual cellphone to your actual ear? word on the street has it that they come in all sorts of manageable sizes and they are very lightweight.

admittedly i'm still a bit behind the times when it comes to such hi-falutin technology. i've only had cellphone for about 2.5 years and every day i try to think of ways that i can banish it from my life forever...because you know that thing you used to do back in the day before cellphones and pagers when you would walk into your house and before you even turn the lights on you would peer catiously toward the answering machine hoping the blinking red lite of people actually love me would be flashing.

with cellphones the suffering can be much more acute. reaching into your pocket every thirty minutes and looking at the blank lcd screen - maybe flipping the phone open and shut every few minutes just to ensure that it is still working. it's all so soul damaging - and now they want to give me an earpiece that whispers hollowly every 30 seconds nobody loves you right now? no thanks! true, the bluetooth would make it easier to fake talk so no one else would have to know that no one loves you (unless of course you fake talk too loudly - because that's sort of a dead give away) but you would still know...

in spite of all of this, nothing breaks my heart like seeing two people walking through the mall together talking on their phones to completely different people - and then there's the whole dinner out fiasco whereby someone will inevitably take a phone call in spite of the fact that they are at this dinner for the express purpose of enjoying your company. but instead of just screening the call some people need the validation of being able to say: yeah, i'm out with so and so...

and the way i see it bluetooth is just the next step towards losing our souls completely. because now you have no idea if the person is talking to you or some other voice in their head. and really, there's nothing more infuriating than responding to someone only to have them stare back at you blankly because they weren't talking to you to begin with. well dear friends, i've had it with all of this nonsense - so from now on, i'm letting the bat do the talking for me. you've been warned.

Posted by young_christopher at 4:23 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

the famous one

good morning and happy sabbath - as you all get dressed and pressed and head out to your own particular house of worship i think it might be a good idea to ponder what's missing from the whole worship service at large these days. i realize the church has been taking it on the chin of late for being to stodgy and uptite about - well about pretty much everything...and in response many churches have begun taking an aggressive approach to catching up with the current culture - music has gotten a kickin' rock beat, jeans and sandals are now appropriate attire (because jesus totally wore sandals. every day) sermons have become largely anecdotal focusing primarily on why we are all such messy people - and join one of our community groups and let's all be messy together. and of course there's the free coffee which is dispensed almost as abundantly as the free grace these days. it seems that church leaders have completely lost faith that we can comprehend a wit of holy writ. so it all gets consolidated and watered down - just like the free coffee.

and yet, in spite of all of these modifications to the moderne worship service something still seems amiss. it's not the complete and total lack of doctrine, or a statement of faith. well actually it is exactly that but i'm not here to talk about that. with all the concessions and adjustments being made one still gets the sense that churches today are not quite in lockstep with the culture.

and i think i may have identified the problem. it's only been within the last 5 years that churches have begun making sermons available on compact disc as opposed to cassette tape - and maybe that technological advancement was satisfactory in the year 2000 (and boy did we dodge a bullet with that whole y2k thing) but here we are blasting our way toward the latter half of this decade and churches seem content to stick with the soulless bland compact disc.

but friends this needs to change. this is why i'm suggesting churches begin making forays into the wonderful world of the enhanced dvd. you know most of them already have dvd players anyway - otherwise how could they show you those heart wrenching vignettes on a weekly basis. and seriously, think of all the possibilities an enhanced dvd might imbue. not only would it shout from the rooftops that christianity matters again it also opens up the door to so many breathtaking possibilites.

no longer would the pastor be confined to the material that he can squeeze into his 20 minute sermon. with the enhanced dvd there would be ample opportunities for deleted anecdotes - extended metaphors - and you know that c.s. lews/john piper/donald miller quote that seemed completely out of context with the rest of the sermon? well on the dvd the pastor could read the whole thing so maybe you could comprehend where he was actually trying to go with all of that. to me the most exciting possibility the enhanced dvd provides is the alternate sermon ending. because seriously, wouldn't that sermon last week have been much more meaningful with a dispensationalist ending? yes. yes it would have.

i know this sounds like a lot of work to put into something on a weekly basis - in fact with all that i've suggested this would probably have to be a dual disc set which could get pricey - but come on people. it's time to roll up our sleeves and get a little bit dirty. and wouldn't you like to hear elder commentary on the sermons? or even a behind the scenes feature that follows the choir from practice to fruition? i know i would. so i would challenge each and every one of you to raise this topic at your next congregational meeting. because in the year 2006 braided belts, pot luck dinners, and rapture drills just aren't cutting it anymore. it's time to make that change.

Posted by young_christopher at 9:07 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

August 5, 2006

god loves a drunk

so i've just returned from the local watering hole hoppys last resort which sadly has become my hangout of late because a: it's 7 blocks from my house and b: their burgers are phenomenal - which is probably why every time you see me in public you wonder privately to yourself if i haven't been packing on a few pounds.

and the answer to that question is yes, yes i have. sadly, i think i am reaching my own last resort with hoppys because for some reason the drunkest drunkards in the bar somewhow find their way to the bar stool immediately adjacent to me and they proceed to slur some nonsense about how they play the bass guitar and hail from the greater (come on feel the) illinois area - and after the first couple of beers imbibed (after already being trashed) they knew various members of rock supergroup cheap trick - but after the 4th round not only did they know members of cheap trick at one time they had in fact been asked to join the band but decided not to for personal reasons.

tonite as i was enjoying my black and bleu burger with a tall frosty killians i was accosted by a guy named barry or burt or some such and he just would not shut up - and this guy was wasted in ways you can't even imagine but he was tossing back bud lites which confused me - because seriously how does bud lite get anybody that blitzed. then dude starts asking me if i get high and i respond in the negative and he proceeds to tell me not to listen to a word he's saying because he's been dabbling in the ecstasy and has no idea what he's talking about. and he has just a moustache and he's a spitter and then he starts saying very inappropriate things about various women at the bar and i just...i just couldn't take it any more so i paid my tab and left.

and honestly, i don't know if i can ever return. it's bad enough being accosted by the bartendresses but this burt/barry business it's all too much. i was terrified that he was going to ask me for a ride when i left - but i downed my killians in a jiff and he still had a good third of his bud lite left and he was threatening to get himself thrown out of the bar because he just had to say something to this one girl in particular. and the whole time i'm thinking - well most of the time i was thinking how satisfying it would be to just nudge the guy off of his stool and then i was thinking about the homeless card swiper thing...but then i thought maybe i needed to find a new favourite place to eat so i wouldn't have to deal with all of these shenanigans...you aren't faced with this kind of nonsense at arbys - sure you might spill some horsey sauce on your favourite pants but that's nothing compared to having a piece of your soul sucked away by a guy like burt/barry. i'm just saying

Posted by young_christopher at 11:37 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

the cash machine is blue and green

so today i was filling up the sexplorer with petrol for the final drive to nashville when i was accosted by a homeless man who said the following to me: "you look like the kind of man who might be going somewhere this summer where you will need these" - the these he was referring to were a small pair of binoculars in a handy leather carrying case. i told him i had no such plans for the summer so i wouldn't be able to help him out. he then asked if i had any loose change to offer - and in truth i did not.

in all honesty, i don't mind homeless people, nor does it bother me that they consistently hit you up for cash for a warm meal or a tall bottle of whate'er it is that cures their ills. actually i should say it doesn't usually bother me because that bible toting woman outside the slow bar that hit me up for $20 that time...ridiculous! anway, i'm getting off track here. i hate to be one of those people, but i'm really wondering when the homeless are going to take that step into the modern era and start carrying around card swipers. because seriously, i almost never have cash on me. i'm a chronic swiper. and it seems to me that if a needy soul came up to me and asked if i could debit them a buck or two i wouldn't be the type of person to object.

of course you're thinking this idea of mine is absurd, because how is a card swipe going to help out a homeless person who is in desperate need of cold hard cash. well, here's the solution - during the daylite hours these folks can walk into any financial establishment and cash in all of the dollars that have been debited to them on the previous day. of course one wonders aloud if a homeless person were enterprising enough to employ my idea perhaps they would also have the capability of finding gainful employment and wouldn't need to live hand(out) to mouth. but maybe they don't want to work, and i can totally understand that.

i mean it's a pretty rare ocurrence in the life of not so young christopher when i wake up in the morning itching to get down to the office which for me is just down one flight of stairs - but i'm here to tell you on a cold morning - that commute can be a nightmare!

where was i? oh yeah, i can foresee other potential problems that might prevent my idea from being successfully implemented. first everyone who's ever used an atm banking machine knows that those service charges can often be prohibitive - and really, how willing would you be to debit a few bucks to a homeless person if you knew there was going to be a $2.50 service fee tacked on. it just wouldn't make reasonable sense, because now your charitable act is getting expensive and you're short two full cups in your monthly dennys coffee budget.

and then what about the cash back option? that can be one of the most convenient aspects of using the debit card at your favourite retailer (target/marshalls for me) but if your debiting $3 to your homeless pal and then you ask for $20 cash back (because why not - you're taking the hit on that service charge so it make sense to grab some spare cash so you don't have to hit up another machine later on in the week) he's probably not going to be your pal anymore and you might find yourself getting robbed and/or kicked in the nuts.

and finally, there's the whole personal space problem to deal with, because in my early drawings the device would be worn around the homeless person's neck, so the actual act of swiping - well, it could seem a little bit intimate and you might be in danger of getting hugged without warning. also - from such close range a crafty/unscrupulous type might take note of your p.i.n. (mine's creamy by the by - and i don't mind telling the whole world) and use it for ill.

all this to say, i know this idea of mine has some obstacles to overcome - but i just wanted to point out that it was my idea. so when some superstar entrepeneur type rolls the homele$$ 3000 off the assembly line you'll know that said person stole the idea from me and maybe you can testify to this effect in a court of law. thanks for listening. and i miss you shy eyes.

Posted by young_christopher at 8:21 PM | TrackBack