My mother would kill me if I didn't stay with her when I go out there. Then she would reanimate me and rekill me, just so I got the message, although I am sure she would do it in a loving way. We've stayed with my brother in the Netherlands, but it's because he invited us.. I like having family around, but that's because no one I am related to or any in-laws would ever presume or stay longer than a few days. They all have their own lives, yo.

JZ, I would pay good money to see you do that.

::Loves JZ to pieces::

Joins in with the JZ love-age.

JZ, I would pay good money to see you do that.

If we weren't living on negative income right now, I'd be so tempted. I can easily think of a dozen or so local improv/Faire people who'd be delighted to participate; in fact, I need to not tell them about this, because they can't afford to fly out either and it'll just make them sad to think about the missed opportunity. Squicking straitlaced people half to death is practically a Faire vocation.

Also, huh. My spellcheck is telling me that vaginas is wrong, that I should be spelling it vaginae. I don't think I ever knew before that that was the correct plural (probably because I've never had much occasion to use the plural). Is this yet another obvious thing that everyone but me already knew?

salvation is by faith alone, in the sense that it's impossible to earn your way to heaven by good works or being a nice person

Huh. I guess that's confirmation that I shouldn't suddenly become a born-again/evangelical/that type of Christian? Huh.

Though I guess it's not saying that if you have faith you shouldn't also be a nice person doing good works. But...I remember in Sunday School talking about people who'd never heard of Jesus, and what happened to them? And being told that there were certain principles that even without the Bible you should be able to figure out--be a good person, in other words--and otherwise, if you hadn't had the opportunity, you could probably go to Heaven anyway. If you had the opportunity and turned it down, though, it sounded more chancy, according to the teacher... :)

I am more than a little nervous--even here in my secular private school in liberal LA--that I will be teaching parts of the Bible as literature next month

We did that, in public high school. Though granted, I think it was senior year. But still.

Maybe there was a cut scene with Pantomime God warning the plants not to germinate when his back was turned, and the Angels have to keep shouting at him to turn around.

Hee. Is it wrong to envision Eddie Izzard as God?

land animals perhaps predating land plants

The wikipedia evolution/genesis thing is very interesting, but...how were there land animals before plants? They just hung out on some rocks and ate things from the sea?? How does that work? I'm v. surprised.

The Roman Catholic side of my family finally stopped acting like Protestant marriages, baptisms, and communion don't "count". Though some of them probably do still think it.

Are you kidding me? Of course they don't count! Especially services don't count--if I had a sleepover on a Saturday night, it sure as heck didn't count if I went to church with someone else's family--I still had to go to Mass later that day/evening! Because you have to go to Mass on Sunday, and this johnny-come-lately Protestant stuff Does Not Count.

We were asked tonight to not come back, because the new owners want to maintain a "family" atmosphere.

Oh damn. That sucks. I'd be v. tempted to do a "fuck you, are you going to ban us individually?" thing, but then I'd also be tempted to just leave and say "fuck you, you don't need my money"

it appears that the real goals of their trip were 1) meet their son's fiancee's parents, which he's trying to avoid until the wedding; and 2) dump their freeloading daughter and her baby on us

Oh damn. Go Raq, but sorry that the relationship had to get to that point.

And on my way out the door, I'd be sure to pull one of the new owners aside and say brightly and very loudly, "Thank you so much for kicking out those dirty perverts! Now that they and their disturbing tech talk are gone, I feel so much more at ease bringing my friends in here to talk about our vanilla vaginas and our husbands' juicy cocks and how we like to fit them together! All under the watchful loving eye of God, of course! Bless you and your vagina and your husband's cock! Bless you all so very much!"

OMG, I love JZ. And want to see this happen very much.

Also, huh. My spellcheck is telling me that vaginas is wrong, that I should be spelling it vaginae. I don't think I ever knew before that that was the correct plural (probably because I've never had much occasion to use the plural). Is this yet another obvious thing that everyone but me already knew?

I don't know about that, but I'm suddenly conflating this post with the discussion from Buffy about needing a plural for "Apocalypse" and it's making me laugh and laugh.

Is it wrong to envision Eddie Izzard as God?

Except Eddie Izzard as God would still be James Mason.

Teppy, you and your group would be more than welcome at the Vine. I'm afraid it's a little far though.

Heee, JZ.

So I've been getting all sorts of side jobs lately. My uncle in Lubbock wants me to spruce up some sort of one-page proposal of his, and my mom sent me a youth group article she wants me to fix. She made me write one for the little newsletter/magazine thing when I visited a couple months ago, and it was likely the best thing that had ever appeared in it, because look at the crap they usually get:

As soon the meeting was done! Everyone changed there clothes and jumped into the pool or beach. As the we got our rooms most of everyone went to sleep because we were all so tired. Day Two we took a visit into down town Cancun, were we visited the many shops that they had to offer in the shopping alleys they had set-up. The shopping alleys mainly was selling authentic Mexican goods that were either hand made or authentic. We left the hotel to have lunch at our sister hotel which was also in our all inclusive hotel. The hotel was not very far from downtown. After we left the hotel, we went back to our hotel and most people took some rest or some people headed straight for the water. As day two came to a end we had a big day four ahead of us.

The person who wrote this is perhaps a couple years younger than I am. He went to high school. I'm not sure if he went to college. I just don't understand how someone can produce something this awful. Willingly.

I turned it into this, for the record, which is not much better but at least coherent:

As soon as the meeting was done, everyone changed their clothes and either jumped into the pool or plunged into the waters at the beach. By the time we got back to our rooms, most of us went straight to sleep because we were all so tired. On the second day, we ventured into downtown Cancun, where we visited the many shops in the shopping alleys. They were mainly selling authentic Mexican goods, many of them handmade. We had lunch at our sister hotel, part of our all-inclusive hotel. Luckily, the hotel was not very far from downtown. After lunch, we went back to our hotel. Although most people took the time to rest, some people couldn't resist the urge to head straight for the water once again. Those who rested made the smart choice, as we had a very big day ahead of us.