The shooting at TX highschool is not Mac's school or near b.orgers. Not that that makes it less horrible, just getting that out there as news catches it.

Wow, Dana.

Thanks for that, msbelle. I like to get the reassurances as early as possible. Ugh, apparently is still happening.

I somehow managed not to bring in my oatmeal this morning. I was really looking forward to that.

t /trivial disappointments

OK, I don't think any of my currently pending tasks are all that urgent.

Kat, that is terrible. I am outraged by the grade changing and appalled by the principal. You Aren't Letting Us Support You is a crappy fucking criticism, what the hell? They need Oz's "I told you what I need, this is not about helping me" speech looping on their personal soundtracks for a while. And so early in the year, sigh, I'm sorry, that must be really hard.

Buddhism is not really about afterlives, although for a long period in China Buddhists were the preferred officiants for funerals (I think it was funerals) because they had the most variety of hells and great descriptions of them.

The end game, as it were, for Buddhism is not about having something good waiting for you after this life, it's about getting out of the game entirely. Off the wheel. Escaping the cycle. Pascal's wager would be, I would think, entirely moot.

Now, I have given a lot of thought to how to deal with finite lifespans and what gives me the most comfort (and seems to fit reality as I understand it) is to consider the universe in 4 dimensions. The space-time representation of your life, or anyone's, occupies it's hypervolume whether our current conscious experience of time intersects it or not. Not unlike eternal life.

Well, it makes me feel better.

Also, as opposed as I am to being required to manage others' emotions, I would hypocritically like a little more regard for my feelings. I cannot think of a way to say "I thought I would be informed about this process before it was active" that doesn't sound whiny, so I'm not saying anything, but I am peeved.

Hmmm...

So our life (as we perceive it) is a 4-dimensional slice of something much larger? That's an interesting idea. That's nice and non-linear.

Course, we probably just get uploaded to a floating spherical hard-drive with spotty virtual wi-fi.

On the Shake Shack in Korea topic, when my K-pop band played in New Jersey last year one of the few things the members said to the audience from the stage in English was "we had Shake Shack burgers and they were really good."

Another random interjection from me: I just read an obituary where the names are so generational, I had to share.

Deceased and his cohort: Ted, Martha, Joan, Lyndon
His children and their spouses: William, Cheryl, Susanna, Stephen
His grandchildren: Aster, Gardner, Wyatt

I mean, right?

For my afterlife, I'm betting on either nothingness/unawareness or transcendent union with the universe/knowledge of the cosmos. Anything else seems so clunky and constructed, not what I'd expect from divine cosmic awareness. If there is anything after death, I expect it to be me coming up before the cosmos and being recognized. I see it like finally being able to meet someone whose good opinion you really want but that person will be able to see exactly what kind of person you are. They're not going to throw you into hell or punish you, but you do want their respect and approval. I want to be able to hold my head up and look the universe in the eye at the end of it all.

The classic Catholic conception of Hell is being out of God's presence. As discussed back in my CCD classes, Judgement Day was pretty much like Connie's looking the universe in the eye - getting respect and approval = heaven, not=hell.

I still want my oatmeal that I did not bring to work, but I would settle for a burger.