So I was working one weekend. It's early Saturday evening, and this junior officer comes in. He has a reservation. Good for him. He's a fairly older captain, probably commisioned from the ranks, or just can't cut it as a Senior O, I'm assuming the latter...
I hand him his keys and (joke starts here) he opens his mouth to speak.
"I forgot my boots at home. Is there anyway I can procure any here?"
I put on the fake sympathetic look. "Yeah, base supply, they'll be open on Monday."
"My flight leaves tomorrow morning."
I say nothing. My face is expressionless. Inside my head, I'm saying "That's great." In a sarcastic deadpan tone. And then he does something which I think they teach all the cadets in officer school when they can't get their way, because this isn't the first time: His eyes widen far wider than some of my asian friends could widen their eyes. I widen my eyes with him because my particular brand of asian doesn't have that problem. His widened eyes stare into mine long enough to make me think he wants me to take off my boots... Sorry buddy, you couldn't fill my boots. I cock my head forward in the "not my problem" posture and wait for a response. He finally breaks the silence.
"Is there a duty officer?"
"Yeah."
I give him the number. It seems like every junior officer is trained to be passive-aggressive too. They're like the yuppies of the military. But generally, only the good ones (the ones without a superiority complex) make it past captain. Thank God.
So he's on the phone, telling his sob story to another apathetic individual. After a few m-hms and uh-huhs, he says, "Well, that's what the military has come to hasn't it?" In an irritated condescending voice.
He hangs up and I pretend to ignore the annoyed look on his face, and then he opens his mouth again, as if he hasn't established his shitbirdiness (shitbird is an actual military term by the way, you can ask me what it means).
"Eight to Four. That's what the military has come to." He says to me as I'm working my weekend evening shift. I say nothing to avoid dignifying his statement.
As he walks away, a smirk finally creeps onto my face. Damn, that was hard trying not to laugh.
A message to this shitbird and all future shitbirds: The military doesn't serve you, it serves the people, and you serve the military, ergo you serve the people. Now, how the hell do you expect to serve the people when you forget your boots at home?!? hahahahaha *sigh*
Thirty minutes later, he comes back. He found his boots. Great! Does he apologize to me? Of course not, he just wanted to let me know so I wouldn't be up all night worrying about him flying without boots on.
Would you want somebody who misplaces his boots flying your airplanes?!?
*sigh* hahahaa *cough cough* hahahahaha *sigh, deep breath* hahahahaha *snore*
Disclaimer: The preceeding story is fictional and is intended for entertainment purposes only. Any similarities to actual persons or actual events is entirely coincidental.
There, now I can't get fired. =D
Wonder what I do for a living? I often ask myself the same question. It's kinda like meteorology in the sense that you can get paid pretty well and not really know what you're doing.
This anigif has nothing to do with what I'm going to talk about, I just thought it was funny...
I'm going to talk about God and the Bible now. omgwtflol
This snippet of the Bible is found in the first three gospels:
Then John's disciples came and asked him, "How is it that we and the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?" Jesus answered, "How can the guests of the bridegroom mourn while he is with them? The time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them; then they will fast."
Then he tells this parable:
"No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment, for the patch will pull away from the garment, making the tear worse. Neither do men pour new wine into old wineskins. If they do, the skins will burst, the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new wineskins, and both are preserved."
For a long time, I've never really understood why the writers decided to include this parable, because it didn't really make sense. Something seemed wrong. The idea of Jesus talking about wine and being very knowledgable about it, and the fact that most churches look down upon the consumption of alcohol. Very confusing. I'm not here, to discuss my beliefs in drinking either, I just wanted to discuss the meaning of Jesus' parable.
The Kingdom of Heaven is like this (this is what Jesus says to explain things, but I'm not Jesus, I'm just explaining): We are the wineskins, and Jesus is the wine, or more accurately, the new kingdom he is bringing in. We need to be like new wineskins, flexible, adaptable, to hold the new kingdom he is bringing in. The old covenant worked for that time, but Jesus brought in a new policy to supercede that covenant and more.
In context, Jesus was addressing the Jews, but I think it's still relevant today, because I see a lot of that rigidness Jesus saw in the Jews back then in the church I see today.
So what am I getting at? Well, like the video I posted earlier and deleted (if you want to see it, ask me I'll send you the link), the crazy fundamentalist lady had gone too rigid, and thankfully, will eventually burst. It would be fine as an anecdote, but unfortunately, it's a common symptom. In North America, it's so hard to be a Christian, because Jesus talks about releasing the captives. Our society is not based on slavery and we're not imprisoned by a tyrant (some would beg do differ, lol), so it's hard to imagine why we need Jesus at all. In our society, hard work can replace prayer, so why pray at all? "You just have to want it hard enough."
Despite all this, I think the gospel is still relevant, we just need to repackage it in ways people will understand. We need to touch on other issues Jesus talked about, like loving your neighbour, which is the same as loving God. Simple things like that. Can you imagine how it would be if everybody put others before themselves? There wouldn't be anymore traffic accidents, that's for sure.
I spoke with a friend last night over msn after he watched the video of the crazy lady. Went something like this:Neil: don't worry about that old woman, she's just a crazy lady... i'm prolly gonna take down the vid when i post again
Tim: it's intense
N: yeah, i just don't wanna give the crazy lady anymore publicity
T:yeah. "you have sinned away your day of grace" that sounds like forgiveness
N: yeah i don't really think much about it what she says
T: yeah. that's what happens when people pick and choose the parts of the bible they like and make a theology out of it... it's pretty scarry actually
N: well... isn't that how denominations started?
T: yeah, and cults
N: i'm starting to think more and more of the bible as a guideline rather than a bible... kind of like a map for navigating rather than a single direction compass
T: yeah, that's the way I look at it. you can't take every word at face value, you have to find the essence and try and live by that. otherwise you get become legalistic, and annoying to me.
N: now i know how to annoy you, awesomeOkay, what I said was pretty cliché sounding if not actually cliché. But I really meant it. In conclusion, I will end with this cliché: I believe that God puts us exactly where He wants us to be. We don't need to become missionaries and go overseas and "save souls". Let's fix ourselves before we try to fix others.
So I went to a wedding yesterday and let me tell you:
No open bar + No dancing = Neil with ADD.
Menno weddings are torture I swear. When I get married, I WILL have an open bar, and I WILL have music for dancing. This I promise. And no, we will not play butterfly kisses, Tim. I promise. Pinky in my eye swear promise. But you're not invited, so it doesn't matter.
For PDAs, one must sing karaoke from a list of songs I have personally selected, which are, of course, all from the 80s. Filipino's know how to do it up hardcore like it's one thousand nine hundred and ninety nine. Not like those shiftless mennonites (I still don't understand this reference btw).
For transportation, I was thinking of riding away on a motorcycle, but I dunno how it would work without getting her dress stuck in the machina and such... Perhaps a tear-off mini-skirt deal or something... Details...
Anyway, that's all that happened this weekend, my dad is out of town, so I save a bit of money this year. That, and I have a new favourite movie. I also have a new-found respect for corn on the cob.
NACHOOOOOOOO!!
I'm at work... I only had 2-3 hours of sleep. Perhaps it's because I closed last night and I opened today. Perhaps it's my cough that kept me awake. Perhaps watching a Clint Eastwood movie from the 80's at 4am has me wired. Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps...
I've got the fever. FIFA fever. South Korean FIFA fever. I was heartbroken four years ago, not when they lost a chance at the finals to Germany, but during their consolation match; where they allowed Turkey an easy goal due to their unattentiveness. This match was where, as most know (and if you don't, call me so I can kick you in the groin), was the match that recorded that fastest goal in history. HISTORY. Gawd. I've always loved watching the gooks play though. They're amazing. You should see them when they play an african team full of large black men. They run circles around them. It's like that old NES hockey game where you could pick between fat guys and skinny guys. I saw this news report on CNN about the phenomenon that is the FIFA fever and how it has saturated the news. And it seemed that these yankees didn't understand why soccer is such a big deal. Well, it isn't that big of a deal, really. It's just a game, just like their beloved baseball. But this game will be watched by 2.5 billion people at any one time. I suppose they're just scared of what they don't understand. God knows I'm scared of baseball. Anyway, I've got the fever. And the only prescription is more cowbell FIFA World Cup!
I've been really irritable lately. I'm still managing to hide it at work. I guess it's because we've been having such amazing weather the past couple weeks and I've been sick and in bed the whole time. Work is definitely a factor, which I won't elaborate on. Ultimate is bothering me too these days. I'm pretty disappointed. I know a few of my teammates read this blog but oh well. Just bear in mind that the title of this post is my disclaimer. I know we're playing in a higher division this year, and we come out strong during the second half of every game, but we never come up with a win. I think we could have easily beaten most of the teams we've played so far, but we keep making stupid mistakes. It's really frustrating. Normally I'm laid back, but I want to play really well too. I don't mind losing really, as long as I know we played our best. But we haven't been, and it just adds insult to injury. I promise you dear readers on my ultimate team that I will play my heart out every game. But we should set up some tune-up matches or something haha.
I'm also feeling a lot better. Thanks so much to those who have kept me in their prayers. No more sore throat, just hacking up brown/greenish goo every morning. FUN!
Billy Talent's new album is coming out this month. I'm excited. You can demo a couple of their new singles on their myspace. (click on the image) 
Pretty gewd!
Also, I have all this week off, so if anybody wants to come over and watch the world cup with me, I'm sure we'll have a grand time. Just give me a call or send me an email! Except you, Janet. You have school work. And I don't like you. HAHA! KEEDING!!!
