Cough, sniffle...Want to hear a song?

Things I got out of camp:
1. 3rd place in soulwinning certificate (wow what a shock)
2. Lots of lessons learned
3. PRAYER for my many NWOs
4. Determination to fight
5. A TERRIBLE FEVER.

Things I lost at camp.
1. My toothbrush. :(

Byebye

So here I am at 6:30, wearing my coat, hearing car doors opening and closing outside, waiting for SHUPPATSU. Camp should be fun.
I'll attend with Gabe, Mark, AND Steve. At least I'll be well-preserved.
Mark's like "Yeah, we'll make sure you don't do anything foolish!" Gee...*grumble*
And then I realized that growing up is all about doing foolish things.
ROLL THE GOLD, BABY.

I can hear a bottle...

El and I tried something today. El donned her busted, taped-together, crooked glasses and we strode out into Shizuoka to go provisioning contact lenses.
I'm SO not a provisioner. Lord help me...I do not see it on the horizon.
I had this dream of being a provisioner. I always wanted to be...the kind of person who has no limits on her faith, just goes out there and expects that, if it's the Lord's will, it will be done! I tried to clear my heart of all my sins before I went so that I wouldn't have any reason to wonder if we didn't do well.
So we get off the train and there's these people right outside the eki passing out pamphlets for contacts.
Sign? Sign?
Hey, you know what's really distressing about that whole sign thing? There's actually no such thing as a "GO" sign...only a "STOP" sign. What's up with that?
So we go to the first place, all geared up for action, claiming the keys and using the weapon of praise, and the sekininsha is not there.
Great.
So we go to the next one. Long long walk, following map.
Sekininsha not there.
HELP! Someone is rounding up SEKININSHA'S EVERYWHERE and taking them to a far far away land!
So we're like, great, now we're out of places. Walking dejectedly back we see another sign proclaiming in loud...words. "CONTACT LENSES"
So we enter triumphantly, figuring it must be a sign (no, really?) and we ask for the sekininsha. WHAT DO YOU KNOW? He's there!
This young twerp comes sauntering out and we talk with him for an entire, what was it El, 5 minutes or something?
And we realize we don't know how to say the word "DONATE". What??? What kind of disciples are we that we can live without knowing how to speak the word "DONATE." That's like...elementary living for God language!
Nevertheless, the man did promise perscription disposable contacts, and did say something about replacing El's scratched contact lenses.
All in all...it was ALMOST inspiring. I'm not sure we understood him right, and that, to me, is an even MORE frightening thought.
But we'll be seeing him again.
Thank the Lord for his little miracles. And if it turns out to be a closed door...at least we broke our bottles.

STEM

So my brother finally wrapped up the project: Recycled.
Mash took it upon herself to be his publicist, and produced this fine piece of work.
Steve wasn't very cooperative, I daresay. So if you think you're going to find a dripping, sensational expose, you'll be disappointed. But it is very Steve. Very Steve.
Knock yourself out.

(Recycled, minus a few bonus tracks, will be available for download somewhere between now and the beginning of November.)

I want to be more...I need to be more...

I no longer see my blog as an art-form.
My entries have been becoming progressively more dead-pan and distanced from my actual life.

I had so much of a desire to keep you away from the confusing things. Life isn't simple for me...because I think too much. It's a temptation to use my blog as another medium for thoughts. But I've tried not to.
I didn't want to talk about other people...
And I didn't want to blog about my day.
It left me nothing to blog about but love and hate--
You'd think that being an extremist I'd have a lot of idiosyncracies. Well, I don't.
I like to feel comfortable with things. I like to tell myself I don't have a problem with it. I reason myself out of irrational love or hatred for anything because it annoys me when other people do it. It doesn't seem to be very calculated.
So I don't know how I happened...or how I ever thought a blog was a good idea.

It's funny how everyone who starts a blog thinks they're making a page that's worth something. Whether you have high-hopes or faltering ones, everyone wishes they could stand out, be something new--different--known--appreciated.
And there are thousands of blogs in the world. You'd think people would learn.
I'm accepting the fact that I am a speckle of dust. My blog is my place for me to be me...but no one wants to see me.

Don't listen to the Enemy when he tells you to "be yourself". Are you kidding? No one wants to see you, and if they say they do they're lying through their teeth...they're attacks of the Enemy trying to appeal to your pride! All the world really wants to see is more of Jesus! That's what they need, and that's what you're here to show them. --D.B.B (wise old man)

A speckle of dust--my biggest potential is to pass into the light and reflect the Lord.

You must make the decision to forsake all. This means forsaking not only the material...but also yielding to Me the thing that is difficult to yield, the thing that Satan desires to control--your mind, your thoughts, your own ideas, your own intellect.

Help.

Sinfest

Tatsuya Ishida rocks.

You know how when rock stars play the guitar they make all sorts of funny faces cuz they're really into it? Well, when I draw I do the same thing. When I sketch I got that easy breezy too cool for school look. When I do inks I whip out my focus face, all intense and burning with concentration.
When I mess up I get the angry Sh*t-I-F**ked-Up-Now-I-Gotta-Use-White-Out Scowl. Very sexy. Sometimes I get that pained expression when I'm doing ultra fine detail work. As I gear up for the big finish my strokes get quicker and quicker, my eyes bug out, my hair explodes like Yahoo Serious, I'm totally insane. Energies reach their breaking point. I can taste the final crescendo as it all comes together, all my skill and talent, my genius, my love, my truth, laid out there on what was once a clean white sheet of paper. Spent, I sit back, light a cigarette, wipe away the last remaining bits of eraser dust and purr, "Was it good for you too?"

-T.

I get it.

I knew I would get it good for the butt picture. And yet,
I marvel at the extent and gravity of your evil (not so) subtleties...
How dare you exploit my weaknesses to your vile ends!!
Good thing you never sign out of Blogger (I know your password anyway)
Damage control, damage control...
YAAAAARGGGHHH!!!! Shall I restart the cycle?

My eyes hurt

Today I uncovered a city of buried treasure.
A certain ancient pentium 0.0 computer was pulled out of its blanket of dust and plugged into a monitor this morning. Danny wanted a computer, and so Dan and I decided to forsake our antiquated one. It was basically mine, as it was chock full of a bunch of text files that belonged to me--stories, poems, thoughts; some things I remember and other things I don't.
So I was just going through them. It was wonderful. I had this entire Fantasy world that came flooding back to me as I consumed pages and pages of Tirim, my very own Fantasy story--fabricated at age 11 and completely mutated on into 14 until its final abandonment. But I remembered everything, it all came back to me--maps, people, places, languages, history...it was so real.
Heh. Funny.

And I found this.

Rhythm and rhyme
Plait the way
Melt like time
Wet the day
Choose the guarded
Guard the high
Take the easy
Live the lie

Blogger Appreciation Day

I propose a blogger appreciation day.
Say, October...sometime. Or anytime between now and then or thereafter.
And I propose everyone join in.
With like...testimonials on the bloggers they know and have met. I first met her... She cried cause I was leaving... He had this dog... etc.
Yo.

Just...just...indulge me. Just...make me happy.

Loving the Lord pt 2

Okay so to chronicle more of my Loving Jesus expeditions,
I went out and bought myself this tiny hard-cover book wherein I am scribbling love-notes to Jesus. I'm not very spontaneous with my expressions, out loud anyway, so I have a hard time sitting there thinking of things to say without repeating the age old "I love you Lord, thank you for everything you do for me, Lord--" and I wanted to get comfortable calling the Lord some things other than "Lord"...if you know what I mean. That's how it is in my prophecy book too, all the way through. "Lord," this and that "Lord," this and that. The Lord--uhh, make that...Jesus-- must be annoyed.
So yes, this is where my notebook comes in handy. I sit down with a trusty pen in hand and scrawl out pictures and sentences and one-word praises and prayers to the Lord. It's kinda corny and artsy, like something I'd do with my husband.
But anyway.
I started writing this prayer and it came out exactly like the culmination of every single cliche praise kiss I've ever heard throughout my life. It was SOOO cliche...just so...normal. But then I realized it's okay, because those were the things that were ACTUALLY entering my head, things I actually wanted to say. And what does the Lord care if they're cliche or not? They're the first time for ME, and that's all that matters. Heh.
I will get the hang of it. I promise.
All that said, be happy for me.

PS: Thanks to Elaina the Clever, all of our posts will now be two days ahead...(until we can redeem ourselves. I expect it will take a few posts.)

Bye bye

Think
about
it.

Imagine, you're a cool dude living in the whateverth century before "bye bye" was heard for the first time, and you were perfectly suave and voyeuristic with your "goodbye" and felt like a total gentleman.
And you hear people start saying "bye bye"...and you shake your head in dismay. Groupies, trendy nerds, the present-day equivalent of idiots that say "Yo" and "dawg".

How far have the mighty fallen.

What's in store for us?
Think about the terms you absolutely detest, and then imagine everyone using them a few decades from now.

Power! Pleasure!

ISn't it groovy how you can mess with the times and dates of the posts?
Here I am in Oct 12th. Where are you? HAHA!
I think I feel a little omnipotent!

Sacrifices

Mark left one week ago with a bed-head and an extravagant amount of goatee.
Mark is coming home tomorrow with close-cropped hair and a naked face.
In his own optimistic words: "I look like a twelve year old!"
Can you see it?
Do I want to see it?

So like I said sometime before, somewhere, to someone, I'm single-momming it for a bit, and growing a profound respect for those mommies who do it everyday. I am a whiny wimp, I bow before your motherdom.
Michelle this week hs been a frightful combination of insecure and overly familiar. Any parent or childcare enthusiast knows the distastefulness of that concoction.
Yesterday while I was taking down Mark's laundry (yes, I'm THAT behind...go ahead and cluck your tongue) she pointed to a T-shirt and observed that it was Daddy's. When I held it up to show her, she said "Hug?" I draped the shirt around her and she stood there for an impossibly long time with her nose buried in it and her eyes closed. Sheeeesh! Whatta Daddy's girl...
Here she is, for real, sleeping with his "Ahtashay".



I oughtta sell this one to Gatsby

Shiojiri to Yaizu

His need for speed


Some kinda inside joke


Had our fill of this


Fluoride rifles through...my wallet!?


HI FLO! CHEEEZE! Oh boy. I'm gonna pay...


Sexy toe sox, just for David

Witnessing Thrills

I am just so overcome with a euphoric happiness that I must exude it someplace.
You see, I love witnessing. It is a new high for me.
I marvel at how disgustingly proud I used to be, never venturing into the unknown where there was no guarantee for my sophisticated and wonderful Japanese. I found myself explaining this in Japanese to one of our Active Members the other day. I told her I used to be so proud that I would avoid topics of conversation wherein I didn't think I would be able to express myself with properly cultured and fluent Japanese. And you should've heard me trying to say that. Seriously, that is one hard concept to relay in Japanese. But she understood me, Praise God.
The other day I said stuff like,"When you ask Jesus into your heart, he breaks the chains and sets you free from conventions and your perception of reality, he sets you free to be his friend!" And I amazed myself. Wow, I'm waxing lyrical in Japanese! It's only JESUS!

And I had this conversation with another Active Member the other day. It's slightly humorous. Just slightly.
Me: You get such thrills from serving Jesus!
Her: Why don't you get thrills from living for yourself?
Me: Well I guess Jesus gives you those thrills. You can't give yourself those thrills.
Her: Yes you can thrill yourself, if you're selfish.
Me: But it's never as fun to have him thrill you as it is to thrill yourself!
Her (giggles): Yeah yeah, that's true.
Me (continuing blindly): He knows how to thrill you better than you know how to thrill yourself. Cause he knows you inside better than you know yourself inside.
Her (totally laughing): Yeah yeah yeah!
And I think she was trying to get me to stop.
I seriously think I traversed some completely unintentional route of thought.

But anyway, I've been actually looking forward to going out personal witnessing. Talking with people used to be a trial for me, but it so isn't anymore. Going up to people out of the blue and striking up conversations with them, I was NEVER able to do that, until now.

Thanks.

HURRAH

I voted for the first time today. Officially, anyway.
I forget what I voted for. But it's the voting that matters.
Look out world, I've got a VOICE!

Kingdom of Heaven

So we saw Kingdom of Heaven last night.
It could've been better. But it definitely wasn't bad.
The leper king sparked interest in me. It really truly was remarkable how he managed to rule a kingdom as a righteous fellow despite such a rivoting disease. Why he was so loyal to his people that he tried his best as a ruler even when the disease was so painful...and on up until it took his life?
Some people just have what it takes.

It was interesting how everyone considers the movie's best features to be about the relations between Christians and Muslims...and how we should all just get along. If I hadn't heard and expected that theme, I would've said its defining conclusion was that of religious hypocrasy. It was interesting to me how the church of that day made God into such a distant entity...not like humans at all. Cold and legalistic, heartless and really rather disinterested in mankind. That was the most thought-provoking point for me; not all the babble about how Muslims and Christians are both the good guys. They even paid such careful attention to NOT make the Muslim kings look bad--because that was the point they were trying to make. Yeah sure, but anyone who wants Jerusalem bad enough to kill everyone for it has good and bad motives that cancel eachother out.
The ending was humble and happy.

Anyway.

Loving the Lord

Love the Lord with all thy heart, all thy soul, and all thy mind.
What exactly does that mean? All? That's a pretty stiff word.
I definitely use my mind for at least 99% of my own thoughts. I'd venture a slim 1% of thinking that I dedicate to the Lord. It makes me feel slimy.
I've never known how to manipulate my soul...but heck, it belongs to the Lord. I don't know what it's doing.
And my heart.
I want to love the Lord, I really do. I feel lonely and I want to have him close to me. I feel confused and I want to have him comfort me. I want him to be that person that's there when I have no one else. But how?

The Lord recently showed me that I've got to think about him more, like I'm talking to him throughout the day. Just talk...have a conversation. Say something and have him say something back. I tried it today, and it definitely isn't a habit yet, but whilst I hung laundry and fried an egg, prepared a bible class and cleaned my room, I had some pretty good conversations with the Lord. I think that's the key to making him a part of my life.
In general, I'd like to know how to strive for it more--really falling in love with the Lord.

How did you do it?