reach out and touch faith

My wife bought the above painting at a yard sale last Saturday. My first reaction upon seeing it was "Jesus was a human resources director?"

After some consideration, though, I realized that it made a lot of sense...

Good afternoon, please have a...no, no, you don't need to kneel or indulge in glossolalia, honest...please, have a seat.

Now you may be wondering why I wanted to meet with you. It's about your conduct as a member of this organization. I've reviewed your performance records and it seems to me that your actions frequently contradict our core precepts.

What? You say you've only been following what's in the employee handbook? Ah, I see. The thing is that when we were a small start up in the Levant, we never imagined the eventual scope or longevity of our operations, and so there's a lot of things in the manual that weren't meant to be taken outside very specific cultural and historical contexts. Because I was otherwise occupied at the time, the actual task of writing fell upon subcontractors, and their individual biases are reflected in the finished product.

And don't even get me started about the translation errors, my friend.

Confusing minutae aside, however, the handbook is very clear about the essence of our mission statement -- pacifism, forgiveness, forbearance, and compassion -- none of which seem to be reflected in your behavior as member of this organization.

Militarism? "Prosperity Gospel?" A rush to pass harsh judgement upon others? Turning spirituality into a pyramid scheme?

Really? This is really what you think we're supposed to be about, you id---

...

I'm sorry, forgive me. Occasionally my temper gets the best of me. (Just ask the moneylenders.) Be that as it may, it seems that your self-righteous fixation on details and has led you to overlook our actual mission statement, the "spirit," if you will, of what we actually stand for. In doing so, you have -- either intentionally or not -- propagated a creed that is fundamentally opposed to ours.

Even worse, you've presumed to do so in both my name and the name of this organization.

Though it pains me to do so, I must hand you this official reprimand. Think upon your mistakes and learn from them.

Go in peace.

Yeah, Jesus is quite the softie, unlike his father, who'd bring down plagues and lightning bolts on anyone caught accessing MySpace on company time.

King Missile - Jesus Was Way Cool (from Mystical Shit, 1990) - The Gospel According To That One Stoner That Shows Up At Every College Party.

Depeche Mode - Personal Jesus (from Violator, 1990) - The Song Guaranteed To Be Played At Every College Party That One Stoner Shows Up At (Also, "Love Shack" and "She Sells Sanctuary". I'm not dating myself at all.)

all is not lost, not yet

Well, wish in one hand and crap in the other and see which one piles up first. - Mike Nelson

I wish I knew what was up with Super Lumina's right front tire.

I wish there was a presidential candidate I could vote for without feeling like I've compromised my principles.

I wish I could take a month off of work to catch up on the massive backlog of books, movies, videogames, and household projects that has built up over the past couple years.

I wish the Pepi the feral cat would let me get close enough to see if there is something wrong with his (or her; most likely "her") teeth.

I wish I could find a decent Wordpress template that fits Armagideon Time's needs without requiring massive modification.

I wish I knew what box my Psychotronic film guides got packed up into.

I wish I was immortal and indestructable.

I wish my gut could properly process whole milk.

I wish the health insurance people would send me the last piece of paperwork I need to file my taxes.

I wish I could find Marmalade, the orange twenty-pound feral cat, a good home.

I wish that comeuppance would come to those in need of it.

I wish I had the time to get a haircut, so I wouldn't have to see a rough facsimile of the Wild Angels-era Peter Fonda every time I looked in the mirror.

I wish my wishes were as witty and creative as the ones in this excellent track...

King Missile - I Wish (from The Way to Salvation, 1991)

come on down to the devil’s armpit

I spent most of the morning and early afternoon trying to complete my list of Saturday chores, an endeavor made much more difficult by atmospheric conditions I can only describe as gross. I don’t know what the heck has been going on with the weather these past few days. The temperature hasn’t been too oppressive, but the levels of humidity in the air have been obscene. Even the smallest physical exertions have become exercises in stickiness (and stinkiness), and it has conspired with the record high pollen levels to maintain a steady, low level sinus headache pulsing behind my eyes.

My cats have the right idea for dealing with the current conditions. The entire brood has been stretched out and sprawled out around the house like so many clocks in a Dali painting for most of the day. I’ve been alternating between naps in the air conditioned bedroom and perspiration-heavy bouts of scrubbing, sweeping, and polishing, all the while keeping an eye on what’s shaking meteorologically. From yesterday afternoon through the present time, there’ve been hints of an incoming front, but apart from some scattered showers and distant rumbles of thunder, no real relief has materialized. It currently feels like the barometric pressure has dropped a bit, but it could just be Mother Nature toying around with my expectations again.

The experience has got me to thinking about my middle teens, when, hell or high water, I would embark on a bike trip to the comic shop in Stoneham every Saturday to pick up the new releases. Rain, lightning, high winds, blinding migraines, or that one time I slipped off the seat and crushed my jewels on the crossbar – nothing could prevent me from making the six mile round trip to find out what was going to happen in the next issue of Crisis on Infinite Earths.

Now I can’t even be bothered to do an internet search to find a synopsis of the current hot event title, much less rally myself in pursuit of some free stuff. Oh, how those fires of youthful enthusiasm have dimmed…

The March Violets – Steam (from Natural History, 1984; collected on The Botanic Verses, 2001) – Higlander wrote about the Violets a couple months back and provided some nice links for those interested in this rather underappreciated (in the U.S.) band. Non-goth enthusiasts might remember the name of the band from the Some Kind of Wonderful soundtrack, to which they contributed a baffling cover of the Rolling Stones’ “Miss Amanda Jones.”

Camper Van Beethoven – The Humid Press of Days (from Key Lime Pie, 1989) – Do you remember college rock radio? I remember the marketing push for this album on its release – the posters, the t-shirts, the endless repeat plays on music store soundsystems – but I was too busy buying lousy hardcore albums to care.

Hey, look at that! Tornado warnings in the next county over! Mother Nature, you're so naughty...