Proof of a Miracle

I said I do not talk about my religious beliefs too much in an earlier post, but I feel recent events warrant it.

Last Wednesday, my mother recieved a call that left her  pretty sad. I prodded, because I suspected what it might be, and I don't like being left in the dark. She told me our grandma had had a heart attack and was hospitalized. I prepared for the worst, but It did not  sound like she was dead. Friday we went to see her. I assisted my uncle, a Pastor/Rabbi of...well it's a Christian Church that takes those extra jewish parts seriously, in getting my cousin. My uncle told me, granny had fallen into a comma of which there was no hope of getting back from. He told me doctors said her vital signs where not compatible with life. It sounded pretty definitive. I fully expected the next day we'd be disconecting her.

But the next day we did not disconnect her. The next day, she awoke. She started getting better and better.


I know what you're thinking: "Now this religious nut guy is gonna take something that I can probably explain in a few sentences and say it was God that did it". You know what? Maybe it wasn't God. Maybe the machines where wrong. Maybe the Doctor made a mistake, or maybe he wanted to set expectations real low.

My granny's in her 80s. She's gonna die, and probably in not too long a time. So I say, yes, it's entirely possible I did not witness the work of an omnipotent being working behind the veil of what we know as real.

I may never know the reason, but I think I should still say this: Thank you God for helping  my Granma.

Apocalypse Watch: Val Verde

40 years. Plenty of time for it to happen

I don't want to post too much about my faith and stuff, because that's not what this Blog is, was mean to be, or I want it to be about. But...



...Some lady decided to say we are gonna get hit with a Tsunami. Wut?

For those of you who who are Spanish impaired, this nice lady is saying that she got a letter from someone in Venezuela,  who seemingly got a vision from God, where he's saying we've done fucked up now with our Gays and our Baals, and he's sending us the wave, a Tsunami that will apparently reach in as afar as a couple of municipalities/and/or the whole island. And very few will survive.

I'm usually not the kind of guy who believes any prophecy...and I'm not about to start now. People talk for God all the time, because they know  some people are too stupid to see their made up shit. Oh, yeah, this year it's the Tsunami.  "God-through-prophets" has said for years we're gonna get an earthquake/Tsunami/Deadly Hurricane. But I think we should challenge and analyze  prophecy for veracity. The Bible says that, and I'm a terrible Christian.

This? It's full of holes. Apparently God wants us to save  our supplies of Food for the crisis. If the whole island is underwater because of a Tsunami, how is my crushed up remains  supposed to get to  my can of Lima beans? And how come it's us? We've got like a million churches, each more anti-gay than the last. Hell, some of our politicians are trying to make our constitution less gay-friendly. We get a Boys Don't Cry-like crime almost twice every year and the only outrage is from  the Gay movement. Whattaya want, Lord?  What's that?

Kill? You...Oh, CHIIILL.I thought you where ordering me to murder.

Still, it's worth the thought: What's the plan? Sure, there's no plan if it's as dramatic as what she says. I guess, pray a lot and stuff bla bla bla. Sure, it's good for surviving the stuff, maybe. Beyond the prophesy, stuff, though, if our island's whole coast was flooded, we'd be in deep shit. Most of the food and other products we consume are imported, and most of that comes in ships. A flood would probably block the arrival of such necessities as medicine, food, and hairgel(necessary for breeding over here). Within a short span of time life as we know it would be strained. And let me put it this way: We had wounded on a Toy giveaway line. It's safe to say a foodline in here would be catastrophic.

So I need to plan for that.

First, I'm learning as many survivalist skills as possible. I don't want to wait for food, and I probably suck at looting. It's not about having cans of corned beefanyway: I'm gonna have to learn to produce my own food, and I'm hoping it's more in a simple agriculture way than in a "bear grills" kind of way.


Second, I know where to head that the zombies won't find me: the cemetery: My granny has a house that a funeral company built around on. There's land to grow stuff, it isn't too populated, and it's nicely fenced/creepy, which should keep supersticious and cowardly criminals at bay until they run out of bullets. And it's not too far from a river. I don't like not having water. It parches and kills me.

Finally, I'm preparing a backpack with provisions for it. Rope, slingshot and the instructions to starting civilization anew.

Oh, that's right, I'm starting civilization anew.  I know, it's pretty cool.

Note: must learn how to make pants.

See, I think you should see the good in everything, and while island spanning disaster and famine usually don't rank as  good unless you are making a movie inspired by them, it's also an opportunity for quick social ascension. With our government  in tatters and America very likely abandoning us(and how our already crippling debt and endangered credit would fare, I can't fully blame them.), the island would be ripe for rebirth. I will rechristen the new nation Val Verde.

Yes, Val Verde, like the fictional country you've read about that always shows up in movies. Here is our beautiful flag and  and coat of arms.

In Val Verde, my Latin is good.

I'm sure your flag is a blatant ripoff too.

Then there's also the issue of  chain of command.

Royal Fender(This is me)

           |

           |

    ------------------

                                                                      |                           |

                                                        Minister of                  Minister of
                                                     Defense  (my brother)          Offense(my cousin)
                                                           --------The others-----------
                                            

Hey, Megalomania is as good a hobby as any.

But it isn't all  80s action movies in Val Verde. I, being one of the few who remembered how to agriculture shit, will trade small amounts of food for  prelooted furniture and virgins. Hey, I need to repopulate the island, you know? I'm like Abraham, now:Willing to get a little side action going as long as  they'll remember it  was for the greater goodish...

I'll take it! No, just  the chick!

If this sounds really vacuous and nasty as a way to deal with a serious and sad scenario, think of  it like this: If I survive something like the proposed, I'm not doing it so that those who didn't can tell me what to do from their watery raves. And 'sides, it's not any darker than proposing this is God's will for us if it isn't true. Wich is exactly what I fear this lady might be doing. Don't stick your words in God's tongue, kids!

5 parts of the Book of Exoddus that never make it into movies

You want some? Come get some!

Movies about the Bible have been done to death( and ressurection). Built in audience aside, this stories are often ripe for adaptations, full of good, evil and interpretation of both. And probably none more so than Exodus.

You know this story. A group of people are slaves in a foreign land, until  one of them becomes  part of the ruling class by accident. Eventually, the oppression of his people becomes too much for him and he decides to help them out, leading them to the only good land in a really shitty desert region  promised land..

Swampy isn't holy.

But not all parts of this story are iconic enough to be made believable as films, no matter how much Charlton Heston is Moses and Ralph Fiennes is Pharaoh. Some of them are straight up unadaptable. Such as...

5 God was trolling the Israelites

 So Moses shows up and tries to convince Pharaoh to let his people go after 3 or  4 plagues. And Pharaoh's got half a mind to let them go, too. And wouldn't you? How many frogs would you need in your house to convince you to higher powers are in the works?

But then God had to intervene. scripture says he "Hardened Pharaoh's Heart" so he would not let the Israelites go.

This is what it looked like on the animated version

God's motives are unclear. What is clear is that Old Testament God wanted this to play out exactly like it did.Obviously, in a movie, you can't have  God in a movie telling you on  one half to struggle for freedom, and on the other half making it difficult. It's like Arnie giving Predator weapons.

4 Moses had a speech impediment

I think we can safely say that if Moses was a real  man, he probably looked nothing like the movies would portray him to be. The Bible tells us nothing of his looks, and we are left to speculate how awesome his beard is.

Awesome!

But we can know, though, that  Moses had trouble talking. When God shows up to him as a burning bush and tells Moses to go free his people, Moses replies back that he can't talk for shit.

Less Awesome, somewhat.

We don't know if it was a stutter, or stage fright or didn't know the language. Maybe He had aspergers. I don't think he's lying, though, because he is later assisted in talking publicly by his brother Aaron. Which is why this won't make it into movies. Moses has to be the star, and he can't be if Aaron is the one who gets to say the cool things.

3 Moses stuffed the idol  down the Israelites throats

Moses came from a mountain where he had just died from seeing God, and man, he probably felt great. And God had given him this awesome stone tablets with commandments for a better life. A better world. It's hard to ruin a day like that, but the Israelites totally did.

When Moses came back, shit had degenerated to Courtney Love levels. Every kind of sin on the tablets was happening especially idolaty of golden statues. I think at this point Moses realized it the hard part WASN'T done, and he was going to have to deal with gold idols for a long time.

You may have heard Moses crushed the tablets of the law in anger. What you may not have heard is that he fed the gold idol it into a soup and fed it to his fellow desert-dwellers.


I don't think anyone would want to see Israelites eat grounded gold. I'm sure that has some symbolism of some sort, but hey, way the economy is going, maybe we soon oughta make and eat some Idols.

2 Moses Wasn't allowed to get to get to the promised land

After a talking to and a  nice dinner as seen above, it was well time the Israelites got to wander the desert for 40 years until they found the promised land. And they all got there. All of them except for Moses.


See, Moses I think by this point, had built some rage. God told him to speak to a rock to make water, but instead hit it with his staff.

That was a no-no.  So God told him if he was gonna rage, he better GTFO.

Moses

Not gonna see this on film. Because  this as an ending would have Mist like proportions. Think about it: escape assasination at birth, grow up royal, give up royalty to free your people, successfully free them, part the seas, look at Yahweh's face...then he kinda fucked it all up because he woke up angry that day
.

1 God wanted a do-over

It really happened. God wanted to kill everyone of His people, but Moses convinced him his street cred was at stake.

'Course, Mose's idea for the situation wasn't entirely peace and love, either.

See, this is what kills it. Most movies have pretty clear cut heroes. The idea that the one who is liberating you is willing to kill you off if you cross him is hard to sell on an movie. But you can't make an omelet without wiping a few eggshells from the book of life, right? So maybe the next 4 hour long epic film about the good book will have a little less characterizing, and a lot more Old Testament God fury.