No more crying babies!

this thought occurred to me a few days(?...) ago.  Will humanity continue to procreate in Heaven?  I get the impression the answer is "no".  As to why humans are continuing to multiply, I have no clue.  Also, I was wondering how in the presence of God I would be asking "Why did you create Hell?"  I think when I finally meet God face to face, this knowledge will be clear.  When I am free from sin and I am finally able to fully see my sins the way God sees them, I will probably hug God and say "thanks".  I guess a non-believer in Heaven is kind of like giving CPR to someone whose been ran over by a train.
This environment, where most jobs are more emotionally tiring than physically tiring and myself and many others have no job and still have income, it's easy to fall victim to laziness.  As a side note, I think it's funny that fast food, apart from much higher paying and much scarcer jobs such as lumber jacking and construction, is one of the most physically demanding jobs.  It's good that young folks get to experience it, now more than ever, since video games have so deeply transported the minds of young folk to realms inconceivable by the couch with which their rumps rest firmly unto...
Uh...anyway;
My last couple posts have been whiny...I am impatient.  I am new to all this, and I need to accept that and continue on.  I don't think I will preach to anybody today.  Unless this counts.  Nobody asks me questions.  I held the door open for a young-looking lady who had taken a cart from outside Dollar General and was heading to its threshold.  She was grateful, it seemed.  She didn't ask about my faith.  I guess that's how it goes.  I'm wearing a St. Baldrick's t-shirt.  I didn't buy it or ask someone to buy it for me.  My mom got it from her participation in the St. Baldrick's fundraising campaign and it doesn't fit her.  Somebody asking my wallet or my keychain, which are usually hidden in my pocket, might inquire about my interest in GHOSTBUSTERS.  My wallet is plain as ass and my keychain says GHOSTBUSTERS: THE VIDEO GAME.  It was actually free and I walked by it without noticing.  My sister did notice and practically scolded me like "What's happening to you?"  As a 6(?) year old, I spotted a Stay Puft Marshmallow Man AM/FM radio that was located waaaay on the other end of the aisle...somehow I ended up owning it and was displeased with its function as a radio (crappy reception all the way), but was nonetheless wowed by its inception and concurrent construction.  It was like a platform for the adorable Mr. Stay Puft to stand on.  If it were a little bigger, I could have maybe got the 4 guys a while later from a yard sale or thrift store, which I did eventually (circa 1995 or so) and stand them on there ready to provoke 'im to breathe fire...those days are gone, and my eyesight is following suit or so my mother tells me.
Hmm.
Maybe tomorrow I can do more.  Maybe not.  I don't think it would make sense to get a job.  I have held firm in the belief that there a very few positions if any that would consider me an asset.  If I wasn't too slow moving for a particular line of work, my lack of social skill and interest in such would probably get me canned.  I don't know.  I might feel differently later...I get the impression that God looks out for his people in order of their level of passion.  My passion level for everything is low.  My history of sin is high.  My motivation for money and material objects is moderate, steered by habit more than anything else...much of that needs to change.  Weather it will or not, only God can say...if I listen...which I don't (yet?) know how to...another thing that needs to change.  Or so as I understand it...

Inside/Out

My pastor's sermon this morning has made me wonder how blessed I really am...I live a very comfortable life...I have no job, and I get bored often because of that but I have a bed, money to buy a bed if it breaks down (although it would take a while to save up for...), food to eat (plenty of it)...
It was detailing SECOND TIMOTHY, in particular the 4 things Paul told Timothy that he needed to know before finishing what Paul was called to do.  One of those 4 things was to expect persecution.  I don't think I've ever been persecuted, but I also have not been spreading the Gospel.  I don't really spread anything, really, except perhaps the feeling of eeriness when I step outside to check my mail once or twice a day...("Look, that shut in is doing his mail checking ritual!")
I go for walks, not so much lately, mostly alone as I don't have any walking companions and everyone I see is in their car.  There's scattered folk who are on their way to and from a car, but what am I supposed to do?  Stop them and ask if they've heard the Good News?
I guess I could apply for a job... I don't think anybody would mind...except me, obviously...and the government would --I think--"punish" me for working...obviously if I make my own money, I don't need "the tax payers" (whoever they are...when you consider how much of the Federal budget is going toward interest and paying down debt that keeps growing + past and present gov't employees & the secret service, I don't think taxpayers are *yet* feeling the load of the government's spending in any area.) help...the question is if I couldn't hold down a job, would I have to re-apply for SSI or would it simply resume where it left off soon after being fired for the last time?  I'm afraid to ask anybody that works in the gov't...I guess I might not end up homeless per se, but even if I did, or would, then wouldn't that enable me to spread the word to people more likely to receive it?  People with something to lose seem more apt to discard God and His Word.  The more they have to lose, the more apt...which brings me back to my initial concern...how blessed am I, really?  I guess I have a choice...but I have to decide...I don't think the Holy Spirit will make the choice for me...

New Life, or what?

I'm still settling into my New Life, rather uneasily.  I'm glad to have embraced The Word rather than trying to defy it, but I sometimes wonder if I'm "Rooted in Good Soil"..."Still others, like seed sown among thorns, hear the word but the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of wealth and the desires for other things come in and choke the word, making it unfruitful."  Hmm...that sounds like me!  I've been attending Church of God's Cape Community Church (Bloomfield, Cape Girardeau, Missouri, USA) and the COG stance is that the only logical interpretation of Jesus' ultimate commandment of not "grieving the holy spirit" is that you have to listen when the Holy Spirit tells you of a sin that's in your life that you need to rid yourself of.  If only I could tell when the Holy Spirit was communicating with me or when I'm simply recollecting something I've heard people say is sin or that I'd read is a sin...my pastor said Satan is the one that makes us feel guilty and that love is a much better deterrent from sin.  I guess I spent too much time denouncing God to have enough love in me to understand love to the extent where God's love would move me to serve God?  That sounds logical...truth hurts as the saying goes...I don't know if it's the "truth" that "hurts", just the fact that I need to spend all this ? time doing things I'm not at all inclined to do in order to have something so fundamental in nature is...I don't know...overwhelming?  I don't know.  I know the ideal is to acknowledge that God is in control and that all will be right if you do so, but...idk...I guess "will" is the tough one...It ISN'T right...It WILL be though...Frig, I'm impatient!  And demanding, too...I don't know if "controlling" is the right word or not because there's nothing that I control per se...I operate a few household electronics objects, i.e.: my computer and blu ray player...I control (or do I?) what I do with them, i.e.: listen to music, watch movies, etc., although I don't control the exact time I begin listening to music or whatever...I do get furious when my electronics items aren't working like I would expect them to.  It just seems counter productive and I know there's a solution, but I don't know what the solution is...within a few months of owning any given computer, I end up thinking "In year two, why not damn the torpedoes and just plank down $200 and get a Chromebook?", and the answer is simply I don't have $200.  If I did, I might as well just pick up every CD in sight and check 'em out...$200 for a computer + $50+ monthly for internet.... that averages to apprx 7 brand spankin' new CDs a month...which still wouldn't be enough!!  I mean, if I enjoyed them, yeah...most of what I listen to on sites like Rhapsody (Rdio, Spotify, etc.) do not stimulate me much if at all.  I come across a CD that stimulates me, the stimulation dies and gives way to annoyance.  I heard Hit The Lights' SUMMER BONES maybe 5 times before I became sick of it.  I heard a little bit of KEEP YOU by Pianos Become The Teeth and the overall experience was monotonous, although "April" was worth repeating a few+ times, now I'm sick of that song too.  I was blown away by Ryan Star's "Losing Your Memory" from 2006's SONGS FROM THE EYE OF AN ELEPHANT, but now I just wish for something equally amazing to come along...I tell Pandora Internet Radio to create a station based on that song and all I get is these songs by artists that fit in this weird sub-genre that I'm not sure how to describe...it's like "post 9/11 soft rock"?  Fugg!  I don't know...but it's like...The Fray, The Script, Matchbox 20, Daughtry, Train, Safetysuit, Nickelback...so on and so forth...First of all, The Fray's only good album was HOW TO SAVE A LIFE, and they are making a killing by catering to music fans who have no ability to discern between mediocre and good and great.  Ditto for Matchbox 20.  Train and The Script are not by any means my favorite band(s), but they do have some good songs.  I was digging "Nothing" by The Script, and they have a handful of other songs that are not bad, but they're not all that great either, and the album version of "For The First Time" is not only worn out on me by now, but makes no sense..."We're gonna drink cheap bottles of wine ,schit talking up all night..."what?  The radio edit takes the "ch" out of "sit" and thus makes more sense.  I don't mind "THE S WORD" in its existence, but the fact that it's put in a sentence where it makes little to no sense is annoying.  I mean, I guess if you're the kind of person that often uses it as an exclamation (like "Schit, man I haven't seen you since forever, schit man!  Aww....schit, look at you!  Schit, man, how's life treatin' you?  Aw, c'mere and gimme a hug!  Schit, man, come inside, let's talk some schit") it makes a shred of sense, like he's exclaiming the importance of "talking up all night"...I mean, seriously, though...what is "Up"?  Talking up?  Or Up all night?  There should be a comma there, shouldn't there?  Instead it's sung as a phrase -- "talking up all night", as if The Script's singer is trying to be some kind of smooth rapper...um...anyway...
But yeah.  ANYway...gosh, I got totally off the subject?  YOU SEE WHAT LIFE HAS DONE TO ME!!!?  AAG!  I know music is nothing compared to the company of God.  I know this intellectually.  I don't know how the f*** to put it into practice.  I think of praying, and I have no idea what to say except "forgive me for my sins, thank you for your son, and thank you for the many other blessings you've given me", but my day and life is so "blah", what am I going to do?  Complain God's ear off?  Everybody who audibly talks to me when I speak to them about such matters basically tells me "well, it's your own damn fault!"  My only way of coping with this boring dull life is to squeeze as much juice as I can from it, how ever little that is.  I.e: music, etc......
I'm not even sure what my point was to begin with...I just feel like if I start some kind of volunteer work, I might "burn out" as my pastor was talking about in relationship to people/instances he'd observed...and I don't know what else to do except start work and get paid for it...which I don't forsee any longterm benefit from...I don't think my brain is really in sync with the "you gotta plant before you eat" line of thinking...I mean, I understand it, but as for getting myself motivated, it seems like it'd make more sense to starve...I mean, I need to lose about 40 lbs, give or take 5 or 10, as it is...idk..."the big picture" as some call it just does not resonate with me until I SEE the big picture.  And in most jobs, there's none to be seen if there is one.  Fast food is a substitute service that people have grown accustomed to.  It's a relief from the time consuming & additionally tiring necessity of cooking for folks who spend all day at work.  But there's also people who stop in fast food joints just because the food tastes good or makes the people feel good.  You can't see the relief of people who are paying ffjs to fix them food so they don't have to do it themselves...in fact, you can't see anybody.  In the kitchen, which is the only place I'd be remotely qualified (if I don't burst into flames from all the hot water and general heat in the air [my sis worked at BK for a long while]), I'd be away from customers anyway, and if I could glance up and observe, I'd be distracting myself from my work and would do less a job and the customers would probably feel self conscious.  I'd have to make up this inner world myth about how my job is making the world a better place than it otherwise would be whilst all the data points to the opposite fact...--since the introduction of the "modern world", how much misery has crept into this nation and at what points in this progression of the modernizing of the world have they spiked?  People were much better off breaking their backs for their pay than they are now where sloth is being paid for in much more subtler but nonetheless painful ways.  And if that is true (I really have no way to say for certain, since I was born in 1983, right when cable TV was ascending into dominance), I should indeed sell my possessions and head for the apple orchard so as to start work on getting healthy food to the masses.  Yeah, except nobody wants healthy food.  Satan's deceptions will win over the hearts of many and he will soon be King of Earth, shortly after which Jesus will put an end to it all.  I hope the new body Jesus gives me (again, assuming I'm not "grieving the Holy Spirit") is free from all the tardive dyskinesia and nervous ticks...my Mom says none of Jesus' army will die in the Final Battle between Good and Evil...don't know if Revelation actually says that as I have not myself gotten nearly that far...I'm still early in the book of Numbers, which is the 4th book in the Holy Bible.  I've read part of The Bible in excerpts via THE STORY.  This week I believe we are going to be studying PAUL'S FINAL DAYS.  I still need to read this past week's chapter.  It's a really long one too.  I was already a chapter behind and I read that early this morning (I woke up at 2:30 A.M.), so I need to get back to it soon (Real Soon!).

media to keep for practicality's sake 'til the end of the human age...

MY HOME ENTERTAINMENT / MEDIA / ART(?) COLLECTION MINUS THE INCONSEQUENTIAL FLUFF I SOMETIMES (OFTEN) OBTAIN...

AUDIO

1. American Football - s/t
2. Genesis - s/t
3. Genesis - ...And Then There Were Three…
4. Genesis - Invisible Touch
5. Genesis - Live/The Way We Walk Vol. II: The Longs
6. Genesis - We Can’t Dance
7. Idlewild - The Remote Part
8. The Rocket Summer - Life Will Write The Words
9. Michael W. Smith - Sovereign
10. Toad The Wet Sprocket - Pale

VIDEO

1. Bringing Out The Dead
2. Clockers
3. The Dark Knight Trilogy
4. Ghostbusters/Ghostbusters II
5. The Last Unicorn
6. nowhere
7. Short Circuit
8. Starman

BOOK

1. God - The Holy Bible
2. Elliot Perlman - Seven Types Of Ambiguity
3. J.B. Phillips - Your God Is Too Small

2014 Year End Summary of Movies That I Didn't Forsake...

THE SPECTACULAR NOW I saw shortly after the dawn of 2014.  I guess it'd been released in theaters the year before, but I hadn't heard of it until looking at the trending home video releases of x week in January of 2014...I saw it with my mom so I can't swear I would have watched the whole thing if I hadn't watched it with her. 
SHORT TERM 12 I saw...late spring?  Might have been summer.  I'd been contemplating it and then Amazon Instant Video had the rental price at a deep discount ($0.99), so I swooped it and pressed play.
WHITE BIRD IN A BLIZZARD - I am a fan of Gregg Araki, despite his largely disappointing filmography.  He doesn't always go for the gold, but even his misses are not entirely tragedies.  This is one of his better ones.
I'm not 100% sure if this was 2014 or 2012 or what...but I did sorta-maybe recently see ALL THE REAL GIRLS, which had been out a looong time before I actually got around to seeing it.  I don't remember why I was drawn to seeing it, but I was, I did and I liked it.

There might be some I'm forgetting.  It seems like I saw some other movie with my mom...maybe it was before 2014...I saw THE EXTRA MAN with Kevin Cline and Paul Dano in 2013 or thereabouts...scratch that it was July of 2012 (I wrote a review of the movie August 1st of that year posted on Amazon).  Damn.  The days just don't let up!  WAAAAUGGH!

I know there's several others I tried watching and didn't finish.  I don't remember what they were.  So far THIS year, I've had trouble enjoying THE JUDGE and FOXCATCHER.  THE JUDGE was better, but it just dragged on and on and on...maybe it was b/c I was ready for bed anyway, but I just felt like there was cool air brushing through my head prompting me to take a nap.  I think I did lay down, but then I got back up b/c I couldn't sleep and then saw the tail end 'cause, ya know, my mom was still watching it (upstairs).

Yesterday's News

I WROTE THIS 4/9 AT MIDNIGHT ROUGHLY, BUT MY INTERNET WAS ACTING UP SO I COULDN'T POST IT.  HERE IT IS.

I just saw INTERSTELLAR.  It was a good accomplishment, not overtly boring, mostly not at all, very little if any technical or philosophical qualms...It was pretty straight forward, but that's about as far as I can come to saying anything bad about it.  It's definitely an artistic work, not some hacked together mess...

I saw it down in my room, alone.  I might be wrong, but I don't think I'd accomplished that since I saw WHITE BIRD IN A BLIZZARD off of Amazon Instant Video back in September of 2014.  WHAT THE HELL!??  That was 8 months ago!!!!

Anyway.  Which one is better you ask?  I don't know.  Gregg Araki has always had such a different style than other filmmakers.  His movies are almost like cartoons except their live action and they deal with real life issues without making them into jokes.  INTERSTELLAR is more like traditional Hollywood filmmaking.  I'd say as far as quality goes, INTERSTELLAR is slightly better, but maybe that's b/c I thought the ending for WHITE BIRD IN A BLIZZARD was a little contradictory (the main character is presented voice over style saying something that I interpreted as her missing her mother.  I guess between my emotional numbness and my lack of experience with loss, I don't have any way of relating to that...the biggest death I've experienced was my cat Napoleon.  I never had to forgive him for any evildoing... he was almost like my sidekick.  And he was a cat.  so...anyway).

Wow.  I felt almost jaw dropp'd coming upstairs after a 2 hr 45 minute viewing.  Oh - I viewed it one sitting.  BOOYAH!  That's like - wowowow!  It's weird enough I finished the movie, but...WOOM!

Anyway.  Next on my "must see"(ish) list is A MOST VIOLENT YEAR, which from what I've read seems to stylistically ripoff movies like GOODFELLAS (1990).  I guess I'll see how bad it is in that dept.  It might just have a mild homage-nocity.  I hope it's not to GOODFELLAS what 2014's THE DOUBLE is to ERASERHEAD (1977) and what ONLY GOD FORGIVES is to ERASERHEAD and LOST HIGHWAY combined.  Then there was UNDER THE SKIN, which didn't merely ripoff the stylistic streaks found in David Lynch's movies, but also "borrowed" stylistic elements of Stanley Kubric's 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY (1968).

Funeral For A Friend 2003-2008 + A Ghost In My Room...

("metaphorically, this ghost is you")

Google Play Music Unlimited service is telling me I like Gang Of Four, a rebellious snot nose band from the pre-Joy Division post-punk era.  Yeah.  So they recommend me all these other decrepit self righteous bands to listen to, most of which are already vehemently worshipped by several boatloads of equally self-righteous fans.  All because I didn't push the "stop" button when ENTERTAINMENT! (1979) was being played back on their site.  Yeah.  So, I have to vehemently HATE anything I don't LOVE or Like in order for me to not like it.  What about GOF's music is so indisputably awesome to warrant a "don't give a f**k" category?  Maybe if I wasn't the introverted observer, I'd be compelled to get out of my chair and dance when GoF is presented, but I'm not the outgoing type.  That's all there is to it.  Is being an introvert so damn unusual?
They also recommend some bands that I actually used to like.  Funeral For A Friend took a lot of flack on a few occasions through their career for their "lack of screaming", the most shallow empty-hearted criticism I can think of for a song/album, but what's even more confusing about that criticism is their breakthrough - the one that started it all - was an extremely melodic album.  It was the most heartfelt, semi-mellow album the guys did ever.  It was atmospheric/layered, smooth, and soothing.  Nothing about it was wild & crazy.  Yeah, there was some screaming vocals.  I don't know why all the emo/metalcore bands feel the need to throw that in.  But that's how its done.  I don't care.  If the music backing it up were equally obnoxious, I'd be compelled to burn it at the stake.  In FFAF's case, it's compelling through and through.  The production on their 2005 follow-up HOURS was very cardboard sounding, but the melodies were mostly spot on, although they don't resound with me as much these days, I'm not entirely sure why.  I guess it's mostly a case of beenthere/donethat, but anyway...I wasn't impressed with their attempt at epic pop/rock, although I haven't listened past the first 2 or 3 songs...MEMORY AND HUMANITY, #4, was really good.  Since then the band has just been churning out music for the sake of it without anything important or worthwhile to offer its listeners. 
Mayday Parade is OK, their career took a bit of a hilly road after Jason Lancaster left; A LESSON IN ROMANTICS remains their defining moment, with their newest MONSTERS IN THE CLOSET as close a runner up as they've mustered without the aid of backup songwriters as provided on their sole major label offering (ANYWHERE BUT HERE) (so far).
There's literally nothing on my whatever the hell it's called page (home?  "Listen Now?") to pique my interest.  THERE'S GOT to be a better way of recommending music based on past listens.  I mean, where's the recommendations based on my listening ("liking") of SUMMER BONES, the newest album by poppunk band Hit The Lights?  That album I've actually listened to repeatedly, although I haven't listened to it in its entirely more than a few times and the first 2 or 3 times I listened to it through & through was on Sony Music Unlimited b4 it went 100% defunct on March 29th.  And what about THROUGH ART WE ARE EQUALS by Slaves?  I don't know if I ever listened to it via Google Play Music Unlimited, but I know I like it.  And instead of recommending all these has been bands, why not that one?  A Skylit Drive and Breaking Benjamin have new music available.  Where's those recommendations?  Granted, I'm getting bored with ASLD and I'm getting the feeling that's not likely to change for any significant length of time, but nonetheless...tons of music, some of it fairly new, none of it featured/recommended on GPM.........OH, THE HORROR!  Granted, if I had a normal life, i.e.: job, social life etc., it probably wouldn't be so urgent...but that's another post...OK, post #2 (haha),....I was thinking about applying for a job at The Salvation Army tomorrow.  Damn getting something .002 accomplished has taken a nightmare's worth of time...I turned on the computer over an hour ago, finally have a semi-large blogpost typed out.  Since I haven't been switching tabs (what ARE tabs for exactly?), my experience (typing this) on the computer has been more or less depleted of headache.
This is Easter.  My small group is taking the week off of THE STORY.  We'll reconvene April 12th and begin where we left off.  I need to get INTERSTELLAR watched.  Or else......If I get it watched in its entirety before close today, I can return it and get $2 on my account to spend on another movie rental(s).  If I feel the need to stop it, I might have to ponder the whys and wherefores and decide the logistics of resuming...if I can't get all that done before Hastings closes, then I guess that's that...I rented it for a discounted price since I had a coupon (2 rentals for $0.99 each).  The other movie I rented was THE HOBBIT PART III, which I have no interest in seeing, but I thought my mother would want to.  She's in the same boat as me, not as anti-social, but at home alone most of the time without a job...and being physically in pain all the time, it's hard for her to find anything to do except watch movies and TV shows.  Anyway...