Those Crazy Evangelicals

I know that evangelicals and other Christians, when trying to defend themselves from the charges of homophobia and bigotry that result from their decision to dedicate their lives to the advancement of the causes of homophobia and bigotry, often recite the slogan "Hate the Sin, Love the Sinner." You know, because it's not really gay people that gross them out. Gay people are fine! It's just all the gay things they do that are problematic, like pursuing members of the same sex for their romantic relationships, or demanding equal rights under the law.

Anyways, I had a thought: given that so many of these prominent purveyors of religiously inspired hatred turn out to be deeply fucked-up closet cases who are perfectly happy to do what they want in their secret lives while punishing those who have the integrity and courage to live their's openly, a more accurate slogan for their movement might be "Hate the Sinner, LOVE the sin!"

Of Imaginary Editors

Is there any writer's joke more consistently unfunny and obnoxious than the wacky fake editorial interjection? [ed. We checked, and no! There really isn't!] Does anyone actually think that this seems irreverent? It's even worse because of the internet: with blogs and webzines and various forums for people to write into, the actual need for editors is much smaller, and yet because of that same lack of editorial oversight, these damn editorial interjections are free to proliferate. People who obviously don't have an actual editor can still use the wacky fake editor to... show what crazy rebels they are? Reinforce their own points in an assumed other voice? I don't know about you, but I've never seen a wacky editorial interjection that didn't either faux-reject the writer's point by way of referring to him like he's some irrepressible truth teller or enthusiastically boost it with its own fake authority [ed. stop ruining this gag I've got going, man!].

I Could Murder Your Ass If Only I Had a Spread Gun

I'm really, really good at the Contra games. Super C in particular. How good am I? Think of how good you are at Super C. Now imagine someone who's ten times better than you. That guy would have to do the same exercise you just did in order to imagine someone who's as good as I am. I don't claim to be a math expert, but I think that makes me 100,000 times better than you.

Recently, I was breezing through Super C (with,*ahem*, no continues) when I realized something. I'm pretty dangerous with the Machine Gun. I can cause some damage with the Laser. I know my way around the Flamethrower. I can even hold my own for a while with nothing but the standard weapon.

But my game really comes to life when I get the spread gun. Pretty much the only thing that can stop me when I have the spread gun is if I accidentally pick up a different weapon. For those of you not in the know, here's a handy illustration of what the spread gun does:



Five big, beautiful red bullets, each approximately four times the size of a man's head. One goes straight forward. Two go forward on upward inclines, two go forward on downward. It's a beautifully effective video game weapon.

But don't take my word for it. Go google the phrase "contra spread gun." Go on, don't worry: it's probably the only phrase including the word "spread" that you can type into a Google search while there are children present or you're at work. As you can see, this is not an original idea on my part: a lot of people really do feel compelled to pay tribute to the spread gun after a good game of Contra.

And I started to think to myself, "Given my demonstrated warrior prowess in the Contra world, is it possible that a career in the Canadian Armed Forces could be just the thing for me?" Had I finally found the direction my life had heretofore been lacking? Could half-a-year's time see me off in Afghanistan, stoically setting out to help accomplish whatever the latest goal is that we've convinced ourselves we have over there? It was a crazy idea, but a crazy idea that just might work. I couldn't dismiss it out of hand without conducting further research.

Alas, judging from a few minutes on the Job Explorer at the Canadian Armed Forces website, the Canadian military doesn't even have a spread gunner unit that you can join. In fact, if Wikipedia is to be believed, the spread gun hasn't even yet been invented yet in real life. Which seems a shame, especially when you consider the potential humanitarian benefits of having a gun that fires five giant bullets simultaneously at different angles on the same vertical plane. Just imagine how much bloodshed humankind could have been avoided if only more of history's great conflicts had been decided by the exploits of one shirtless commando, charging relentlessly forward through wave-upon-wave of enemy soldiers, firing from his unlimited supply of ammunition, occasionally accompanied by a similarly dressed but contrastingly colored partner, across about seven distinct environments each with their own unique hazards, before finally reaching the enemy's main base and climbing inside their giant alien master's head to destroy its brain.

Rambling

Sometimes, I must admit, I have a tendency to ramble. It's strange, because when you see people rambling, you tend to assume that they're really invested in the conversation, or at least in their own part of the conversation; yet, most of the time when I ramble it's when I'm uninterested in what I'm saying, and am just saying it to fulfill my part of the conversation. I don't really like to make idle small talk, so when people say something, I try to come up with something interesting to say that's related. Sometimes, I just don't have an interesting observation to make. Someone will say "Did you ever notice that Cadbury chocolate is always so much richer and creamier than other brands?" and I'll say "Oh, yeah? No kidding... I, well actually it was only even recently pointed out to me that mass-produced chocolate would be consistent across companies, rather than just brands, you know? Like, that every Nestle bar [it would be much easier for me, at this point, to at least stick to the established Cadbury example, but I'm dedicated to broadening the scope of any discussion I participate in.] would have the same type of chocolate, rather than just every different Aero bar, like Aero Caramel or whatever, having one kind of chocolate, and then every different Crunch bar having another, you know? I haven't had that frame of reference for long enough to really investigate the differences between the major candy companies' chocolate formulations, so I can't really agree or disagree with your assertion that..."

And usually somewhere in there, a voice in the back of my head goes "James! You're rambling!" and I realize what's happening and I try to get quickly to the end of whatever clause I'm currently at in the endless run-on sentence I've got going and somehow salvage the situation so I don't look like I'm really intimidated by a simple conversation with this person. "Whatever you do," calls the voice, "do not say something that calls attention to the fact that you were just rambling." At which point I usually say something like "Blah! Man, got off on a ramble there, huh? I'm sure you're riveted by my fascinating observations about the state of the various candy companies' chocolate formulations..." and off I go, stringing together quips and pointless observations, extending sentences into paragraph form and just generally failing to get to any point worth making.

I think that may get to the heart the appeal of writing to me: as it's a more deliberate process than speaking, you can easily avoid getting in to situations like that.