MUL.DILI.PAT
I’m using the sample “Vader2″ layout for the K2 mod that I’ve been experimenting with. This is the layout I saw that convinced me I should use K2 with my blog. I need to work on my own color scheme for my blogs, as well as come up with some cool banner images. I’m keeping this layout up as a reminder that I need to get working on assembling some graphics and stuff. Wish me luck…
-Tom
Boing Boing just pointed me to the now online version of Beyond Cyberpunk. This is a web-translation of the famous HyperCard stack. I’m kind of sorry I was not a Mac-head in the pre-OS X days, when things like HyperCard were popular. I’ve heard the praises for Hypercard sung high and low, and it makes me want to develop a homebrew or OSS implementation. Meh, just an idea. Still, HyperCard aside, I was (and am) a huge fan of Cyberpunk literature (and all of it’s derivative and descendants). While I was not fortunate enough to be a “user” of Beyond Cyberpunk, a lot of this was the shit I was in to back in the day. Brings back some good memories. Take a gander at it.
Watch your six, Ace!
-Tom
First it was the Robovie-M, then it was the Chroino, now, my heart sings for the MANOI. Truth be told, I think my favorite still has to be the Robovie-M, but it’s about $2000. The MANOI costs the same, maybe cheaper, and comes in a nicer looking shell. Maybe this is my personal Pokemon… gotta catch ‘em all…
-Tom
PS: on a totally different topic (one that I didn’t think warranted a new post), I just read up on the Monomyth theory, and Carl Jung’s concept of anima. I love Wikipedia.
Sorry for posting a billion times tonight, my mind was just doing it’s thing. I wanted to quickly post on a revelation I just had about being a twin. I think twins are born because there is just too much awesomeness to be contained by one single person. Think about it =P
-Tom
So, the day has come. Over the weekend, my parents finally took the onramp on to the Information Super-Highway. My brother was immediately forthcoming with his blog. I have yet to share my online world with my parental units. It’s not like I have some great secret to hide. I have not come out of the closet (and there is no chance that will be the topic of a future post ;). I have not clubbed baby seals for fun and profit. For the most part, I think my blog is pretty run of the mill. That being said, I have used the f-bomb a few times, and if there is one off-limits word, it’s that one. So… should I let them know about my blog? I don’t want to self-censor my blog. I’ll probably tell them, but I’m curious what the random readership has to say.
-Tom
So the newest batch of agents to graduate from our illustrious training program hit the floor on Tuesday. As with any group of new agents, they need a lot of guidance. In the evenings, I’m usually the only person trained to help these people out (the luck of the schedules), so I’ve been spending my evenings, devoting my time to make sure they don’t crash and burn.
Among the sea of tech support reps, my eyes settled on one particular young woman. I instantly thought she was cute, definitely my type. Over the course of these last two days, I’ve had to help her out a bit, a task I have no problem with. It seems she likes teh anime, seeing as I noticed an Otakon badge on her bag as she left, and she was sporting a They Might Be Giants shirt yesterday. So far, the signs point to her being someone I would enjoy spending more time with. To top it off, she seems genuinely happy when I come by (though that could be her joy in having help).
As you can probably tell, I’m developing the hint of a crush on this girl. Alas, all is not well in Tomland. When I first started out working, I set for myself a policy that I would not date coworkers. In the past, this was always an easy policy to stick to, since the girls that worked here were never all that much to call home about. I’m also a manager now… I can’t afford to pursue a relationship with someone who has to answer to me.
And that is the crux of the issue… I can’t even approach her to ask if she wants to hang out, or do anything else that, if anything, would allow me to get to know her better. I’m already kinda shy, so it’s not like I’m meeting girls all the time (but I’ve been told I should not be shy since all the girls at my job “like” me, even if I don’t reciprocate those feelings). Add to that the fact I’ve been girlfriendless for about a year and a half… and I’m feeling just a smidge lonely.
Sux.
Oh well, yet another incentive to get a new job, I guess =D
-Tom
Looks like I’ve been kinda busy. I updated to WordPress 1.5.2 and I’m being a bit adventurous by implementing the new K2 theme/mod that is still in first stage of beta. Still, it works out well, I just need to get the code working for threaded comments. I’ll add an image banner soon, like I originally had. And stuff.
-Tom
…so why am I gonna devote an entire post to religion? Easy, because I don’t plan to preach, and this is more an exercise on my part. Truth be told, this is more a post about names and weird coincidences, but I will get kind of pedantic at times… trust me though, I’m not preaching (I hate being preached to), I’m just thinking aloud.
So let’s begin. If I was placed at gun-point and asked whether I was religious or not, and if so, what religion I worshipped, I would have to say: “Christian”
So what’s with the quotes? For the most part, my involvement in the Christian faith is that I believe there is a God, similar to the one described in most Christian doctrine, and she had a son who went by the name of Jesus Christ. At that point, it kind of all falls apart. I’m not a fan of going to church, or with people preaching to me, etc. I basically believe that God is my home-girl who watches over me and is kinda just there. The God I know wouldn’t admonish me for making a lewd joke, because she knows I’m just kidding (and if you’ve noticed I’ve made God a woman, well, that’s only because “it” sounds bad… I’d prefer God be asexual and not take sides).
Anyway, so where is this all going? Easy, I was reading Wikipedia and decided to read the entry on Jesus. While I’m not strongly religious, I did take a class on the history of Christianity in college, and I seem to have picked up my mother’s interest in history. This lead eventually to me reading of the Gospel of Thomas which I’ve heard about but never took the time to look at. It’s not a canonical gospel, but from what I understand of it, I think it resonates with my personality and beliefs. Here are a couple of excerpts from said article:
The Gospel of Thomas is mystical—it emphasizes a direct and unmediated experience of the Divine.
Oh, look at that, a “direct and unmediated” connection to God… what else?
…the Gospel of Thomas premises salvation on an enlightened understanding of one’s true identity — an image of oneself as divine.
Perhaps because I’m a twin, I find myself wondering about my “identity”, what makes me… me, but I’ll touch on the twin thing shortly…
So now I ask myself, who was this Thomas? This person who shares my first name? He who apparently preaches ideas I find myself in favor of…? More reading asserts the Gospel of Thomas was written by the hardly mentioned apostle Judas Thomas Didymus. To abbreviate the article, Thomas was hardly mentioned in the gospels, and only in John’s gospel three times. The third time he was mentioned (in John 20:24-29), he doubted Jesus’ resurrection and became a believer after asking to touch the wound. I find this fact significant because it parallels my belief in the existence of God… for me, seeing is believing. I’m pragmatic by nature, give me hard empirical evidence .
But see, there I contradict myself. I’ve seen nothing to prove that (the Christian) God exists. Again, here is why the Gospel of Thomas is significant. This gospel is not a narrative, like the canonical gospels, but is simply a collection of sayings (attributed to Jesus). The emphasis is on interpreting the words of Jesus and discovering God through them. In a way, it’s this self-interpretive nature that describes my own views on religion. Anyway, I did not start this post with the idea that I’d be talking about my religious views, this is all a stepping stone in my thought process, so lets move on.
As stated, the author of this gospel is assumed to be the apostle Judas Thomas Didymus. The name Thomas is derived from the aramaic Tau’ma, which means “twin”. In addition, Didymus is Greek for “twin”. As stated previously, I have a (identical) twin brother named John. This is where my brain does some kung-fu… The apostle Thomas was only mentioned in one of the four canonical Gospels: John’s. In a way, the existence of the apostle Thomas hinges on the existence of John, which I could says has strange parallels to the fact that my brother’s name is John; it’s also the name of my father. This is how my brain works, people!
Coincidentally, the gospels of Thomas and John are often compared. It was the topic of Elaine Pagels‘ book Beyond Belief. I’m not gonna read too much in to it and try to assert that John and my personalities are divided along the same lines… I basically went through this entire post to point out this odd symmetry. I’ll let my brain chew on this later.
That’s all for now. I read an entry in Wikipedia and then I started connecting dots and here we are. Consider this a small window to my world, and how I think. Scared? =P
-Tom
I officially decided to change the name of my blog today. It is with sadness that I retire the title “Choreographed Dancing Makes Everything Better”, mainly because it’s a long title and I wanted something a bit shorter. The new title pays homage to an old interest of mine. If you get the reference, I’ll give ya a cookie. =D
-Tom