GUYS.
Courtney got me Darth Vader's Tie Fighter in LEGO form for Yule!


I also got me some Transformers PJs, and a sake set. Yay, presents.
Courtney got some t-shirts, one of which has a picture of a witch hat and says "I weigh the same as a duck," and one with the musical symbols for full rests (on both treble and bass staves) which says "Everybody Shut Up." Also got her a calendar. Woo.

I am not as cool as my wife.

------------

So, I got accepted to ECU. I have to do a bunch of registration stuff, and sign up for classes, but I'm basically all set to start getting government cheese, at the rate of 1000 bucks a month. That'll cover all of my current bills, but it won't allow the wife and I to move out of her parents' house. In order to receive my government cheddar, I have to maintain a 12-hour class schedule, which leaves little time for other monetary gain. I can keep my job at the Sojourner (they'll work around my classes) but that's only another couple hundred bucks a month.

OR

So, I got a job offer from a Toyota dealership here. I haven't actually verified this, but I'm pretty sure the job will be commission-based, which means I could potentially make tons of money, or absolutely zilch. Said job is full time, which means I'd have to try really hard to keep my job at the Sojo, and there's no way I could go to college. On the other hand, I've been good at sales when I've done it before, and this is the kind of sales job from whence come long, successful careers.

------------

Two roads diverged in a wood. Neither road was particularly more traveled than the other, and both had their apparent drawbacks and advantages. Then my infant started crying, and my wife asked for my help, so I stopped waxing poetic and started worrying about money again.

See the poll, cast your vote, make any arguments you can think of. I'm probably going to go to school and snub the Toyota place, but I don't really want to. I want to move out so badly, and I know that's not possible on 1000 bucks a month. I need to figure out how to do both, to be honest.

Oh well. I'm going to go play with my LEGOs some more.

I'm Pagan. This is not something I typically go out of my way to say anything about, but if it comes up, I certainly don't hide it, so this should not surprise most of the people who know me.
Being Pagan, and literate, I find myself perusing the selection on the New Age shelves at my local Barnes & Noble. This section naturally houses books on Wicca, which I personally find retarded. It has almanacs that include things like moon phases and harvest times. It has books on totem animals, the meanings of trees, and how to read ancient runes.
All of this is fine. It makes sense. The spiritualities associated with the New Age movement include all manner of these things - there are tons of Shamanic Animalists, Nature is worshipped as it's own entity in many circles, and I myself cast runes for divinational purposes.
What is not fine, however, is the marked increase in books about alien abductions, freemasons, the Illuminati, vampires, werewolves, and Satanism. The straw that broke the camel's back, for me however, was the recent inclusion of the novel "The Men Who Stare at Goats." I know the movie looks awesome, and I don't know which came first, but that is hardly the point. It has nothing to do with Nature Worship, the New Age movement, or anything else even remotely related.

So I'm pissed! It's insulting to have that crazy shit next to books related to my faith. They don't put anything about the Spanish Inquisition in with the Holy Bibles, do they? Fuck no. In fact, the Malleus Maleficarum is in with the New Age shit. Next to the Necronomicon. In an effort to help keep the general public from misconstruing the associations of my faith and its ilk, I decided to put up some signs. Polite, concise, and strictly informational. I taped one to the top shelf of each of the four sections dedicated to the New Age category, and moved on. To help in the long-term, I've written up a letter that I'm going to start mailing to Steve Riggio, probably once a week or so.

So, my point is this: if you are Pagan yourself, or just enjoy guerrilla education, take the sign, edit it accordingly if you need to (I'm sure other major bookstores are committing the same folly) and tape 'em up. Send the letter to Mr. Riggio, or whomever else you like. Just make sure you sign your own name, please.

¶
Then began her life.

I'm still awestruck by the gravity of it. A single miniscule thread just latching onto the interplanar web of existence. It's awesome. Like a hundred billion hotdogs.

I read this book recently: Paganism: An Introduction to Earth-Based Religions, by Joyce and River Higgenbotham. Yes, it's a wordy title, and the dual authoring doesn't help, but it's very well-written. It's not your typical "Hippie" book, by some whack in a tent covered in moss, writing with her own menstrual excretions. And it's not your typical "Pagan" book, by some fuckwitted incense-enthusiast who uses a penname that follows the Mad-Lib-esque "Adjective Spooky-NounSpooky-Noun" formula.
I recommend it.

In this book, the authors posit a theory regarding the fabric of space-time. They suggest that reality itself is constantly in a state of unfolding and enfolding. This happens too fast for us [or indeed, the laws of physics] to recognize. They relate it to the image on a television screen. Every time the universe re-opens, [presumably] everything is just minutely different. Occasionally, something brand new appears.

I got to witness that. I saw the very last time that the universe was sans Lillia. And I saw the very first moment that she was included. And it was full of stars.

¶
Hopefully, that's as sappy as I'll get.
Now, here's all the stuff that I'm expected to know:
▫ She was born at 1038 hours, on August 17, Twenty Aught-Nine. She was one week and three days late.
▫ She weighed seven pounds, fifteen ounces, and was twenty-one inches long.
▫ Her name is Lillia Raine. She wasn't named after anyone, we just liked it.

Here's all the stuff that I think is more important:
▫ She was not induced, there was no epidural administered. There were no painkillers given, before or after. My wife hardly whimpered during the whole thing. She is a fucking superhero, and I'm honored she chose me.
▫ The first song she ever heard was Bankrobber, by The Clash. It was performed by me at around 0300, the morning after she was born, in the hospital room. It put her right to sleep.
▫ I changed her first diaper.
▫ She has Courtney's eyes, ears, cheeks, and mouth. She seems to have my nose, and possibly my chin, the poor girl; my chin has a goatee on it. Hopefully, it turns out she's got someone else's.

¶
I'm also out of the Air Force. This happened some time ago, and is massively less important to me than the birth of my daughter. I officially separated on 4 July (Independence Day, lulz) and did not get high. I have not gotten high yet, despite all my oaths to the contrary, and it looks like I won't be. It's not as appealing as I thought it would be. Anyway, fuck the Air Force, and fuck the military. If you, or anyone you know is considering it, stop. It's just fucking retarded. Dumbest God-damned thing I ever did.

¶
I'm waiting to start my new job, and I'm not terribly thrilled about it. Hopefully I win the lottery or something, because I'm completely sick of having to be concerned with money. In that vein, someone explain to $spyed that Seniors need not be bombarded with advertisements, no matter what our subscription status. How fucking rude.

¶
Once the new job is going, and cash-flow is restored, I'll be taking care of some things, among which is the purchasing of a new computer. It will very likely be a lousy one, and probably a laptop, which implies prebuilt. That notwithstanding, it should make my presence on deviantART a lot more regular. Maybe then I'll finish my novel. And I'll get back to the forums. Poor things are probably rotting by now.

Right. I likely ought to start considering sleep. It's in high demand these days.
-Nathaniel