forgive me, for I know not what I do
A gentleman who goes by the name Heisenberg wrote in response to the etherf@rm birthday post:
It has become a habit, before doing something like work on the machine, with the first cup of coffee, let’s see if anything new is there. It is a cordial website. Not much of a compliment, but it beats reading the local morning paper. So, why isn’t there something new there this morning? Letting the rank and file down? Hop to it. Think and post.
Indeed, days on which I do not post render me sleepless at night because I know I’m not just “letting the rank and file down”…I’m letting
myself down. On mornings after non-post days, while you and many others are drinking their first cup of coffee, reading the local paper, or having sex (some, in the interest of efficiency, have devised methods of doing all three at once), I clean the floor of the local church’s bathroom with my tongue to atone for my sins. So strong is my remorse and so great is my desire to make good with the world that if the doors of the local church are locked, I shatter one of its stained glass windows. On those days, while I’m licking the church bathroom floor, I get little pieces of glass stuck on my tongue. I then spend the whole day in front of the mirror, picking pieces of glass out of my bloody tongue with tweezers and/or a dustbuster.
You’d think that these consequences—emotional suffering, overwhelming guilt, and a bloody, lacerated tongue—would dissuade any human being with my DNA profile from going another day without posting.
But it doesn’t. It becomes a vicious circle. A vicious, vicious circle.
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14 responses
cyn
Comment posted at 15:47 on Monday, January 27, 2003
so at heart you’re a catholic?
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poog
Comment posted at 17:13 on Monday, January 27, 2003
He certainly has catholic tastes.
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inspoetica
Comment posted at 19:34 on Monday, January 27, 2003
I was uncertain, but now I know, res is religious. Amen to that.
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Comment posted at 20:39 on Monday, January 27, 2003
Who? Me?
Hey, I said “Thank you” and you edited that out. I been misquoted.
Anyhow, what I want to hear more about is the coffee and the sex and the newspaper. And seven folks involved, you say?
Anyway, the mosque down the street needs somebody to lick up the shoe soles, while the shoes are off. Interested? If you ever worry, trust me, it’s shinola. They don’t keep dogs.
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Comment posted at 20:50 on Monday, January 27, 2003
Anyway, how you going to keep them down on the f@rm, after they’ve seen you in church?
So, should I feel guilt or shame, for bringing you to such remorseful admissions. I am now in abject gullt myself, truly, for what I have caused.
But really, how could I bring you to such confessions, when I’m not even on the other side of the booth, saying don’t worry, I’ll take that responsibility, now lap the beads.
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Comment posted at 22:32 on Monday, January 27, 2003
cyn: I’m not catholic. I don’t bend over for anyone, not even priests.
inspoetica: Actually, I’m not religious at all. The only religion I subscribe to is that called fly fishing. We worship a god named Trout.
heisenberg: You weren’t misquoted, your statement just wasn’t quoted in its entirety. And thou shouldst feel neither guilt nor shame, for thy post caused me much guffaw. In regards to confessionals, it’s clear by now that the etherblog is my confessional. It’s also my urinal. Go figure.
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Comment posted at 06:56 on Tuesday, January 28, 2003
You mean that warm damp sprinkling on my head was not holy water? What have I been baptized into? Anyway, confessionals and soap boxes are not at all disjoint sets, though nor identical. There’s the old adage of four boxes for disputation in America - the soap box, the ballot box, the jury box, and the cartridge box. You have your forum, my vote, I won’t sue on the misquote (SEC Rule 10b-5, for example, talks of material misstatement or omission), and only about five times in my life have I held an AR-15, always unloaded and sans clip; that’s way too long a story; so, again thank you for instigating ideas and anecdotes to friendly people. Your anecdotes are the antidote to tedium. Go figure.
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poog
Comment posted at 10:18 on Tuesday, January 28, 2003
cathàoàlic (adj.)
1. Of broad or liberal scope; comprehensive: “The 100-odd pages of formulas and constants are surely the most catholic to be found” (Scientific American).
2. Including or concerning all humankind; universal: “what was of catholic rather than national interest” (J.A. Froude).
Catholic
1. Of or involving the Roman Catholic Church.
2. Of or relating to the universal Christian church.
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inspoeitca
Comment posted at 10:52 on Tuesday, January 28, 2003
Isn’t fly-fishing a dangerous cult?
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Comment posted at 15:50 on Tuesday, January 28, 2003
So why isn’t there anything new there this afternoon?
Fly fishing—the one tool I you necessarily must keep in you tackle box is a pair of needle-nosed pliers, with a cutting jaw at the fulcrum. I caught a hook salmon trolling in Hood Canal, and was glad to have the cutting power.
Even those who never make mistakes, make mistakes.
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Comment posted at 06:39 on Wednesday, January 29, 2003
Well, here I am in the morning, drinking coffee. I won’t say anything that the overly sensitife could take the wrong way. Far be it from me to have anyone view me as critical. Would I want to foster some kind of over-reaction? Me? No way. Well, I was just reading the local paper, and I hear drumbeats. Distinct drumbeats. The headline, “Bush’s case against ‘evil’ “. I read on expecting a Darth Vader thing, but it was about Saddam. Then something about “A burtal dictator … with ties to terrorism … will not be allowed to dominate a vital region.” I said, oh, the Saudi’s better worry, but I read on and it was about Saddam. Has anyone else noticed, the guy wears blue ties when he wants to talk tough, red ties when he wants to schmooze. Has anyone tried to do a tie-index, like the Greenspan briefcase index,and see if it predicts or lags swings in the financial markets?
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Comment posted at 09:42 on Wednesday, January 29, 2003
I have reread the original, resonant, posting. At a guess, Resonance, having never met face to face, would you guess your DNA profile, or mine, would be closer to Ted Bundy’s? Ain’t that a bite?
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Comment posted at 11:17 on Wednesday, January 29, 2003
Cut me a break, will ya? They’re these things called TIME ZONES.
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Comment posted at 07:06 on Saturday, February 01, 2003
The comment before the last, R. With pedophilia in the priesthood in the press, you should probably especially not bend over for them. That said, never bow or kneel. If you are bent over in pain, or knocked to your knees, that is merely physics or physiology at play. It is not a bow nor a kneel. It is not a defeat of spirit. Those who love you won’t ask it. Those who ask it don’t love you.
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