“What I hate is this idiotic drivel about ‘I am God – I am man – I ride the winds – I look through the smoke – I am the life sense.’”

“It’s ghastly!”

“And I wish American novelists would give up trying to make business romantically interesting. Nobody wants to read about it, unless it’s crooked business. If it was an entertaining subject they’d buy the life of James J. Hill and not one of these long office tragedies that harp along on the significance of smoke -”

“And gloom,” said Tom. “That’s another favorite, though I’ll admit the Russians have the monopoly. Our specialty is stories about little girls who break their spines and get adopted by grouchy old men because they smile so much. You’d think we were a race of cheerful cripples and that the common end of the Russian peasant was suicide -”

My first back-to-blogging post will be to officially announce that I am going to be tracking my get-out-of-debt program. As of August 1st, 2009 I was indebted to Citi Cards and Discover in the amount of $4942.91. I also owe about $5000 on my car and around $17000 in school loans, but I am focusing primarily on my credit card debt because it is bad debt that I had no plan of paying off…until a few weeks ago. My mother and I sat down and did some figuring and we came to the conclusion that in addition to my minimum payments I should pay one hundred more dollars every month. This isn’t the fast track solution, but it is the doable solution. This would mean by February of 2010, my Discover card would be paid off (and at 0% interest I will have officially used their money for free). The not so exciting part of this process is that the majority of the money I owe is on my Citi credit card that is currently at 29.99%. On my payment plan, I’m looking to pay this off in about two years (around the same time my car will be paid off).

So, why am I in this much debt at the ripe, young age of 22? 1. I thought I was grown and decided to get a credit card in college against my mother’s warnings. 2. I spend money when I am sad or bored. 3. Numerous times I forgot to make payments, made payments late because I didn’t have money or didn’t want to ask my mom for help to make the payments. 4. I didn’t trust God to bring me through financial quandaries and wasn’t faithful to pay tithe.

While I can’t say I’m happy that I owe a stupid amount of money to these companies, here is the bright side to my ignorance: 1. I made the credit card mistake early, on things like clothes and books and dinners and realized the error of my ways before I found myself in an unmanageable situation. If I hadn’t applied for a card in college, I most assuredly would have eventually. Maybe when I was actually making money and thought I was better off then I was, I wouldn’t have been scared to rack up the cards even higher. 2. Looking back on all of the things I used my card for and when I used my card, I realized many purchases were made in an attempt to fill some void…whatever the cause may have been at any particular time. I think it is important to realize what it is we do when we should be praying or talking or thinking so that we can change our habits. 3. I have seen the real connection between my faithfulness to tithing and trusting God to always provide. I was taught at a young age that tithing is important. I remember standing at my dresser with my dad while he explained to me that all I had to do was move the decimal place one spot to the left to figure out how much I owed. At that point in time, however, I didn’t understand that giving to God went beyond financially supporting your church. I’ve come to realize since that when you give God ten percent, you are blessed even more than you gave. When you give, especially when it hurts, you become aware of how God provides and through his provisions he shows Himself to you. When I pay my tithe every week, I’m not only saying “use this to further your kingdom”, I’m also saying “I trust you will provide me with everything I need…even if I don’t understand how it will happen.”

Since the start of August, I have paid 401.68 cents. That total covers a late payment from last month, a late fee, an over-the-limit fee I was assessed because of my late fee and this months payment. This weekend, my family had a garage sale and I made enough money that I am going to be able to put about $300 on my card above and beyond the minimum and fees I had to pay for the month. Once all of my payments go through for the month I’ll update my debt status  and continue keeping track of my ups and (hopefully minimal) downs until my cards are paid off.

I know there are a lot of people who feel weird about talking about their funds and spending habits and there could be someone who actually reads this one day that will “tsk tsk” my unwise financial decisions, but I want to track my progress because it is very exciting for me and because I hope that it may inspire someone who is afraid to commit themselves financially to God. I want my experience to somehow be a learning experience for someone else, and maybe my writing here will be an avenue for that to happen.

PS My mother is a financial whiz and in addition to the grace of God, I wouldn’t be able to formulate a stick-to-it plan and I probably wouldn’t even understand the importance of getting out of debt. I highly recommend asking her for this sort of advice if you ever find yourself needing it.

Anyway, the movie was so bad that I didn’t even sit through the whole thing. This is probably another reason why I’m not qualified to make any generalizations about the movie, but whatever. In summary, I didn’t enjoy the movie because:

1. It’s slow

2. Boring

3. Predictable

4. There’s something off about the characters

5. I hate ironic tragedy
Really, the movie is boring because it’ slow and predictable. I didn’t see the ending, but I assume that the allusions to the father dying in the beginning explain what happens. Regardless, throughout the entire movie, the relationships that will be formed and broken become very apparent before anything even happens. Additionally, the reasons (plots) behind the changes in relationships are obvious.

I don’t connect with the characters. The parents are too exaggerated. They are supposed to portray some sort of facade to the outside world to make them appear “perfect”, but the facade is so extreme that it is see through, or at least should be, yet it doesn’t seem anyone else on the “outside” picks up on that, which makes those characters seem ignorant and unlikable. The plot that involves a broken relationship between the parents and the daughter is almost underplayed. It seems like the daughter should be more angsty to keep up with the extreme positions the parents take. The neighbor boy isn’t “weird” enough to make the relationship between he and the daughter shocking…it’s expected.

Also, I hate tragic irony. Again, I’m not entirely sure what happens at the end, but I assume the father dies, making the relationships he’s formed and the “stands” he has taken throughout the movie tragically ironic…like Romeo and Juliet. This doesn’t break my heart or cause me to consider the implications of everyone’s actions throughout the movie, it just makes me think the Dad was a loser who put up with the B.S. in his marriage and at his job too long, went off the deep end in a sort of mid-life crisis which in the end lead to his death. In short, it just makes me think the Dad was dumb and cowardly.

I know there are tons of bad movies out there, so why should I pick this one to complain about? Because I wasted my time watching a crappy movie, and I for the life of me can’t figure out what all the hype was/is about. Maybe if I had watched it when I was 12, I would’ve thought it was “edgy” because my parents probably wouldn’t have let me watch it. Other than that, if anyone cares to explain to me why it’s so “good”, I would gladly accept an explanation.

So, a few weeks ago I was out doing some homework for a photo class when I stumbled upon this church in Fishers called EASTERN STAR. It had a pretty sweet steeple so I pulled into the empty parking lot to get a quick pic. By the time I shifted into park and turned my camera on, some car bolted across the parking lot and pulled up beside me. It was one of the Pastors or something. This was our exchange:

Christian: “Can I help you?”

Me: “Oh, I was just going to take a picture of the church for a homework assignment.”

Christian: “You can’t take a picture without our permission… and you don’t have our permission.”

Me: “I can’t take a picture of your church?”

Christian: “You don’t have our permission.”

Me: “Soo… I can’t take a picture of your church?”

Christian: “Not without our permission, no.”

Me: “So, can I take a picture of your church?”

Christian: “No.”

Me: “You won’t let me take a picture… of your church?”

Christian: “Not without our permission.”

–That seriously the conversation I had before he drove to the side of the building and went inside to prepare his sermon about how Jesus loves and accepts everyone. He kind of looked like a young Eric Estrada — you know, back in his CHiP days. This was the only reason I didn’t really get pissed. If Ponch doesn’t want me to photograph his church, then I won’t. At least not on his property — it’s fair game across the street however.

Now then comes my dilemma. I can’t let this go. This guy is a giant hypocritical douche bag and I can’t let him think he’s won. I will photograph this church again in excess. I have two options:

1) Become a member of the church and photograph the shit out of it every Sunday in front of him,

or,

2) Photograph the shit out of it anyway until he approaches me again — at which time I douse holy water on him and see if anything happens.

Next up: Informing the upper class that those “Salvation Army” buildings they pass each day are in fact not National Guard recruiting centers.

This is the first time I’ve ever really enjoyed Elvis Presley. You can read about this poem here.

Greg getting deep with me because we had forged a "trust"

What? You mean you didn’t save all of your AIM conversations from 2001-Present? Pffffft, bet you feel like a dumb ass. Yeah, nothing says “over-high school” like spending 2-3 hours a week pouring over e-mails, instant messages and Xanga posts about how shitty Junior year and Pre-Algebra is. Whats that? You passed Pre-Algebra in the 6th grade? Fuck you. No one uses that shit in real life anyway.

Source.

P.S. I totally had deja vu while writing this post.