Logic

While reminiscing with my mum about my experiences in the FE colleges:

Mum: "I didn't know Bluebeard was bonkers."
OddBabble: "Of course he is! He's called Bluebeard because he's got a blue beard!"
Mum: "Well, I don't see why that should be my natural assumption. You also have a friend called Shoekeeper and as far as I know, he doesn't keep shoes."
OddBabble: "Good point!"

OddBabble likes to...

1./ In her free time, OddBabble likes to dance, watch Lost and Grey's Anatomy, and spend time with her friends and family.
2./ OddBabble likes to spy on him from the darkness of her upstairs bathroom.
3./ Before her games OddBabble likes to relax and listen to music and indulge in her hidden talent: sewing.
4./ OddBabble likes to play on VMK. That's Disney's Virtual Magic Kingdom.
5./ OddBabble likes to proofread the local paper.
6./ So, you know how OddBabble likes to do all these surveys and then post them up for everyone to read her answers, well for some reason, i always have to read...
7./ The newlywed OddBabble likes to buy furniture sight unseen, and, in return for Jeff's turning a blind eye to his girly house, he gets sex.
8./ Apart from writing, OddBabble likes to make/play games, beer, movies and a host of other things that cannot be talked about on a family website.
9./ Back from the challenge, pseudo celebrity OddBabble likes to quote Joe Walsh. "Everybody's so different; I haven't changed."
10./ After drinking a lot and expending a lot of...energy...OddBabble likes to get a snack to keep everything stable.

First 10 results after googling "OddBabble likes to"

Bricking It

In two months, my contract will run out, and I’ll have the UCCF door closed behind me and bolted. At the moment I am trying hard to make sure that I can walk right into another one, but so far all I can see is wilderness.

Either way, it scares the living crap out of me.

Whatever happens to me on June the 18th will be something I’ve never done before. All my life I have either been a student, or someone who works with students. Each stage of my life has been a smooth transition from doing something I know, to doing something else I know from a different perspective. I can hardly imagine what it will be like to step off that treadmill to somewhere foreign.

I know that change has to happen, and I know that I don’t want to stay where I am, even if I had the choice to do so. Things are finishing where I am and it’s like trying to warm my hands on a fire that’s almost out. I know I need to get up and make a new one.

I know too, or at least have been reminded, that God is still there. I know he loves me and that he loves to bless me. That he knows me, knows what I love, what I'm good at, what I’m scared of, what my weaknesses are. He knows the right job for me, and he knows how to help me get it. There’s no rational reason why he would lead me to being a make-up artist, or historian or cricketer, or something else that I would hate and have no talent for. I know he’s not vindictive.

The thing that scares me is the truth that he does know what’s best for me better than I do, and that that sometimes means that it hurts. When I look back over my life, I can see why all the twists and turns have come about. I can see most of the time, what God was doing at each point, and why he did it. I can see where going his way saved me from disaster, and I can see where going mine dropped me right in it. I know that whatever he brings me will be what’s best. The Bible tells me so.

But my memory is not short enough to forget that learning those lessons was always painful. That being sanctified, being obedient, being disobedient, being pruned by the great keeper of the vine; that these things hurt.

I know it will hurt to say goodbye to my UCCF family – it’s hurting now!
I know it will hurt to change such well-worn routines, to leave behind esoteric words, mannerisms, intonations, uniforms, networks; all the ingrained things that come from being part of such a small and particular world as I have been a part of.
I know that the challenge of my sinfully putting my identity in my work and in my ‘status’ in having this job, will be a painful challenge. A disorientating challenge. An uncomfortably humbling challenge.
I know that my shyness and fear of entering a world where not everyone has known my name since before they met me, and the things I have done before will seem meaningless to them; I know that these things will erode my sense of identity even further.

It’s these things that I’m scared of, even if I’m led into the most OddBabbleshaped job I could dare to imagine. I know I need that challenge and I need the change. I just wish there was a quicker, less painful way to do it.

Philosophical Conundrum

So I was told that rats made good pets. I thought that I would get two girl ones, and call them Pam and Barbara. Then I bought a book about rats and discovered that they wee on you carpet all the time and need constant attention and supervision. Bye bye Pam and Barabara.

My conundrum is this: By calling into existence the concept of Barbara and Pam, were there from that moment, two ACTUAL rats, who would in the future be named thus? If so, when I decided not to buy them, did they cease to exist? Have I murdered two theoretical rodents? Or have there, since their conception, been two rats, who I WOULD have bought, but now that I haven't, they are just called, say, Sylvia and Prunella?

It tortures me so.

Compromise

When I go on holiday, I like to lie in in the mornings for as long as possible, before eating something delicious and slowly consuming cooling alcohol in the warm shade, reading a book, watching the locals or discussing Interesting Things with my companion. These long days might be punctuated by visits to local markets to look at cheap tat, or various activities involving staring at foreign people, or long periods of sitting down. In the evenings I like to eat more (especially whatever the locals eat, as I like to try new food), then drink more, and then dance.

I also enjoy playing catch.

When Witsy goes on holiday, she likes to get up at a reasonable hour so that she can make the most of the time she has away. She likes to look at places of historical interest and visit museums. When eating in foreign countries she likes to find a place where she can eat a cheeseburger. She likes to plan her activity-filled days in advance.

She also enjoys playing catch.

Witsy and I are holiday buddies.

We play a lot of catch.

You would think that two such vacationally incompatible people would be an unwise Holiday Buddy partnership, but that is because you do not know the magic of the Witsy/Barney combo, or how inexplicably and endlessley satisfying the ancient game of catch can be (especially with the Hi-Bounce Pinky, pictured).

The secret, is that relational magic word - compromise. It is perfectly possible and pleasant, for me to sit and read contemplative contemporary fiction in the grounds of a castle, where Witsy is running around reading placards & feasting on historical facts.

After a quick round of catch, it is perfectly acceptable and enjoyable for Witsy to go and take photos from several angles of some ancient sewage works (or something), while I sit and sip a Bacardi, listening to music and watching people go by.When ski-ing, in between games of catch, there's nothing wrong with me gliding along green runs looking at the pretty trees, and then having a little sit down, while Witsy bombs backwards down black runs across mountains spanning three countries.

See? Compromise.

Becci's Strange Dreamworld #1

"Well...first of all you decided to go to taekwondo with me. When we got there it was at a swimming pool and everyone was walking round the edge and every now and again jumping in and getting out again and then walking around and continuing to walk around. Then we left and went to the changing rooms which were like little huts that you'd find in some foreign country. I can't describe them. Then we went back to your house where you were like this poor kid who had abusive parents and I relaised you needed to get out of there and it made me really sad. And you had all these brothers and sisters and then I realised you could leave because you were an adult, so we left and went to kath's house. When we got there her house was a crap-hole,so we were discussing that it needed decorating. So we decided to decorate it but Kath said we couldnt all live there whilst it was being done so you and her were like "we dont need Becci, lets get rid of her"
And i was sad.
You gave me a hug.
And then you grew a beard."

Oh Bother

I am a Christian, and sometimes I swear.

I was in the car with Priss listening to Rootless Tree by Damien Rice the other day, and I warned her that it had some 'rude words' in it. Sure enough, Damien got very upset, and in the chorus screamed a broken; "F**k you! F**k you! F**k you, and all we've been through!" She asked me whether I thought that he would sing different words if he became a Christian. I think it would be a real shame if he did.

I am a person that loves language. I love words and I love people that really know how to use them. I love the precision of it - that there is usually a perfect word to express that exact thing that you want to say, and I love the giving and recieving of that precision when we communicate. Sometimes I think that exact word has to be a swear word.

Imagine if Damien sang; "Go away! Go away! Go away!" or similar. There just isn't another word or phrase that communicates the pain and rage that he feels towards this ill-loved woman, than the one he has chosen. Trying to put a more socially acceptable word in there is an attempt to sanitize language, but language is not supposed to be hygienic. It describes the world we live in and the world we live in is not pure and lovely. We need words to express that, or it's like pretending that we live in a Walt Disney Mary Poppins bubble.

The world is not 'messed up'. The world is f**ked up. A messed up world is one where some people get sad sometimes - the kind of thing we tell little children when we try to guard them from the truth. The reality is that we live in a fallen world which is ravaged by sin; every concievable thing is spoiled by it and not as it should be. Every single person is fighting a losing battle against themselves from which they are helpless without a saviour. The language we need to describe that is strong and offensive because that is the nature of the thing it describes. We need the visceral percussiveness of that word to say things which make us rage.

Of course there are contexts where this is not true. Of course that word can describe sexual violence, or can be used as a weapon against someone. What makes language wonderful is also what makes it dangerous; it is powerful. We can choose to use words rightly or wrongly, for good or for evil. There's a reason why I've used *s instead of letters, and that's because I want to be sensitive to people that don't agree with me. I'm aware of verses like Colossians 3:8 (But now you must rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander and filthy language from your lips) and Ephesians 4:29 (Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs) but surely this is about the context and the intent with which we use words. I don't think it means we speak in a watery way that doesn't express reality. I hope it doesn't mean that Christians don't have access to that precision of communication that others have.

Please don't hear me as saying that I think sermons should be peppered with swear words, or that Christians should regularly be effing all over the place. I know that there is a great inelegance in that, and a high potential for offending someone. I know there are few occasions when a swear word is the right word. All I'm saying is that we should not be afraid of certain words. They don't bite. They are just serving their function.

Anyone that doesn't agree with me can just....go away.