:: The Ruminant ::

The Ruminant's first visitor, amayamaya, left a nice comment requesting more posts. Just as retailers often display their first dollar, I am going to display this first comment for a while. Rest assured, amayamaya, when I get my thirty minutes of fame, you will have your fifteen. I hope I'm not too selfish to keep some of the fame for myself.

:: Friday, January 31, 2003 ::

Proselyte

I was walking across campus the other day in desperate search of a course I'm supposedly taking. I was gliding through the student commons building when I noticed two young men wearing cheap suits with the hair tied up into neat little buns. They were moving toward me on an intercept course. When I saw their nametags I knew I was in trouble. "Oh great," I thought, "Space Mormons."

    "Looking for something?" asked one of them with inappropriate boldness. "Yes," I answered, "a Xerox machine."
    "Why settle for a poor copy," continued the bold one, "when you can have direct access to the source?" I lost the will to fight, and I couldn't muster the courage to be rude and say "piss off!" So I sat and softly wretched while they continued.
    "I'm Elder Buzz and this is my companion, Elder Nephraimichi, and we're with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Space." Elder Nephraimichi interjected: "You can call me 'Neph.' You may know us as the Space Mormons, but these days we actually prefer to be referred to as 'The Church.'"
    "That's right," continued Elder Buzz. "We'd like to share with you our knowledge of another Testament of Jesus Christ. You see, not only did Jesus preach in Israel. God has many children everywhere, and after His resurrection Jesus went to other worlds to preach His gospel there. The testament of these events is written in The Book of Space Mormon."
    "Okay," I replied, "what 'other worlds' did Jesus visit?" I decided this conversation would at least be better than my class on using Lexis-Nexis.
    "Well," chimed Elder Buzz, "perhaps you've read in the Bible about how, thousands of years ago, several of the original Tribes of Israel were driven from their homeland. They're now called the Lost Tribes. The Book of Space Mormon tells about how they wandered in the desert until the prophet Nephraim had a revelation from God. God showed them the way to build spaceships, which they used to immigrate to the moon. The people who live on the moon today are actually the descendants of these ancient Israelites."
    "I always figured there weren't any people on the moon, what with no atmosphere and all," I said.
    "Oh, there are!" said Elder Neph. "They're very tall, and they dress like Quakers. And God has provided them with plenty of oxygen to breath."
    Elder Buzz added: "Sadly, though, they have all fallen away from the true knowledge of God. Space Mormon was the last of the righteous Nephraimite tribe. He compiled the Book of Space Mormon shortly before he was killed by the sinister Laminates, who practised a synthetic idolatry and forgot about the true Heavenly Engineer who had made mankind in His image through cloning.
    "The Book of Space Mormon was nearly lost, until in the early 19th century, when the Prophet Yosef Jung was inspired by God to create a substance that repelled gravity. Using this with some deep-sea diving equipment, Yosef travelled to the moon. God led him to find the ancient inscribed optical plates of Space Mormon. He fought off the evil Moon Laminates and returned to Earth, where God helped him to build special equipment capable of reading and translating the sacred optical plates."
    I let the elders rattle off their story, but I became more bold in my criticism once we began reading from the Book of Space Mormon. "Do you really mean to tell me that God couldn't write better English than this?" I asked. "I mean look at it:

...and it came to pass that the men didst hear unto God and in hearing didst heave upon themselves up to the mountains, where did they molten from the rock helmets which were clean, and smooth, and clear, and behold! That the helmets were opaque, so'st to blocketh out the harsh solareth radiation upon their flight... and it came to pass that the suits they did make were tight, like unto a dish, and the gloves thereof were tight, like unto a dish, and the boots thereof were sturdy with wide tread, and where they didst meet the pant leg they were tight, like unto a dish...

    "What does any of that even mean?" I asked. "And look at this rediculous passage:

    'Lo and behold ye,' saith the Lord to the Brother of Jordash, 'I hast given thee mighty plans that shall carry thee far.' 'Yeah verily thou hast,' saith the Brother of Jordash, 'But, oh Lord, shouldst we require air, what shall we do?' And the Lord thought for a minute and did say, 'Verily, I thought of that. Thou shaltst put a hole in the top, with a stopper in it. And when thou shouldst needeth any air, verily shalt thou unstopper it. And if any space should leak in, thou shalt replace the stopper. Verily the Lord shall provide.'
    And it came to pass that the Brother of Jordash had another question, and asketh him thus, 'Oh, Lord, one more thing; how shallst our space craft fly upward into space? What bringeth them thus?' And it came to pass that the Lord didst say 'Oh ye of so littleth faith! Didst thou thinketh that I forgot about that? No! As a test of your faith, I decided that you shouldst solveth that problem!' And so the Brother of Jordash sat outside and did think for three longeth days. And on the fourth day he did exclaim, 'Oh, Lord! I hast figured it out! Thou shalt touch the rear of the craft and it shall glow, causing it to fly!' And the Lord did reply, 'Yeah, that sounds like that will work.' And it came to pass that the Lord didst bring down his mighty finger from heaven, which was 9.76 meters in length, and He did touch the craft and they did do all the things that the Brother of Jordash expected them to do.

    "I don't even know where to start with this. Language problems aside... Hell, even setting aside the scientific problems, don't you see the major plot holes in this?"
    They evidently did not. They stood smiling at me, shaking their heads. "You need to understand the power of faith" said Elder Buzz. "All the science in the world couldn't make those spaceships fly. Only the touch of the Heavenly Engineer, through the faith of the Brother of Jordash, could give life to their crude cedar engines. You too can have that kind of faith. Pray now to the Heavenly Engineer, and ask him to send you a transmission confirming that the Book of Space Mormon is true. Let Him switch on the Spirit in you the way He switched on those engines!"
    "Maybe later," I said. "Right now this all just seems like a load of crap. You still haven't answered how they live on the moon with no atmosphere. We've been to the moon, and didn't see anybody. We've had telescopes aimed at the moon for centuries with no signs of any civilizations. It's all just dead craters. And who is the Brother of Jordash anyway? Why is he the only guy in all this who doesn't get his own name?"
    "The true name of the Brother of Jordash was revealed to Yosef Jung through revelation. His name was Mhngxzn. It apparently cannot be pronounced and could not be spelled in the ancient language of short-hand Spanglish that was spoken on the moon when Space Mormon wrote his books. As for the other things you said, you have to learn to see past all this 'science' to the more powerful world of faith. The power of God gave them air to breathe on the moon, but their rejection of Him bred centuries of war which destroyed their civilizations. They mostly live on the dark side of the moon now, where we can't see them."
    Elder Neph interrupted: "In the end, though, these are all just words. Words aren't what's true. The Church is what's true."
    I started edging away. "I think I'll keep my faith with equations and experiments," I said. Elder Buzz gently grabbed my arm and said, "Can we meet with you later for another discussion?" "No," I said, "I really don't think I'm interested." "Well, we're very sorry to hear that," said Elder Neph, "We only want what's best for your soul. We hope you will come around to The Truth. Good bye."

Getting away from them had been surprisingly easy. Maybe they just realized they could use their energy more effectively with someone else. I was glad to be away from them. But the encounter has stuck with me for some reason. They unnerved me. I've been having trouble sleeping since I met them. I'm trying to distance myself from the experience by indulging heavily in the one beverage they think is ungodly: RC Cola. I sure hope it helps me forget that there are such nutty zealots lurking around my own home town.

:: Chris 5:27 PM [+] ::
...

It is natural for the author of a brand new blog to be curious about the hits it receives, and to wonder who might be stopping in for repeat visits. While there are only a few posts on The Ruminant and I understand that there won't likely be much traffic here, I nevertheless look eagerly at the site-meter details to see if anyone stopped in recently. Usually, they have not. But I began to notice a pattern: someone from a domain named ARTMENG1 showed up several times in the list. This piqued my curiosity. Who is this mysterious "ARTMENG1"? I went sleuthing. I'll spare you the boring story of my mystical nslookup ritual, and skip to the end: it was me. I am the mysterious repeat reader of my own blog. How narcisistic. And yet, perhaps there is a certain zen aspect to writing for an audience of myself. I write not the words which many may want to read. I write the words which want to be written. That's something to chew on during the train ride home...

:: Chris 4:22 PM [+] ::
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The Edge of the Earth

A lot of people don't realize that you can actually see the edge of the Earth from Edmonton. It shouldn't be that surprising; to get here, you just head to Montana and drive north for a day or two. After traversing the deadly Alberta badlands, you arrive at the mythical frozen land of Edmonton. If you go to a high point, like my office window or apartment balcony, you can look across the horizon to the northern-most rim of reality. It looks like this:

Some people mistake this for the sunset. In fact, it is the Fires of Valhalla, the colliseum of the gods and the birthplace of dragons. Sometimes, when I'm bored with the dull activities of my neighbors, I turn my binoculars toward the northern rim. I see dragons rising and descending in a terrifying and seductive dance of fire.

I may fall victim to my curiosity about the north. On many days I look toward those mysterious fires, and a deadly yet irresistible thought infects my mind: "road trip."

:: Chris 4:53 PM [+] ::
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Blog Spawn

This is my newly spawned blog. Here is where I will record the events of my life, as opposed to Corpse Divine, which will contain my opinions and arguments about things. I currently live in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, so I'll open with a story about the snow. Last night I drove out of my underground heated parking garage to return a rented video game. The snow was a foot deep on the roads. It had been snowing for days, and the city made no effort to clear it from the roads. Slow going and cold it was. When I returned from the video store the snow was so dense and slick that I couldn't pull back into my garage. So I parked on the street.

Today I took Erin to the grocery store. She instantly regretted not wearing her gloves, so I gave her mine. It's -30 degrees Celsium outside, by the way. She went into the store and I decided to clear some excess snow off of the car. I held the brush with my gloveless arm and wiped one window at a time. My arm slowly froze. Not only did it freeze, but in the intense cold it compressed to such a density that it could only be called a new state of matter. It was harder and stronger than any rock, and it did not soften when I returned to the warmth. I am now called The Neutron Fist, and I intend to strike heavy blows for justice, restoring order and ending the sinister corruption that has so long held Edmonton in its claws. I shall start by dealing with a truly evil supervillain... The Landlord.

I hope someone enjoys this blog.

:: Chris 6:31 PM [+] ::
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