"Allow myself to introduce... myself." (Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Blog)

I am not oblivious to my own nature, neither my strengths nor weaknesses.  So, don't think that I am unaware that I can be a serious fellow.  No no.  It's true.  If a heart attack and I were to get into a Contest of Seriousness I would beat him so solidly he'd have a coronary.  (scratches head)

Here's the story.  So, my family just went through the process of taking the Meyers-Briggs test.  For the uninitiated, the Meyers-Briggs is a personality test.  Yes, if you are wondering, I failed.  Okay, kidding.  It doesn't work like that.  The test is meant to, in a general way, evaluate your personality and help you understand it better.  It is actually an incredibly effective to tool to help you gain a bit of perspective on yourself.  The results are surprisingly accurate.  When reading mine, I wondered if perhaps it was a prank played by those who know me.  It was as if the test makers had not asked me questions and evaluated me, but followed me around for a week.  (Looks over shoulder, checks under lamp for bugs) 

Getting the results was a ton of fun.  My brother, Jason, was an INTJ.  This personality type is also known as the "Mastermind" personality type.  Shocker that this is the most compatible personality type with mine.  My brother and I enjoy serious conversation.  Serious is fun for us.  Every now and then it is fun to cut loose, BUT on the whole, the most fun things are things with purpose. 

I am an ENFP.  A somewhat common personality type... for women.  ENFP males are rare.  Yes.  Shut up.  Moving on.  Our personality type is called the "Champion".  This is the El Cid, Advocate, fight for a cause kind of champion, as in "one who champions a cause," champion, not a "we win" champion.  We ENFPs are not satisfied unless we are fighting for a cause, sharing the human experience.  Yes, exactly, they bugged my room.  I will find them eventually.  For example, we ENFPs and INTJs think solving world hunger is more fun than dancing... because it is. 

I know you probably don't agree, that is why I am revamping my blog.  Apparently, most people find dancing more fun than solving world hunger.  (Under my breath: "Weirdos")   I am going to be doing my best to continue sharing my heart, keep trying to glorify God, but do so in a way that those who don't think that solving world hunger is more fun than dancing can read this blog and be blessed and entertained.  The two are surely not mutually exclusive.  I mean... (clears throat) ...it will be totes hilar and so awesome!  

So, my new guidelines are...


Keep it funny.  Yes, I am serious as a heart attack, but that don't mean I ain't never funny.  Sometimes I is.

Keep it short.  This one will be hard, as I have a penchant for verbosity.  Tis true and I know it.  I will do my best. (sheepish grin, crosses fingers behind back)  I want this blog to be accessible, as apparently most people these days have little to no attention span and struggle to focus for Wow the biggest gecko just crawled across my window.  Or is it a salamander?

Keep it real.  I am still an ENFP.  More than that, I am still a child of God.  I still want to bless you and be blessed by you, exchange thoughts,  share hidden human experience and insights, try my best to glorify God above all else. This life has not ceased being short, and we can all help each other in living more fully.  My hope is that God's gift to me, my ability to communicate, will be used to His glory.  

So, come back and keep reading.  And hit the little "like" button if you did in fact like.  Takes two seconds, and despite your ADD, surely you can manage to NICE! Email from the Prince of Jordan!  Gonna be rich.  Check y'all later.  

Steak Trees, and the Hierarchy of Animal Cuteness

So I am feeling a bit more literary today, writing two posts in one day, but I feel like it.  I am going to break from my usual focus on theology, and just share a random thought. 

People today are particularly odd about animals.  I think this is because nearly everybody lives in cities, so people's limited encounters with animals and the outdoors has warped some very basic concepts.  When I used to work at Labatt, I remember just laughing as I listened to some of my coworkers talk about how they couldn't think about the fact that meat came from an animal.  I could just see this scenario in my mind, where this older gentleman is walking down this gorgeous, perfectly lined orchard of trees.  He steps up his ladder that stretched up toward the massive green crown, and he grabs a T-Bone hanging from the tree's branches.  He gives an approving look, telling us that the meat is ripe.  He plucks the meat off the tree, and tosses it into the back of his old 55 Chevy truck.

Being a part of family that has hunting as such a big part of it, I have been absolutely blown away by the level of hypocrisy that has become so Vogue as of late.  My first encounter came in High School, when a fellow student, upon hearing that I hunted deer, got so enraged, he threatened to kill me.  Just let that sink in for a second before I mention that he was wearing leather shoes and a leather belt.  That is the only time I have been threatened for hunting, but it is far from the last time I have been called evil by people who wear leather, have leather couches, eat hamburgers, wear products tested on animals, and more.  When I ask hard questions in return, there is no reasoning.  It just is. 

The biggest reason I have found that people will become so enraged over deer hunting, is because people have this underlying hierarchy of animals, the cuter they are, the more important their life is.  Kill a deer, and you are monster.  Kill a stupid cow, and that's just life.  Fish suffer from have no whites in their eyes.  i think if they did, they would have more sympathizers.  Birds are pretty, but still enough different from us that we are pretty cool with the billions of chickens and turkeys we have killed on our behalf each year.  Insects don't even get a thought.  I bet PETA exterminates without a thought. 

In the end, it is a frustrating thing, being someone who takes part in something so basic, so normal to life, save for the last fifty or so years.  It reminds me of how influenced we are by peer pressure.  We struggle so much with presentism (the idea of judging all other times with the assumption that the present is correct).  Oh well.  I really do not foresee a change on the subject.  It is just one of those funny little thoughts.