Easter is mentioned in 20 posts, which ranks #33 overall for things. It is most often associated with these...

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This year we're going to be checking out Easter in the Park. Which from what I can tell by word of mouth, is a really big deal in Uptown. From what I can tell by the internet, it hasn't existed since 2007. All I really wanted to know was what time people generally started showing up, and what most people tended to bring -- blankets, wine, cheese? But I guess I'll just have to do whatever I want and hope it's not too outlandish.

Speaking of outlandish, Daniel's birthday is coming up and as his present this year, I've decided to throw him out of an airplane. And I'm going to join him. We'll both be free falling from 13,500 feet above beautiful Whitewright, Texas. I'm absolutely terrified but strangely looking forward to the experience. I think it'll be a riot. I paid a little extra to have the whole thing documented on video for posterity. I may or may not show you all. They do post the freefall on the internet for all to see. Anyway, wish me luck.

And good luck to all of you finding eggs laid by rabbits. Creepy.

There's a new promotional deal from the good people at M&M's. You might have seen the commercials for it. It's kind of cool. You can log onto their website (mms.com) and customize your M&M's. You get to choose two colors and two phrases. So you could get like lavender and yellow M&M's that say, "Happy Easter," and, "Praise Jesus!" But therein lies the problem. That's like all they will let you do.

They have a few rules you must abide by in order to get your customized candy. First, no single letters. They take pride in their brand or some shit like that so the only single letters they will print on their candy is their trademarked "M." Mmmk, no big deal. Secondly, no company names or organization names. Whatever. This is where it gets stupid. No references to drugs. They had an example of a candy they would not print and it said, "Mary's Pills," which I thought was riotous. I can just see Mary's face when you give them to her. She'd kind of try to feign like she found it amusing but really she would just be kinda like what the hell? Yknow? Also you work with Mary and she's kind of uptight. So okay that eliminated like a third of my ideas. And finally, no obscenities. Game over. I'm not buying customized M&M's.

The last thing wrong with this idea is that you only get two lines and each line is 8 characters each. So you really can't express anything in inuendos or whatever to get around their Nazi rules about what they will and won't print. So here's what I'm thinking. I will start my own business where I do nothing but buy plain M&M's and then print stuff on them for you. And I'll have a microprinter so you can get M&M's with your entire manifesto on them. All I'm saying is that the M&M's pictured here would be fun to nonchalantly sneak into a child's birthday party and if the only thing standing between me and that goal is some kind of edible microprinter I'm not entirely sure exists, but if I does you can be certain it would be wildly prohibitively expensive... well then, I'm not going to let that stop me.

Well. So. Anyway. That may or may not have been worth an entire blog.

Happy easter, bitches!1!!!

Since tomorrow I have to post my picture of a crucified bunny rabbit, I thought I'd take the opportunity today to reach back into the vaults and post my easter story. Years and years ago I started The Conduit conspiracy theories newsletter. After 400 subscribers and 0 issues, it morphed into The Conduit online zine. After 0 subscribers and 0 issues, the only thing I have to show for about a decade of effort is the cover art and one article. I showed you all the cover art back in May of 2003 and now, for your reading pleasure, is the blasphemy that is my easter article.

Saturday, March 15, 2003
JESUS RISES FROM DEAD, SEES OWN SHADOW

Another year gone by, the world finds itself reflecting upon the life and death ... and then life again of its lord and saviour, jesus h. christ. Roughly 2000 years ago, news of jesus' physically and biologically law-defying rise from the dead caused waves amongst the uneducated populace of the ancient world. But the question that was on everyone's mind was not the who, what, when, where, or how ... but, did he or did he not see his shadow?

Town officials were overjoyed at the sight of the still groggy jesus' bed head peaking out the top of his tomb. They waited with bated breath to see if the no-longer-hibernating son of g*d would see his own shadow or emerge unawares. A delighted crowd of merry-makers cheered as the still squinting resurrection and life turned and jumped at the sight of his own darkened outline on the ground below him.

What does this joyous occasion mark? Because he saw his own shadow, the story goes that the world can look forward to 2000 more years of shame and guilt. While some may be disappointed by the prediction, not all are so easily discouraged. Area man and fellow carpenter, Ahmed Aksul, says, "I don't buy into the whole philosophy of easter. But it's still fun to come out each year and watch the only brown-haired blue-eyed man in ancient Mesopotamia rise from death's cold grasp into everlasting life."

The general sentiment of the crowd mirrored that of Aksul. Local mother of 26, Shiba Sulaha, was not permitted to speak to another man under punishment of stoning. However, her husband stated, "The woman is overjoyed at the announcement that some poor, white Jew saw his shadow. She enjoys shame ... as well as guilt."

This reporter is just happy that in today's fast past technological world of reading and thinking for oneself, that the concept of an obviously drug induced fantasy has not been lost. So this year, when easter comes yet again, and you are out with the kids on Sunday morning looking for the eggs jesus has laid in the lawn, take a moment to remember that without death, there is no life. And without jesus, there would be no shame.

This weekend went by rather uneventfully, which was fine. I didn't go anywhere from Easter. Not that I had a lot to do in College Station, but I was still sick and having trouble breathing for extended periods of time so I decided to just waste my days away sitting on my favorite couch watching my favorite TV shows. It was a wonderful time. Almost everyone I knew went to their respective homes to celebrate the day with their family so I was a little bored.

Last night I went out to Northgate with Stino and the crew and had a few beers. I wasn't sure if it would be a good idea or not since I was sick and it was cold and rainy and there were no places open past 1:00. So we got kicked out of Duddley's at 1:00 with full chuggers of beer and nowhere to go. People were suggesting that we 'chance it' and drive home with our beers, but you know me and you know I wasn't down with that. We ended up on the porch of Gatsby's finishing up our beers before we could go in and drink their beer. We ended up pouring some out on their fabulously sodded back porch (all the grass is so dead, its extremely tacky and stupid). Anyway, in the end I decided it was a good idea to have gone drinking because I woke up this morning feeling much better than I have the past few mornings. That is a good thing.

David27 went to Houston to see his family. He just came home today and called me on his way to let me know that he had gotten me a present. I was decidedly excited. He couldn't drop by and give it to me but he did tell me what it was. He got me a fish! He had read my webpage saying that I wanted a fish but didn't know how to take care of one so he bought me a beta, since they require minimal upkeep. I've decided to name him 28 in honor of our good friend 27. I am going to love him and hug him and squeeze him. I think he's going to bring him over tomorrow and I can't wait. I'll take a picture of him and share it with you all when he does. Later you have nots!

Went to IHOP late last night to break my diet. Stuffed french toast was worth every carb. Went to bed watching Waking Life. Good flick. Hard to watch when dozing off at 3:00am. It's a thinking movie, not a drinking movie. Woke up with no cough, good news. Woke up (early, as you can see) with pain in neck and shoulders so intense that sleep is not an option. A hot bath did not alleviate any discomfort. Perhaps some yoga will help. Otherwise agony continues. Hope you have fun in church today, suckers.

I guess everyone wasn't as excited about my flowers as I am. I continue to grow more excited each and every day as they continue to grow. The day that one of them blooms, drink are on me! (No, thats not a typo -- drink are on me!) In other news, Owen and I finished rearranging the living room finally. Everything is at an angle, but they're at different angles. It's very avant-garde. The spaces left in the corners by furniture being at wonky angles allowed me to put a little bit of back lighting, which I think really pulls the whole room together. Yay me.

Last night I went over to David27's to watch a movie with our old friend Michael Potts. Good times. We watched Party Monster. It was a pretty good movie, I missed the beginning, but if you get a chance to see it I recommend. I brought a bottle of wine as per Mr. Potts' request, and then he decided he didn't want to drink. But David27 did not have a corkscrew, so using a round thing and a hammer, Michael hammered the cork into the bottle instead of pulling it out. Ingenious. I never would have thought to do so. Why, oh why must I always think inside the box?

I've decided not to return home for jebus's second birthday. I would have to drive there and back all in like one day and I hate doing that. Plus the whole church fiasco will reer its ugly head betwixt the parentals and I. Besides that, I think I am deathly ill. It feels like someone has been standing on my chest for like 2 days now. And I can cough until the cows come home but nothing will come up. Maybe I'll try not smoking and see how that affects things. As it is, pity me! I'm sick! Check you sluts later.

Oh I am so excited. My wildflowers have only been planted for like 4 days now and they're already starting to sprout. Can you believe it? I actually thought there was a good chance that they would not grow for me. You see, I don't exactly have a green thumb. In fact, everything I touch turns brown, even my beloved cactus. But not this time, my friends, not this time. I love my wildflowers and I am going to nurture them and love them and make them bloom. It's almost time to hit them with another batch of plant food.

In fact, maybe I should give my new friend a hit of plant food as well. He is a palm tree and he now lives behind my TV. I've been wanting to rearrange the living room for a while now but Owen has not been very keen on the idea. So I decided to do it in stages while he was out of the apartment. I put the TV in the corner but it looked stupid with the speakers turned all inward so I brought the TV out flush with them, which looks good but created a huge empty gap. Long story short (which I know is ridiculous to say after you've already told the long story) I bought the palm tree to go in that space.

In case you're wondering that's Ben Affleck on the TV screen. I was watching my new Best of Molly Shannon DVD from Time Life video. It's turning into quite a collection now, I wasn't even aware more were on their way. Joy! Easter is almost upon us and everyone is kind of meandering home to celebrate, but I think I will just stay in College Station. I dunno, maybe I'm just jealous of jebus. It would be so awesome to have two birthdays.

So I guess all I have to do if I want a lot of comments to be posted by anonymous well wishers, all I have to do is post controversial depictions of history. I didn't mean to slight Scott's beer chugging abilities in the least, I was merely unaware that he had finished first. So congratufuckinglations to him. Indeed, a job well done. Everyone else, as always, can gig this. It is, however, flattering to know so many people frequent my website.

How fun was that power outtage, eh? I was sittin in Thompson working on my calculator user manual when everything went down. We decided to call it a lunch break, but it turned out that nowhere could serve food. Talk about sucking. There was absolutely nothing to do. So many times that day I was like "Oh I'll go do ... no, can't ... but I could ... no wait ... I'll just go home and ... no, no I won't." Man, I love electricity and miss it when its gone. I ended up making the best of the bad situation though. Despite the fact that I had a shitload of studying on the internet to do, as well as finishing up some programs and writing some papers, I managed to relax based on the fact that I could not possibly do any of them. So I rode the bus over to Brandon's apartment and we sat out on his patio and chilled in the nice weather just waiting it out. That was really fun until the bubbles came on in the hot tub, and we realized the power was back. I had to go back to school and he got called back into work, so we walked over to my house and I gave him a ride to work.

In other news, today I took a chemistry test that was pretty hard. I think I did alright on it though. All I need is a C so I can pass this stupid class and be done with it, and I'm pretty sure that I got it. I don't want to be presumptious though. Anywho, I gotta run, my little break is over.

Travel plans: I'm heading to Austin tomorrow to present some projects to the good folks at National Instruments. And then Saturday I'm going to Houston to have easter with my brother. But I will definitely see you all on the flip siiiide.

3 Day Weekend. Ah, the old American pasttime. Ain't nothing like it. Big shout outs to Jebus for bringin' us the Good Friday holiday. Tonight I'm just going to relax. And naturally, by "relax" I mean "get drunk." Tonight's festivities will commence around 7 with watching some Friends. Allison's getting some wine for us, since we're all wino's now. From there, I'm gonna go to Ryan and Todd's and play some 6-cup.

Tomorrow I'm planning on being productive since no one will be in town. Everyone I know is going to home to celebrate the resurrection and eternal life of their lord and savior Jebus Christ by finding chocolate eggs left in the night by an enormous bunny rabbit (circa Bill Hicks). That should give me some time to get caught up on school and just chill in the apartment by myself ... something I don't get to do nearly enough.

Anyway, if you are staying in town, be sure to give me a call cause I'll have lots of free time and no one to spend it with. On a footnote, thanks to everyone who has already written me in for senior yell leader. If you haven't already, be sure to go to http://vote.tamu.edu and write me in. Thanks and gig this.