For the record, I have no idea who Kanye West is, but…

I’ve just gotten a supreme kick out of reports of his ego.

Apparently he’s a rapper of some renown (if renown can be redefined as celebrity gossip about retarded things people do) who’s said that his greatest pain in life is the fact that he can’t watch himself perform live on stage. But as sad a fact of physics that might be (can’t he bring a mirror on stage?), that’s not all that’s worth telling the world:

“I do have an ego and rightfully so. I think people should have an ego. Think about it – I don’t offend people, I don’t put anyone down. Do I name names or bring people down? That’s not my thing. But I give myself big-ups. I feel good about the music I make. God chose me. He made a path for me. I am God’s vessel.”

Okay. Now, apparently he’s also apologized somewhat for being an asshole to gays, but let’s have a look at his lyrics and see if anything sounds like God’s interested at all in speaking through this dude.

I see he has a song called “Jesus Walks”:

We rappers are role models we rap we don’t think
I ain’t here to argue about his facial features
Or here to convert atheists into believers
I’m just trying to say the way school need teachers
The way Kathie Lee needed Regis that’s the way I need Jesus

The way Kathie Lee needed Regis. For what, ratings?

By and large, it sounds like he doesn’t just want to walk with his god, he wants to be one:

While on VH1’s “Storytellers,” Kanye has revealed that he sees himself as more than just a simple musician. As per his own admission, he is the closest thing to God there is, as he is the musical chosen one.

And, if that isn’t unlikely enough,

Kanye has also told Details magazine that he was the “end-all, be-all of music,” a superhero, and a boundary-breaking icon. “One of the problems with being a bubbling source of creativity – it’s like I’m bubbling in a laboratory, and if you don’t put a cap on it, at one point it will, like, break the glass. If I can hone that… then I have, like, nuclear power, like a superhero, like Cyclops when he puts his glasses on.” Kanye West maintained.

Yeah, okay. He’s a bubbling source of something, all right. Just a year ago, he claimed on his blog that his “first love” was fashion and apparently went on for a while worrying about going to a fashion show because he might be mobbed by all his adoring fans and might cause a commotion. A year before that, he pitched a hissy because he didn’t win any MTV awards. Initially he claimed he lost because he was black, then he backtracked and said it was all about profit because they gave a prize to Britney “Trainwreck” Spears, or at least more attention to her life.

But, attention is a prize it seems Kanye is also vying for, hence this craptacular ego trip he’s on. Truth be known? I think his shoe is more interesting than he is.

Oooh. Pretty.

How to lose a finger playing volleyball

Wear a ring to your game, get it caught in the net and yank too hard, that’s how. If you don’t actually lose your finger, you will lose the ring you were wearing when doctors have to cut it off your broken, swollen digit.

Jewelry has its place and its place is not in school.

Now, is that a newsworthy statement, and by “newsworthy” I mean deserving of column space in a major paper?

I don’t think so. But, add the fact that the ring in question is a purity ring and the girl who owns it was told to stop wearing it at school and suddenly it’s not a public safety announcement but a “You’re Stepping On My Christian Rights” story.

Kioni, who is a regular church-goer, was inspired to wear the ring by the American pop group the Jonas Brothers, who have all made pledges of celibacy.

Purity rings are popular in America where organisers have persuaded a vast number of teenagers to abstain from sex.

Kioni, of Ottery St Mary in Devon, said: ‘Lots of girls sleep around. I want to keep myself pure.

‘Many of my friends want to get one. If people can wear head scarves, why can’t I wear a ring?’

Kioni, who will turn 13 later this month, added: ‘The ideas behind the purity ring are something I believe in. I believe in Jesus and a lot of his teachings.

Big whoop, kid. It’s a ring. If your school has a rule about not wearing rings, you can’t wear the ring, no matter how much it means to you. You can feel strongly about chastity and abstinence and Jesus without bragging and complaining to the media. It’s not about what the ring stands for, little miss. It’s about all rings.

Yesterday, Mrs Jarrett defended the ban and said: ‘The ring would be extremely dangerous in PE, technology or science lessons.

‘I have told Kioni she can keep the ring in her bag. I’m quite happy for her to have it in school.’

She added: ‘It’s great that young people have this commitment. I think purity rings are a great idea. But she should keep it in her pocket or purse – it would be a health and safety issue if she wears it on her hand.

‘It’s not a case of being religious or anti-religious. We take the view that it’s potentially dangerous.’

I expect the same rule would apply to earrings in Phys. Ed., too. I knew a girl in school who ripped her earlobe after getting an earring snagged on a net. That’s not a mistake you make twice.

This girl needs to get over herself.

Yet another believing is seeing moment

Why does the media report these things? A while back I mentioned a woman who claimed she’d found shells on the beach looking like Jesus and Mary.

This time around, it’s a lump of what might be bone or shell that some claim looks like the Virgin Mary. They’ve put a picture up showing a sculpture’s impression of what Mary might have looked like in robes beside the lump that bears zero resemblance to figure in the sculpture. Zero.

Benedict is not very religious, so he hopes to pass the shell along to someone who is, for the right price of course. “I think I’m going to sell it. I think I’m going to have to, just to see how many people want it and I feel like some people would care about it more than I probably would.”

He’s already put listed it on eBay. The bidding opens at $24.99.

Oh, to live in a world where people don’t get Madonna Fever.

If I’d seen that thing wash up, I would have thought it looked like a fish with a bulbous nose, or maybe a polar bear’s head. Like so:

Mystery shape

Yes, definitely a polar bear with the harsh arctic wind ruffling his neck fur. Actually it’s like the bunnyduck. Do you see a fish or a polar bear? Can you look at both at the same time? Do you get a headache trying?

People see what they want to see – Jesus in the clouds, for example

“Unbelievable!” says the voice in the video. Yes, it certainly is unbelievable that anyone would stare at a cloud and start filming because he thought he saw Jesus.

But, some good news that they aren’t all dummies “down under” –

Eagle Vale Anglican Church minister, the Reverend Craig Hooper, told our sister paper the Macarthur Chronicle he was keeping an open mind about the cloud.

“There’s nothing to say that it couldn’t have been the face of Jesus in the cloud but we don’t really know what he looked like because there were no photos when he walked the earth 2000 years ago,” he said.

Attaboy. We don’t. Just because that’s the image this guy wants to see when he looks at that pattern of clouds, that doesn’t make it the real thing, if ever there was a real thing.

The article also mentions,

Interest in Raby’s holy cloud follows similar incidents like the toasted cheese sandwich which sold on eBay for US$28,000 in 2004.

A Florida woman believed she saw the face of the Virgin Mary burned into the sandwich and claimed it had not developed mould in the 10 years – leading up to the online auction which attracted more than 1.7 million hits.

Bread won’t mold unless it’s damp. The toasting process evaporates all the moisture. If you box it up for display for ten years where it’s going to remain dry, of course you won’t get any mold on it. Stupid woman. I wonder how much the casino that purchased it managed to raise for charity afterward. How much would it have sold for if she’d claimed it looked like Bette Davis? I think it looks like Bette Davis.

Ganesh, the new god of gardening?

I love the stories of people seeing things in things so it’s a nice switch to have a story not based on Catholic delusions. This time it’s a Hindu man’s fervent belief that Ganesh has healed him, thanks to the god’s appearance as an amaranth plant:

Lal believes the flower’s position – growing through concrete, facing a garage he converted to a prayer space – is evidence of a connection to Ganesh, revered as the Remover of Obstacles.

A manager at a Manhattan uniform company, Lal hurt his back lifting a box and was in pain for 3-1/2 months – but no more.

“I felt that healing power that came with it,” he said. “I’ve lived a religious life all my life. I feel my prayers have been answered through the deities.”

Friends and neighbors have already streamed to his 90th Ave. home to see the flower, and Lal said he’d welcome pilgrimages by Hindu faithful.

He knows some people will be skeptical and insisted he did nothing to sculpt the flower.

Heimerle said that wouldn’t be possible anyway, because the plant is too fragile.

“Nature is a strange thing, and it’s possible it may have just done that spontaneously, but who’s to say,” Heimerle said.

Who’s to say, indeed.

(H/T to Friendly Atheist for the story)

Shell shock of another kind.

This is not a well written piece of journalism. It’s the written word form of a 5 second sound bite, which is what it might have been. It looks like WESH is a television station in Orlando, Florida and affiliated with NBC.

An Orlando woman claims she has found Jesus and Mary on some shells.

She was on the beach, found an open shell that looked like it had Jesus inside and a little later found one that looked like it had Mary and and Baby Jesus. She also says that she’s had nothing but good luck since finding them.

No pictures of the shells or the woman.
The author of the piece isn’t named.
The woman isn’t named.

Is this what passes for journalism now? I could do this. I could ask a random person on the street if anything happened to her this week and then roll with it. Who cares if it has the interest level of navel lint? Who cares if I don’t provide any proof of picture or name of person to verify and validate what I’ve written? Hell, I could just pull a story out of my ass and it could wind up as a FARK headline, too, which is the place I found this story.

Ah, right, I forgot Drew’s motto: “It’s not news, it’s FARK.” It’s crap that passes itself off as serious broadcasting and FARK celebrates that type of thing. FARK exists because of that type of thing. It’s perfectly reasonable to find it on FARK.

It’s perfectly unreasonable for it to have been published in the first place. If WESH.com is a serious news source, stories like this shouldn’t be ranking third in the headlines, above “Are you an undecided voter?”

Actually, that one isn’t news either; they’re looking for people who can’t make up their minds and want to ask why. I guess it has the potential to be hard-hitting journalism but I don’t think their survey of average American voters will roust out anything that hasn’t been said elsewhere for the past, what, year and a half?

All in all, that was very disappointing.

Believing is believing, regardless of what you see?

From Arkansas City, Kansas:

The image appeared at the One Stop Body Shoppe, a low-impact weight loss clinic for women, after a rain storm.

“A client was laying here looking up and told me, Michelle, you have Jesus on your ceiling. I just kind of looked at her, and she said you do, Jesus on the ceiling,” said Michelle Beech, Manager.

“I think its the silhouette and kind of a partial beard,” said Dominique Sartin, Body Shoppe staff member. “She said if it had leaked a little more it would be a beard on the other side too.”

So is seeing believing?

“Believing is believing. Regardless of what you see,” said Sartin.

And a money maker is a money maker. They’re considering selling the water stained tile on eBay. I hope the money they get for the sale goes towards actually fixing the leaky roof.

This face in the drywall, though:

John and Omar have been doing this kind of work for 30 years or more and they’ve never seen anything like this. “I’m not a religious man by any means, I mean, I believe in God and stuff like that but when I seen that, that’s the first thing to come to my mind.”

His brother-in-law is not so sure. “It’s just open to personal interpretation of what you see. I do see a face. As far as putting what that face looks like, I don’t want to go that route,” says Gissendanner.

Whatever it is or looks like, one thing is certain according to Gissendanner, “For drywall finishing this was a pretty exciting day.”

Other people who have seen the image agree it looks familiar. Many think it does look like Jesus but, Moses, Sasquatch and Charlie Manson have also been mentioned as possibilities.

I think it looks more like Edgar Allen Poe. But, I approve of the brother-in-law’s rational outlook here. He’s not swayed by religious fervor. It’s a stain that maybe looks a little like something. So can clouds, so can tree bark, so can rotting grapes.

Because the world needs more conspiracy theories

Apparently several earthquakes around the Pacific Rim yesterday are getting blamed on CERN and their Large Hadron Collider:

This is not a joke. This is not a ploy. This is real. 4 major earthquakes in a single day, and it just so happened to be the day the LHC was powered on. I’m not saying one caused the other because I have no definite proof, but I’m also not saying that it isn’t possible. If you dismissed the fear of what the LHC could possibly bring to the earth, I asked that you take another hard look and consider the possibility that you could be wrong. Consider the possibility that you don’t know everything and also consider the possibility that there are forces out there which are much greater than our understanding, some of which are not meant to be tampered with

No definite proof, but Bwana.org still feels compelled to spread the coincidence as a secret truth.

What is it about people?

Why is this even reported?

I’d say go look at the so called Jesus Moth article I found via plime.com but why should this silly thing get another viewing?

Cripes. Once again, people are seeing just what they want to see and nothing more. Once again, the media is willing to give someone their 15 minutes of fame for no sensible reason.

It is a natural thing for people to look for patterns in the chaos that is reality. A natural thing. So why do people insist of thinking natural things have supernatural origins? Why? Why!? Why!!???

Barking up the wrong tree, in my opinion

It was after work and Moreau had just opened a beer in the backyard of his Danforth and Birchmount Rds.-area home when he noticed the familiar image of the Virgin, her arms outstretched, in his neighbour’s tree.

“I’m not a wacko,” Moreau said yesterday, adding he was stone-cold sober.

–“Neighbours amazed by likeness of Virgin in a tree”

I thought it was only ignorant Americans who fell for this kind of hoohaa.

But, I like how Moreau insists he was sober.

If the man really doesn’t want a lot of gawkers, why the fuck would he mention his delusion to the media? And, why think a made-up image in a tree could cure someone? There is no real cure for stupid. All you can hope to do is contain it.

A bigger question to ask might be, why does the media report this kind of thing? Rorschach would die laughing if he weren’t dead already. The things people can convince themselves into believing is quite extraordinary.