Mother's Day today

Today on Mother's Day we had a christening at our church. For my Mother I bought her flowers as her request. Afterwards I then took part in litterpicking as part of a "Clean for the Queen" event to help clean up Detling and get rid of junk and rubbish that had been hiding in areas that the average person wouldn't look into.

My Valentine is gone.

I have just lost my current girlfriend and maybe that's for the best. I feel like I want to talk about her.

I've been going to a number of online dating sites, most of them are asking for a fee usually.

I was recently told that Russia has the most beautiful women on the planet, so I decided to try a Russian Bride dating website called Russianbrides.com and I have to say that they are indeed beautiful.  However, the website in question had a pricing structure that screamed extortion to me. You couldn't even open letters without having to pay money? "What the..." was my first reaction. Nowadays this website in question seems more interested in Ukrainian women then from Russia, not sure how much Russia's influence has on Ukraine, or Slovakia, or the countries of Easter Europe but I digress.

Eventually I went to a website called Russian Cupids.com. One day they gave me a 48 hours free trial. I took it, then sent greetings to multiple women hoping for a quick response and I did. I got a woman called Evelyn Nyarko. She said that she wanted to make it a permanent relationship, like genuine wife and husband. On the first day we definitely felt like we could see eye to eye, we talked a lot about what we enjoyed and what we like to do. Unfortunately on day 2 there came a problem that ultimately strained the relationship to the point where it was probably permanently destroyed on last Friday: Long stroy short, she wanted to come to England to meet me, fair enough, but she insisted I send money to her to "Pay" for her plane ticket. She said that the best way to do so was Western Union Transfer. Ultimately I did send her money, only to come to a conclusion on that night that I just gave money to a fraudster. I managed to get the money back the next morning (thank goodness I suppose). There are some things I think you have to learn from personal experience regardless of how many websites, tv shows etc. tell you about online dating frauds, usually the first thing they tell you is to never hand out money to someone you don't know on a personal level. I don't know about you but less then a week is definatly disconcerting.

Throughout the last 10 or so days before Friday she insisted that she wasn't a fraudster, I wanted to believe her, she gave me pictures of herself (one of which was apparenlty the picture of a porn star called Briana Lee), she spoke to me, her parents then spoke to me, she skyped me and showed me her face, however I simply didn't send her anything, even my parents did not want me to do so and neither did my sister suggesting that if she loved me she should pay for it herself. Also my parents believed that even if she did buy a plane ticket to England and flew here she would be sent back immediately because she didn't have a Visa, something that takes 3 weeks at the least to complete, and costs £85+. Interestingly, she insisted that through her embassy in Ghana, Africa she could get her immigration issues sorted in 3 days, something I couldn't find any ring of truth in. Ultimately she declared our relationship over on Friday. I have cried about this and I'm ready to try again. Finding a woman that will fulfill me will no doubt be hard.

Evelyn wasn't the first woman I talked to that got me in serious trouble. There was another called Meg Smith (or at least that was her profile name). Throughout my text conversations with her, all she talked about was sex. Whenever I started a conversation with her she would often ask if I have an erection. She eventually got me in trouble with my Mother's swimwear (I'll spare the details). She then claimed to be truly sorry for it, but later on she wanted me to seduce some of my female co-workers in my workplace. Eventually I was told to block her once and for all, and I never heard from her again.

If there is one thing I'm finding frustratingly hard in my opinion is the issue of accents. I hope I don't sound racist for this, I don't think there is anything wrong with an accent, but I worry about it being strong and thick and I just can't understand what they are saying even if they have perfect English. There was a comedy film I once watched called Hot Fuzz, in one scene the protaganist Nicolas Angel and his partner Danny Butterworth bring with them a fellow officer to go to a farm to sort out a quarrel with a farmer who has such a thick accent that Angel needed to speak to both to understand what the farmer said even though he was speaking English. I feel like that's my problem with accented individuals that use words in a way that seem different to what I'm used to hearing or have an accent that I find hard to hear correctly.

Its Valentines Day Today

Today is Valentine's Day

The origins of Valantine's Day date prior to Jesus' Birth with the Pagan ritual known as Lupercalia which replaced a ritual called Februa which is where we get the Month February from. Lupercalia  seems to be in honor of the Pagan God Lupercus, the God of Shepards. The ritual seems to be made in honor of Lupa the she wolf who found Romulus and Remus who were left at the Tiber River in Italy and raised them until the Shephard Faustulus found them and raised them in place of Lupa.

The ritual goes like this: between 13-15th February the Pagans would sacrifice two male goats and a dog. They would then annoint two patrician Luperci with the blood of the animals and these two were expected to smile and laugh. Afterwards women would cue to be whipped by these two who would dress themselves with the skins of the goats they sacrificed, with the hope that this would boast their fertility and help with their child birth pains.

In 5th Century AD The Roman Catholic Church decided to create Valentine's Day to Christianise the Pagan celebration. There was more then one Saint Valentine, one of them was known to make underground marriages which was outlawed by Emperor Claudia II outlawed marriages to soldiers believing that Single soldiers would perform better in war then married ones.

It was Valentine's Day that saved the card industry and helps restaurents boost business. Needless to say this celebration has been heavily commercialised. Since today was Sunday the holiday was recognised and celebrated in my Church.

Of course because of the Pagan roots of Valentine's Day I'm obviously worried about getting involved with this holiday.

Have I got a valentine? I kind off do. There are multiple problems with her that I plan to discuss another time.

How much is today's Christianity like the one that was formed when Jesus first came? (WIP)

A while ago I stumbled onto an article that describes how the early Christians and today's modern American and Evangelical Christians would be very different between each other, to the point that it would be alien to each other and would probably flat out reject each other.

I can't find the link right now.

The Comment section then directed me to this documentary

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89a_Q2e78RI

Watching this documentary is surprising considering the differences between the Christians of America and the Christians during Roman Empire and the differences expressed by Pagan Romans. These differences between all three types of people is surprising.

What's most surprising is how much the early Christians beliefs on how to live seems to clash with how I've lived most of my life.

There are a lot of things that I find amirable about the Early Christians such as their commitment to the poor, to the point that they kinda became poor themselves, and the fact they were willing to take the sick and heal them, even risking their safety and get possibly sick as well, while the Romans were willing to throw their sick family members out of their house and leave them to their fate. The early Christians definitely suffered early persecution at the hands of the Romans who apparently held the Christian God in a really low opinion.

I would like people who are Christian to watch the documentary and compare your life and your church to these early Christians and let me know what you think in the comment section.

Had another Horrible day today.

There are times when I bottle my issues and thoughts about myself, causing me to worry about the future and struggle to "live in the present" as my Mother has been telling me. I keep thinking about what's happening in the world and struggling about what to do and I sometimes bury myself in things I find funny such as comical game show answers. I also think the state that our world is becoming and that I believe that its going to get a lot worse before it gets any better. I also think about things that are sinful, like porn.

During the morning I went with my Mother to go to Waitrose, we left relatively later then we should've, I wanted to go because I wanted cleaning stuff for my home especially for the bathroom. On the way there we saw a fridge just dumped near our church right at the bus stop. This is really hurtful because I just spent Saturday afternoon clearing up that road of litter, making 6 bags and for extra measure I found 2 car batteries inside the trees that I spent a good majority of the morning litterpicking and clearing up causing my car to get mud, leaves etc. inside my car. You can't just put car batteries in the bin, they have specific requirements to be recycled and to find them just dumped next to the road in a place that you wouldn't see is upsetting because of possible environmental consequences.

When we went to Waitrose I checked the nearby Hospice of Hope charity and in the end I didn't buy any games they were selling, in part because my computer isn't working, and because of what I've been told about video games. This hurts because I feel like I should've bought them because if they aren't sold they go to the skip. Some Christians would say probably "Good", just keep in mind the money I could've spent would have been used to help terminally ill people.

Mum told me I wasn't being with her even when I'm standing near her. There were times I wondered off, which is something Mum is very familier with but still aggrivating the real annoying point was it wasn't until we went to the checkout that I decided to get something that I could eat as a lunch, which in the end was ravioli and I spent longer then she wanted. When I got outside I discovered that there was an item (Strawberry Chewing gum) that I took out of the store without paying, so I went back to put it back, I simply forgot about it until we left the store.

Mum and I had another argument regarding the Bible. Mum is not a follower of the Bible and my father told my about my uncle who spent 6 years studying the Bible to become a priest, only to study the Bible origins and it apparently caused him to lose his faith. She is really upset on the fact that I stopped eating pork, among other things, since she enjoys raising pigs and . She sees nothing wrong with pornography, saying that its perfectly normal for people to look at.

When we got home I spent a lot of time in the car and when I finally went inside Mum was crying (I assumed it was my fault, although she denies this). I snapped and started to hit my head with the door, and I was screaming in anger and frustration. It wasn't just today its been everything. My recent job seems to take a toll on my health, since I started I developed a chest infection which has lead to a cough that to this day it hasn't gone, a bug that caused me to want to vomit and made me emotionally effected and recently I've developed an issue inside my mouth thats making eating more difficult. What's worse is that I can't seem to fight my addictions involving Youtube that causing me to abuse my body and sleep patterns. Eventually I managed to calm down and Dad and spent some time together with me organising the house and afterwards I cleaned my car inside and out.

I'm currently on the Book of Daniel, this one is one I'm looking forward to since I remember Daniel being thrown into the lions and God protected him from harm.

Went to an art exhibition of M.C. Escher

I went to an art exhibition featuring Maurits Cornelis Escher or M.C. Escher today with my mother.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M._C._Escher

To me his work is quite surreal and can easily work as a wallpaper design, yet, it was made as a work of art. His paintings extremely popular, popping up in restuarants, schools, and musuems. Yet, he was elusive about who he was and it took a while for the art world to appreciate his work. His work got the attention of both mathmaticians and hippies like The Rolling Stones. M.C. Escher's work took him weeks to complete, weeks. I would've given up on the first day with that much demand for attention to detail.

Interestingly enough his work was considered so great he was asked to make 600 copies of certain paintings. He was so fed up he actually tried to charge more money for each copy in an attempt to drive demand down, this actually backfired as the more expensive it seemed to some people the more they wanted it.

His most complicated work in my opinion was Metamorphisis III. The picture in question is a very long portrait.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metamorphosis_III

He is very good at twisting your perspective. Textbook example is Still Life and Street. It looks like a balcony view of a street at first until you realise the books are resting on the buildings and the balcony is also the street.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Still_Life_and_Street

While his last work before he died which was snakes is curious. At the time of this his family had left him and he was in really poor health.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snakes_(M._C._Escher)

I find it even more interesting that he did the Tower of Babel. Its an illustration I've never seen before.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tower_of_Babel_(M._C._Escher).

I want people who read this to do some research onto M.C. Escher and tell me what you think.

Thoughts on the song "Jesus he knows me"

I'm a big fan of Phil Collins since childhood. His songs of love have always been something I listened to and my favourite song is "Another Day in Paradise" which was about the Homeless.

Recently I stumbled onto a song of his called "Jesus He Knows Me". Released in July 13th 1992.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus_He_Knows_Me

The song is a satire/parady of TV Evangelical Christians, American Christians who use the TV to preach the "Gospels", claim to show miracles and wonders every Sunday. The song itself pokes fun at how these people are pampered, the media attention these people get such as billboards and magazines,  living the luxery that many dream of, yet few achieve, how they talk about how to get to paradise through them and ends with the "Church set" being showered with money, with wheelbarrows full of money being moved around before they reach $18 million.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=35K6vQRt67g

The music video itself is edited, partly because of content that some people seem offensive, such as the pool party that had multiple girls in pink bikinis, other content was Phil Collin's charcter making satircal preaching which included "God, telling him to get $18 million by the weekend".

Phil Collins would then go on to be in Room 101 with how he felt about the TV Evangelicals. His first sentence about them was "I don't know how they get away with it". He made the record to tell to people to wake up, you're being fleeced.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7JHhXgqfKL0

Even within the Christian Community there are those who accuse them of being con artists and scam artists

One person as an example is John F. MacArther who claims these people are "A Colossal Fraud"
http://www.gty.org/Blog/B091207

Personally I don't believe that all of them are fraudsters but its a perfect example of abuse of power which Jesus would no doubt abhor. Even recently I saw a video on Facebook about those who preach the End of the World and go around in private jets and luxery homes. I feel sorry for those who have followed the fraudsters as when they say "Lord, Lord" to Jesus or something like that they are likely to be told "Go away, I never knew you".

Remember the Bible says John 14:6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the father, but by me.

Interestingly enough the Bible warns of such people:

Matthew 7:15-17 Beware of False prophets which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. 16 Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of good tree bringeth forth? 17 Even so every good tree bringeth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth evil fruit. (This to me means that you need to test their spirit with the Bible to know their fruits).

Matthew 24:5 For many will come in my name saying I am Christ; and shall decieve many.

Matthew 24:24 For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall decieve the very elect.

2 Peter 2:1But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that brought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction.

Personally when it comes to False Prophets I see people accuse each other of promoting heresies time and time again. Some defend themselves, others don't. It gets to a point where its hard to know who to trust.

My Cat has been put to sleep

Its been finally called. My cat Watson had been sick for a couple of years. He got bad breath and was struggling to eat cat food recently, Watson also fell out of the couch and had trouble breathing. The final nail was when he almost reached the litter box but missed. Mum and Dad decided to finally take him to the vet and be put to sleep.

Watson was our last cat that moved with us when we moved home over 10 years ago. I was the one who fussed with him most and gave him most attention. Jokingly calling him a whiner and a fuss seeker because he lost a leg to a car several years ago (he got on by surprisingly well with only three legs).

I wondered if my family did the right thing. I decided to investigate what the Bible teaches about euthanasia of pets and 412teens.org has an article that goes into detail about it. There isn't a "Yes or No", but suggests that when all things are tried, Euthansia is considered to be merciful thing.

http://412teens.org/qna/what-does-the-Bible-say-about-pet-euthanasia.php