Let's Talk About Sex...

The Task:
During a sermon series on sex and sexuality, my job was to illustrate the concept of sexual temptation, especially in regard to single people.

The Concept:
After a few rewrites, we landed on the idea of a guy preparing for a nice date, only to be hounded by his altar ego, who like the proverbial "Devil-on-the-shoulder" keeps suggesting that he abandon his principles.

The Players:
Jeff Bernstein (as Marcus), Ian Liardon (as the Altar Ego) and Michelle Sagor (as Diana).

My Favorite Part:
Three. Ian dancing to Marvin Gaye. Ian going to grab Michelle's butt, and the fact that I was able to work in a reference to both Color Me Badd and the pottery scene in Ghost in one script.

You can view it on YouTube by clicking below. Or, if you'd like, you can view it in a higher resolution by clicking here.

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies

I don't know if this is creative, or a sign of the Apocalypse. Austen redone, only this time with zombies.

What is the opening line?

"It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more human brains."

From Amazon's description:

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies features the original text of Jane Austen's beloved novel with all-new scenes of bone-crunching zombie action. As our story opens a mysterious plague has fallen upon the quiet English village of Meryton and the dead are returning to life! Feisty heroine Elizabeth Bennet is determined to wipe out the zombie menace but she's soon distracted by the arrival of the haughty and arrogant Mr. Darcy. What ensues is a delightful comedy of manners with plenty of civilized sparring between the two young lovers and even more violent sparring on the blood-soaked battlefield as Elizabeth wages war against hordes of flesh-eating undead.

*sigh*

State Slogans

I read the other day that the state of Wisconsin recently unveiled a new slogan and a new state logo. This logo was released on Monday by the rather oxymoronic-sounding Wisconsin Department of Tourism.



From the news story:

Coming up with the slogan and accompanying logo — which shows a silhouetted figure doing a cartwheel across letters spelling out Wisconsin — cost $50,000, the state’s brand manager Sarah Klavas said. The money came from the department's annual $10 million marketing budget.

Some thoughts. First of all, Wisconsin spends $10 million on marketing? Per year? What is their target? Who is their target? Secondly, a man doing a cartwheel? Really? Thirdly, the slogan "Live Like You Mean It" - I like it. It’s good. And it’s certainly better than the old Wisconsin slogan (We have cheese, badgers and Favre!).

It made me do some research into other state’s official slogans. These are the actual state slogans that these state's Departments of Tourism paid money to develop. Below them, I have made a few comments of my own.

Arizona – The Grand Canyon State
Original Slogan - Arizona – It’s Gorges. Get it?
When your primary claim to fame as a state is a giant ditch, you have commerce issues.

Delaware – It’s Good Being First
This is a reference to Delaware being the first colony to sign the Declaration of Independence. Again, when the best thing your state did was more than 200 years ago…

Florida – The Sunshine State
Original Slogan – Not just oranges, old people and a whole bunch of drunk kids for a week in Spring.

Illinois – Mile After Magnificent Mile
Original Slogan –The Place that Gave You Lincoln and Obama. Shut up, Hawaii, you’re not taking this from us.

Indiana – Enjoy Indiana.
Original Slogan – What the hell is a hoosier?

Kansas – There’s No Place Like Home
Original Slogan – Conveniently On Your Way to Colorado

Louisiana – Come As You Are. Leave Different.
Original Slogan – Thank God for Mississippi.

Maine – It Must Be Maine
Original Slogan – Our Pollen Count is Super Low Because Ragweed Can’t Grow in These Extreme Conditions

New Jersey – Come See For Yourself
Original Slogan –The Armpit of the Nation

Ohio – The Birthplace of Aviation.
Original Slogan –Seriously, North Carolina, you need to shut up about being first in flight.

Oklahoma – Oklahoma is OK.
Original Slogan –Oklahoma is Mediocre

Rhode Island – Unwind.
Original Slogan –Not a Road. Or an Island.

South Carolina – Smiling Faces. Beautiful Places.
Original Slogan –Still kind of bitter about the Civil War.

Texas – Don’t Mess with Texas.
Original Slogan –Don’t Mess with Texas. Seriously. We all carry firearms.

Utah – This is Still the Right Place
Original Slogan –This is Still the Right Place for Polygamy
Original Slogan 2 –So White, you can Hear It

Virginia – Virginia is for Lovers.
This is ironic, since the word “virgin” in in the state’s name.

West Virginia –Almost Heaven
Okay, what kind of messed up theology do you have to have for West Virginia to be a near representation of heaven?

This whole exercise reminded me of this graph How Californians See America which I thought was funny, and the even more humorous graph How West Virginians See America.

Feel free to suggest other alternative state slogans that I might have missed.

An Open Letter to the San Jose Sharks

Michael T. Lehr
President and Chief Executive Officer
Worcester Sharks and Sharks Minor Holdings, LLC
525 West Santa Clara St.
San Jose, CA 95113

Dear Mr. Lehr

First of all, I would like to introduce myself. My name is David Tieche, and I am a local Bay Area representative for the Society for the Promotion of Good Grammar, and we are writing to object, in the strongest possible language, to a recent campaign by the San Jose Sharks organization.

Understanding that many of your players and fans are Canadian, we want to make it clear that we have no wish to create an international incident. Furthermore, we are frightened by the prospect of angering large men who carry sticks, many of whom are from a country (Canada) that doesn’t use the death penalty as a deterrent.

Enough skating around the point. Earlier in the year, during the NHL pre-season, your organization printed and distributed thousands of promotional t-shirts, encouraging your fans to be truly dedicated. I am including a picture of the aforementioned shirt:



Here is another picture.



I want to point out a number of things, in case your elementary school teachers never told you. The word who's is a contraction, short for "who is". This is the word you used in the printing of this shirt. This is NOT however, the word you wanted. The word you wanted was "whose" which is an interrogative pronoun. Interrogative pronouns are used in asking questions, as in "Whose tooth is that out there on the ice?" or "Whose beer just spilled on my shoes?"

The man wearing that shirt is a friend of mine, and a raging lunatic when it comes to his devotion to your team. But I cannot, in good conscience, allow him to walk around in a shirt featuring that kind of grammatical atrocity.

In the future, here is what I suggest: before you spend tens of thousands of dollars printing thousands and thousands of promotional t-shirts, make sure that someone with a firm understanding of grammar proof-reads them.

This will not cost you extra money. For example, there are several Elementary schools close to your offices in Downtown San Jose. Gardner Elementary (502 Illinois Avenue) and Washington Elementary (100 Oak Street) are almost within walking distance. I am sure that the 3rd, 4th and 5th grade students would very much enjoy helping out their home-town hockey team.

Imagine if Sharkie, your mascot, showed up at their school with a series of mark-ups for the students to proof. This would send the message to impressionable children that Sharkie wants to devour not only divisional rivals, but also egregious grammar. Now that would be something.

Perhaps a fresh and grammatical start such as this would be just the thing to earn the San Jose Sharks a playoff berth next year.

We’ll be watching (from a safe distance, just in case).

Sincerely,
David Tieche
Ad hoc representative
The Society for the Promotion of Good Grammar
SPOGG

BTW: If you liked this post, check out the originators of the SPOGG by reading the book "Things that Make Us [sic]" by Martha Brockenbrough.

Happy Birthday, Ben

In honor of my friend Ben, who I miss greatly. I've already written some of these down before, but it's good to repeat sometimes.

1. Ben's birthday is the only day of the year which, when yelled, sounds like a battle command from Gandalf or Aragorn in some sort of Orc battle sequence in The Two Towers. March FOURTH! You can't do that with, say, April 12, or Dec. 11.

2. Ben doesn't mind breaking all spoken and unspoken familial bonds and covenants by moving himself and his wife away, all while using the clever excuse "God told me to do it" so you can't really argue with him. This shows that he's very nefari...err...clever.

3. Ben rejected the US educational system, and instead opted to attend graduate school in Canada, a nation whose most prominent hockey teams is called the Maple Leafs. The last time I checked, the plural of "leaf" is "leaves." It would be like called them the San Jose Sharkeses.

4. Ben loves Jess. I have had the opportunity to be in a weekly accountability group with Ben that meets every Tuesday night, and has for the past four years. During that time, I have seen Ben move from the "engagement" stage to the "married" stage (and been privy to lots of "insider information" about Ben and his relationship with Jessica). Here's what I can tell you without breaking bonds of confidentiality: Ben takes very seriously Paul's mandate to Christian husbands to love their wives as Christ loved the church. He is deeply considerate of Jess' wishes, thoughts and desires. If love is best shown through one party "humbling" themselves to serve in selfless love another, then Ben has clearly shown this type of love during the years that I have known him.

5. Ben has more energy than a squirrel who found a discarded bag of chocolate covered espresso beans, ate them all, and then accidentally fell onto a syringe of synthetic squirrel adrenaline (it could happen). The first thing that a person notices about Ben is his energy. He’s a soccer player, and he’s built like one: slender, average height with an aura of speed about him. He’s quick to laugh, quick to talk, quick to smile. He’s got this giant smile, with perfectly proportioned teeth. It’s a smile so perfect, you have to think his parents are still paying off orthodontist bills. And that energy pops out no matter what Ben is doing. You soon realize that this guy is passionate. Passionate about the movie the movie he just saw, passionate about the best flavor of scone at Starbucks, passionate about which pets are the weirdest for humans to own.

But here's what I have found: people will follow passion. There is so little authentic passion in our increasingly apathetic society that Passion is almost like an indicator of life and vitalitty. And we all, as people, are naturally attracted to that. We want more of that in our lives. And we are willing to follow that, even if it's not good or healthy. Ben has a great deal of passion, which makes people pay attention, even if they're not inherently interested at first in what he's saying.

Ben's biggest passion, is of course, God. His life is centered around his adoration of this God who became man and died on a cross. The narrative of the Bible captivates Ben. And now there is this collision of Ben's great passions. His passion about people, his passion about God, and his passion that the Bible really does have the power to change lives forever. That's a perfect storm of passion. So world, as Ben turns 28, watch out.

Are Violent Video Games Preparing Our Children Adequately for the Apocolypse?

Hilarious.

Are Violent Video Games Adequately Preparing Children For The Apocalypse?