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Cheesus

There are times that I just scratch my head. We have another religious sighting in mass-produced food products.

A Missouri woman says she has found Jesus in a bag of Cheetos. When Kelly Ramey opened a snack-sized bag of Cheetos, she felt something unusual and checked it out.

Most of her family and friends believe it looks like a mini orange sculpture of Jesus on the cross. Ramey and her husband call it “Cheesus.” Others see something completely different.

Although the name is brilliant, I might add.

H/T D-Listed

My niece is going to absolutely explode with joy.

It appears her new hero, Johnny Depp, has been tapped to play the Mad Hatter in the new Alice in Wonderland movie which will be directed by Tim Burton.

I’m telling you, the squeals of delight that you hear from northwest Tennessee are going to be from her.

I’ve been reading quite a bit about the Knoxville shootings. Two people dead, hundreds of people seeing a man give his life to save theirs, a day where children woke up, excited to be in a musical in front of their friends, their family and their fellowship.

For the people in the church, for those people burying their dead, this isn’t a political issue. It’s an issue of grief and loss. Of the real horrors in this world where a madman walks into a church and starts shooting. The reality that nothing makes sense.

And then I read this passage from Michael Silence this morning and if I lived in Knoxville, I’d like to just sit at the end of this desk and offer silent support because no truer words have been written.

Show the world Knoxville will unite and progress together and not fall into the black hole of hate. Please, let’s see some strong, firm, united and resolute leadership on this. Keep moving forward, because if you are not, you’re going backwards. The time is now, this morning, this minute, for leadership by example. Give our teachers a direction to point our children toward. Now!

When I was 13-years-old, a girl’s body was found, raped and mutilated in the woods here in Hooterville. Her name was Cary Ann Medlin and her murderer, Robert Glen Coe, was the first man put to death in this state in recent history after years of sitting on death row. As an adult, I covered his hearings and saw the emptiness in him. The darkness was so black that not only did my skin crawl but I had to make myself keep looking at him. He not only took a child’s life but he took the innocence of this area away from us. We no longer rode bikes all over town. We didn’t wander the streets like we did before Medlin’s death. He took so much.

After he raped her, 8-years-old, Medlin told her “Jesus Loves You.” He stabbed her in the throat. As a reporter, years after her murder, I saw the pictures. I can’t unsee them, you know.

When I heard of the shootings, I thought of Coe. I thought of the families who will all be scarred by this. I thought of Medlin’s family and of the Coes.

I thought of the shock that Knoxville is going through right now.

I thought of the loss.

This isn’t a political issue to me. This is about how in the blink of an eye the world can change. And how it affects everyone. Stew was the biggest liberal you’d ever meet. Not one of us thought of his politics when he died.

The story by Granju hit me the hardest. Adkisson is a madman. His “excuse” of shooting up a church most likely has as much to do with his ex-wife being an ex-parishioner than anything else.

We need to let these people heal. All of these people from the family to the city of Knoxville.

The air is chewy these days.

Within moments of stepping outside, I find myself covered in sweat and breathing is amazing and labored. The sky is thick with the humidity of the South. As Squirrel Queen and I were headed out to enjoy the Monday of our staycation, the tire on the truck was flat. We changed it, SQ rather as I fetched things as is my role in situations like this, and we were wet, our skin clammy from the heat.

We were headed to play darts. It’s become a special thing between us in the last couple of weeks. We keep seeking the best place to play, away from the issues of the day. We aren’t good but we are getting better. We’ve also found in our dartplay that it creates a bubble where we don’t have to talk to other people. If that sounds rude, I’m sorry, but it’s true. We play the game and we don’t have to answer questions. We laugh. We encourage each other.

Life is about transformation. I’ve been spending more time with Homer which is wonderful. In the mornings, we are watching Angel although I’ve seen it. It’s a quiet bond where we can lose ourselves for a little while.

When I was younger, I used to collect things. Now I wish to unburden myself with the things that I thought I had to have. My life is simpler now. I realized in a moment of epiphany over the weekend that I haven’t lived in the moment for awhile. Always living in “what would happen next.”

I’m sure a lot of this has to do with Stew’s death. Sometimes I miss him so much that I choke back tears.

What a waste of living in events that might happen and not seeing the world around you at the moment. The dart games have taught me this. One throw of the dart, then another. Some games you win. Some games your strategy works. Other times you are just slinging darts hoping for the best, relying on luck that you might come out ahead.

Life is like a dart game.

I was hot last night and I’m starting to hit the numbers I’m aiming at. It feels good seeing I’m getting better. I came home and made a salad made with what we bought at the Farmer’s Market and heated up some corn. I ate the salad with my fingers, the balsamic vinegar making my fingers oily. My niece talked about playing basketball while I cut the vegetables.

In the moment. We forget in the moment.

I don’t want to wish my life away.

I watched sharks biting people. It was graphic.

Random thoughts swirl through my mind.

I ask Squirrel Queen if we can play darts again. She smiled before she fell asleep.

From Silence:

In a 10 a.m. press conference I just watched, Knoxville Police Chief Sterling P. Owen IV said Jim D. Adkisson singled out the church for its support of “liberal” and “gay” issues. Owen said the quick action by some church members to stop Adkisson likely saved lives. He said it was clear Adkisson planned to use the additional ammunition he had. He also expected to be killed by police, Owen said.

When I lived in Nashville I went to the Unitarian Church.

My sincere thoughts and prayers go out to Knoxville.

UPDATE: Goldni says it better than I did.

Yesterday, I posted some pictures on to Flickr. Just some random shots of my family, my silly obsession of taking pictures of my dogs, veggie shots and the like. Things that interest me. Ironically, I spoke to my sister about I wanted her to sign up for flickr so I could mark some of the photos of the nieces family/friends only. She said she would.

Some of my nieces’ photographs are public. My youngest niece loves having her picture taken with the dogs and I comply. She’s cute as a bug and she likes to pose and pretend she is model.

Well, I uploaded a shot of her just lounging about. I didn’t see anything wrong with this picture. Just a little girl lying against a refrigerator talking to her Aunt Tick (that’s what they call me.)

I made a mistake. One very grave mistake that I won’t make again. I tagged the picture “kids” which I should have never done.

Within 20 minutes, I noticed that one of the public photos I put up had been favorited. I thought Homer had done that. I went to the account.

There were dozens and dozens of pictures of young girls. My niece’s had been favorited and the person had put it in a set called “Tiny T**ties. I was speechless. I started to look around and there were dozens of these, just young girls playing around that this person had other things that I’ll just say were disturbing and unmentionable. I immediately changed the tag of kids, privated several more of their pictures just for friends and family and, quite frankly, went into a blind rage.

I’ve never been so angry in my life. I complained to Flickr and I apparently raised enough hell that when I went back to see if this pervert was still doing this, I noticed Flickr had deleted this person’s account for being inappropriate.

Jagadiah had a problem with this as well.

I have a camera on me at all times. I take pictures of things that interest me and for my job. There are people like Squirrel Queen, Chris Wage and I that are always snapping pictures of something. And there are many times I haven’t put up pictures of my nieces because I was afraid that they might be seen by someone who might think of getting their jollies off. I thought this photo was appropriate. I only tagged “kids” this one time. It took no time for someone to seek this out.  SQ, Wage and I aren’t predators. We like taking pictures of things and we make the call, responsibly, of what is appropriate and what isn’t because we are good people.

But it’s sick people like this person who was sexually stimulated by a picture of my niece that ruin it for everyone with a camera.

Learn from me. Don’t tag your pics on Flickr with “kids” in the tagline.

As I’m campaigning that catfish are the sharks/evil doers of ponds and lakes during Shark Week I must bring up the lesser-known Carp.

The Misunderstood Carp

I’d never eaten Carp until I meet Squirrel Queen. It’s tastier, in my opinion, that the suspicious catfish which admittedly is pretty darn good unless you are my brother in law, Squeegee Monkey. As a native of Boston and Buffalo NY and a transplanted Hootervillian, he’s not taken to catfish. However he might like the carp.

One never knows.

I also am considering going to what here in Hoots is called a “feed” this afternoon. Basically, people get together and eat food thus the name. Feeds happen in churches and usually American Legions and the like.

“Feeds” also remind me of zombie annihilation but maybe that’s just me.

The swinging life of Hooterville. My main reason of wanting to go to this particular feed is the establishment has a dart board.

And from my understanding, they are serving fish.

Thus this very unpolitically correct blog post.

Image Credit

Mick Jagger became eligible yesterday for his pension.

In five years, when he turns 70, he will be eligible for a new roof for his home or so the stories said. Apparently that is a benefit when you hit the big Seven Oh.

Reminder #342 I’m not 21-years-old anymore.

In honor of Shark Week, I’m taking a few days off from the job to work on some personal stuff. Let us discuss Shark Week for a few moments.

Sharks are fascinating because they are killing, eating machines. They have no qualms or guilt about eating.

They are the Chuck Norris of the sea.

I am very odd about the ocean and lakes. I love the water but fish weird me out.

When I was a kid my parents took us to Paris Landing. I had a $1 scuba mask. Now, if you have been swimming at Paris Landing, there are these jagged, angry rocks that are in the shallows that tear the hell out of your feet. But I went bounding in anyway with great enthusiasm and abandon with my little mask sitting atop my face.

And then I went under and saw all the catfish. I have to tell you, I walked on water getting out.

Fish freak me out. It’s their world not mine.

And catfish are UGLY.

You may be saying, “Newscoma, how can you discriminate against catfish?”

I can and I do discriminate against them. So there. Sue me. You also may be wondering why I’m comparing catfish to sharks when there is no known connection.

I don’t know but in some odd yet disturbing way, it makes sense to me.

But I still love shark week.

A therapist would have a field day with me.

Image credit from National Geographic

Badger and I watched Barack Obama’s speech yesterday. We livestreamed it and sat in the advertising office. Usually with things like this, I keep one eye on the computer and one eye on tasks that I’m doing.

I didn’t work on the other tasks as I watched Obama’s speech in Berlin. You couldn’t help but just sit and watch.

I cannot recall in my lifetime a speech from a candidate for any office give a speech like that. He didn’t sound like a candidate at all.

He sounded like a leader.

Obama is smart. There is no doubt. He has the world’s stage this week. And he did well.

Squrrel Queen did this for Stewman.

When his widow found out, it was of the good.

Go here.

This reminded me of Stewman.

I know of few professions where people actually call you and say things like, “Gosh, I don’t know what I’d do if you weren’t there…..”

It isn’t brain surgery or as vital as, say, police and fire officials, but radio DJs are obviously very important to a lot of people in their daily lives and I’ve found that’s even more true in smaller markets

Frank does what Stew did. I tip my hat to him.