You know you've survived christian culture if....

-You've ever thrown out all your "secular" c.d.'s...only to replace them a year later
-Your vocabulary has ever been peppered with words like "burden" or "fellowship"
-For graduation you received a Thomas Kincaid painting
-You've actually tried a pack of testamints
-You wash your car with a t-shirt that says "GAP-God Answers Prayer"

I am reading a pretty funny book right now called" The Christian Culture survivial guide. The misadventures of an outsider on the inside." especially funny for those of us with the upbringing of the "independent, fundamental, your-going-to-hell-if-your-not-baptist, Baptist". So far I'd put it on as a Danielle pick. Here's a bit more for now...

TELL-TALE SIGNS YOUR ABOUT TO ENCOUNTER AN "OLD-FASHIONED" MEETING WITH THE ALTER.
-If the pastor closes his sermon with "I want every head bowed and every eye closed-I want no looking around. "This sign is biggie! My advice? Do exactley what the preacher tells you to do.
-If there is lots of rustling around by individuals who have "alter call" responsibilities (i.e., deacons, musicions, singers, and ushers will probably be scurrying around to get into position.) These people will be looking down at their feet as if you can't see them as they walk over your toes and into the aisle.
-If you here the word "stanza"
-If you here the pastor say "I see that hand" as they look around the room for potential converts.
-If the song during your alter call begins with the words "just" or "all." If this happens, you are definatley in the midst of an altar call. Just hum along if you don't know the words.

Sad news

Dear Family,

Hamdy just received word a few hours ago that his mother died this morning. We knew she was sick but didn't know it was so serious. We are both shocked and in grief. Hamdy is still deciding whether to go to Egypt right now or not. Unfortunately, in Arab culture they bury the body right away so he wouldn't even be able to see his mom one last time. He may go to comfort the family though--his sisters are only 15 and 13. Please keep us/them in your prayers.

Baby got Book

Here's one for those of you who went to a yuppy Christian college...gotta love the creativity...slightly reminiscent of our MC Hammer "we've got to pray just to eat today"
http://www.whiteboydj.com/babygotbook.html

Lazy Sunday

Speaking of double true and the Chronicles of Narnia, if you haven't seen this yet, you need to (especially you of the tv persuasion, not that I'm excluding you, sara). Remember when SNL was funny?

alright, I'm ghost like swayze

just too punny

this made me chuckle, and made me think of at least one person in this family...

Guffaw!

Hamdy's new Blog

www.hamdykassem.blogspot.com

In response

Cousin Council members (and lurkers):

I received the following email in response to the whole suspenders controversy. I thought I should make this known:

"Jess, in response to recent prejudicial statements on The Cousin Counsel regarding suspenders, I would remind the Council that many things in life depend on suspension."

This comes from a well-known uncle and father, who should be suspended for bad jokes. He's also a lurker still in the closet.

Blogging Faux-pas :

1. Overuse of ridiculous acronyms: LOL, ROTF, WTF? - everytime you digitaly laugh out loud, God rips the wings off an angel

2. Having no point to any entry whatsoever, excluding those that are amusing for the sake of it. This rule is slightly subjective, but i think we can all agree that no one cares about the hard pressed purse decision you made at the mall today is going to make anyone a better person.

3. Grammer and/or Sppelling.

4. Commenting on something simply to plug your own blog. i.e. "OMG, you are soooo absolutely right on that, you should totally read my blog over here! LOL!

And yet, i am writing this post to inform all who dwell within these channels that i have (finally) put up some pictures and notes from this past Holiday over on my other posting board, here. Please don't hate me.

Melungeon or Not???

Could it be possible that we share a swarthy heritage with the king himself? Melungeon scholars say yes. Place your votes here (as well as other submissions of famous melungeons to Melungeon or Not)

Melungeon breed standards:

So, I was watching the AKC Dog championships on Animal Planet with Hamdy the other day and you know how they have all these characteristics for each breed that are supposed to show it is really pure, beautiful, etc.? Funny things like "The neck is strong and muscular, clean-cut and relatively long, proportionate in size to the head and without loose folds of skin." and "if dog bites judge, IMMEDIATELY DISQUALIFIED"
Well, in my twisted little mind I started thinking about what if they had breed characteristics for human families and had shows to determine whether persons were well-bred, pure, etc. (oh, I forgot--we do have beauty pagents!) Anyway...I was just wondering...what would be the breed characteristics of the Melungeon family? I think if we set some standards now then we all have something to aspire to...but well, unfortunately, we will have to disqualify some people.

Just another day at Super Walmart

Billy to Walmart cashier(who was wearing an Operation game wrist watch)-"How's it going"
Cashier-"Pretty good...except for the condiscention from my peers"
(the story went on...Billy phased out and then returned to hear)-"Like an ambilacal cord you just have to cut it!"
Billy-"Have a good day"
Walmart cashier-"Have a good day or else"

Billy is pretty sure the cashier was flirting with him.

Test Your Sunman IQ -- It's Fun...and It's Safe

As of the 2000 census, Sunman had a population of 805.

The estimated population in 2004 was 806.

Full-time Police Officers: 1
His/her annual income: $26,964

The only news on the Sunman Chamber of Commerce website is an announcement for the upcoming Wine and Fireworks Festival on September 3-4, 2004.

Elevation: 1,021 feet.

Sunman is home of The Renegades, the Herald Tribune Best Band 2004. They have three lead guitar players.

The days of allowing animals to roam the streets of Sunman will soon end according to a recent article.

The distance from Sunman to the Kentucky border is 19 miles.

Major employer in Sunman is McPhersons, established in 1954 as a part-time mail order venture providing printing services for the medical and dental professions. Very interesting.

Recently in Sunman, a 98-pounder, who had never been around horses, did not have a lick of trouble with the BLM stallion she bought.

A Comprehensive List of People, Animals, Plants, Food, Car Problems, Broken Bones, and Other Unfortunates that Bother Me MORE Than Pat Robertson

1. Pickled Herring

Home really home now

Well I'm finally able to be at home and staring at my christmas tree which was once very nice but now after a month has become the scariest christmas tree ever. The branches are slowly inverting, swallowing the ornaments that it once wore proudly. It also has a large concave area on it's side....I am scared to start to take off the ornaments as I am pretty sure it will swallow my hand and then the rest of me into what I can only assume is the land of scary dead christmas trees! I got back to Columbus on Sunday afternoon after missing my flight from NYC to Columbus on Sat. night because our flight left Paris an hour late due to the fact that they had to escort a passenger and his luggage off our flight.....why you ask....There we're many rumors flowing around the plane, but our friend in row 13 said he heard the attendants talking about somthing with the guy not allowing them to see his passport. Who knows really! So I got home Sunday afternoon and had to leave for Cleveland monday evening , but am finally home to rest now! I will try to get some picts up of our adventure soon! There are only 300 to choose from....I'll try to narrow it down! We had an amazing time! Side note- If you want to just dive into culture shock...go to Super Walmart to pick up a few things the minute you get home from the middle east...what is that place?

I must add one of my personal favorites from said visit to Doug. Holla back with some pictures from Cairo!

Treading Lightly...

Well, i have been debating for a few days since i received an invitation from the proud initiator of this electronic sounding board whether or not i should tread into the new waters of the council, but, i decided i was thinking about it too much and will simply just say hello.

so, greetings from windy cheyenne.

and, to bring tidings of good cheer i offer this gift of joy - my favorite picture of the last few weeks:

Cousin Lost and Found

Hey, do any of you know Andrew's "land" address?

Bonjour from Hotel Innova Paris

Well we are now in Paris...and let's just say that the first day we we're here all Danara and I wanted to do was stay in the room and watch French MTV...and mope that we weren't in Egypt anymore! And While we did finally drag ourselves out of the room we still have done alot of French MTV watchin! Paris is beautiful but it is no Cairo! However we do enjoy sipping coffee in the smoke filled cafe's and taking 2 hour lunches while getting in our occasional tourist attraction such as the eiffel tower, louvre, notre dame cathedral and many others. We took the train to Versailles today and it was very nice...a quaint french town with of cours an enourmous palace in the center. We also had the largest Crepes known to man while we we're there. Well our adventure is coming to an end there is so much more to tell especially about egypt...please remember to ask us about the New years eve party at the Nile Hilton which we stayed up all night then hiked Mt. Sinai the next day (well we rode camels half way) also about our new 50 friends, and Danara's new egyption "boyfriend" AAhcmadd who bought us many gifts and took us to many nice places on his tab(he works for Sony in Cairo...and is a high roller) Well we head home in about 24 hours...but don't worry we have many pictures to share and I am missing my husband so I am now looking forward to coming back! It's just not right to be in the city of love with your sister!

Home, Home on the Range

On the subject of cultural experiences, Doug and I have been savoring a bit of frontier life as of late. Wyoming holds all the wonders any savvy traveler could ask for--buffalo, pronghorns, tumbleweed, winds strong enough to blow semi trucks over. Okay, so maybe not the cultural milieu you'd find on the travel channel. But the moral of the story is that I am very much looking forward to Doug and I starting our life here, mostly because being together in Wyoming is better than being apart pretty much anywhere in the world. Without further gushing, here's some highlights of the trip so far (in numbered bullets for the logically inclined):

1. Free plane tickets!
The airlines were so packed that on our trip from Indy to Denver, we volunteered to be bumped from our seats not once but twice, which translated into United Airlines sending us to Denver in first class seats on a later flight and giving us each two free plane tickets!

2. Climbing in Golden, Colorado
New Years Eve day was spent with Doug's cousins Dylan and Anne and friend Sean rock climbing in Golden. It was a beautiful day--warm and sunny enough to make me forget it's December. Doug and I are starting to look and play the part of Coloradoans and rock climbing has become one of our new obsessions.

I'm quite proud of this one


Doug climbing


3. Gift registry
I hesitate to add doing the wedding registry at Bed Bath and Beyond as a highlight, though I'm sure it will become a highlight when 200 friends and family come July 1 bearing gifts. All in all it was about a 5 hour ordeal and we left feeling the kind of confused exhaustion that comes from spending 5 hours in a store and walking out empty handed. But I'm excited about some of the stuff we registered for. You can check out our registries at www.rei.com and www.bedbathandbeyond.com.

4. Tomorrow we're planning to drive through Colorado and New Mexico to stay in Albuquerque with some friends for the weekend. Then on Sunday it's back to Bloomington for me so that I can begin my last semester of classes on Monday!