Please Don't Go Brandon

The phrase kept showing up in my social media feed, probably as it has for you. I’ve been busy, so I kept putting off finding out the reason for the latest social media fad, but finally bit: just who is “Brandon” and why is everyone cheering him on? It seemed like everyone was having lighthearted fun… at first.

tl;dr: The phrase is shorthand for “f—- Joe Biden.” And that seems like a problematic statement coming from believers.

Not What I Usually Quote on Here

Christopher tagged me with this interesting meme.

1. Grab the nearest book.

I walked over to the nearest set of books (not being in the middle of a research project, I don't have any books on my desk), which — as I quickly remembered — is my Scripture shelf. Between me and the shelf is a bunch of books, but these books are ones I ordered for classes this fall and have not unpacked yet, so I continued to go with looking on the shelf. Not wanting to type in Greek characters and thinking simply opening up an English Bible wouldn't provide anything terribly unusual for this little meme, I decided to grab the first non-Bible book on the shelf. Is that cheating? I went past the standard Bibles, past the Greek Bibles, past the Torah and Tanak, which took me into Other Scriptures (I try to be somewhat organized so I can find what I need when I need it, although I have a ton of books to reclassify at the moment). Ah, the first one there is the Qu'ran. (Penguin Classics' The Koran translated by N. J. Dawood.)

Ok, that should prove interesting.

2. Open the book to page 123 and find the fifth sentence.

“Then others succeeded them who inherited the Book and took to the vanities of this nether life.” (That's from 7.167, for those interested.)

3. Post the text of the next three sentences on your blog along with these instructions.

'We shall be forgiven,' they said. And if such vanities came their way once more, they would again indulge in them. Are they not committed in the Scriptures, which they have studied well to tell nothing of God but what is true?

4. Don’t you dare dig for that ‘cool’ or ‘intellectual’ book in your closet! I know you were thinking about it! Just pick up whatever is closest.

Well, I provided the caveats to my selection above. I'll try again tomorrow and select a book without any caveats. To make sure I don't time my search so that I'm by “cool” books, I'll try to look at as close to 4:30 P.M. as possible.

5. Tag three people.

Ed, Eduardo and Mark. (All readers of asisaid should consider themselves tagged, for that matter.)

Let's ReMEMEber Some Things

Unconscious Mutterings has us doing free association. Let's see what happens if I try it with the ten words they gave me:

1. Replenish::Pickles
2. People::Alex
3. Trend::Text Messaging
4. Girlfriends::Depart
5. Spirit::Holy
6. Banshee::Video Card
7. Oasis::Palm Trees
8. Thrills::Roller Coaster
9. Fountain::Pink
10. Boxes::Day

And, let's try Word Beads as well.

“It may seem as insignificant as a gnat, but being an apologist for using memes to fill space requires much devotion to the art of composition, for we must serve up such apologies on a silver platter.”

That was easy.

Sunday Lunch: Soda

Michael has again provided a Sunday Lunch meme to respond to.

1. What is your favorite soda?
Coca-Cola. I also like Dr. Pepper on occasion and have lately been drinking Full Throttle (and energy drink/soda) every-so-often.

2. How many or how much soda do you drink a day?
Rarely any. I might drink a couple of sodas a week. I use to drink about six liters per week at home, and usually would get soda when eating out, but over the past year or so I've pretty much eliminated soda from my diet.

As a side note, combining this with slightly improved eating habits (I order a salad on occasion and also try not to overstuff myself to the extent that I use to) and ten minutes or so of exercise daily has really paid off (with the help of prayers for increased will power to do those things). I've lost about 50 pounds (22 kg) going from about 270-275 lbs. (122-124 kg) to 220 lbs. (99 kg), as of this week, in a bit less than a year. That's taken me from a body mass of 35ish (considered obese) to 28ish (overweight), which might not be perfect, but puts me in a lot better proportions than I've been in since grade school. Soda's OK, but I'm glad I've reduced my intake.

3. Do you drink it with a meal?
No. At the moment, it is most likely that I will drink a Full Throttle in the afternoon when I have a bit of a headache and need an energy boost.

4. What is the weirdest soda you have drank?
I do not drink weird sodas. Although if you mean just plain bad, I'd pick something like Vanilla Coke, which really didn't agree with me for some reason.

5. Do you think it should be sold in schools at lunch time or ant other time?
I think that's fine, although it'd be good to offer reasonable alternatives too.

And, I'll add this question: 6. What do you refer to soda/pop/coke/sodie as?
Soda, plan and simple.