“probably exists”

Exactly.

I tried so hard to be a Pentecostal Christian.

But they were flouncing about and I was just… standing there. Aghast.

Everyone was crying in the ecstasy of religious fervour and despite the emotional high I, wasn’t.

I haven’t drank the kool aid. Kind of a shit answer to this question TBH but there it is.

When did I succumb?

Okay. Here’s as close as I got.

It’s early 2000’s.

I am in Whitehorse, YK.

I am am a supervisor for a contract inventory company.

We are waiting, around 40+ of us in the cold, to inventory the Walmart up there at 5:30am in the morning.

To be clear, some of us were up at 3:30am when it was still sunny out the “night before” living our best lives.

There is a drunk, and high, native. He’s in the parking lot we’re all gathering in. And he’s making everyone uncomfortable. He’s bouncing around a bunch of people who have no idea how to deal with him but I see he’s got a line I can understand…

Me, being me, decides my white ass (I have a lot of indigenous ancestry that isn’t readily apparent) gets it.

So while 50+ people make a circle around him, I walk up to him. Sit down, and talk to him.

He tells me about the Sun God.

I am an atheist, then I was more agnostic but close enough.

And y’know what?

He tries, maybe in spite, maybe* because*, he was high as a kite, to sell me on the Sun God.

And, he does.

I am Atheist. There are no gods, no Divinity. No souls. But I mother, fuckin, listen.

If I were to believe in a god, as an atheist, The Sun God would be it.

Because of this high, random ass fuckin’ native who sold me on it in a parking lot while the 50 other people watched and judged him without actually listening didn’t actually listen.

Pentecostal god: believe in me despite no reason to.

Sun God: I am a FUCKING SUN. I give warmth, I am here, on time. Every day. I am life sustaining. I create and I destroy.

I’m still an atheist, I don;t actually believe in the sun god, but if, as an atheist, I was pinned down? The Sun God is about as close as I could get to divinity.

The movie has a quote that breaks me.

“I am a monster.”

An antagonist who knows they don’t get redemption. It was a new thing for me. Shouldn’t, but was.

A unified language, Esperanto.

Hell, I’m a native English language speaker that doesn’t do well with other languages but I saw the pragmatic case-use of it.

I don’t have experience with that all, I’ll say is I wish KhanAcademy managed to get accreditation but I am not at all surprised they didn’t.

I loved and am happy that we got both. Regardless of the business BS behind them.

Without B5 we’d never have got Garak. And both are some of my favourites, ever. It’s that meme, I want both. Both is good.

Surprised it wasn’t mentioned before. It’s not the genre I like but I’ve heard it in the same breathe as B5 so many times I know I’m missing out on something great.

I know the episode. I loved it.

Garibaldi getting a visitation from Dodger (when he loves Duck Dodgers) was great. Also, sexy redheads are dangerous.

But the thing I love the most about that episode, despite many awesome points, is that G’Kar lamented sleeping on the bridge and not getting to experience it. Showed a lot of character growth on his part, wisdom, to realize what he’d missed out on.

Love me some TNG. The scene where Picard berates Riker and La Forge for not trying to get along with Barclay was informative and sadly beautiful.

Also, the episode where La Forge’s visor tech saves a planet where blindness would’ve been eliminated at birth is still a “go-to” of mine as an example of why we need IDIC.

Battlestar Galactica (the new one).

Babylon 5 is my favourite show, but “The Hand of God” in season one is my favourite episode of all time. (33 was pretty damn good too.)

there’s a lot of clever, tightly written, whimsical comedies out there

Frisky Dingo still hits it best for me, in that regard. But the humour is so abstract I have a hard time recommending it.

My city has gone from one of the worst cycling-friendly places to one of the best in the country in the past two years. Lots of construction.

Neat hearing a positive story in that regard as I, 99% of the time, hear the opposite as people transition to a different road norm. (Just a product of where I am.) And the saying of my city is, “newly wed or nearly dead” and the “nearly dead” portion definitely have troubles adapting to the new ideal that yes, you have to let the guy in a cycle go first despite being in a big SUV hogging the road.

I still remember how much of a game changer it was to finally figure out that I could pre-record the show I wanted to watch on a tape then watch it later that night after work. (Was Angel, a spinoff of Buffy.)

Then I realized I could fast-forward the ads by doing so.

My god. I was living the life then.

Ahh I like the Fargate too. Claudia Black was delightful.

I did miss O’Neill though. “Two LLs” holds up three fingers

I watched the first few minutes of it and realized it was something I’d probably love but not in that moment. It looked like something I needed to be in the right headspace to really appreciate. I do that plenty, knowing sometimes I want popcorny action and other times I want, well, a mood.

It was on my watchlist so long it damn well got cancelled, but it’s still sitting there waiting for me to enjoy. One of these days. That and a rewatch of Mars Express should make for a good weekend binge.

Canada (I’m Canadian) had quite the turn last election. We were almost surely going into a conservative religious-dominant government until our southern friends showed us the error of that way.

I generally don’t vote to be honest. But now? Well. To be entirely frank…

Fuck me.

As someone who is very poor and one step away from being on the streets (which I won’t do so one step away from… y’know) I was expecting a conservative government to gut everything I rely on.

Instead I’ve been at a work resource center and they’ve been telling me now is a “hot time” to do things like government funded retraining. Specifically due to the government that’s in power now.

So yeah. Maybe I should get in a line and vote. Turns out it makes a difference.

Not sure why this is getting downvoted.

Rule #5
No political videos, post those to !politicalvideos@lemmy.world instead.

Fallout 2e1: Definitely Recommend

Pluribus: Slow but good. (Mild 1e8 spoilers)

The Mighty Nein: Recommend with the caveat that it’s more emotionally interesting than thought-provoking.

House of Ashur: Still can’t recommend this but the latest episode was a bit more interesting.

I can tell when people only read the title. 😉

Neat, be interesting to hear from the horses mouth. (At it were.)

Dunno if I could do your job, good on ya. All the times I’ve had to phone 911 they’ve been calm and collected and it’s certainly helped keep me calm as well. (The above story sadly is just the first time.)