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Have been doing, as usual for this week, not much. Watching TV (Big Brother finale and assorted BBC America stuff), eating (went out to get gas and picked up some Wendy's), sitting around online and hanging out with my cat, who has been unusually friendly tonight. I overslept again today and am going to stay up all night so as to accomplish things in the morning... going to go dry some laundry, pick up some packages, that sort of thing.

It occurred to me that I don't write much about my feelings in here, just various things that I've done, and not even the interesting things. Somehow I managed to leave out some of the more interesting occurrences of the last week or so. I realised this last night after I wrote the last entry, but I was too tired to go back and do much about it... not that I remember much that I was going to write about! But I have made a promise to myself to try to remember to write about internal things as well as my external activities.

I was looking at the book Pad a few minutes ago and thinking about my decor and something occurred to me. I've always had this idea that I was going to have some pretty, perfect minimalist room, but truthfully, it's not in my personality. I'm most likely going to end up with more of the same that I have now, and continue to make do and have a bizarre decorating scheme. In that way, I'm right in line with the philosophy of that book, but it was kind of odd that one of my cherished youthful illusions fell away ten minutes ago and I mostly just shrugged.

Another odd thing.
Very few people know this about me.
My parents met at induction classes for a well-known cult. The cult leaders did not want them together. I was raised in this cult until I was in elementary school... hard for me to say what age because even after we were no longer going to regular meetings we occasionally went to large events (we had family members who were still involved), and because for years after we were out, my mother continued to parrot certain of their ideas/terminology. But I think that I was around eight years old when most of our ties were severed. I have it to thank for the fact that I absolutely will not have anything to do with Xian organized religion. I have an aunt who was even a missionary for this group.

I'm not sure what motivated me, but very late the other night (Monday? Tuesday?) I felt a sudden desire to get out of bed and look up web resources on this group. I felt... not necessarily happy, but somewhat satisfied... to find out that the group has become more paranoid and bizarre in the 15+ years that we have been away from it, and that it is failing, and that it was never legitimate to begin with. Here are some of the sites I found which either expose the Way Ministry for what it is, and/or offer help to people who want out or who have recently left:

Ex-Way.com: The Cult That Snapped
No WAY Out
Arkansas Democratic Gazette feature on the harmful effect the Way Ministry has had on families in its area
Messiah Lutheran Church's anti-Way page

What does it all mean to me? Well, when I was up north, I started seeing a guy who is a practicing Jew (I may have already mentioned this). We're not in a relationship or anything, but I started to question the fragmentation of my religious upbringing. I was never involved in a church, but had a religious regimented upbringing nonetheless. Not much was said about Jews either way, but I had the impression my mother wasn't, at a certain period, pro-judaica (she was also homophobic, used a lot of Way terminology, etc - she is not like this anymore, and in fact has looked into joining Xian groups that also celebrate all the Jewish holidays). I am not a huge fan of Christianity, and it didn't really occur to me until the other night that what I knew as Christianity was The Way Ministry, and that regardless of how I continue to feel about Xianity and the hate/fear-fueled prejudice of the religious right, the Way is a sect and what they believe is not shared by all Xians. This will not lead me into a magical transformation into "good xianhood" (I'll never make it there... my views are far too open & aware of the essential similarity between all basic religions, and I'm highly skeptical about the divinity of Jesus), but it does make me dislike the Way even more.

So that is something I have been thinking about over the past few days.

Also, I am thrilled that RU-486 was approved. There are few studies to support the pro-lifers' assertions that this will hurt women, kill more babies, blah blah blah. I think they are just scared that it takes away some of their power to protest in women's faces at clinics. (Keeping in mind that many women have been protested at and verbally abused by these groups when they've been going in for pap smears, etc... this is a women's health issue, and it kills me that the religious right is interfering so much with the availability of complete and necessary medical services to ALL women of ALL faiths. grrrr.)

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I am watching a special on IFC (I think... it might be the Sundance Channel) about Errol Morris and documentaries. It seems that the man responsible for such films as The Thin Blue Line and A Brief History of Time is also responsible for that asinine Levi's commercial of a few years ago in which the girls had "friendship" (they hoped) tattooed on their stomachs in Tibetan (which they couldn't read). Oh well.

I have been trying to think of things I am interested in, so that I can list them for the livejournal profile bit where you can see everyone who is interested in a particular thing. I listed a few people who seem to have some similar interests or whose journals I like to read as my friends, too. (Most of my actual friends are still over on diaryland or pitas, and are not likely to move over here now that the pay scale has been put into play, even though they should. At least sign up, guys. Comment. Etc.) I listed a ton of things, go check it out. Those who know me know that I left certain things out... this was intentional.

more housework to go do... I may not write again before I go to sleep.

I need to find receipts so I can return some things that need to be returned because I don't need them, and bought them on impulse...

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I am out of Cheerios. This is a tragedy of international proportions. I have had to resort to Special K Plus. I will have to go to the grocery store when they open.

I don't think I am going to be getting as much done this morning as I wanted to. For instance, the laundromat opens in an hour, and I don't have all the clothes washed that I need to dry. I think it may also be raining outside, which is par for the course on days when I go to do laundry.

There are little wall-climbing frogs outside my window and the noise that they made is more like little birds - *squawk squawk*. They have been doing this for the past few nights, I think because it is so wet outside.

My kitty is becoming more friendly tonight, wanting to sit with me a lot. I think because I let him into the livingroom last night, where the cats aren't allowed to go, while I was cleaning my room - he always gets very affectionate while he's in there. Also, he is afraid of storms, and I have been seeking him out wherever he has been hiding in the past few days, and encouraging (but not forcing) him to come out and sit with me. So tonight he is acting like My Cat again, something he hasn't done in a while.

Shakespeare in Love is on again. I'm going out for breakfast soon.

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man, I am so totally fucking useless right now... too tired to accomplish anything, but too awake and edgy to sleep. I can't actually drive to do the things I need to do (like return various things to various stores to free up a little bit of cash here and there), but I need to get them done soon.

I found the receipts I was looking for... I had put them in a Safe Place. The books will be back in time for their 30 day limit (and I was going to return them anyways, fortunately) and all the WalMart and Target stuff is well within limits, but the Elliott Smith cd (jeez, how does that boy spell his first name) has to be returned today if it's going to be returned at all, and it's not going to make it. When I finally do sleep I am pretty sure it will be like a log and for a very long time.

Water from my refrigerator pitcher is good.

I hate it when my mother treats me like a little kid, issues orders, doesn't treat me with any respect because she's irritated. My mother has never treated me with much respect - it's part of that charmingly absolutist side of her personality (like I mentioned in the notes below about what a scary fundie she used to be). I love my mother and we're actually pretty close, but it drives me absolutely bugfuck faster than you can say Jack Robinson when she starts treating me like a recalcitrant child.

Say Anything... is on now. This is probably my favorite movie of all time. The newest issue of Bust has John Cusack on the cover but it's deceptive because he didn't get interviewed. He just came out as the #1 Man of Bust readers. Someone wrote a sidebar suggesting that it is Lloyd Dobler rather than John Cusack that we are in love with, and I have to agree. I mean, John is cool and all, but Lloyd is my ideal man.

Fuck, I am in a lot of debt and have to get a job, so I am definitely going to have to drop my figure drawing class... its scheduling is too inconvenient with the two other classes. I will retake it next semester as my only class. :(

I'm tired. I don't want to think about this. If I weren't on Paxil, I wouldn't just be rushing around my house piling up things that need to go outside on the garbage heap (junk mail, magazines, bags of paper junk from the rooms I've cleaned, etc) and putting things away. By some remarkable feat, the kitchen almost looks clean.

Well, this is my kitchen we're talking about, so clean is relative.

*sob*

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gah... I'm awake, I'm awake. I woke up around 10 or so.

Why do I feel like my head is stuffed with cotton?

I need to get things accomplished. I may sleep a little more, then in the morning I will definitely go finish my laundry.

The Wild Party is on, but it's almost over. Just past the orgy scenes. When Eyes Wide Shut came out a lot of critics commented that it's impossible to do an orgy scene that doesn't look deeply silly, even more so to do one that is actually sexy. I have to say that I might be in agreement with that one, even though I liked EWS.