Jealousy…. The green eyed monster:
A nearly universal emotion.

What’s mine is mine.
What used to be mine, is still… mine.
What I covet.. is.. in my mind…. mine.

This is human nature.
We all feel this… overwhelming emotion.
Those who cannot, or… are unwilling to deal with it… cause pain.. for themselves… for the person they care about… and gain nothing.

A woman, pregnant… with number five… is irrationally jealous… when her husband goes with friends to a strip club.
She refuses him sex when he returns… and for weeks after… because she believes he will be thinking of the woman on stage… not her.
Undoubtedly true…. and yet, we know… she has her own fantasies.

I leave you with a bit of Shakespeare:
Iago:
O, beware, my lord, of jealousy;
It is the green-eyed monster which doth mock
The meat it feeds on; that cuckold lives in bliss.
Who, certain of his fate, loves not his wronger;
But, O, what damned minutes tells he o’er
Who dotes, yet doubts, suspects, yet strongly loves!

I was going to write as Kalfu… Haitian… A Petro Loa of the “crossroads.” Kalfu controls the evil forces of the night.
I decided it would be presumptuous of an Atheist.

God….. What a peculiar concept.

Tell me again why I must participate in strange ceremonies, and give someone money to speak… for me… to this.. all powerful…. all knowing…. person?

God… someone to blame for your bad decisions.
God… a parent figure who will… kiss it… and make it better.
God… a device to give order…. reason…. to a chaotic world.
God… an explanation for why evil so often lives well…. and good, so often suffers.

I have no faith…. I need proof.
You tell me “just look around,”….. then you insist I accept… your… “faith”… as explanation enough.
This is.. NOT… proof.
It’s merely your inability to accept… to understand…. anyone else’s viewpoint.
You insist that your’s is… “The One True Religion”…. and that all others are false.

The Sunni and Shia kill each other over… One Passage… their other differences, are no more than minor asides.
Mormons… were driven out of so called civilized states.
Catholics… were refused jobs…. and a Catholic president, was seen as, very nearly…. a miracle.
Fools……. one and all.

Do not pray for my soul…. I don’t believe.
Do not curse me….. it’s too late.
Do not try to convert me…. I am…. by your standards… beyond saving.

If your religion gives you comfort…. and harms no other… perhaps I envy you, your delusion…. a bit.
I have little faith in anything, except the law of gravity…… and mankind’s, apparently infinite capacity for evil.

Since you rely on your.. “God”… to bring reason, to an unreasonable world, I leave you with this question:
If there is a God….. why must it be… sane?

From http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Easter_Eggs:
Lucien Lachance, the individual who recruits you into the Dark Brotherhood, is a charicature of Lucien Lacroix, a character on the Canadian television series Forever Knight. Chronicling the journeys of an eight-hundred year old vampire, Nick Knight, Forever Knight introduced Lacroix as the creature who brought Nick into his dark family, as Lachance does the player character.
If you need to ask…

BTW:
I’m still pissed that they killed LaChance

During a longish, meandering discussion, a person I’ve known for a number of years made the statement that Mahatma Ghandi had liberated India.

I tried to explain that “Empire” is based on greed and could care less about one man starving himself to death in protest.
I cited Nehru’s manipulation of the press and riots in the streets as the primary reasons for the British Empire withdrawing.
I went on to explain that I saw Ghandi as a symbol, much like Jomo Kenyatta, or Desmond Tutu. Not necessarily as a great leader, but as a physical representative of an idea.

The response of this otherwise rational person was to raise his voice, while telling me that I knew nothing about great men or history.

It’s nice to have heroes, but to allow the myth to become more important than the man, is to denigrate both the person and their sacrifices.
To me, a human being, complete with human failings, is always more interesting than a one dimensional mythic hero.

Now the question:
Should I tell him James Bond is not a documentary?

This quote is taken from the Notebooks of Lazarus Long, by Robert Heinlein, and it epitomizes what is right, and what is wrong, with our basic human nature.

A televangelist was caught with a device in his ear that allowed him to hear his wife read from prayer cards people filled out before they got so see him.
When he was discovered to be a fraud, convicted, and sent to jail, a few people still sent him money.
People hate and even kill other people because they interpret a single passage in the same religious tome differently.
I choose religion to make my point because it is the thing people react most fervently to.

Dr. Phil is the star of the moment, and people give him a great deal of money and trust.
He’s a great advocate of talking things out, and there are times when he makes sense even to a cynic like me.
But how is this approach going to save a relationship, that was based on people not being to tell the difference between good sex and love? The same sex with the same person all the time gets monotonous and a lack of sex is frustrating.
What happens when you find out that you really don’t have anything in common and you don’t want to take a walk in the park because there’s nothing new to say?
How can you save someone who doesn’t want to be saved?
People swear they are going to try to work things out, and yet, this is usually just a passing phase. They treat it like stopping smoking, “I can quit anytime I want, and I’ll do it, just as soon as I finish this pack.”

People are looking for simple answers to complex problems, answers that don’t require their actual participation or any thought on their part.
Religion gives them an all knowing father figure and a reward in heaven. –Would a priest lie?
Dr. Phil has all the answers to their relationship problems. –He must have the answers, he went to school to learn all about it, and they’ve even seen him on television.

If you’re looking for the good part, here it is:
Rationalizing allows a mother to think her children are just misunderstood, and are genuinely, good, brilliant and beautiful instead of the little monsters the rest of the world sees.

My philosophy is simple:
Most of life’s problems are brought about by our own actions.
And most importantly –Shit happens.