For the past few hours I’ve been planning my funeral.No, I’m not planning to kill myself or anything. You see, I’ve been reading a delightfully good book, Godchild, and many people die in it. And I was thinking, “If I were to die, what would my funeral be like?” I don’t want my funeral to be like the ones I’ve attended; drab, uninteresting. I want mine to be beautiful.

First, the dress code. I would want to wear something like http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_oj6V1q8d30s/Stkkf2w5HII/AAAAAAAAAyY/hmaR-SwICC0/s400/FuneralPartyDress.jpg. Yes, I’m very extravagent and, to some, tasteless. Ah well, it’s my funeral, after all. I should be able to wear what I want. As for the others, I want them to wear black. No colors. And I want the clothes to be formal, not jeans and a T-shirt (I have, actually seen a man wear this to a funeral).

Second, location. I don’t want my funeral to be in a funeral home. No, I want it to be in a Cathedral. Not really for religious reasons, but because I find cathedrals to be very beautiful. Also, most of my relatives are buried in Tennessee. I’d…rather not be.

And lastly, the coffin. I want it to be a dark wood, like ebony. I also want it be filled with white roses. It may seem like a ridicules request, but I’ve seen a picture of a coffin like this, and it was very lovely.

I also want MCR to play at my funeral and me to come back to life and start dancing.

I don’t know if this is a real picture or if this is a real newspaper cover but thought it was interesting!

In the last post, I mentioned that there are two letters s in ancient Egyptian.  You won’t have been impressed.  Who is going to be impressed by two s-es when they already know about the four h-es (even though they haven’t met them all yet)?

Actually, the s situation is a bit more complicated than I let on.  There are two s-es rendered in transliteration, but one of them has two hieroglyphs to go with it.  We had one in the last post:

That was the vertical one.  Now meet the horizontal one:

Originally, it was pronounced more like a z, but it evolved into an alternative way of writing s, depending on whether or not the scribe had to fill a vertical or horizontal space in a group of signs.  You can see the point immediately in the full version of our tomb owner Senusret’s name:

We’ve already met the goddess Usret, “the powerful (female) one”, whose name appears first in writing, even though it comes second in pronunciation.  Now we’re on the second part of the name in writing, although it was the first part of his name when spoken: 

     se-en; “man of”.  The horizontal s hieroglyph depicts a bolt, of the type you can see on the doors of the golden shrines of Tutankhamun:

Here’s the carved relief version from the cartouche of King Sesostris in the last post: 

It’s simple to draw:  a straight line with a couple of short cross-hatches in the middle will do.  And there we have it:  se = man.

The n holds no mystery for you.  We’ve seen it all before.  It’s a ripple of water.  It means “of”.  You know that.  So, on to the final sign in this group:

Isn’t he lovely?  He’s a seated man, and he has no sound – he’s the strong, silent type.  He has no sound because he is a determinative – a hieroglyph stuck on the end of a word to show what kind of word it is.  We’ve had a determinative before, remember?  The town or city determinatives in the first line of the offering formula are the same kind of sign.  I explained then that, because the Egyptians wrote very few vowels, they had to use some device to distinguish between words which sounded different when spoken, but had the same sequence of consonants when written down.  This is what the determinative does – it shows it’s the word for man, as opposed to a similar word meaning something else.  But you remember all that. 

In this case, though, he’s not part of se, man, but of the name as a whole:  he’s the male  determinative for the masculine name, Senusret.

He’s complicated to draw, but he’s worth it for the animation he will add to your enigmatic line of Christmas card hieroglyphs.  Inanimate symbols are attractive enough, but you can’t beat a cute little animal or a tiny little person for instant appeal.  I usually start with a circle for the head, then a triangle, pointed side down, for the torso. A second triangle, pointing left (in this case) forms the lower leg, and a smaller one sticking up behind it forms the raised knee.  You can put in two short strokes for the feet, and two bent lines for his arms, as though he’s doing an impression of Toulouse-Lautrec power walking.  And you’ve created a little man.

Here’s one they made earlier, when they were painting texts on a coffin:

See?  He doesn’t have to be that complicated.  They’re simple creatures, after all.

When on a date, it’s always good to ask questions. You never know what the answers will be…

Does West Ham fire Gianfranco Zola this week or wait til after Chelsea puts the final nail in his coffin. Hope I’m wrong but if Zola wasn’t just about the nicest man in football the press would of been calling for his head along time ago.

This guy isn’t a West Ham hater just a guy who writes about premier league teams and his comment about our situation right now sums it all up in three simple lines.

Love him or not his days are numbered but I disagree with the fact that he has his job because he is so nice. He has his job because we don’t actually have a proper owner and the guys in the hot seat right now know absolutely nothing about football and are probably worried what would happen if he went and wouldn’t have the slightest clue who to replace him with.

Hardcore bands Alesana, From First to Last, Asking Alexandria, The Word Alive and Memphis May Fire preformed at Mesa Theater on Main Street Saturday night (December 12, 2009) during the “You’d Be Way Cuter in a Coffin” tour.

Memphis May Fire, a quintet from Dallas, Texas was a powerful and fitting opening act. The lead singer, Matt Mullins, encouraged the small but quickly growing crowd to participate. We were impressed by their energy and enthusiasm.

The Word Alive is a six piece band from Phoenix, Arizona. Although they were heavier than Memphis May Fire, they possessed a unique characteristic which was a keyboardist. However, we feel that this member did not serve much of a purpose with the exception of his crazy stage antics because we were unable to hear the keyboard throughout most of the set (this also might be due to Mesa Theater’s poor sound production). The excessive amount of their use of breakdowns was tasteless in our opinion. The guitarist/back-up singer, Zack Hansen, reminded us of a rabid squirrel due to the fact that he bore his chipmunk-like teeth when he screamed. Despite said criticism, they had aggressive stage presence and good instrumental techniques.

Asking Alexandria is a quintet from the United Kingdom. It was interesting to hear their British accents when they screamed. The band has no keyboardist although their use of previously recorded synths was well executed and added an effective atmosphere to their performance. Although despite their positive qualities, the band was ill-mannered on stage. The band members spat on the crowd gave people ‘the bird’ and would shout obscenities while performing. This made them less respectable in our eyes and made them seem juvenile and immature. We purposely stayed away from the stage in order to avoid getting spat on.

From First to Last is a well-known quartet from Georgia. Little did we know, we were in for an interesting performance. From First to Last was the most original sounding band up to that point. One of the main things that set them apart from the bands that played before them was that a high percentage of their performance was spent singing and not just screaming. They gave the impression that they were actually glad to be there as opposed to being pissed off. They chatted with the crowd in between songs and made jokes on stage. Their performance lightened everyone’s spirits.

Alesana was the main headliner on the tour. The six-piece band is from Raleigh, North Carolina and included, not one, or two—but three guitarists. Their performance evoked a very strong response to the crowd. The lead singer, Dennis Lee, leaped from the stage and surfed the crowd (the only other time we’ve seen that attempted is at A Smile From the Trenches show when their lead singer, Stoney Anderson dove into the crowd and was dropped). They played an hour-long set. Vocalist and guitarist, Shawn Milke paraded flamboyantly on stage and at one point in the set acted as if he was physically flirting with one of his fellow band-members. Alesana was the perfect ending to a high energy event.

To listen to the bands mentioned above:

Alesana: www.myspace.com/alesana

From First to Last: www.myspace.com/fftl

Asking Alexandria: www.myspace.com/askingalexandria

The Word Alive: www.myspace.com/thewordalive

: www.myspace.com/memphismayfire

….to my new main shop!

I happily now have a lovely spot on the Scribble sim which is exciting exciting!! I’m in the process of moving most of my hunt participation to this location; the Jingle Bell and Peace On Earth hunts, both for the month of December, are all set. Items won’t be hidden until the 30th, so don’t go crazy, but the signs are up!

And it just keeps getting better!

My best bud Arialis has opened his shop across the lawn from me, so come and check out his lovely coffins, headstones and more! Seriously, there is nothing like his coffins that I’ve ever been able to find in all of sl. Don’t be intimidated by the fear of falling through a rotting floor – go inside and check it out!

Psst…there’s another lovely store coming in, too: Turnip’s Homes and Stuff which you’re going to go gaga over! Stay tuned or stop by and see what’s new!

Scribble is already home to the main stores of Scribble, Sanu, and This Is A Fawn. We’re so glad to join them!

The following article was taken from a magazine published in 1882 entitled The Literary World (Vol. 28).  It is basically a book review on a newly published (at the time!) tome on the genealogy of the Greenleaf family.  In reading the article you will discover what this particular genealogy is of interest to the literary community.

The Greenleaf family is connected to me through Phebe Adams, wife of Nathanial Currier through my great-grandmother Jennie Lucy Currier Walton’s paternal line.   Edmund Greenleaf, a patriarch of one the early New England first families had three children connected to our family.   Edmund’s son, Stephen, married Elizabeth Coffin, the daughter of another prominent and patriarchal forefather, Tristram Coffin.  Mr. Coffin’s daughter, Judith, married, Tristram Coffin, Jr.  Thus,  siblings married siblings – there wasn’t a huge selection at the time and their families were apparently well acquainted.  Their decendants, Henry Adams and Sarah Dole (who married five generations later) decend from Stephen and Judith’s lines, respectively.  Also, John Greenleaf, another sibling and son of Edmund,  was married to Lydia Frost Pierce (2nd spouse for each).  They had no children together, yet Lydia and her first husband were the great-grandparents of Henry Adams.  Phebe Adams was  Jennie Walton’s great-great grandmother.

THE GEEENLEAF GENEALOGY.

Feuillevcrt.
” Whose leaf alto shall not wither.”

THE compiler of a good genealogy of an honorable family is a public benefactor, whose service to the community is generally far out of proportion to the return he receives for it. The Greenleaf Genealogy will furnish, probably, no exception to this rule. The family is an important one; it has filled a prominent and at times and points a distinguished place in American history, and Mr. James Edward Greenleaf of Charlestown, Mass., has performed a great task in the preparation of this work. We shall do what in us lies to secure attention for it, and widen its distribution.

The handsomely printed octavo of 553 pages is an extension and an enlargement of a genealogy published by the Rev. Jonathan Greenleaf, D.D., in 1854. The lapse of nearly half a century has afforded time not only for a considerable increase of materials, but for improvements in the methods of constructing such a work, and the present compiler has taken advantage of both with intelligence, patience, and zeal. There are few literary labors that call more loudly for the exercise of these qualities.

The threads which have been so skillfully woven into this fabric are chiefly these: (i) A brief history of the Massachusetts town of Newbury, of which one Captain Edmund Greenleaf was one of the original settlers in 1635; (2) a chapter of personal histories of Greenleafs who have attained distinction, with special regard to military and naval service; (3) the genealogy proper of all the descendants of Edmund Greenleaf (born abont 1574), arranged by families and generations ; (4) a list of unconnected Greenleaf families whose names and some data concerning whom are entered without being fully followed out; and (5) a number of illustrations, including portraits, which add much to the interest and value of the record. There are an abundance of notes, historical and genealogical, indexes, a chart, and blank pages for the insertion of manuscript additions.

It is a long and shining line — the line of Greenleaf. There was Captain Stephen Greenleaf, “the great Indian fighter” of his time, the latter half of the seventeenth century; and the Rev. Daniel Greenleaf, who was another St. Luke; and the brothers William and Stephen Greenleaf, re

Genealogy of the Greenleaf Family. Compiled by James Edward Greenleaf. Printed by Frank Wood. For sale by the author (Charlestown, Mass.), and by William B. Clarke & Co., Boston. $7.50.

spectively sheriffs in Boston under the governor and king at the time of the Revolution; and Rebecca Greenleaf, who married Noah Webster, the lexicographer; and the Hon. Simon Greenleaf, also the famous Royal Professor of Law at Harvard College; and James Greenleaf, his son, who married a sister of the poet Longfellow; and Benjamin Greenleaf, of whose common school arithmetic alone 560,000 copies were printed from the first set of plates; and John Greenleaf Whittier, who took his middle name from his greatgrandfather on the maternal side.

The paper on which this book is printed was made by a manufacturing company at Holyoke, Mass., of which O. H. Greenleaf is president and O. S. Greenleaf treasurer, and it is bound in leafy green; so that from frontispiece (of the author) to colophon, without and within, it is true to its- title. We add it to our row of genealogies with the satisfaction that attends the making of a distinct acquisition.

The Neocon Republican Terrorist vision of a divided and segregated America, where everybody that is not a white Anglo-saxon Christian is considered cannon fodder and trash, is coming to fruition. It is reminiscent of the reaction to the new population of freed slaves that the white former slave masters had after they were soundly defeated in the Civil War by the Union army.

This is the period in our history called Reconstruction where,for a decade after the Civil War,blacks gained political power, and some attained financial wealth as well.

During Reconstruction, southern whites turned violent when they saw blacks making major gains.

 Reconstruction was followed in the South by domination by the Democratic Party and the enactment of Jim Crow laws, grandfather clauses and similar measures. The bitterness and repercussions from the heated conflicts of the era lasted well into the twentieth century.

Read more about the Reconstruction era here… http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reconstruction_era_of_the_United_States 

Southern state governments quickly enacted the restrictive “black codes“. However, they were abolished in 1866 and seldom had effect, because the Freedman’s Bureau (not the local courts) handled the legal affairs of freedmen.

The Black Codes indicated the plans of the southern whites for the former slaves.^[24] The freedmen would have more rights than did free blacks before the war, but they still had only a limited set of second-class civil rights, no voting rights, and, since they were not citizens, they could not own firearms, serve on a jury in a lawsuit involving whites or move about without employment.^[25] The Black Codes would limit blacks’ ability to control their own employment. The Black Codes outraged northern opinion. They were overthrown by the Civil Rights Act of 1866 that gave the Freedmen full legal equality (except for the right to vote).^[26

 There were many reported murders of blacks in the south during reconstruction, but many killings of blacks went unreported, and by all accounts, millions upon millions of African-Americans were killed by the hands of bitter southerners, as reported in this account taken from Wikipedia by a soldier visiting from the North...

The number of murders and assaults perpetrated upon Negroes is very great; we can form only an approximate estimate of what is going on in those parts of the South which are not closely garrisoned, and from which no regular reports are received, by what occurs under the very eyes of our military authorities. As to my personal experience, I will only mention that during my two days sojourn at Atlanta, one Negro was stabbed with fatal effect on the street, and three were poisoned, one of whom died.

In todays modern post-racial world, we have organizations and groups that have a mission to keep track of, and to investigate the existence of, the number of racially motivated,or bias motivated crimes against minorities,religious groups, gay Americans.

Currently, America is going through another Reconstruction like era,as we are experiencing the racial backlash of hatred based on the election of our first black president,Barack Obama.

The election of Barack has caused a rise in all forms of hate crimes, as well as the emergence of the Ku Klux Klan as a force to stoke the flames of hatred and encouraging physical action of violence against blacks, Gays, and all other religious groups that are not Christian.

What is most distressing is that the tide of racial violence is being egged on and financed by the foreigner Rupert Murdoch, and the entire Republican party,that at one time represented the opposite of what they believe in now.

For a group that, centuries ago, used to be the main supporter of civil rights, they currently are the main driving force behind this increasing tide of racism and bigotry that is the rage in most of the states in America.

The racist are moving from the south, and invading the once liberal California, in order to spread their southern tradition of hatred and illiteracy. Hate crimes based on sexual orientation shot up 21 percent in Los Angeles County last year, while religious crimes increased 14 percent, because the southern bigots have moved in.

The Daily News in Los Angeles reports that...in 2008  in the Valley,James Shamp, an African-American man who worked as a janitor at a bowling alley in Canoga Park, was shot to death as he was throwing out trash. According to the report, three members of the Canoga Park Alabama gang, which has a long history of violent anti-black crimes, were arrested and charged with murder and hate crime enhancements.

The San Fernando Valley had the most amount of hate crimes in the Los Angeles area.

"Whenever I look at a map of hate crimes, I find there is a great diversity of hate crimes that occur in the San Fernando Valley," said Robin Toma, executive director of the commission. "You have anti-Semitic hate crimes, homophobic hate crimes and racially motivated hate crimes. There is also the phenomena of racialized gang violence."

Sexual orientation hate crimes rose the most last year, with more than 80 percent targeting gay men and at least nine crimes traced to Proposition 8.

A report on a sexually motivated hate crime from the Daily News... A white lesbian couple walking hand-in-hand on the beach in Malibu. The mother of a white tourist family from Arkansas told them, "You are going to burn in hell!" and dumped her water bottle on one of them and punched one in the face...

Please keep that level of ignorance in Arkansas,...and my family is from Arkansas.

The election of the first black president and hot-button issues such as abortion and gay marriage contributed to the spikes, anti-bias groups say. Public figures like Sarah Palin and Glen Beck have done a lot to cause the current racial hatred that whites are visiting on all others.

The two of them have been quite effective when it come to rallying sympathy for groups like the KKK and the Nazis.

USA TODAY is reporting that the number of attacks on blacks increased 8% to 2,876, accounting for seven of every 10 race-motivated crimes.

"There is this kind of extremism going on," says Hilary Shelton, director of the NAACP Washington bureau. He says Obama's election and the recession led to a backlash against blacks as some people look for someone to blame for hard economic times. http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2009-11-23-hate-crimes_N.htm

I say to the world, this is a good look at the so-called ''Post-Racial'' America, a country where race relations and the unity of the races has been usurped by the in vogue traditional American practice of racial bias,hatred and division.

Our country has been going through this cycle for well over a Hundred and 8o years, and by the looks of things, that sad tradition will continue.

What do we do to end this....will we come together, or will we have to resort to our primal instinct, where only the strong survive.

I think that based on 200 years of data and statistics, the tradition of racism is alive, well, and thriving in the United States, and that we are guilty of the same atrocities against humanity...our own people, that we so blatantly accuse our so-called enemies of doing to their minority populations.

We are all truly hypocrites.

Read more on this story from these trusted sources…

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/23/hate-crime-on-rise-gay-re_n_368276.html

http://www.dailynews.com/news/ci_13829526

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2009/11/20/LA-sees-hike-in-certain-hate-crimes/UPI-95381258737529/

This wasn't how it was suppose to end!

Two sisters from Stockholm, Sweden are hoping to sue the group of drunk undertakers who accidentally dropped their father’s coffin on it’s side into the grave. And what I mean by dropped is, it landed with such a thud the two women ran crying and screaming from the cemetery fearing their father had fallen out of the casket. The two were in so much shock they aren’t even sure if the coffin was righted before it was covered or whether, if daddy had fallen out, he was put back in. Both sisters have been on sick leave ever since the incident.

Psst How did they manage to find a group of drunk undertakers?

Somewhat morbid song I wrote from the darker sides of my brain.

Yanked and stretched down this hole
Screaming bloody murder as it devours my soul
Blood pours from my needle cut eyes
The sky falls down as the fairy dies
…………………………………………………………………………………………
You keep me going
only reason I’m alive
So When the wind stops blowing
I don’t know if I’ll survive
The insects keep on growing
It turns me inside out
But I control it
You’ll never know
You’ll never fit
Inside this coffin
…………………………………………………………………………………………
The Blood you don’t see
How dead I may be
Scraping nails against a chalkboard
It laughs as my bones are ignored
these worms pull me down this godforsaken hole
I feel like I’m losing you to hot mistaken coal
…………………………………………………………………………………………
You keep me going
only reason I’m alive
So When the wind stops blowing
I don’t know if I’ll survive
The insects keep on growing
It tries to turn me inside out
But I control it
You’ll never know
You’ll never fit
Inside this coffin
…………………………………………………………………………………………
I can never tell you
How my face is turning blue
Like a Damned old leper
I am rotting piece to piece
Like a lie I have kept her
I am rotting piece to piece
…………………………………………………………………………………………
The Blood you don’t see
How dead I may be
Scraping nails against a chalkboard
It laughs as my bones are ignored
these worms pull me down this godforsaken hole
I feel like I’m losing you to hot mistaken coal
…………………………………………………………………………………………
You keep me going
only reason I’m alive
So When the wind stops blowing
I don’t know if I’ll survive
The insects keep on growing
It tries to turn me inside out
But I control it
You’ll never know
You’ll never fit
Inside this coffin
Inside this coffin
Inside this coffin
…………………………………………………………………………………………
Ah aah aah ah ah
Nails and stones they have crushed my soul
As the knife cuts deep
It helps with the creeps
The Smoke feels good
You wouldn’t have understood
The alcohol numbs
As it slowly hums
Hmmmmhhmmmhmmm
You won’t kill yourself tonight

So time really does fly when your having fun. I honestly can’t even believe that it has already been a whole 12 months of blogging! I have enjoyed every crazy, wacky, wild post and all of your comments! So much has changed in my life since I started this thing. I have gotten married, changed jobs, gone crazy, had at least 2 nervous breakdowns, and of course grown out this wild stache! 13,359 views also blows my mind!! People have actually looked at this thing and at least a few people have enjoyed it. I use this thing day in and day out as some sort of therapy. It is my little shout out to the world. I never know who is watching or reading or spying on my awesome blog. Now with a new year on the horizon and a new year of blogging ahead I am stoked. I hope you all keep reading and commenting. I am going to make this next year twice as good!!!!!

There will be more, and more, and more tattoos this next year! And I hope more to come from my homie Josh out at Saints and Sinners in Carrollton!!

There will be no more weddings only happily ever after! Or at least till death do us part or until death do we start!

There will be a TON more AM sessions. I do feel that I will be heading back to Irving for the AM sessions I have not enjoyed Lewisville. I hope to get back into my skateboard rhythm. Or maybe I will kill my skateboard when I finally lose it!

Of course I will be writing as much as I can about mustache and moustache related items! I can’t see myself with out my facial friend! I hope that in the future he can grown and become very strong.

Moustache related item!

Mustache related item 2!

I really want to say thanks for all the support. Continue to visit themostmediocre and read up about your favorite crazy skateboard tattoo weirdo with a moustache!

Just last week, I got a package from Alex over at Dance Party Massacre. I didn’t know what tee I would be receiving, and I was extremely excited to open the mailer up as quickly as my little fingers could go. Inside this envelope were goodies and a tee that I had been eyeing on the DPM site for quite some time! “Fresh 2 Death” is one of my favorite tees from DPM’s second season, and I’m very excited to get the chance to review it!

As you can see, this design includes metallic ink. I’ve never had a tee with shimmery ink before, and I think that it was a perfect addition to this particular design. It would have been boring to see the coins and the “bling” be a plain bronze color without the glitter-effect. Instead, we get to see something that’s more true-to-life on this piece.

This tee came with a custom hangtag. I love it when companies take the extra step to do this because it makes their products look even more professional. This hangtag is nice and simple, which is a good thing because it’s not tacky!

“Fresh 2 Death” also features a custom tag on the left sleeve, as well as a custom printed tag on the inside of the shirt. Again, these are excellent additions to show just how professional this company is.

In terms of print quality, this tee looks beautiful before and after wash. The only difference is that some of the glitter specks in the bronze ink have migrated to other areas of the print after washing, giving them some sparkle. It’s not too big of a deal and you won’t even really notice unless you’re staring at the print (something that I do just for reviewing purposes!).

The details on this print are spectacular and are well-defined on the tee. The print job is terrific, and you can see all of the little details clearly. The artist made sure to illustrate this piece without having the lines be too thin to show up in the print. All in all, I give this design an A+ for translating well from computer image to t-shirt print! I love everything that goes into this composition, and I think that the tee itself is fresh!

Another thing that I love about this design is that it wraps around the torso a little bit. In my opinion, the placement is very unique. While it could have just been smacked right in the center of the tee, making sure that the print ended along the two edges of the shirt, DPM went with a more original route.

I give this t-shirt from Dance Party Massacre two thumbs up for everything–from presentation to print quality. Although I think that $27.95 is quite steep for t-shirts in general, you can be sure that you’ll get a high-quality shirt in return when you order “Fresh 2 Death.” For those living in the U.S., you’ll also be happy to know that shipping is free!

And after goodness, purity:

Wabet,  ”pure” or “clean” - in the feminine form when spoken, but without the loaf of bread representing the t , because it’s so obvious to those in the know that the scribe, dashing off yet another offering formula, hasn’t bothered to write it down.  But we know it’s there, don’t we?

Advanced office scribes like us will also have deduced that the masculine form is wab, and that the rather curious sumbol above is a triliteral sign conveying the sound of three letters, w a and b. 

We’ve had b before, haven’t we?  If you cast your mind back to the first line of the offering formula, when we were looking at Abydos or Abdju, one of the major cult centres of Osiris, you’ll recall that the letter b in ancient Egyptian is represented by the human foot.  And what do we have as the bottom half of this symbol?  A human foot!  That’ll be the b, then.

But what’s that spout on top, and what’s it spouting?  No, it’s not what you’re thinking.  They could draw what you’re thinking much better than that.  The upper part of the symbol is a little water pot, and it’s pouring forth a libation of purifying water.

You can see the kind of pot in full pouring action in this scene from the sarcophagus of a royal lady:

In this scene, one of the lady’s servants is pouring her a drink.  In temples and in funeral rites, water was used for ritual purification, as in this scene where a priest is pouring water over the coffin of the deceased:

It’s a shame the painting has flaked away just where I want to show you the water spouting out of the pots, but never mind.  And the blue wiggly lines for the water have come out nicely.  So, the symbol for “pure” was the standard ritual purification device of ancient Egyptian religion, the pot pouring out clean water, rendering the person or object it was poured over cleansed and pure.  Wab was also the word for “priest” in ancient Egyptian; literally, “the pure one”.

Here’s an example from a temple relief:

We already know how to draw the foot.  Then just draw a little oval on top for the pot, like an egg lying on its side, but square off the pointy end a bit for the rim.  Then draw a zigzag line for the water, arcing out of the pot in a graceful curve.

Finally -please remember all this when the office plant contractors come round and water the aspidistras.  And stop stubbing out illicit cigarettes in the rubber plants, and using the weeping fig as a receptacle for your coffee dregs, or the office party plonk.  They’ve been ritually purified.  Have some respect.

A cap sits on the coffin carrying Uganda’s former Army commander Maj. Gen. James Kazini who was allegedly  killed by a girlfriend, Draru Lydia Atim in Namuwongo, a Kampala surburb on November 10, 2009.

Book Five — Chapter Eleven Senior Year Williams College, Adam Inclines Toward Christianity, Adam Resigns from His Fraternity, Melchizedek Is Crushed, A Call from Clarissa

CONTENTS NEXT

I note with chagrin the length of the previous chapter. I will try hard to make this one as thin as can be. We do not want to over-write. You can read in the words of the title that I will be performing a prodigious feat.

Adam returned to his small suite at St. Gandolph’s, shared with the cordial Bernard Lanvin. It was his senior year. He had no love life. That was OK. He had no classes. Only things he was writing for his professors. An account of Dostoevsky’s novels. What Freud thought. And for Fred Schuman, an account of the Institute of Politics at William College and the role in it of Bernard Baruch. This latter work may be found in the Baruch collection at Princeton.

Adam found his academic work no challenge. He simply did it, always received the highest marks and thought of it as next to nothing.

He did well enough with no relationship, frequenting cultural events and taking an interest in what was being offered in the theatre and in the art at the new Clark Institute down the road. He inspected the impressionist works there with a critical eye.

He began thinking about the future. He knew what he didn’t want to do. But not what he did. More and more. he inclined toward what could loosely be called Christian understandings. He was familiar with the contempory religious writers and their antecedents, particularly existentialists, with Kierkegaard and Dostoevsky at the forefront.

He had one friend at Williams during those final years, a Korean named Warner Kim. He was the smartest person Adam had ever encountered and their conversations were in a realm beyond anything he had ever experienced. Kim also inclined toward a Christian view of things. Adam would never lose the image of Warner Kim. Walking side by side and talking of everything. He visited Kim in New York
and found him in an apartment with other young Koreans. They went out to eat. Warner, whose Korean name was Kyung Won Kim, poured his tea. Adam poured his.

Our hero’s Christian interest was further whetted by the arrival of a replacement for Chaplain Cole, who had been named President of Lake Forest College in Illinois. The new man was William Sloane Coffin, Jr.

Coffin had already had a bit of a career. He’d been a CIA agent. He had a fluent command the Russian tongue. He had mastered the piano. He was almost a celebrity. One could not fail to note, in addition, Coffin’s wonderfully charming young wife, Eva Rubenstein, daughter of the famous pianist. Eva’s face conveyed a memorable delicacy, strength and intelligence.

The new chaplain soon established himself as a preacher of merit, whose aphorisms were apposite and cutting. Chapel was required back then. His oratory caused apathetic auditors to sit up on a Sunday evening.

If the late 1950s contained germs of the iconoclasm of the 1960s, Bill Coffin knew things were blowing. And, like many successful individuals, he could dominate things around him. At the same time, could make others feel accepted, even important. All these qualities served him well.

So did the tenuous position of fraternities at Williams. The student union, to which I have already referred, was built in part to assuage the guilt created by the exclusion of a significant group from membership in the houses. Fraternities were inherently selective in an academic environment where values might have inclined more in the direction of inclusion. Williams was subservient to fraternity culture.

Coffin lost no time in excoriating the system from the pulpit. The college lost little time in polarizing around his attack.

A related event took place in the bowels of St. Gandolph’s. It was the obligation of the brethren to consider future members. As 1958 began, there was a meeting to go over a list of potentially interesting prospects. Adam attended. A young man from a Caribbean locale was deemed questionable by the house president. His pigmentation did not pass muster. Adam quickly suggested that pigmentation was a shabby reason for exclusion. The president prevailed.

Later that night, the president came to Adam’s room. Our hero lounged with a book on his bed. The president asked if he was OK. Adam repeated his view. The president said, “If you feel that way, maybe you shouldn’t be here.” As quickly as you read these words, Adam resigned from St. Gandolph’s.

He left the house the following day. He wrote a brief resignation suggesting that an inherently excluding social process had no place in a liberal arts college. Word spread. Three other students resigned.

Melchizadek, whose friend Froggy helped Adam get into St. Gandolph’s, was crushed. More emotional than Adam had ever seen him. He was not wildly attentive to Adam during all his years away at school. Now he was on the phone insisting that immediately with James Phinney Baxter, President of Williams. Ensconced in the presidential parlor, Adam was calm and matter of fact. He would not change his mind.

Melchizedek reserved his vitriol for Chaplain Coffin. Had there been no Chaplain Coffin, Adam would still be in St. Gandolph’s. Adam saw this as an insult. He left of his own accord.

Of course, his leaving gave Coffin ammunition. Why should it not?

Adam could not change Melchizedek’s mind. He had had embarrassed his father before his friends. This was a mortal sin.

Bill and Eva Coffin invited Adam to live with them. Within a day he was ensconced in the upstairs back bedroom with his maroon Dodge parked behind the house.

He had Coffin’s distinctive speech down pat but was nonplussed when sharp, young Eva insisted he perform. Otherwise pretty much led his own life and had an easy relationship with the Coffin family, which included a lovely infant daughter named Amy.

The fraternity issue bubbled but Adam went on quite normally, doing his work, getting accepted to Union Theological Seminary, applying for and getting a summer job at the New York State Psychiatric Institute as an attendant in the children’s ward and solving his social situation in a remarkably intelligent way.

One evening when the skies were still dark but spring was in the air, two fraternity classmates of Adam set out in a sedan. They were drinking. They had a loaded shotgun. In the Coffin house were only Amy and a girl sitter. They stood in the kitchen. She held Amy. A shotgun blast shattered the front window and left telltale marks on the refrigerator door. The girl had the intelligence to call the police. penetrated all the way to the The boys were apprehended and expelled.
Within four years, the fraternity system was entirely abolished.

Coffin joked, “If you want Panflick, he lives in the back.”

Alumni were incensed. The joy of their college years, no more. Coffin might not have lasted at Williams. But soon after the the shooting, he accepted the chaplaincy at his alma mater Yale, replacing the venerable Sidney Lovett. Bill went on to a distinguished career With with the likes of George H. W. Bush and other CIA functionaries, he had belonged to Skull and Bones. But in the years to come that fact was less prominent in than his exertions against the the activities of our Skull and Bones-influenced government.

Eva went her own way as well. The marriage did not last. She became a distinguished photographer. She never lost the look that captivated Adam.

*

Adam solved his love life deficit by inviting Vanessa Demarest to the big final dance of the year. She came from Radcliffe willingly. With complete brother and sister understanding, they had a delightful weekend together. They caught up on memories. They had the Coffin house to themselves.

As the year wound down, Adam continued to frequent St. Gandolph’s. Friends there were more than happy to have him as a guest. There was was almost a silent affirmation that he acted correctly.

Ironically, the president of the house would one day be a professor of history at Williams, with a concentration on the American Civil War.

*

With diploma in hand, Adam got a call from Clarissa. This was rare. He knew instantly it was momentous. Clarissa was at the height of her celebrity. A household name. But she was still the balanced and caring soul Adam had known at Sinicock.

Clarissa: Adam, can you go up to Heath?

Adam: Of course.

Clarissa: Norbert had an incident, Adam.

Adam: Oh.

Clarissa: He tried to kill himself. With pills.

Adam: (Silence)

Clarissa: He refuses to have anyone stay with him. He says it was just a momentary impulse. I asked him if you could visit. He said yes.

Adam drove up the hill to Heath. Norbert welcomed him with a handshake and a smile, as if nothing had happened.

*

A final note. Adam’s Capri painting had graced the wall above the couch in his study at St. Gandolph’s. It was lost.

Whether Adam forgot to take it when he left, whether someone else took it, whether it was left in place to become an attic treasure somewhere, it was no longer in Adam’s possession.

Adam was in touch with his creativity during the coming years, but he would always lack this clear reminder that he, Adam, had once been a painter of some talent. He never took it up again.

CONTENTS NEXT

The events/meetings of Visual Kei fans in Thailand are always at MBK Center (Mahboonkrong or มาบุญครอง) every month. MBK is a famous shopping center which has a big space for meeting at the corner of the street. It is near Siam Center, just across the street. You can just imagine of Thai girls dress as Harajuku people. People around the world know that Thai girls are very pretty, so what they will look like, … the prettiest one you saw in Japanese. No lie.

Some Visual Kei bands are so famous in groups of rich teenagers in Thailand, and a lot of Japanese animas do, too. These fans pay a lot of money for their costumes which they wear only in one day. Dir en Grey, Gazette, Miyavi (ex- Dué le Quartz) and D’espairs Ray are very famous currently. Although Malice Mizer is something old, but people always love to dress like them. Mana’s lip is very attractive and unique.

Photo of area around Siam Center by Sw Eden

Nongnut is one of classmates in high school. She got asked to dress with a white-fur costumn, because it was not fit in her friend’s body. Her group liked Hyde, L’Arc~en~Ciel so much. She gave me her drawing of Hyde, and I still keep it. Hyde is considered as the best guy in L’Arc en Ciel. He is who you should talk with and have as a friend.

Right now, let’s cross the street to Siam Center. Several buildings have small rooms for rent. Most of those rooms are for rent. Many teachers rent them and their students have to pay a lot of money to take extra classes. It sounds mean that those teachers do not teach everything they know in the school, because they need more money. Visual Kei fans also rent the rooms, too. They use it for the meeting within their own group for each band. X Japan fans liked to eat some spicy things together. Some big fans of Visual Kei also buy many CD and DVD from Japan and sale them in this place. Most of the discs are second hand, because they already watched them. I walked up and looked around in the latest time I visited Siam Center. A group of teenatures with dark-eyes-make-up watched Yoshiki played his piano.

I know an event that X Japan fans usually do in May 2nd of every year. They will meet at MBK or Siam Center and have some party. They will take a bus or train to Hua Lamphong Temple, which is one of the best place to do Coffin-Offerings. They donate money for the corpses who do not have coffin. They hope all merit to go for Hideto Matsumoto (Hide or 秀人松本), their hero.

Here’s my drawing of Hideto Matsumoto.
I do not usually put something that I do not own the copyright.

I do not usually dress as Visual Kei, but I do dress for Halloween. I had got a reward for the scariest dress. Sometimes, I dressed not for the contest. My close friend and I painted ourselves and walk around our high school. Halloween is my most favorite day of the year. So now, let’s go to class!

Not too sure if the in-laws would be amused but Pat Vincent decided to arrive at his wedding in a coffin. Yes, a coffin. Then after the ceremony he jumped back into the wooden casket and was transported by train to the reception. Of course he was British, sheez!

to make their packaging exactly like this… so that my virginia slims addict sistahs would get a morbid reminder each time they take and light that stick!

If the patch doesn’t work, try carrying your smokes in this.

Daily people are dying throughout the world of diseases caused by smoking. This package concept shows how close this problem is to us. As every day each smoker carries this problem in his/her pocket. They carry death.

Packaging by R.J. Reynolds