Wednesday, June 6, 2012

Oh, Yes, I Remember My Blog Now...

No, I haven't vanished off the face of the earth this time, either. It might have seemed like it, though. I'm not really sure how many people actually read my blog other than the wonderful Amy *waves*, but I do like blogging, for some reason.

I also took a look at Amy's blog, and her latest post was entitled ECLECTIC BLOGGER AWARD. Now that is a word that I really like. Eclectic. I think that sums me up pretty well. Along with 'eccentric' and 'unfathomable'.

Anyway, when you receive the award, you are apparently supposed to nominate five other people for the award and then tell five things about yourself. Judging by this, I was apparently nominated for the ECLECTIC BLOGGER AWARD. (Why am I still putting it in all caps? Because I like caps. So there.) So now I must follow the process myself.

First things first. THANK YOU, AMY! You are probably the most dedicated reader of my blog. At least, you are the only one I know who really reads it. I'm not sure my parents do (not that I would really mind... yeah, I'm weird that way. But I've never been embarrassed to been seen in public with my parents or anything like that. I mean... they're my parents. It'd be pretty bad if I were embarrassed of them), and I only have five followers. I know, I know, we cannot measure the worth of a blog by the number of followers or the number of reviews (cue the music, 'Through Heaven's Eyes' from Prince of Egypt). Even so. When someone praises me, my usual reaction is bewilderment and nonchalance. My attitude is basically, "What was so special about what I did?"

Still, kind words leave an impression on me. I don't forget them and I try to live up to them. (Some of the best praise I think I ever received was from a lady after a church function who said about me, "You don't have to tell her to work." Man, that humbled me.) So, thank you, Amy, for all the nice things you said about me. I am terribly at talking about feelings stuff, but I can write better about it.

All right. Now I have to mention blogs that I like/follow/whatever. Hoo boy. I don't really follow all that many blogs. I especially don't know how to make links to them (although I could made educated guesses and possibly get it on the eleventh try). But I will list blogs!

Amy's blogs - A Small Step in the Shoes of Amy Jane and Just the Little Things to Change the World. - I like reading Amy's blogs because it is really neat to have found someone who thinks like me on various stuff. Seeing as how I am probably eclectic incarnate, this is understandably rare.

American Papist - This used to be a blog by Thomas Peters. He had great articles about Vatican affairs and stuff in the American church, and also plenty of Papist Pictures of the Day with hilarious caption contests. (The best involved a picture of a Middle Eastern prelate, apparently holding two kite strings. The caption? "Some people claim they have a direct line to God. Mwahaha. I have TWO!") Unfortuantely, his blog has been assimilated by CatholicVote, and it's all politics now. Plus, other people write stuff. I don't look at it as much as I once did, but occasionally I do. And rejoice when there's a Papist Picture of the Day.

Bad Vestments. Just Bad Vestments. www.badvestments.blogspot.com Check it out. You really should. It is hilarious. It showcases horrible examples of liturgical vestments and the corresponding horrible ecclesiastical taste of the prelates who actually WEAR this stuff. The captions and the comments are hilarious. On the bonus side, though the guy who runs the blog is a sort-of Anglican, he respects Catholics. I like people who can be reasonable! Only once has the Pope ever been on Bad Vestments (title and caption: OOPS: The Holy Father has a rare lapse in judgment.), and his example wasn't near so bad as some other egregious offenders (BV OVERLOAD and TARGET PRACTICE spring to mind). Someone in the comments noted that it was from his infamous Austria trip and the dude in charge of his wardrobe was fired after that. They also noted he's looked a lot classier since then.
As a bonus, Bad Vestments is now also including "unacceptable church designs". The comments on these are always great. One ("GIANT DEAD SPIDER") was mocked in the comments as the Church of St. Grima the Wormtongued in Mordor. XD.

XD. I do like that symbol. I also like how my brain insists on putting a period after it, as if "XD" were a complete sentence.

Death Star PR. www.deathstarpr.blogspot.com Sith-oriented takes on everything Star Wars. Sorry, Amy, they hate on Doctor Who, too. (Woohoo, and that rhymed, too.) There hasn't been any new post in forever, though.

Does FAILblog count?

All righty... five things about myself. Do they have to be generic things like, "I like chocolate," (I am a chocoholic, for you information), or more specific? Oh, well. I'm listing five things. And I suppose I had better avoid things that Amy mentioned or it will look like I am plagiarizing (the SHAME and BANE of all writers). However, I do also like piano, reading, and writing, and I also love my family.

(1) I am a huge Tolkien fan, and if I could find a way to put a counter on my blog I would be running a countdown to December 13th when The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey comes out. I firmly believe LOTR is the best book of the millenium (last millenium, numskull) and wish it were required reading in high schools. As oppposed to Lord of the Flies, or something else equally heinous.

(2) I read philosophy and apologetics books. For fun. I love quoting Peter Kreeft, J. R. R. Tolkien, C. S. Lewis, and G. K. Chesterton. I collect their quotes, in fact. Because of this, I know exactly what terms like 'the ontological argument for the existence of God', 'hypostatic union' and 'pschyosomatic unity' mean. Go have fun looking them up.
I am currently reading two hagiographies (saint biographies) by G. K. Chesterton, one about St. Francis of Assissi and one about St. Thomas Aquinas. Needless to say, they are both awesome.

(3) I have very traditional taste in many things, including art, sculpture, architecture, and manners. If you follow my blog at all, you are probably aware of my visceral reactions to modern art. I shall say no more on the matter.

(4) I also read encyclopedias and dictionaries for fun. My vocabulary should probably indicate this. I am told I tend to use big words. Most of the time this is not intentional; I usually just like the way big words sound. I also aim to deliver them in as straight-faced a manner as possibly (the judge of which, however, I am not). Hence, my delight over Dr. Bibbee's ability to do the same thing. It was hilarious. The first day of class he was using long words completely seriously and I was cracking up on the inside.
Sometimes, I use big words intentionally. This is usually done to confuse annoying cousins, because I just love the confused, "Huh?" on their faces when I do it.

(5) I have created an entire world in my head. I have invented a legendarium, like Tolkien. I am working on pretty much my eighth story about my world. I have invented five major languages for my world. I also illustrate the characters from my world (the good guys, that is, not the bad guys, siince I don't really like my bad guys. They exist for me to torment). If you ask me about my world and my stories, I shall gladly tell you about them, but let me first warn you: it's like unleashing Noah's Flood. Somebody once wrote Tolkien a letter asking him somethign about his legendarium. He responsed with like an 18-page letter giving a brief synopsis of The Silmarillion, and apologized for it. Yeah... it's pretty much the same for me.

Oh, and (6) I am a grammar fanatic. This should be obvious. My family is used to me reading the paper and commenting out of nowhere, "Spelling error," or, "Grammar error."

Does that suffice?

Yup, Amy, you were totally right when you said that I write very, very long blog posts.

In Pace Christi,

Elyse

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