Featurettes about the Catholic Church

1) "mary remained a virgin, and...."
"but it says in the bible that Jesus had brothers and sisters, and one of them named James is a historical figure, same with Joses, Judas, Simon and his sisters too..."
"SILENCE!"

2)"hey, let's all pray to saints!"
"um, why?"
"because we ourselves do not deserve to pray to God, so they can pray for us"
"where does it say that in the bible? and, i mean, the whole point of the christian faith is a personal relationship with God..."
"SILENCE!"

(Jack says:
LOL)

3) "hey, let's get a ruler dude... let's call him a pope, and he will be the decsendant of saint peter and he'll be the voice of God on earth!"
"hey yeah great idea!"
"hey dudes, what year is it?"
"year 900... why?"
"well, if we're supposed to choose a direct descendant of saint Peter, thats gonna be kinda hard, because his lineage ended like, 20 years after him? i don't even know if he had a kid... and doesn't god annoint people himself to his voice on earth? and why are chrsitians gonna be under the dominion of one church leader that doesn't even have a biblical foot to stand on to have any legitimacy?"
"SILENCE!"
Patty // www.tejic.se says:
"hey guys, lets say that the bread and wine of the lords supper is ACTUALLY the blood and body of christ, so that people think it's more than a symbol..."
"hey yeah, great idea"
"but dudes, doesn't that mean thet Jesus hasn't died once and only once for our sins? that means he is sacrificed every single time for our sins when we have the lords supper... thats not really biblical.. i mean, Jesus didn't cut off his arm at the lords supper, he said the things figuratively and..."
"SILENCE!"

4) "Hey, i know, i think that the priest dude, he should be the one who receives confessions from the people"
"yeah!"
"and he should be the one saying what they need to do to such and such thing to be forgiven, like i dunno... let's call it a hail mary and other stuff like that...."
"yeah, i like that"
"yeah, and let's also have things that you have to buy for forgiveness... called indulgences-
"catchy!
"- thank you,.... yeah indulgences. that way, we get a bunch of money and people feel compelled to buy them because they want to go to heaven..."
" but hey, dudes... it says in the Bible that the only person who can forgive sins is God himself... and that you are justified by faith, not by actions, so the whole hail mary stuff is just bunk...and i mean, how corrupt is it to have people buy their salvation? that isn't anywhere in the Bible and it's perverted in a way, and-..."
"SILENCE!"
"-hey is this why we're not actually allowed to have Bibles and...-"
"SILENCE!!"

5) "Hey guys, i have an idea..."
"yeah?"
"yeah, so picture this: we keep people guessing about them or their loved ones going to heaven after all... so we invent a thing called purgatory, where people go if they either weren't baptised, or something like that..."
"i like i like... hey, maybe we could have people like, buy candles and stuff, that they wold light as a prayer, you know... and sellt he candles, so we get filthy rich..."
"hey yeah, that would be sweeeeeet. and people would never know if they are actually going to heaven or not, so they would need us for everything and believe everything we say!"
"yeah!!"
"hey guys, sup?"
"oh nothing nothing...-"
"nah, we're talking about a thing called purgatory, where people go if we feel like it and then we get moolah when poeple buy candles and stuff to get people out of purgatory... you know...and then people are at our mercy, it's so sweet."
"hey dudes... that isn't anywhere in the Bible... it says that you have either accpeted the Lord Jesus-Christ as your savior and you go to heaven, or you haven't and you go to hell... i mean, thats pretty black and white... and like, whats up with the selling of candles? thats like corrupt, you know... why do you want money? "burglars and moths will eat away at these earthly things..." and i mean, yeah, what up with the whole "controlling people" thing, thats like messed up... i mean, i don't think God would be very pleased with you-"
"SILENCE!"
"- hey so is this another reaosn why no one gets a Bible to read on their o-"
"SILENCE!!!"

Stockholm Big Air 2006

This day was.... epic, i'll say.

The skiing was ginormous and the jump enormous. Jacob Wester, Henke Windstedt and Oscar Sherlin of sweden battled PK Hunder, Charles Gagnier and Niklas Karlstrom i think from the rest of the world.

Jacob unleashed the biggest flat three i have ever seen, charles was insane and took himself out after a stomped switch ten. Oscar was throwing the sweetest double grabs, and PK the sweetest 720 nose mutes...

All in all, it was insane. i got to talk to jake for the first time in a while, and that was plain cool (though the pic not so much.)

here is a video.



and some pics!


The Jump


Overview


PK and Oscar


psychadelic gagnier


Oscar sequence


beeeeuuuhhh 


Gagnier


Oscar, Niklas and Jacob


Pk and Henke


yay!


The podium

Väsjö again... again!

Well, today marked the day where i will try to never, ever, rent ski equipement again, lest it be poles.

I show up at Väsjöbacken at 9 15, a whole hour and 45 minutes pre-opening. Luckily, it is a beautiful day and the snow is great. That's just about all that goes well for me today.

So i get a call that my friends won't be there until 1. Great. That leaves me to ski on my own for 2 hours. So i go and rent my ski equipement. Once again, i need to get the feel for a completly different pair of boots. i try them on, and they're way too loose, even ont he max. So i ask for another pair, the only other they have, seeing as it's the end of the season, in a size i can wear. They're a bit too small. Ill be getting blisters. Yay, i think.

Then i ask for some skis. All they have twintip wise are some mojo 70s 163s, center mounted, or 7 yeard old head air skis, with bairly a twin tip, and mounted wayyyyy back. Oh, and they're something like 75 65 80, at best...
I go for the mojos, i trust them more. How i was wrong. Those things were the equivalent of snowblades. I tried the small jump, and barely made it, they're so wobbly.
So i head back inside and grab the older skis. I try them out, and i just can't get used to them. They're too thin. Way to thin. And given the mounting point being way, way back, i had little to no stability. I point it on the big jump, over jump it and barely make it. You need tails on skis... Then i try again, less speed but i pop more. Due to the lack of tail, i clear the entire landing to my back... After a bunch of flailing in the air, i was like: "Dude, this will hurt, stop flailing, it'll be better". I Flat out land on my back, hit my head and lose both skis. Thank goodness for helmets and back protection. After a bunch of graoning, i get up, and try it again, making it, but with no grab, no nothing. This reeks.

I head isnide, to basically wallow in self pity. It's the last day of the season, and i won't be able to accomplish anything. yay. The ski dudes at väsjö see im mad, and they start talking to themselves. At that point, Axel and his friend Jens showed up. Finally, someone. We ski around, and then im like: im going for the three over the small jump.
But as i get clsoe to it, i remember the back seat,a nd shy away. I can't believe it. I don't trust my skis to be there on the landing. I storm off inside to have a bit of food. When im done, a super chill dude asks me if i want to try his skis. At first i accept, then im like, mayeb i don't want to break his skis. He says it's cool, theres no way i can break them. Sure enough, he has mojo 90s from next year, 186.
So now i ahve to get used to these skis! They are awesome, but too big for me to launch anything right away. Silly me, cos' i launched stuff right away.

So without really getting a feel for them, i try a three. I clip off the lip, and over rotate, but without much if any pain. So i head back up, and try again. this time it's bad. I fall straight to my hip, twist my ankle really, really badly, and hurt my elbow. That's it. End of season, right there.

Moral of the story? It's good to have your own equipement. You know how it skis, you know what you like, and it likes you.

Anyways, i kinda managed to get some pics from it, so voilà!





The acronym to describe the day i had.


it's a beautiful daaaay.


the crew


best pic of the day


into the sun


fasha and me


nicole sequence


jens sequence


jens sequence


axel sequence

Bushisms

* "We wouldn't go forward if we were concerned about the security of the United States of America." —Cabinet meeting, 23 February 2006
* "You took an oath to defend our flag and our freedom, and you kept that oath, underseas and under fire." —Speech to Veterans of Foreign Wars, 10 January 2006
* "I mean, there was a serious international effort to say to Saddam Hussein, you're a threat. And the 9/11 attacks extenuated that threat, as far as I—concerned." —Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 12 December 2005
* "Wow! Brazil is big." —After being shown a map of Brazil by President Lula da Silva. November 7, 2005
* "I think it's important to bring somebody from outside the system, the judicial system, somebody that hasn't been on the bench and, therefore, there's not a lot of opinions for people to look at." —On the nomination of Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court, Washington, D.C., October 4, 2005
* "We look forward to hearing your vision, so we can more better do our job." —Gulfport, Mississippi, 20 September 2005.
* "I'm also mindful that man should never try to put words in God's mouth. I mean, we should never ascribe natural disasters or anything else, to God. We are in no way, shape, or form should a human being play God." —Appearing on ABC's 20/20, Washington D.C., January 14, 2005
* "I believe we are called to do the hard work to make our communities and quality of life a better place." —Collinsville, Illinois, January 5, 2005
* "I refuse to be sucked into your hypnotheoretical arguments." —Indianapolis, Indiana, October 15, 2004
* "I hear there's rumors on the uh (pause) Internets that we're going to have a draft." - Presidential Debate, St. Louis, Missouri, 8 October 2004
* "I want to thank my friend, Sen. Bill Frist, for joining us today. … He married a Texas girl, I want you to know. (Laughter.) Karyn is with us. A West Texas girl, just like me." —Nashville, Tennessee, May 27, 2004
* "Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we." —Washington, D.C., 5 August 2004
* "I want to remind you all that in order to fight and win the war, it requires an expenditure of money that is commiserate with keeping a promise to our troops to make sure that they're well-paid, well-trained, well-equipped." —Washington, D.C., 15 December 2003
* "See, without the tax relief package, there would have been a deficit, but there wouldn't have been the commiserate — not 'commiserate' — the kick to our economy that occurred as a result of the tax relief." —George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., 15 December 2003
* "[T]he Iraqis need to be very much involved. They were the people that was brutalized by this man." —Washington, D.C., 15 December 2003
* "[T]he best way to find these terrorists who hide in holes is to get people coming forth to describe the location of the hole, is to give clues and data." —Washington, D.C., 15 December 2003
* "Justice was being delivered to a man who defied that gift from the Almighty to the people of Iraq." —Washington, D.C., 15 December 2003
* "This very week in 1989, there were protests in East Berlin and in Leipzig. By the end of that year, every communist dictatorship in Central America had collapsed." —George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., 6 November 2003
* "America stands for liberty, for the pursuit of happiness, and for the unalienalienable right of life." —Washington, D.C., 3 November 2003
* "[A]s you know, these are open forums, you're able to come and listen to what I have to say." —Washington, D.C., 28 October 2003
* "The ambassador and the general were briefing me on the — the vast majority of Iraqis want to live in a peaceful, free world. And we will find these people and we will bring them to justice." —Washington, D.C., 27 October 2003
* "[W]hether they be Christian, Jew, or Muslim, or Hindu, people have heard the universal call to love a neighbor just like they'd like to be called themselves." —Washington, D.C., October 8, 2003
* "Washington is a town where there's all kinds of allegations. You've heard much of the allegations. And if people have got solid information, please come forward with it. And that would be people inside the information who are the so-called anonymous sources, or people outside the information — outside the administration." —Chicago, Illinois, 30 September 2003
* "[W]e've had leaks out of the administrative branch, had leaks out of the legislative branch, and out of the executive branch and the legislative branch, and I've spoken out consistently against them, and I want to know who the leakers are." —Chicago, 30 September 2003
* "I'm so pleased to be able to say hello to Bill Scranton. He's one of the great Pennsylvania political families." —Drexel Hill, Pennsylvania, 15 September 2003
* "I think war is a dangerous place." —Washington, D.C., May 7, 2003
* "I just want you to know that, when we talk about war, we're really talking about peace." —Washington, D.C., June 18, 2002
* "There's an old saying in Tennessee — I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can't get fooled again." - Nashville, Tennessee, Sept 17 2002 [1]
* "The true threat is whether or not one of these people decide, peak of anger, try to hold us hostage, ourselves; the Israelis, for example, to whom we'll defend, offer our defenses, the South Koreans." —Washington D.C., March 13, 2001
* "I've coined new words, like, misunderstanding and Hispanically." —Radio-Television Correspondents Association dinner, Washington, D.C., March 29, 2001
* "If the terriers and bariffs (barriers and tariffs) are torn down, this economy will grow." —Rochester, New York, January 7, 2001
* "If you're sick and tired of the politics of cynicism and polls and principles, come and join this campaign." —Hilton Head, South Carolina, 16 February 2000
* "I know the human being and fish can coexist peacefully." —Saginaw, Mich., 29 September 2000 (referring to a dispute over Upper Klamath Lake)
* "They misunderestimated me." —Bentonville, Arkansas, 6 November 2000
* "It's clearly a budget. It's got a lot of numbers in it." —Reuters, May 5, 2000
* "I understand small business growth. I was one." —New York Daily News, 19 February 2000
* "We ought to make the pie higher." —South Carolina Republican Debate, 15 February 2000
* "It's your money. You paid for it." —La Crosse, Wisconsin, 18 October 2000
* "The most important job is not to be governor, or first lady in my case." —Pella, Iowa, as quoted by the San Antonio Express-News, 30 January 2000
* "The administration I'll bring is a group of men and women who are focused on what's best for America, honest men and women, decent men and women, women who will see service to our country as a great privilege and who will not stain the house." —Des Moines Register debate, Iowa, 15 January 200

Vemdalen 2006

Wow... where to start? play by play? long essay? rhyme? meh, here goes.

Saturday we embarqued on our trip to Vemdalen
7 hours of drivin' to get to the mountain
Listening to some Nas gettin' down
and in general acting like a clown
the time flew by, we were there in an instant
the noise and lights of stockholm are now distant.

Into the single room where we all would sleep
we all rushed to our cots for ours to keep.
Settling in, getting the outfit from the suitcase
man, it felt great to be back in a snowy mountainous place.

After supper, we all hit the hay
the snoring gets louder, rarin for the big day;
tomorrow is skiing, been waiting for it for a year
all skiing hell will break loose, that much is clear.


Sunday is the first skiing day of the week
as i go to the rental shop, the stuff they give is weak:
5 year old 1080s and 10 yeard old boots.
"Hey dudes, do you have anything better" i say to these fruits
"yeah, maybe, but what we have is for experts" they say.
I clear my throat, and let them know to their obvious dismay
that i am that expert, and that i can take whatever they got.
So they hand me some X wave boots from last year, smelling somewhat like pot
best fitting boot i have ever had i must admit.
then they hand me some scratches from last year, my are they ever fit.

So here we have it, my pro setup
the only place i can go from here is up
witht he best equipement i have had in my life
im ready to own the mountain like butter is owned by the knife.

The goal of the day is to warmup and get the feeling back
and hopefully not have my back go crack.
So i warmup, hit up the fun park that has a mignificent view
bluebird skies and rolling hills extending out into the blue.
So i try some stuff, get some 180 crutons over the beginner jumps
im psyched everything is going great, many fist pumps
happen during the day. I get some 360s over a small red kick
this day is ging etter than i could have ever hoped, nailed my trick!

So we get back to the cabin, and i discover a new skill of mine
as i masage the backs of one, two, five, nine
dudes, who all applaud my magic hands
even the girls are lining up for a massage from the magic hands.

Supper, then bed. And so it was the first day.

Monday. Yeah, so my brain hurts after trying to rhyme after a week of skiing. anyhoos, monday we were in Vemdalen again. I tried some 180s over a big jump, about 7 or 8 meters long. I failed miserably 3 times, but it got me confident to try stuff, since i didn't die. i don't ctually remember everything i did on monday... but i did some 360s again, nice and hucked ones over small jumps, and did the big jumps at the bottom. yep.

Tuesday. I believe this was the day we went to Björnrike. It had an awesome park, and i nailed a 180 over a decent sized jump and 360s over the same jump, nailed a box, and did a wallride. it had a jump line, so that was new for me. Hitting 4 jumps in a row, wow, what a concept. that day, after landing off the box, i poled myself in the face, and bit my lip pretty badly, sothat was nice and fun. i also got my first taste of skiing through the woods, something i rarely did in france. i got pretty good at it, given the ice and everything.

Wednesday. So i had a goal to do a 360 over the big jump at the top of the park in Vemdalen. But i ended up skiing by myself, so i didn't feel like doing enything stupid like that. Hypocritically, i tried to do 540s that day. and whadyah know? I LANDED A 540!!!!!!!! yeah baby!!!!!!!!!!!!! hucked, sure, but it's a 540 baby! i also stepped up to the red jump at the bottom of the park, which was a good 15 meters long and sent you a nice 4 meters in the air. Cruton straight airs anyone? oh yeah.

Thursday. POWDER DAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! there was like, 30 cm of fresh pow pow to shred. i taught myself how to skit he trees, and man did i get good at it. fast skiing through virgin pow in between trees = proof that there is a God. i went to the park a bit, just because it was soft landings, but most of the day was spent in the trees. it was also this really awesome girl's birthday, so that was sweetness incarnate.

Friday. POWDER DAY!!!!!!!!! this time, there was a meter of fresh pow. My poor little scratches couldn't handle it however, which was sad enough. BUT: i landed a 360 over the big jump. and not hucked mind you, no. this was a smooth, tucked, slow rotating 360. best feeling in the world right there. a friend of mine named patrik took me thorugh the forest which then led us to the top of the park. without speed checking, i went fromt he trees and a meter of pow directly into the big jump and threw a smooth 360. THAT was the higlight of my week. i can now throw 360s pretty much anywehere excpet of the HUGE jumps. But im getting there man, im getting there!

Basically, this week was like, the best week in terms of skiing that i've ever had.
yay!