more thoughts on new york

- there are no fat people in new york! did anyone else notice that?

- ummmm new york is cool.

anyway, i've been hanging out with my cousin in jersey for the past few days with my brother, and my cousin's got these two adorable kids. rachel is 4 years old, and she's probably the smartest most energetic person in the world. what's awesome about her is that she still likes me even though i do absolutely no fun stuff with her. then there's caleb, who is about to turn 2 but is almost the same size as rachel. i think he's going to be a professional athlete or body builder. he's super cute too, and he does everything rachel does. sometimes i want to tell him - no, be your own person, caleb! but then he's at the age where he actually understands what people say, so i don't want to confuse him. caleb is the cutest boy in the world.

aside from playing with the kids, i've been spending time with my bro lately. sometimes hanging out with him is more than i can handle, but it's been really cool seeing him these past few days. first of all, and most selfishly, he's great with kids so he deflects attention away from me and my awkwardness when the little ones are around. but also it's been fun spending time with him before he goes to africa for a year.

one thing he likes to do when we hang out is tell me about how much i suck. talking to my brother is like taking painful medicine sometimes. actually, it's more like taking painful medicine all the time, whether you're healthy or sick. or rather, it's like being prescribed painful medicine by a doctor who is convinced that you're sick all the time, when really that couldn't be true because you're just as healthy as everyone else and they don't take medicine and they're still alive. but anyway, i was a little bit sick, and i've been doing some moderately painful introspection lately. i'm resolved to at least get on the path of healthy selflessness, away from the black-hole syndrome that pops up now and again.

i'm excited to see staf and pdave when i go out to cali. and then i'll be living with mom and dad all year. my goal for that is to not be such a baby, and for me to be able to hold an articulate conversation with my dad without getting frustrated that he doesn't understand me. i guess those two goals are all one goal, to just grow up.

speaking of not being a baby... john apparently told mom that i'm really awkward around babies. to which she replied, "Chris Himself is a baby!" :*(

anyway i should sleep soon. because rachel and caleb will surely be trying to wake john and me up tomorrow early in the morning. -_________-

edit:
omg... i completely forgot about my rwc experience. it was mostly okay but... also very weird. i got there a little late, so the worship time was almost ending. i sat between my friends, mike and dave (this detail is important), and then the main pastor introduced the guest speaker for the day. the guest pastor talked about how his favorite hobby was making out with his wife and that we should all look at his wife because his wife is hot. later in his sermon, he said "i would not slit my son's jugular for any of you. i mean, look at him. he's hot." his son is 18 months old. [out of context... but still, weird in any case]

he would go on to preach a good, normal sermon, but before that he did something out of the ordinary, and pretty much out of the blue. he asked us to pray after he read the bible passage while putting our hand on our neighbor's chest. now, some pastors will instruct the congregates to hold hands or put a hand on each others' shoulders if we feel comfortable. but this was ridiculous! everyone started giggling, and he said, "oh, not for anyone of the opposite gender of course." but even if two girls sat next to each other.... isn't that still really inappropriate?

but to end this long story, i was sitting in between two guys so i just crossed my arms and put both my hands on my chest. i didn't want them squeezing my little moobies during a sacred time of prayer. but i did have my eyes closed - i wonder what everyone else did, especially the girls. i mean. i don't actually wonder what they did. but it does make one wonder what the heck that pastor was thinking.