God, of course, might not be highlighting sins, but noting instead that a significant portion of the population is too poor to flee such an event even if they wanted to do so.  God might have been bringing attention to the neglect of our national infrastructure or the over-deployment of National Guard troops to Iraq. 

Monotheists assign God great power to create havoc and almost no power to communicate with humans directly.  God speaks hombre a hombre only to those with secret decoder rings and large television networks supported by love offerings.  The rest of humanity is forced to wade through the flood waters, shaking fists at the sky and Air Force One circling high above.

Perhaps the Great Bearded One in the Sky is simply sitting back in his overstuffed heavenly barcalounger tsking-tsking as he looks down on earth.  Did you not understand the rules of nature I created?  Building below water level was naughty, naughty.  Oh, and this heating up the world thing doesn't help either, my children.  Personally I like the French Quarter.  After all, my son was rather fond of hanging out with prostitutes.  By the way, have you never heard of an Ark?

Humans have a long history of blaming deities for calamity.  We like to believe we are special and deserve protection beyond that afforded to other occupants of the planet.  Hurricanes and earthquakes, fires and floods remind us our lives are just as finite, our futures without guarantee.  In these moments we can accept our mortality, our insignificance, our irrelevance, or we can scream and chant and demand justice from an invisible higher power.

13 September 2005 - (Link to this entry) (Comment)

I don't really know what the Blame Game is. As a Christian child I grew up playing Monopoly (Who Would Jesus Bankrupt?), Operation (playing doctor in any other manner was prohibited), and Shoots and Ladders (years later also the name of a leather bar).  We were not allowed to play Dungeons and Dragons (which involved the occult), Ouija (a game with the direct participation of Satan), or Twister (which leads to inappropriate touching).  I suspect the Blame Game is something played in Southern states where a weekend of fun might include dragging someone behind your pickup truck. 

Most games are best played indoors on rainy days.  By indoors I mean some place you live regularly without being inundated by water or having to wait for a porta-toilet with several thousand other unbathed people.

A better game is the "Steal Everyone Blind and Hope a Hurricane Doesn't Expose Your Greed to the World."  This game is complicated and requires a lot of paid consultants to make it work, which means most of us will never get to compete. 

My childhood pastor once regaled our youth group with a story of a boy who realized his Ouija board was evil.  The boy threw the game in a trash barrel and lit it on fire.  The fire caused the demon locked in the board to be released and it appeared in the flames, cursing at the boy for his choice to destroy the game. 

If you think I'm going to compare this Ouija board to the Steal Everyone Blind game you are horribly wrong.  No, I am staying in Washington DC tonight just a block from the gayest supermarket on earth.  I will shortly walk down the street and watch the muscle queens cruising in the deli section.  Twister anyone?

20 September 2005 - (Link to this entry) (Comment)

I was working on an inspired entry when my computer died and the entire work was lost.  This followed moments after my cats jumped up and stared at the walls, something they do from time to time when the unseen occupant of my house decides to walk downstairs for a visit.  Coincidence?

(I do not believe in ghosts and therefore I only half believe my house has one.  However, the evidence is rather considerable and the cats seem annoyed by something I cannot see.  How does a laptop that is plugged in and also has a full battery simply quit?  It could be Microsoft or it could be ectoplasm.  You decide.)

It is past midnight and I have neither the energy nor the time to reconstruct what would <begin lie> likely have been my best entry ever </end lie>.  So pretend you read something really amazing and tell your friends about SisterBetty.org.  By the time they come here to visit I'll write something much better.

26 September 2005 - (Link to this entry) (Comment)

Hunky UPS Guy just delivered six new skeletons.

Fall in Maine is wonderful.  The weather is turning cooler, the leaves will shortly begin to change colors, the squirrels are busy gathering seeds in the trees, and the UPS men are still wearing shorts.  I appreciate this most as fall brings extra UPS deliveries while I prepare for the Annual Garish Holiday Displays.

My family wasn't big on holiday displays.  My parents did not think highly of Halloween, and because we were Christians, anytime Halloween fell on Sunday we had to go trick-or-treat on Saturday night.  The people in the neighborhood gave us odd looks as we wandered about in our costumes a day early.  While Christmas was a high holiday, we lived too far in the woods for anyone to appreciate a gaudy light display even if we were inclined to produce one.

In San Francisco, holiday displays are limited to those apartment dwellers fortunate enough to have street-facing windows (not necessarily a benefit the rest of the year), and further limited by the size of those windows.  Try as one can, a few lights strung around the perimeter of a window just doesn't conjure much holiday cheer.

Now I own a sprawling two story house with a porch, enough electrical outlets to cause rolling blackouts in Canada, and years of pent up holiday decor angst can be released.

Last year my modest Halloween display caused traffic to slow in front of my house.  This year I am aiming for gawkers: seven skeletons, numerous impaled skulls, several dozen bats, more webbing than an Indiana Jones movie, spooky lighting and something moaning beneath the porch (not to be confused with the periodic non-holiday related moans that sometimes come from the basement). I won't be satisfied until my house is used as background for the cheesy local news program.

That is just Halloween, then comes Christmas...

Some people might think this gaudy display an attempt to attract attention, or to one-up and feel superior to the neighbors.  Others might argue it is simply the creative gene wedged in my homosexual DNA.  And a few conservative folks may say it is thumbing my nose at traditional values.  Perhaps all are true. 

Me, I hold it as my contribution to fighting terrorism.  As long as I shop for holiday goods, the terrorists cannot win.  Plus, the more I buy, the more my credit card company donates to hurricane victims.  That makes me as patriotic and compassionate as anyone who cannot donate blood can be.

Now, I have to run off to dress one of my skeletons as a recently deceased pontiff.

[Sister Betty says:  Smooches to DrewBear for single-handedly creating a 5% increase in my web traffic. Goodness that boy sleeps around!]

29 September 2005 - (Link to this entry) (Comment)

For uber-geeks, SisterBetty.org now has an RSS feed.  Sister Betty live on your desktop.  Click here for the feed.

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