A story from my childhood.

There was once a little lad who lived amongst the purple pansies of The Royal Slaughter Fields. He was quite happy within his purple pansy paradise -- being surrounded by these perpetual symbols of thought reminded him of the importance of self-observation and quiet reflection. Although, on his more cynical days they simply reminded him of man's bastardization of nature, and he would silently curse the practice of forced cross-breeding.

But today was not a cynical day. Today was the day of the harvest, and this little lad was full of excitement. He had waited his whole life for this moment. Today this lad would become a man... but not in the way you would think. There would be no test or trial of manhood to overcome. There would be no marriage. No, this lad would become a man in a very real sense, for he would be eaten by a man.

The Royal Slaughter Fields were so called because this is where children grew plump and were slaughtered to feed the mighty royal army. To be eaten by these monarchistic soldiers was the best end a child could hope for... but it was not always so.

Long ago, this land was a Holy Technocracy ruled by intelligent and powerful technicians guided by the divine light of God. They ruled justly and fairly, repairing computer problems and fixing broken traffic lights with great speed and skill. However, there was an evil force brewing in the underworld. Discontent with the fluorescent lights used to illuminate their dark caverns, these cave dwellers decided to overthrow the Holy Technocracy.

Within the Realm of Souls that lied within the deepest caverns of the underworld, the Nine Blue Harridans of Desolation gathered together and summoned a mighty beast out of the Ossuary of Suffering. This beast brought great pain and suffering to the leaders of the land, and all appeals to their God seemed to go unheeded. And so the Holy Technocracy fell, and the greatest government ever known to man was destroyed. In its place was established the Tyrannical Domain of Anguish.

Life in the Domain was not good. Without the technicians, broken microwaves remained broken, air conditioners ceased conditioning, and text messages wouldn't get sent. And yet, in some dastardly twist of fate, people lived infinitely longer than before. Surely life without texting is no life at all, and so loving mothers would send their children off to the Royal Slaughter Fields to live a peaceful life amid the purple pansies -- a life which would be cut off quickly before they grew out of their childish innocence and awoke to the horrors of television without TiVo (and in the not-too-distant future, no television at all!).

And so this small lad silently thanks his mother for this gift as he stands up, flings his arms into the air, and is pulled away by a ravenous armored warrior eager to feast. The rush of the wind disturbs the pansies for but an instant, after which they return to their peaceful, purply existence, awaiting the next child who will call them home... for a time...

I need to find someone who can heal my mind.

As if there weren't enough of these out there, here is my very own "coming of age" story:

I've mentioned it before, but now it is time to lay it all out. I am a god. I have no special powers or abilities and I haven't really created anything worthwhile, but the fact remains that I am deity. This was not by choice. Indeed, I have tried to stop it, but when a strange alien race begins worshipping you there just isn't much you can do about it.

It all began a dozen-plus years ago. This was a strange time in my life as I exited the prepubescent stage and found myself pubescing and such. Yes, I struggled as we all do with these changes, but most disturbing of all were the regular alien abductions. I couldn't tell anyone about them, either. "Mom, something strange has been happening to me. You see, I --" and my mom would cut me off quickly with something like, "It's normal," "Everyone experiences it," or some other response that effectively dismissed my concerns as nothing more than those of a boy turning into a "young man." Needless to say, I believed her and figured that aliens must be abducting all of my friends and classmates as well, so I just struggled through it like everything else.

I'm not sure what the aliens saw in me, but after a year or so of these abductions they began acting differently. They were polite and courteous, asking me how I felt and what I desired. The probing diminished significantly... okay, actually there never was any probing, but I thought you might be wondering since it's such a clichéd abduction thing. Anyway, they did continue to take me to their ships and such without asking permission, but the thought never occured to me that they should ask since, as I said, I thought this was all a normal part of growing up. The point is that their treatment of me noticeably changed, and I became aware of the fact that they were, well, revering me. Needless to say I was confused by this strange change in behavior.

As the years rolled by, things got even more strange. The aliens developed the habit of presenting me with gifts. With time, the aliens would only present ONE alien (who wore elaborate and flowing robes) with the gifts, and then only he would present them to me. Eventually, I only ever saw a few of the aliens (who had apparently become the "priests" of this new religion). They would present me with holographic recordings of prayers and such, worship me for a while, and then send me back home.

In case you haven't quite grasped this yet, let me reiterate that I thought this was all normal. I figured everyone was a god to their own little colony of space aliens. I only began to suspect otherwise when we had a lesson in church about how we can become gods (a grossly misunderstood LDS doctrine, by the way). When I raised my hand and said, "I've already become a god," and, "Aren't you all gods, too...?" the class went silent and I had to talk with the Bishop later that day. When I started telling him about the aliens, he figured I was just up to one of my normal tricks, smiled, shook his head and then my hand, and sent me on my way. He also said with a chuckle that maybe I should stop dating his daughter since he wasn't sure he was ready for her to become a goddess for some crazy aliens (of course, I always thought of her as a goddess... but I digress.). I knew he was joking about his daughter, but I was reeling from this revelation and in my crazed mindframe I broke it off anyway. It was probably better for her in the end, what with my random abductions taking me away at inopportune times and whatnot.

Realizing that perhaps things weren't as normal as I had thought, I began saying things to try and feel out whether any of my friends were also alien gods. For instance, I might say, "Boy, it sure was cold in outer space today," or, "Those aliens just couldn't stop with their adulations last week," and one time, "Those new robes make our extraterrestrial friends look pretty ridiculous! Am I right?" Needless to say, these subtle attempts to discover my friends' potential alien dealings were always met with strange looks and whispered comments. It was becoming clear that my god-status, and even my abductions, were completely and totally abnormal.

I was about 18 by this time. High school was winding down and life was staring me in the face. I had serious decisions to make about college, mission, career, and so forth. I was excited to be done with the lameness of the high school social scene and to move on to bigger and better things. Dating became complicated as I prepared for a mission and as girls started thinking that dating after high school meant marriage was around the corner. As I dealt with these incomprehensible attitude changes, something much more serious and terrible was happening to my alien worshippers.

I found out about it one night as I was reviewing some of their prayers. There were always so many of them and they tended to be so boring and inane that I usually didn't pay much attention, but on this night something grabbed my attention. Many of the aliens were praying for "deliverance from our enemies." This seemed strange to me since they had never told me of any enemies before. So on my next abduction I asked the Uber Max Priest of Holy Thosdom about these enemies. What he told me both fascinated and saddened me.

Turns out that a year or so before, some aliens came from another alien colony (I'll call this new colony the Basilites, and the aliens who worship me Thosites from now on to keep things clear) proselytizing for their faith, which advocated the worship of Holy Basil. It may be worth noting that Holy Basil isn't an herb on their planet, but a remarkable material that I found to be a very satisfying replacement for Silly Putty. Regardless, they worshipped Holy Basil as the originator of all life and matter (which honestly I wouldn't doubt, after having played with some for quite some time) and were sharing their message with all who would listen. Unfortunately, they found Thos-worship to be a most grievous sin (Basilite scriptures specifically forbid it, which I found quite shocking), and it was their belief that all Thosites must either be brought to their senses or eradicated.

As you can imagine, the loyal Thosites were firm and steadfast in their belief in me, which is good because I definitely exist and there's nothing fun about others denying your existence. And so a great war was beginning between the Thosites and the Basilites. When I discovered this, I thought it would be wise to give new revelation detailing my pleasure and desire for the spilling of Basilite blood. I didn't have anything against the Basilites per se, but I couldn't stand by and watch them slaughter these aliens who had come to be as children to me. And so I lifted my commandment of pacifistic resistance (I had given many commandments and such over the years because it seemed like the right thing for a god to do), and the Thosites began to fight back.

I shan't detail the mighty battles or list the names of those who perished -- there are other, more respectable places for such things. Instead, be content to know that the Thosites were amazingly proficient in battle (possibly due to years of repressed rage -- one of my previous commandments was to repress rage) and the Basilites didn't stand a chance. We tried to spare the lives of some, but those we spared waited a few months and then captured me and tried to kill me. It was quite the adventure, but again the details aren't necessary here. In the end we had to kill them all. On the upside, we did get all of their stores of Holy Basil, which as I said before is some amazing stuff!

So the Thosites won, the Basilites were eradicated, and I finally realized that I'm a pretty awesome god. And now, several years later, my aliens are the greatest and most revered beings in all the galaxy. As for me, I think I'm ready to live my life.

My two favorite things are commitment and changing myself.

If, as has been suggested, a blog is nothing but a sewer for mind defecation, then it should be obvious that I have been suffering from an extreme case of mental constipation. It has been quite painful, I assure you, and as such I have taken steps to fix it. While finding laxatives for your bowels is both easy and fun (that's a reference to youthful days of finding ingenious ways to loosen the bowels of my friend's siblings...), procuring mind laxatives has proven much more difficult for me. I have been told that alcohol and some illegal drugs are great at opening your mind and letting the thoughts spill out unfettered by silly internal dialogue, but my personal morals keep me from partaking in such wonders. I am thus forced to simply push through this ailment unaided.

It is unusual for me to resort to scatological discussions, but even someone as prim and proper as myself has to deal with these issues. The body is lame and weak (a pansy, if you will), and unable to absorb and make use of a startling amount of the food we ingest. Likewise, our brains are constantly absorbing more information than they know how to deal with, and they just have to slough off some of that nasty, stinky waste from time to time. Normally I like to try and pretty it up before I plop it in the porcelain blog, but today my creativity is at an all-time low. I believe I've had a creativoscopy.

Combine all this with the fact that the Internet lines for our office were physically cut yesterday and we may not have Internet access until 5:30 tomorrow evening, and you will understand why I have no choice but to sit here and write whatever comes to mind. I apologize that my mind frame is not in a more pleasing state. I could attempt to talk about butterflies and roses, but such things disgust me... yet I'm up for the challenge.


In an emerald green valley lived a happy little family of butterflies. These were no ordinary butterflies, however. They were rich beyond imagining, for they lived in a giant bed of roses. These roses were also extraordinary, for they grew in colors incomprehensible to the frail human mind. Their beauty was above that of the most beautiful thing you can imagine, and their scent was different for each creature, pandering to what each subject considered to be the most desirable smell of all. Needless to say, the rose butterflies were the envy of all insects everywhere, but there was no ill will within the valley.

The rose butterflies were kind and gracious -- magnanimous even. While it was forbidden by the butterflies' god to allow others into their rose bed, the butterflies did not consider themselves better than their peers, and would give what they could to the betterment of the insect kingdom. Bugs and arachnids, on the other hand, were of course shunned and abused as they should be. It was not uncommon for the butterflies to organize events recalling the Coliseum of Rome, with spiders battling centipedes and snails. It was this combined with the butterflies' completely inoffensive nature that endeared them so much to the Yellow jackets, katydids, ladybugs, earwigs and other insects of the realm. But something was about to go horribly wrong.

One gorgeous day when the happy sun was spreading joy across the rose butterflies' emerald green valley of beauty and splendor, a most joyous event occurred. A caterpillar had recently cocooned itself on the stem of a rose that was the most stunning of any rose that had ever grown in the valley, and on this day the chrysalis opened, revealing a butterfly which was truly a sight to behold! Not only was it most pleasing to every sense, it also drove all thoughts of pooh-related humor and such from the mind. Truly, it was a miracle! But all was not well.

Such beauty as this was never supposed to present itself to our world. Indeed, this butterfly was the proverbial butterfly whose wings would create hurricanes midway around the world. Only in reality, it was much worse. It happened slowly at first, since the valley was accustomed to seeing things more wondrous and amazing than anywhere else in the world, but with time it became apparent that the mere presence of the butterfly was causing drastic changes wherever it went. Anything exposed to the butterfly's wonderment would become self-conscious, noticing every little flaw it possessed when compared to the butterfly. This could only lead to eating disorders, expensive surgeries, and depression. Since medical science had yet to progress far enough to treat insects and roses for eating disorders, slugs had no faces to lift, and bumble bee liposuction hadn't been perfected yet, every object in the valley (both animate and inanimate) gradually descended the downward spiral into the very pit of self-loathing.

The butterfly was not unaware of the suffering it was causing, and so unable to bear seeing the sad state of its friends and family, it left the emerald valley. This proved disastrous for the rest of the world. Being vastly more repulsive and disturbing than those beings which inhabited the valley, those in the rest of the world were instantly driven to insanity. Those who could afford it went to plastic surgeons, but this only resulted in increased depression since even with fake beauty they failed to compare to the butterfly's innate grace. Indeed, even the prettiest and most self-confident of my readers would have been driven to the brink of suicide.

That's why I grabbed my fly swatter and killed the thing. The End.


Ah, well, that was some much-needed relief. I'll try to do this in private next time...

And if you're wondering, the Internet is still down. Work sucks right now.