Well, Delbert’s outta Counseling. The idea is to replace unhealthy living habits with healthy ones. Delbert said the primary thing the trip accomplished for him was a newfound appreciation for what he has in life — he was face-to-face with people who had nothing, who had burned all their bridges, had no family or friends to rely on, and no place else to go besides the Mission. He seems different since he got out: more motivated, but also somewhat humbled. As far as the Fundamentalist Baptist Kool-Aid goes, he seems to have taken a few sips, but not exactly chugged the entire glass. It’s still fun to hang out with him, and he’ll still talk about “worldly” politics, philosophy, movies, books, and music.
He said he’s started reading The Brothers Karamazov. (That’s one of the books I bought because I like the idea of the book being on my shelf, but haven’t actually read it yet.)
I spent the night last night at Grandmother’s, so I began my day by talking with her for about an hour at her house. Then my Uncle picked me up and we went to Cracker Barrel for breakfast. He had a full pancake breakfast but all I had was a cup of coffee. We talked a lot about religious topics, since he’s a fervent Evangelical. (That’s what I was raised as.) He invited me to [REDACTED] to see his new Church.
After this, Delbert came over and we filled out some job applications. The online Kroger application asked him to agree or disagree with the most hilarious hypotheticals such as “I don’t care much about seeing my work through to completion” or “People can be so annoying.” Most of the time it was obvious the answer you were supposed to give, and Delbert gave that answer. Then we went to the Emperor Buffet and ate Chinese.
There were many attractive ladies there, and Delbert almost spat his rice out of his nose when I said out of the blue, “All these women deserve attractive men to kiss their necks.”
Yesterday Delbert came over rather early to tell me about his time at the Baptist mission. He gave a lot of anecdotes about the people he lived with, the kind of chores he had to do — that sort of thing. It’s pretty much what you’d expect from a Baptist mission. After that we went to Wal-Mart and got ourselves an Icee at the restaurant there, hanging out and talking some more. Delbert brought me home then, and after I paid the landlady her rent, I found I had locked myself out of my apartment again, so Delbert had to come over with his spare key and let me in. We hung out for a couple more hours and then he took me to Grandmother’s.
I’ve had an eventful couple of days, with a lot of company and a lot of riding around, but the weather has not been cooperative. It has been frequently raining and sometimes storming throughout these past three days. It’s been rather chilly as well. So the circumstances for getting out of the house have not been the best, but it has been enjoyable nevertheless. There were absolutely a ton of people everywhere we went. These rural counties, it’s always like this on the third of the month. Government Check Day. Wal-Mart was packed.
I’ve determined I’m going to try to save up enough money to get me a new computer, so I can play games like Crysis and The Witcher. I’ll probably only be able to put away $50 to $100 per month, so I imagine I’ll be able to get a decent computer in 2009 sometime. I suppose I could sock that $300 tax rebate in a bank account somewhere, but I thought I might spend that so it will stimulate the economy like everyone hopes it will. I was thinking about buying a new 360 with it so I can play games online. In any case, the number one enemy for my bank account is definitely fast food — when I’m out in town there’s little else to do but eat, and I frequently end up getting a hamburger or taco or something while hanging out with whomever I’m with.
I’ve also decided to switch focus from reading about Schizophrenics and Philip K. Dick to the foundations of Western philosophy and religion. I’ve started downloading the works of Plato from Project Gutenberg and reading about 20 – 30 pages per day. I’ll probably read the Bible next, in the King James Version. I always get stuck around Leviticus or Deuteronomy though, get bored with all the rules and regulations and just drop it. I’ll try to complete it this time. I’d like to eventually get around to reading some Gnostic texts, but I’ve decided to go with the basics first. Maybe I’m trying to find answers; I doubt any of them will come to me. Plato in particular feels especially old-fashioned, with his concepts of morality and service to the State.
Most people don’t seem to take those old values to heart anymore. Those that do seem like they’re giving them lip service in order to convince others to shoulder the burden. I’ve also started spending time with the Rogers Family. I went over to their house on Saturday night, ate lemon pepper chicken and watched DVR’d episodes of Trading Spouses. They just so happened to turn on the episode with the crazy Catholic woman from Louisiana that’s been all over the Internet (‘She is not a Christian!’) so that was supremely entertaining. They invited me to go to Church with them the next day, but the ringer on my phone got switched off so I missed them. I’ve actually been thinking about going to Church at several different places recently, not because of religious instruction but to feel some sense of belonging to a community. It probably won’t work out though, I usually feel isolated even among large groups, and sometimes especially while amidst a large group.
My Dad asked me to design him a webpage. He wants to host all of the songs from his various CD projects there, as well as create a little podcast that people can subscribe to. The major problem I see with the idea is that he records and produces Gospel music, and it seems like the majority of listeners to that kind of thing would be old-timers who don’t really know how to use the Internet. But I’ve installed simple web design software on this computer and researched a little bit about RSS feeds, so I’m going to try to get him up and going. I intended to work on it yesterday and today but various friends and acquaintances kept interrupting. All in all, I’m trying to find something more productive to do with my time than just sitting on my ass playing videogames. I guess I have a lot to be thankful for, and a lot more going on than you’d expect for a mentally ill person.