Thanksgiving 2013 and Black Friday 2013

I've elected not to mark future belated posts (other than Bible Verse Sunday posts), including this one, as belated. This is because I now see that due to a crowded schedule, nearly all of my posts are becoming belated. In view of this, I find it ridiculous and unrealistic to have all of my posts commemorating significant occasions be posted on the exact same day as the said occasions occur. Therefore, this post (and future "belated" posts) will not be marked as "belated." Now, on to the main  event...

The first Thanksgiving was originally celebrated by the Pilgrims as a feast to celebrate their survival and bountiful harvest in 1621 (It was not, itself, a feast of literal giving of thanks, which would have been celebrated by fasting and prayer). Various Thanksgiving Days were proclaimed by church and political leaders throughout the years to come, to give thanks for various things. For example, President George Washington once proclaimed a day of Thanksgiving to give thanks to God for the American victory at the Battle of Saratoga. However, Thanksgiving wasn't made an official, federal holiday until President Abraham Lincoln made it so in 1863. Since then, it has been celebrated annually in the United States. Though various "harvest festivals" are celebrated in countries throughout the world, Thanksgiving is the only holiday specifically dedicated to giving thanks for our blessings from the Almighty. Thanksgiving is traditionally celebrated by gathering family members and eating a lot of food, watching the football game, and reflecting on what we're thankful for.

Thanksgiving, my favorite holiday, was celebrated by I and my family in a way I don't believe we ever had before. By this, I mean that most of the guests for the occasion weren't family members, but were but friends of the family. The Hilliards and the Rajaos were here, as well as my Uncle Bill and Aunt Patty and my grandparents on my dad's side, so that there were fifteen people in all. We had a wonderful time! I taught Ano, Mr. and Mrs. Rajao's son, how to play chess (he needs more practice), ate a huge amount of food, and generally had a good time filled with uplifting conversation. After everyone else left, I and my family watched "A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving," still pretty funny and touching after all of these years. This year, I am thankful for my friends, my family, the roof over my head and the food I have to eat, and my wonderful, (still mostly) free country. I am also thankful for all of the material possessions that the Lord has seen fit to bequeath to me, for my good health, and for our safe travels. Most of all though, I am thankful for my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and the many other blessings that I may have forgotten to mention.

And now for something completely different. That is to say, let's talk about Black Friday. Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, is a day of greed, chaos, and waste, ironically following what is supposed to be a day of gratitude, calm, and conservation. Contrary to popular belief, its name does not come from companies getting "in the black," but rather from a nickname coined by Philadelphia police who viewed the occasion with dread. The best sales of the year are on this day, resulting in shoppers flooding stores at all hours of the day, trying to beat each other (sometimes literally) to that great deal on that flat screen or what not. Contrary to popular belief, this nightmarish scenario is not a result of capitalism, but of materialistic commercialism. There is a significant difference, but that's a different post. This day is often made light of over at Retail (for more on the comic, click here), for good reason.

For Black Friday, my dad and I traditionally try to avoid the chaos at the big stores and go do something together, usually bowling and Christmas shopping at more low key locations, such as Barnes & Noble. This year, we went down to ACME Bowl down in South Center, and we bowled a good game. He won, but I'd like to think I acquitted myself well, with around 200 points (he had around 280). That said, I really, really need to work on my technique. I went stretches of getting four gutter balls in a row, multiple times! But it was still fun, despite my wrist aching a bit at the end. We then went over to Barnes & Noble and bought some stuff. I'm so glad I have all these gift cards! After that, we drove back to Renton, grabbed lunch at Burger Town, and teamed with a bunch of other people to decorate downtown Renton. We had a lot of High School helpers this year, and I stopped by the Comic Hut after we were done and picked up a copy of Azrael: Agent of the Bat #62. I then went down to LMA to help out at the Parent's Night Out event, in which a group of younger kids were entertained with games, pizza, and, because it was Instructor Driver's birthday today, cake! All of the attendees were treated to the opportunity to shove a whipped cream pie in Instructor Driver's face (also, happy birthday, Mr. Driver!)! I helped a lot, doing things like putting down boundary cones, and with helping get rid of leftover pizza. Man, those kids were loud. But hey, pizza! Plus, the proceeds from admission go to benefit the LMA Christmas party. In sum, this was a fine beginning of the Christmas season. Man, I love Christmastime. I like Thanksgiving better, but Christmastime is a close third, after Easter. It's just so festive!

Image courtesy allianceabroad.com

Labor Day 2013

Today is Labor Day, which you may very well know is the U.S. Department of Labor's favorite holiday. Also, never wear white after this holiday. Bad jokes aside, Labor Day is a federal holiday which commemorates workers, and variations of it are celebrated by some 80 countries around the world, often coinciding with May Day. In the United States of America, Labor Day is celebrated on the first Monday of September, and marks the symbolic end of summer (the actual last day of summer is in fact September 22nd). It also marks the beginning of the college football and National Football League season.

Labor Day dates back to the year 1887, in which Oregon made it a state holiday. Thirty states adopted Labor Day as a holiday before it was made a federal holiday in 1894. It was made a federal holiday following civil unrest involving labor disputes on May 1st, called the Pullman Strike. President Grove Cleveland wanted to have a holiday dedicated to workers, but did not want it to be associated with communist or anarchist groups who also commemorated May 1st. Thus, the Central Labor Union of New York was allowed to choose the present date for Labor Day.

I have always found it ironic that Labor Day is often celebrated by people not laboring. Of course, this is not exclusive, as there were plenty of retail workers working when we went to the store to buy school supplies today. I believe other people celebrate the holiday by having a barbeque or some other sort of get-together. If there were more pomp surrounding this holiday, I think I would be more enthusiastic for it. On the other hand, the people over in New York unfurled the world's largest American flag for the occasion, suspending it over the George Washington Bridge. But back in the day, there used to be huge parades commemorating the occasion, probably having decreased due to falling union membership over the last thirty or so years. But still, it would be interesting to see a modern Labor Day parade. Who would be in it? Probably union officials and politicians, but maybe a legion of desk jockeys and factory workers as well. That would be a sight to see.

I didn't do much celebrating for Labor Day, spending most of it working. I helped my dad put up some cabinets at the shop today, and shopped for school supplies with him and my sister. Yes, school is returning soon, and I am actually looking forward to my classes this year. I will be taking five classes at the co-op and one class at Bellevue College, plus Bible Quiz Team. I will go into those classes in detail at a later date. My mom attended a potluck at our local swim club for Labor Day, which I came to in time to get some bean dip and barbeque chips; all the other food was mournfully gone. There was also no taekwondo class tonight, no doubt for the purpose of celebrating the holiday. I also didn't memorize any quiz verses for the holiday.

Bible Verse Sunday #27, (Belated) Geek Pride Day, Bible Quiz Team Tea Party, and New Feature Announcment

Today's verses are John 15:18-20:

"'If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours."

The ESV Study Bible has this to say on these verses:

"15:19 therefore the world hates you. Christians should not be surprised that unbelievers in the world hate them. It follows a pattern seen in the world since Cain murdered Abel (see Gen. 4:8, Heb 11:4; 1 John 3:12), and it is seen in the world's reactions to Christ himself (see John 15:18)."

In the main service at church today, the pastor talked about how the prophet Hosea was the last prophet to prophesy in Israel before the Assyrian takeover, and how Hosea proclaimed God's message of a "total recall" of Israel. That is to say, God intended to punish Israel because they "...no faithfulness ...no steadfast love [and] ...no knowledge [of God]." In the High School service today, which I paid much better attention to that last week, the youth pastor there talked about importance and method of evangelism, and our motivation and duty to do engage in it. There was a hand out, and in it we were given a list of categories of unbelievers (e.g., family, school, neighborhood, etc.) who I know, and wrote down names on that list (you people know who you are, ha ha ha). I forgot to meet with the church librarian about a position in the church library, but she said in an email that I could meet with her next week. After that, I went home and ate lunch, after which I went to the Wendt's house and had a little tea party with the rest of the Bible Quiz Team. I know tea parties are supposed to be kind of a girls' thing, and I was one of only two guys there, but hey, I was invited and I like tea, so don't judge me. Anyhow, I chatted with Mr. Wendt about my writing, and he gave me some very enlightening advice to me concerning a story of mine which involves the country of Somalia. Very complicated stuff, which has led me to be open to the possibility of making that particular installment of The Ultras a sort of political satire. Of what, well, you'll just have to wait until the graphic novel comes out.

At the end of the tea, scones, and Yorkshire Pudding part (I helped make the scones by pealing the grapefruit skin shavings), we played the game Apples to Apples, of which I won the descriptor card "Fat & Sassy." I had to go before we could finish the game, however. My mom and I then went to the store buy most of the stuff we need for the Memorial Day dinner/barbeque we're holding tomorrow. A lot of our family will be coming over, though not all of our family, as we don't want to overwhelm poor mummy. I'll also be going to see Iron Man 3 at the theater tomorrow for the morning matinee, with my dad, my sister, and possibly my good friend Nick Towne. I think it will be a very awesome movie. No spoilers, please!

I would also like to take the time to announce a new feature on my blog: Ask Levi! For those of you who are familiar with my Facebook-based vlog series, Ask Levi! is a feature where you ask questions and I answer any that I darn well please. Questions are asked via the comments section, meaning you have to post your questions by posting it a comment below. You can ask questions on everything from religion and philosophy to technology of any type, cats and dogs and other animals, comic books, movies, television, video games, heck, food even, and just about anything under my area of expertise, which is just about everything. I will not answer questions that any fool (no offense) can look up on Google, such as what the circumference of a circle is, or how to properly use the word "whom." Questions that are harder to answer, which require deep research, these I would love to answer, such as what is the difference between authoritarianism and totalitarianism, or if Batman is effective as he could be. So, post them below, and if you don't, I'll be forced to either make up my own questions, which would be dishonest, or discontinue the feature before it even starts. So please, ask away!

Also, Geek Pride Day was yesterday, not today, as I originally thought, so I only celebrated that blessed holiday by working yesterday. Oh well, Happy birthday, Peter Cushing (he's the guy who played Grand Moff Tarkin, though he's been dead for 19 years now), and happy 30th anniversary, Star Wars Episode V1:  Return of the Jedi!

Also, I would like to wish everybody a blessed Memorial Day weekend. I wore a suit to church to commemorate the occasion, a black tie event if I ever saw one. I will post a more detailed entry on Memorial Day tomorrow evening. In the meantime, I hope everybody has a blessed, fun memorial day weekend.

Retail

November 28, 2012

I love this comic strip. It gives wry, funny look at life working in an average retail chain. The cartoonist, Norm Feuti, also wrote this book called Pretending You Care: The Retail Employee Handbook, which is pretty funny, though some bad language makes it inappropriate for younger audiences. All in all, however, the comic strip is clean and wholesome, and is a good sources of entertainment and parody.

Black Friday

Today was Black Friday, known throughout the world as a day of rock bottom sales and great bargains. To paraphrase Marla Masters from the comic strip Retail, it is quite ironic that a day of gratefulness should be followed by a day of greed. At any rate, the only bargain I got was 20% discount on all items at my local comic book store, the Comic Hut. I also did some shopping with my dad at Barnes & Noble, though I still have some shopping left to do yet. I hope to get it done sometime tomorrow, but at any rate, I have plenty of time.

Before I went shopping, however, I helped my dear old dad to decorate downtown Renton, as is our annual duty. We put up garlands on light poles, in the drizzling rain, and plan to come back to finish the job soon. I'll be working tomorrow, at my dad's shop no less, so maybe we'll get it done sometime around that time.

After all that, we went to my grandma and grandpa's residence (that's my dad's parents) and had some Thanksgiving leftovers. We watched a little bit of the football came between Washington State University and the University of Washington, though I'm not sure who won. Last time I checked it was 23-25 or something in favor of UW, though I'm not completely sure. We also watched a little bit of Mary Poppins on ABC, which I haven't seen in ages, but still has the same old charm as it did when I was a kid. Finally, we are home and trying to decide what to watch. I'll update about that on my Facebook page.

So, in the meantime, what did you all do for Black Friday? Did you shop, or did you just stay home and eat leftovers? In the words of Jeremy Jahns, comment below and let me know! I'm very eager to hear back from my readers!