Albert saved my soul, or so he thinks

Apparently leaving a bar at 2:30 am on a Monday night in Mission Hill screams "Lost Soul" to one particular Boston city cab driver. It couldn't possibly scream that I got off work and had a beer and now just want to get home safely, but anyway, Albert, as I came to know him, began chit chatting with me once we dropped Marcy off at her home. She apparently isn't in need of saving. Just me. After I informed him that I'm relatively unimpressed with my current career path, he began his sermon. "Please forgive me, I don't mean to cross the line, but God has a plan for you, you just have to accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior." Yep. With that simple sentence Al began the process of saving my lost soul. Those of you who know me well, know that I am fascinated by religious people, particularly those who are so passionate that they feel the need to reach out to try and convert random people they encounter so clearly I was quite intrigued. Nobody had ever actively tried to save me before so I assured Albert that he wasn't crossing the line nor was he offending me.

He continued on about how he loves me, and Jesus loves me, and there is a very real devil who is trying to keep me from reaching salvation and he uses his people - the Godless people - to lead me away from Our Lord Jesus Christ. Now please note, dropping Marcy off and getting to my house takes no more than 7 minutes at that hour of the night so once we arrived at Rena St., Albert stopped the meter and asked if he could continue. I told him by all means to continue saving me. He then asked me to pray with him and I agreed. I then repeated after him, and asked God to save me. Amen. He told me that his name, Albert, means "noble" and to him that means his inherited higher character is what encourages him to save lost souls. He then asked what my name means. "An officer of the court." I replied to which he had no response except "Well, isn't that nice."

Albert then gave me a piece of paper and a pen and asked me to write the following on one side:

Jesus loves me!

1-800-759-0700

Ask for a higher calling

and on the other side:

iumi.org

He then informed me that I have a God shaped hole in my heart that can not be filled with money or fame and will only be filled when I accept God into my heart completely. He told me that while he loves Mr. Barack Obama, he is bringing America quickly to its downfall as he is not running it as a Christian nation and had Mr. John McCain been president we'd be at least on a path towards salvation as the founding fathers wanted this nation to be a Christian nation despite any evidence I could come up with to contradict that and if we don't become a Christian nation again, we will meet our demise. This is where things escalated out of control as Albert simply just started listing passages I need to read in the bible and they are as follows:

John 8:58 - "I tell you the truth," Jesus answered, "before Abraham was born, I am!"

John 14:6 - Jesus answered "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the father except through me"

Isaiah 9:6 -

For to us a child is born,

to us a son is given,
and the government will be on his shoulders.
And he will be called
Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Micah 5:2 -

"But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah,

though you are small among the clans of Judah,
out of you will come for me
one who will be ruler over Israel,
whose origins are from of old,
from ancient times."

Genesis 3:15 -

And I will put enmity
between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and hers;
he will crush your head,
and you will strike his heel."

Exodus 3:14 - God said to Moses, "I am who I am . This is what you are to say to the Israelites: 'I AM has sent me to you.' "

Deuteronomy 18:15 - The LORD your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your own brothers. You must listen to him

By this point, it was after 3:30am and I needed to get to bed as I had to work in the morning so I thanked Albert for everything, he asked me if I was saved, and I said "I think so." Apparently that was the wrong answer. "NO!" he exclaimed, "You ARE saved. You've accepted Jesus into your heart, right?" I couldn't tell him that I was really just partaking in his exercise in futility because I was fascinated by him and wanted to know exactly what went into saving someone's soul through the glass of a cab window. "Yes." I responded warily looking to the sky awaiting the lightning strike from above. Albert and I parted ways with him convinced he'd done God's work and converted one lost soul.

For those of you who aren't going to call the number, it's for the 700 Club or the Christian Broadcasting Network.

Feel saved yet? For those of you who do, Albert's website has a Salvation Confirmation Form you can fill out so he can congratulate you and welcome you to the family of God.

A collection of my wintery thoughts in search for employment

These were all written sometime between mid-January and earlyMarch whilst I was in search of a job:

"I've found myself recently searching the snowy streets of Boston for places where one is allowed to sit and read or sit and write or sit and rest without purchasing anything and I think I've gotten pretty good at locating such places to keep myself warm whilst killing time before an interview as I rely solely on the train times to get into the city when necessary. I'm currently in the center of Quincy Market at one of the low wooden tables with small wooden stools on the North Side of the market surrounded by the interesting crowd filling the overly touristy market at 11am on a cold friday in late January. A few small families, not small in stature, but small in number. Mother, father, son. A single eccentric looking older woman whose cerulean blue scarf matches the sweater she is wearing under her black coat with only the end of the left sleeve exposed. She has a black winter hat with two gold pins on the front brim. One I can't quite make out, but if I let my imagination run free, it looks like ET slinking around on his back legs. The other is simply of a left hand. The woman is wearing big framed glasses that fall just to where her cheek lines begin. Her coral colored lipstick has been ever so slightly smeared with the spoonfuls of chowder she's shoveling into her mouth from paper cup via plastic spoon. There is a group of Hispanic teenage boys sharing plates of fish and chips, chattering away far too quickly for me to ever follow with my less than basic understanding of the Spanish language. I still have an hour to kill before my interview and unless another interesting character comes along, I'll just be entertaining myself with Ken Kesey and his Demon Box of delights."

"I hate myself anytime I find myself sitting in a Starbucks somewhere but significantly more when I'm dressed for an interview in a suit and heels somewhere downtown, with my pretentious Grande something or other, which in reality is really only black tea but veiled behind it's 60% post-consumer fiber cardboard sleeve and it's green and white 10% post-consumer fiber cup, onlookers could mistake it for a Grande Skinny Soy Vanilla Latte with an extra shot, no foam. My only hope is that my copy of Demon Box sitting next to my notebook deters people from thinking I'm as pretentious as I feel I'm faking to be.

It's dark in this part of town, seemingly all the time. It's the sort of place the sun can't find and nobody seems to notice. Too many too tall buildings with too many too important business people too busy to care about the noteable vitamin D deficiency downtown.

Fifteen more minutes until I'm thirty minutes early."

"The charcoal grey clouds are stampeding through the dolphin grey sky at an alarming rate. The flags, struggling against their teather to the pole, the bare branches on the February elm trees, writhing eastward all makes me feel like I should be heading that way faster than I am. Stagnant at the train station patiently awaiting the arrival of the 5:38 local into Boston, more patiently than a handful of people standing almost on the tracks themselves with the asinine thought that perhaps if they stare hard enough the train will come. It's late. There is nothing you can do to make it arrive faster. Train approaching, please remain behind yellow line. The words echo in my ears. There is something about simple instructions that make adolescent boys, waiting in their Kevin Garnett jersey's to go to the Celtics game with their oblivious, cigar smoking fathers, completely ignore the warning of an approaching locomotive. One boy heads towards the track to see the train approaching. It's coming much faster than the local train. Another Acela barreling through the Mansfield station. He doesn't realize as he leans his head out over the track. His father laughs and slaps his buddy on the shoulder paying no attention to his child about to be torn to pieces. "Look out!" I start yelling but nobody hears me over the screaming of the train horn. The boy, finally noting that the 150 mph train was about to tear his tiny pinhead off his green jerseyed body, dives away from the track as the cars of the train are so fast passing that they're out of sight by the time he makes it back to his feet. "Whoa!" He says to his friends. He looks up, dad didn't notice. I'm crying."

"Yet another homeless, jobless wandering sort of day for me. I had an interview at 9am at Fanieul Hall for an Assistant General Manager position at Zuma Tex Mex, which looks to be a sub-par tourist haven with stale chips and watery, overly salted margaritas. We'll see. I got an interview for a position at The Red House in Harvard Square and I had time to kill before I could head over there as I was given a 2-4pm window so I thought the best way to spend the few hours I had to kill was to fin a table in the rotunda of Quincy Market, on the south side, near the wall. I drifted between sleep and Salinger while the sun slowly rose through the high window, warming my face and back with it's weather blocked rays. With those panes of glass between me and the outside world, I nearly forgot about the frigid temperature and the reminder that the spring winds have yet to begin blowing despite the turning of calendar pages.

While I know I'm currently destitute and beyond any point of peculiarity, I'm not sure that Cafeteria Boston is the place for me to work. Once you get past the typically upity, judgemental, obonxious air of superiority carried by most survice purveyors on Newbury St., you sitll end up in some low-ceilinged basement restaurant that despite it's self-proclaimed "American Bistro with Mediterranean Influence"-dness, it smells oddly like curry and I couldn't decipher if it was the Indian restaurant a block a way, or just perhaps the staff themselves. Off to the Red House which I know lacks both the obnoxious pretention and the smell of Tandori Chicken. Also, a homeless man said he'd call me later.

I stood in the Park St. station, subterranean, awaiting the always efficient red line to carry me and everyone (minus the bald man strumming his guitar and singing Oasis slower and sadder than I ever imagined possible into his microphone, booming out from his lone, battered amplifier) to their cross river destinations. The tracks, I happened to notice - as I don't often look at them - resembled city blocks in a well planned midwestern city, evenly spaced and perfectly straight. Amid one of the "blocks" was a dead rat, stiff back legs fully extended, front legs seemingly absent without further inspection. A block and a half up the tracks was a whole bagel. One can only wonder which came first, the rat or the bagel.

I waited for the train to arrive, expecting but knowing the impossible odds, that upon impact between train and rat there would be a bloody explosion covering our panhandling crooner in rat innards. Relief? Disappointment? Neither really as I held my breath as the train passed with no incident. We all piled on and after two soft dings of the bell, the music abruptly and mid-lyric disappeared."

Eight Reasons I'm not $113 Million Dollars Richer

Someone from Queens won $113 million dollars playing MegaMillions yesterday, and that person wasn't me. Here are the eight solid reasons why I'm not a millionaire...yet.

1) I didn't play. OK, so technically I didn't buy a lottery ticket for this drawing, but I did when it was at $90M, $65M, $42M, and so on all the way down to $12M, so I suppose the title to this post should be "Top 10 Reasons I'm not $90 Million Dollars Richer"

2) The Awwww Factor. I don't have one. I'm a middle class, 20 something from Boston who is (mostly) self sufficient. There is no mortgage to fall behind on, I didn't get laid off, I'm not a cowboy living off the land, and I ain't got 6 children. There's no reason anyone who doesn't know me should feel good about me winning lots of money.

3) I'm too intelligent. Some people might think that being too intelligent to win a game that has been referred to as a "tax for dumb people" doesn't make sense, but I'm convinced the Powers That Be are all about some GED redneck from backwoods Georgia or Iowa or Montana winning the Jackpot because those same Powers own the E! network and those same rednecks will make for entertaining TV whether they end up with a reality show or on THS Investigates: The Curse of the Lottery II.

4) I'll spend and save my earnings wisely. This may be more aptly labeled as number 3a, but I'm sure I'm going to struggle to get a substantial amount of reasons anyway, so it gets it's own. I have spent admittedly abnormal amounts of time thinking about and/or planning what I would do with the majority of my money if I were to win any exorbatant amount. It's not so much that I expect to win, as that I just want to be prepared if I do. How much would a house cost in Wellfleet on the water? How much would a vineyard in Argentina cost with a 5 bedroom house attached? How much would it take to pay off my loans and debts, to pay off my family's debts? Perhaps new clothes without holes or pen stains or a wallet to hold my belongings so they're not all just stuffed in my pockets. With all of that considered, I'd still have a lot of money left for savings (and maybe an Aston Martin or two...yes, I'd get my license).

5) I'm too rational. I have no ties to any particular set of numbers, I'm not superstitious, I don't think my birthdate is lucky, nor is yours. With all that said, I always quick pick the numbers instead of playing a particular set and with some quick google research used to find statistics that match my cause, I found that according to the 1996 New York Daily News,"Quick Pick is not the best route to winning. More than half of all players use Quick Pick instead of selecting their own numbers. But Quick Pick has accounted for only 38 percent of the winners".

6) I'm too good at not working. I'm not one of those people that would continue working my job because I'd need something to give me purpose in life or my passion for waitressing is just too strong to stop. Amazingly, I can find plenty to do with my time if I have all the money I need and (you can ask my friend Kevin), it's fun to have me around because I'm up for just about anything when I don't have to work in the morning. Want to fly to Holland tonight? I'm in. Want a weekend in Vegas? I'm in. Beer Olympics? Done. Rugby World Cup? Sold.

7) I'd get really fat. I realized yesterday that one of the major reasons I can't save a lot of money is because I like delicious food. I like to go out for delicious food, I like to cook delicious food and if I were to have a completely disposable income, I would spend a lot more time and money doing both of those things. Now, in theory, I'd have a lot more time to work out and money for a personal trainer, but in reality, I don't like working out and won't like it more if I pay someone to make me do it. Actually probably quite the opposite, I'm also really spiteful.

8) I'm not convinced I'd help stimulate the American Economy that much. I'm not a down home girl who thinks my back yard is all of the world I need to see (not that I have a back yard, but you get the point). If you look at the things I've mentioned I'd do with my money, nearly half of my theoretical spending thus far is off shore. You might never see me again if I win the lottery because I may spend my time between my cottage in Chile and my house in Malta.

So I probably put too much thought into why I didn't win and someone else did considering that I didn't even play, but I will not be deterred. I'll probably go buy a ticket today as $12 million dollars (the lowest the jackpot goes/is at now) would change my life substantially and I'm not one of those people who will only play when it's up over $100 or $200 million because I'm not that greedy. I am, however, greedy enough to desire a cool twelve mill and make plans for my life thusly. And with the creation of this list, perhaps I'll take a different approach, and start picking my own numbers based on some random reasons so when I do win, I'll have something to say about it at my press conference that will make all the spectators say "Awwwww."

Update:

9) I have no real plans for giving a substantial amount of money to charity. I'm not one of those people that claims I'll give half my winnings to feed children in Dorchester or something. I'll probably do something good with my money- maybe I'll do some volunteer work, but in all honesty, other than those that have been charitable to me, I have no strong sense or desire to give up much of my winnings.