And on the 13, Beans reveals his True Self!

 Bwahahahahaaaa!  It's the Thirteenth, so it's the day of hiding.

No, I don't have Triskaidekaphobia, the 13th, the Ides of the month, is actually a historically bad day for the Beans family.  Car accidents, major health issues, trees falling on houses, just about everything short of Smashing Meteor of Death, and I still have many 13ths to live through, well, until SMOD hits, that is.

Instead of cataloguing all negative 13ths, I'll just relate some other things that Beans is going to have to reconcile with The Lord once the SMOD hits, or Ragnarok or The Fall of 'Murica or whatever life/world ending event happens (like, well, lungs filling up with fluid and that's enough of doom there...)

See, I can be a bit of an anal sphincter.  Shocked, right?  And I tend to kind of poke the badgers of society (no, not you, Scott the B) when they poke me.  Thus having to reconcile with The Lord once I suffle off this mortal coil.  Eh, it's the cross I bear.

For those who don't know, I live in a university town.  With the reputation of being The Berkeley of the South.  Yeah.  Didn't know that when I moved here many moons ago and didn't discover that until roots were well and truly planted, else mayhaps roots planted would have been in some more conservatively bented area.  What could have been, oh well.

Said town has a bit of a problem with non-Judaeo-Christian/Religions of the Book 'religions.'  Think things like Wicca and modern Druidism and other very untraditional beliefs.  Just like every place that is 'progressive' and 'liberal' (and I hate the debasement and redefinition of those two wonderful terms.)

Now, me being a modern person, I'm pretty tolerant to just about anything as long as it stays 10 feet away from me.  Organ meats, spiders, witchy-twitchy stuffs, fine.  Just don't invade my personal space with any of that.  Well, some spiders can get closer, but spider touch me I touch spider and spider don't want none of that if'n you know what I mean.  That pretty much goes for other weird stuff like all insects, rodents, snakes yada yada.  And unwashed hippy freaks, tweakers, ganja enthusiasts, druidic shamam, shamanistic druids and you get the idea.

What's my beef with non People of the Book?  Lack of tolerance, man.  They harsh my mellow bigly.  

Like in the SCA (Society for Creative Anachronism, their motto is "The Middle Ages the way they should have been." No, seriously (eyes rolled hard.))  This means that Christianity exists along non-traditional religions.  Supposedly.  But over the years suppression of Christianity and Christian themes in the SCA have gotten worse and worse while non-traditional religions are allowed to express themselves heavily.

So me being a good boy and not wanting to push buttons, and to keep friendly with various SCA friends (or people in this benighted town,) I wouldn't actively express my rather conservative Christian values, much.  I'd express them as if I was playing a role, which I wasn't.  Just they took it that way.

Saying goodbye to people, I could get in trouble for saying "Go with God" or "May God follow you" or other actual medieval phrases.  Serious wailing and gnashing of teeth on their part.  Instead, I'd toss out "Via con Dios" or "Gott mitt Uns" or "Deus Vult."  And they'd smile and nod their pretty little vacant uneducated heads.  Meanwhile Mrs. Andrew would stare at me like I just committed a Mortal Sin and either give me a fist-to-shoulder nuggie or a Gibb's Slap to the back of the head once we have cleared enough space between us and them.

Seriously.  "Via con Dios" good, "Go with God" bad.  "Gott mitt Uns" good, "God is with Us" bad.  "Deus Vult" good, "God wills it" bad.

I even snuck in "Kyrie Eleison" a couple of times.  Literally "Lord have Mercy" and also the battle refrain of the Byzantine Empire.  Got a couple "Christie Eleison" in, that being, of course, "Crist have Mercy," but that got some side eye as it sounded a tad more Christian than 'Kyrie.'

Seriously.  Not kidding. Say it in a 'foreign tongue' and it's all good.  Say it in English and it's BadThinkTime.

Then there was the time in this town during the early days of war after 9-11, when a bunch of granola-crunching lack-of-deodorant-wearing leftists were protesting Bush II's illegal war, and were shouting slogans, you know, the same slogans leftists have been chanting since the Cold War.  I suggested maybe "Work will make you free" and they actually liked it.  And then I said, "It sounds better in the original German."  And nobody, except the cop I knew, got it.  And he called me the rude version of an anal sphincter.  

Yep. That's me.

So, late tonight, dealing with weather issues, so here's... Mr. Mister.  With their hit, "Kyrie Eleison."  No, not that.  And, yes, I had to explain to some witchy-twitchy types that the song they were dancing to was a CHRISTIAN SONG!  God help them, for they are beyond help themselves.  Or in Southern Grandma, "Bless their little hearts."

Oh, no, evil Christian music.

Here's the lyrics:

Kyrie eleison
Kyrie eleison
Kyrie elei

The wind blows hard against this mountainside
Across the sea into my soul
It reaches into where I cannot hide
Setting my feet upon the road

My heart is old, it holds my memories
My body burns a gem-like flame
Somewhere between the soul and soft machine
Is where I find myself again

Kyrie eleison down the road that I must travel
Kyrie eleison through the darkness of the night
Kyrie eleison where I'm going, will you follow?
Kyrie eleison on a highway in the night

When I was young, I thought of growing old
Of what my life would mean to me
Would I have followed down my chosen road
Or only wished what I could be?

Kyrie eleison down the road that I must travel
Kyrie eleison through the darkness of the night
Kyrie eleison where I'm going, will you follow?
Kyrie eleison on a highway in the night

Whoa-oh-oh, whoa-oh-oh
Whoa-oh-oh, whoa-oh-oh

Kyrie eleison down the road that I must travel
Kyrie eleison through the darkness of the night
Kyrie eleison where I'm going, will you follow?
Kyrie eleison on a highway in the night

Kyrie eleison down the road that I must travel (Kyrie, will you follow?)
Kyrie eleison through the darkness of the night (yeah)
Kyrie eleison where I'm going, will you follow? (Will you follow?)
Kyrie eleison on a highway in the night

Kyrie eleison down the road that I must travel
Kyrie eleison through the darkness of the night
Kyrie eleison where I'm going, will you follow? (Will you follow?)
Kyrie eleison on a highway in the light

Kyrie eleison down the road that I must travel (Will you follow?)
Kyrie eleison through the darkness of the night
Kyrie eleison where I'm going, will you follow? (Will you follow?)

Songwriters: Richard James Page, John Ross Lang, Steven Park George.

This has always been one of my favorite songs, once I heard it.  Just a good song to sing when walking or driving or passing through various valleys of death and in the darkness of the night, if you know what I mean.