That's awesome.

"Somewhere in the control room of my mind a fat little dwarf in a security outfit was paging through a Penthouse while smoking a cigar with his feet up on the table, watching the security monitors of my brain with his peripheral vision."

I love the fact that not only is it just a security guard, it's a DWARF security guard. He must've eaten some pizza or something before bed.

Reminds you of Dave Barry, doesn't it? Some of the posters noticed that too.

(Subscription-only? I'm not registered and I can see the threads fine.)

I'm still subconsciously sulking that Dave retired from his column in the first place. No columns mean no column compilation books.

I used to be registered, but as of a couple of years back (or whenever it was -- some time after I posted a link to that thread about "The Lord of the Rings, as written by well-known authors who are not named J.R.R. Tolkien"), I would have needed to pay actual cash to continue posting there. I decided against it.

Hilarious website.

Skimmed it. I'll have to go back and look at it some more later, when there's not quite so much uproar going on just over my shoulder, but it looks amusing.

Ah yes. It's surprising, if you don't know about it already, that Protestant fundamentalists are just as worried about Catholics' souls as they are about non-Christians'. But it's true, and they even send missionaries to heavily Catholic areas. (It doesn't go both ways -- Catholics don't agree with fundamentalists, but we don't consider them or anyone else auto-damned.) This is one reason the ecumenical movement rarely gets anywhere. One man's trifling difference is another man's irreconcilable one.

Back to links. I recently found out that YouTube has been an enormous boon to amateur comedy troupes. Here are two whose skits are absolutely hilarious: <a href="http://www.baratsandbereta.com/">Barats & Bereta</a> (picture <a href="http://www.robandelliot.cycomics.com/">Rob and Elliot</a> in live-action) and <a href="http://derrickcomedy.com/">Derrick Comedy</a> (fans of 24, you must watch the "Tom Rogers" videos).

Perhaps not auto-damned, but last time I went to mass with my fiancee, I certainly wasn't allowed to partake in communion. Nor any other time for that matter.

(ahem)

Forget Guitar Hero

More links:

• TV Tropes is a comprehensive and hilarious wiki of TV and entertainment clichés. Be prepared to follow way more links than you meant to.
• On a similar note, it's The Grand List of Console Role Playing Game Clichés! Even funnier, and highly reminiscent of the Evil Overlord List.

Reply to IJD (liturgical minutiae warning):
Okay, but that's very different from saying you're going to hell. <Liturgical minutiae> And while non-Catholics technically aren't supposed to take Catholic communion, we don't exactly sweat over it. My grandma, who's Anglican, always takes communion when she goes to my church, and my folks are iffy about it but don't think it's a big deal. Priests and eucharistic ministers don't pass you through a Catholic Detector first -- it's up to your conscience whether you receive or not. (By the same token, you sometimes see particularly devout Catholics decline to receive on a particular week because they feel they're not in an appropriate spiritual state. Most of us schlubs aren't that sensitive to ours, and again, that's okay.)

^Actually, you're somewhat incorrect there, Zeke.

http://www.catholic.com/library/Who_..._Communion.asp
http://www.catholicherald.com/saunde...s/ws040506.htm
http://www.catholic.com/thisrock/2003/0302sbs.asp
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acro...43/closed.html

Hope that helps :)

I've long been fans of both of Zeke's links. They're definately worth it, but don't go to TV Tropes until you have a lot of time to dedicate to it.

I'd appreciate it if someone would PM me about why so many people are willing to accept the idea of actually eating Christ's flesh. That level of theological discussion is a little beyond the message board.

The Catholic Encyclopaedia - outdated, but still useful :)

In the Year 2000... dogs will howl along with La Bamba?

FiveMinute.net is BAD, mmkay? ;)

After all, Fiveminute.net is not just illogical. It is unbelievably, astronomically illogical.

I knew all that support of Communism would come back to bite me.

Bad, Zeke, Bad!

Zeke will do everything in his power to hoodoo us.

I don't suppose anyone could give us the abridged version of that load of mumbo-jumbo?

Basically it's a randomly generated letter of complaint that you can set to complain about any person or company you like.

So whatever load of mumbo jumbo you got was different to all the other ones.

Key points:

I'll simply summarize by stating that FiveMinute.net discounts important principles of our culture as mere platitudes. And I can say that with a clear conscience because FiveMinute.net likes harangues that leave behind a legacy of perpetual indebtedness in developing countries.
FiveMinute.net likes to generate an epidemic of corruption and social unrest.
FiveMinute.net's list of sins is long and each one deserves more space than I have here.
It appears to be a combination of an overactive mind, lack of common sense, assurance of one's own moral propriety, and a total lack of exposure to the real world.

Social unrest from 5M.net? "Everyone, run for your lives! Fivists with lame senses of humor are coming!" :)