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Thursday, June 26, 2003

I'm starting to doubt whether I should order shoes online. I ordered a pair of shoes which I just received, and I specifically ordered them because the website said the heel was 2 inches. I love 2 inch heel shoes; I feel so tall in them and they look fantastic with short skirts.

I received the shoes today, and the heel is not 2 inches but 1.5 inches. I even measured it myself with a ruler and compared them to my other shoes with 2 inch heels.

So I'm on the phone with customer service, and a guy answers, and I'm like having a apoplectic fit because I don't think he gets that half an inch makes all the difference in the world for a woman's shoe.

He then tells me that if I had ordered the shoe by phone, I would have gotten the correct the heel height because his order screen said the shoe had 1.5 inch heel. And I'm like, why is it wrong "your website", is that my problem or yours?

So of course, I had to order another pair of shoes with a 2 inch heel, and I asked him three times to make sure the shoe had a 2 inch heel.

The shoe I ordered with the wrong heel height is so cute too, that I can't decide if I want to return it. I'm thinking the shoe might look great with pants or jeans but never with skirts, long or short.

I'm sure the male customer service rep was thinking, half an inch, what's half an inch on a shoe. But half an inch makes all the difference in the world on a shoe worn with a very short, thigh high skirt, and even a long skirt as well. Ask any woman!

Here's the shoe, Isabel; stylish but from a comfy brand.
Facing the death of a loved one and silly childhood thoughts

My aunt in Florida got me started on this track. My aunt is convinced that if she goes to see grandma, that grandma will die. She said that grandma told her she wanted to see her one last time before she died, and that was two years ago.

My aunt got me all freaked out, because here's what grandma said to me. She said she would stay alive until I got married again. Grandma is old fashioned, and she thinks that women can't survive in the world unless they're married.

So I'm thinking, because this is what you do when you're indirectly staring death in the face, that I wonder if I've stayed unmarried all this time to keep grandma alive.

It's a silly thought and very childish I know, but I wonder if this belief is living somewhere in my brain. I mean after all, who wants to see their grandma, my second mommy die.

See the problem is, when you have two mommies you have to experience your mother's death not once but twice. Mom # 1 is dead, and that experience haunts me to this day.

I know there's some childish part of me that wants to delay the death of mommy # 2 as long as possible, and if mommy # 2 said she wouldn't die until I get married again, why not just not get married. Then mommy # 2 will live forever.

Childish, isn't it?
My friend, who I went to West Virginia with and who I play "spot the mullet with whenver we go out, are going to see this movie called American Mullet.

My friend always wins because she's totally into mullets. She even sends me mullet haikus whenever she finds them on the Net.

West Virginia was fun because we could play "spot the mullet" every day. Best places for mullet sightings in the SF Bay Area are at sporting events like Giants and A's baseball games, football games, and county fairs.
So that was my bad catholic sermon rant.

Things I miss about the Catholic Church:
beautifully decorated churches
all that wonderful stained glass
the statues
the stations of the cross art
prayer candles
altars to various saints galore
lots of services to attend because there are times in one's life when you have to go to church every day
kneeling - I always found kneeling very spiritual, don't ask me why. We don't kneel in protestant churches.

Things that I liked about this catholic church:
a very racially diverse congregation (way more than my protestant church)
the church has a sunday mass in cantonese and one in arabic
confessionals that say "Hearing Aid"
confessionals in languages other than english
confessionals that say "face to face"

Things I like appreciate more about my protestant church:
sermons that remind me of my childhood catholic church
bibles in the pews (catholic churches have no bibles in the pews)
great music and choir
for a protestant church, mine has a ton of stained glass windows and a giant mosiac of Jesus, and yes the fact that we faintly resemble in decoration a catholic church does come up once a year. Most protestant churches are very plain.
My church has communion every other week, which is way more than a lot of protestant churches

One last thing. If the catholic church believes that during the communion the bread and wine actually turn into the body and blood of christ or transubstantiation, can the priest act like the miracle that this is, instead of a "I'm so bored with communion" delivery.

Transubstantiation is a "miracle" darn it! Like the resurrection, it's like "amazing, glorious and unbelievable." Can't we at least treat it like the miracle that it is, instead of delivering the service in this "haven't we done this is all before and isn't it boring" way. I hate rote robotic delivery of the church service, no matter what the religion is.

See, this the fault of my childhood catholic priests. They took their catholic service rituals and their religion deadly serious. Communion was like delivered in a hush, like "this is such a miracle". In fact, the whole service was delivered in this, what I can only describe as totally spiritual.

My childhood catholic priests did everything during the service with gratitude and they preached that church and service was something you should feel priveleged and grateful to attend.

I still feel that way. I go to church on Sunday, and sometimes I still feel that I feel blessed that I have faith and that I can sit in a Sunday service and worship with other people.