January 28th, 2026: Another day of writing and work. I had more breakfast and took the bus to work to find out that Seth M wouldn’t be here again today because he’s sick despite being present at the party yesterday. I got a mug and put in 2 sugar packets and 4 tiny things of creamer to heat it up in the microwave for 30 seconds so my coffee would be warm despite all the creamer I’ve added to it. I went back to my desk and then drank it for a bit when I was on the computer looking at Google news and stuff. I talked with Edgar some more and found out that Seth M was still gone and the Ukrainian man didn’t have access to Google Admin so when I went to classes. They were fucked. I had a guy call me over because his USB-C cable still wasn’t working occasionally so I finally decided to go search for a new one and got it for him. He praised me so much for finally fixing his problem. I went back and continued to not have many problems to help out people with. I passed by the Polish lady and she said:
“Hi Gemerson!”
But I didn’t muster up the power to respond, because of past anger towards her. I went over and got the meat lovers pizza for lunch and went back before getting on the bus at 1:35pm for my 2:30pm class but the bus driver just had to dummyedly take a 10 minute break in the middle of the fucking drive there and I got to class with 25 minutes to spare. Chloie was waiting outside and I talked with her more, formally introducing ourselves, she switched from nursing school to being a health planner at her old college and we got along quite well, I didn’t get the opportunity to ask for her Instagram. I was asked a question on the correct room number by Naruhito. We got in and I was with Malthus again. There was a freewrite about our 5 firsts and last, I put Ireland for the last country visited, our next freewrite was about one of the things on our list but to change enough things to make it different in 10 minutes. Here’s what I wrote down starting with shifting my arrival in Ireland forward by 8 years:
>10:40am, August 2nd, 2025: Katrina and her family touched down in Dublin from Chicago airport, she took notice of all the green on the field, especially compared to her native Chicago, which was mostly ugly suburbia. She wished architects could take a lesson or two hundred from Ireland. Getting off the plane was a relief compared to an hours-long sitdown in economy class, her brother Marcellius was loudly relieved and her sister Bridget was far more excited than the both of them. After the baggage they would have to be picked up by their second cousin (dad’s mom’s mom’s son’s daughter’s son) Patrick and drive to his home in Abbeyleix…
Malthus stopped talking to his mom when he was 15 and that lasted for 14 years and his story about her not talking to him except for birthdays. We went over the Stephen King writing excerpt about the toolbox that I forgot to touch (lol) and read it a bit to prepare. I went over to my second class and saw Drawmjia on the way. I got an energy drink and went in to learn about upper and lower bounds of scaling equations and was severely lost. I got out and walked all the way to Bible study at 5:37pm, being let in by Kaufman, Father Aquinas and Father Palmer. More people came like Lewis, Magdalus, Elijah, and a guy from Green Bay. We talked about people we’ve failed to evangelize with Lewis mentioning his former girlfriend who he only repelled more back when he lived in his hometown of Neenah and she was lukewarm but he ended up seemingly making her less Catholic. I talked about my parents and going 0-4 when it came to inviting people to the Catholic Center (Lizzo, Laundrea, Asherah, James) and while we were leaving. I checked my phone and looked at my conversation with Margaret to see she read my message Saturday. So there’s hope she might come to the adoration. I looked around when I got in and nothing. Cliffe was there and so was Oriang, Kristine, Alley, the South African, Nikki, and her boyfriend. No sight of her so once I did my reading for yesterday on The City of God, I left and I took the bus home. I got back and ate some more leftovers while James was making food because he had troubles swallowing. He left a spoon in the dirty dishes rack and asked me to clean up his spoon because he thought it was mine. I went back to write my assignment due tonight and here’s what I put down
>The City of God’s first of twenty-two books, which we read in class, is a dissection of the false yet popular belief in why Rome fell to the barbarians was that the Romans had turned away from their old gods and shed them for Jesus Christ. Saint Augustine notably does this through the excessive usage of manichean (figuratively and possibly literally) comparisons of good and Christian versus evil and pagan. The city of God in heaven versus the city of man in Rome, (6) the Christian God who defeated death versus the pagan gods who could be vanquished by the admission of the pagans themselves (8), the plague of the body and the plague of the soul (43) and the unjust suicides done by the pagans versus the rare approved killings of oneself or others comissioned by God. (32)
>Yet Saint Augustine in his writing sometimes muddles the designations of good and evil. Pointing out that the supposedly evil barbarians spared those good Christians and the “good” pagans who hid in the basilicas and churches, writing:
>“...For in the sack of Rome they afforded shelter to the refugees, both Christian and pagan…”
>(6) Augustine’s usage of dichotomies is an application of the Christian worldview of good versus bad in stark contrast to the pagan view of no clear source of good and bad, where your more focused on favor of the various different gods akin to trying to maintain your reputation with tons of different people in your life who oftentimes oppose each other. In the Odyssey, Poseidon is the primary enemy of Odysseus for the blinding of his son Polyphemus where as in the Aeneid, Neptune (his Roman name) only shows hostility to Aeneas at the requesting of Juno, someone who hardly shows up in the Odyssey.
>In a possible remnant of his Manichean origins, Augustine’s first book of the City of God is influenced heavily by the discussions of what constitutes good and bad.
I then took a shower after submitting it to the wrong assignment and published my blog entry before going to sleep.
Song of the Day: The Largest - BigXthaPlug (2024)
