Prenatal Crucifixion: A Daily Jesus from Ohio

Jesus has paid a visit to earth again, this time lodging himself firmly in the uterus of Monet Sledge of Lorain, Ohio.

Did Jesus Appear In An Ultrasound?

A Lorain, Ohio, woman got an ultrasound in preparation for her first baby, but instead of seeing the image of an infant, Monet Sledge saw something else.

"I was shocked like really," said Sledge.

She showed the picture to her sister Tequoia Smith, a married mother of four who has seen her share of ultrasounds.

"I was expecting to see little body parts," said Smith. "Like a face, arms and legs." But instead she too saw the image of Jesus on the cross. "As soon as I saw it I was like oh my gosh."

Some people are encouraging the mom to sell the image on eBay, but she has not decided wether or not the image is for sale just yet.

She embraced the picture as a positive message from above.

"People say maybe my baby is gonna be blessed and maybe it is a good sign," said Sledge. "I don't know, I've done wrong in my life, maybe he's forgiven me early."

Big sister Smith agreed.

She added that the family has had some challenging times lately with injury, employment and other stresses.

"Maybe it's a sign of a good pregnancy or maybe we've just been through so much it's a sign that everything is gonna be okay. After the initial shock it's like God is here even when you don't know it."

I read this story and I was all like omigawd, fer sure!

This is a very typical Daily Jesus in two ways. First, it's sighted by people who note that they've been through some sort of major trauma and general emotional stress in the time leading up to their vision. Second, a sale on eBay of the object bearing the divine imprint is being considered. In this case, I'd give good odds that it will happen. After all, as the Jesus-finders tell us, they need the money.

I can't help but feel a bit sorry for Sledge. Giving birth to those nails is going to be very, very painful.

Personally, I don't think this baby is going to be particularly blessed. She's being born into a family where everyone repeats the word "like" over and over again and, like, that, like, is a like pet-peeve that, like, drives me, like, totally nuts. Unfortunately, I suspect that the child will be born into a family that is having the same problems that it had before they received the Holy Ultrasound of Lorain. It is, after all, just a photo like any other. The significance attached to it is the product of a desperation to find something to cling to. That probably isn't the best basis for an interpersonal relationship, let alone a parental one.

Sphere: Related Content

In Which My Bullshit Detector Finally Melts

Readers (somebody is reading this thing, right?) may be getting a bit tired of the whole Grease-Spot Jesus thing, especially now that the auction on eBay has ended and Deb Serio has made her money. Still, now some new things are coming out in her statements that I think bear comparison to what she'd said before the auction. For instance, here's something from the Lynchburg, VA News & Advance:

She said some people have told her she shouldn't profit off Christ's likeness.

But to Serio, an active Lutheran, the mark on the garage floor isn't a sign from above - it's just a smudge.

"I don't consider myself someone who needs a Christ-like image to fortify my beliefs. ... There are some people who need this kind of thing to sort of start them on their faith journey. I don't. That's why I don't mind parting with it," she said.

That seems a bit different from what she said back when this story first appeared:

It is there and maybe it's there for a purpose.

Seems a bit odd, doesn't it? Assuming that the image had appeared there for a purpose, wouldn't one assume that the purpose would have involved the people living in the place at which the image appeared if one is to credit its appearance to intelligent and omnipotent authorship in the first place? If this purpose had involved somebody else, wouldn't the image have appeared at somebody else's house without involving a schoolteacher from Virginia receiving hard currency in the process? Or is the implication simply that Jehovah intended that Ms. Serio receive precisely $1525.69, and if so why exactly that amount?

I must say, the needle on my bullshit detector has deflected far into the red zone on this one.

The Associated Press story also contains the following comment in the course of an interview with Serio:

An active Lutheran, Serio considers the smudge just an odd occurrence _ not a sign or miracle.

The story in the News & Advance is, if the credit is to be believed, not simply taken off the AP wire, but was written by a staff member at the paper, one Matte Busse, so ostensibly we have a couple of independent sources reporting that Serio said the same thing once the auction ended. Could this be correct; could the woman who initially posited that the "image" appeared on her garage floor for some purpose, who told reporters that they took it so seriously that they feared stepping on it and promised it daily that they would "be good" as they left home now be saying that it's really just a smudge that has no divine powers, isn't miraculous, isn't a sign from above? Could that really be smoke beginning to pour from my overloaded bullshit detector?

EDIT @ 11:53 AM, 8/10/07: I sent email to Matt Busse asking him to follow up on the story and he informed me that "I wrote the story for The News & Advance, which then sent it to the AP, which then rewrote it & distributed it to its member news organizations. This is pretty common practice & is how most of the AP stories get out there. That's why some of the quotes are the same in both stories." So, to be fair, the quote really only came from one source, that being Mr. Busse.

If it isn't, this line will surely make it burst into flames!

I really never thought I'd get any, to be honest," she said. "I know that sounds sort of naive, but I put it up there as sort of a lark, thinking, 'Well, who knows who's out there.' I'm surprised.

— Lynchburg News & Advance

Catch that one? Here's a person who, according to her eBay profile, has been selling there for nearly eight years giving us a "Golly gee whilikers" line of crap when her initial take was

I kept thinking of that grilled cheese sandwich, remember the grilled cheese sandwich that sold for like $30,000...

— Original story, WSET-TV

I must say that it's rather rare to find a con artist who so blatantly calls bullshit on him or herself, but my poor detector is glowing the most marvelous shade of reddish-orange right now. I suspect I may need a new one after this.

A final thought; if someone intentionally misrepresents an MP3 player they sell on eBay, it's considered fraud, is it not? If I sell you something that I claim is an iPod but deliver to you something called an ePlod manufactured in a sweatshop in Senegal, I would be barred from selling on eBay, correct? So why is it that after making the claims Serio made about this "image of Jesus Christ" can she now clearly contradict herself by saying that it's "just a smudge" and not be considered to have defrauded islandoffthecoast who, unless he/she is even more foolish than I can comprehend, never would have shelled out more than $1500 for a sealant smudge on someone's garage floor?

This is just another one of those circumstances in which religion serves as an excuse/exception to normal reasoning, isn't it? Ah, this fellow says it better than I can, I suppose!

Sphere: Related Content

Jesus Sells!

The auction of Grease-Spot Jesus has ended, netting Deb Serio of Forest, VA $1525.69 for a stained hunk of her garage floor.



The winning bidder goes by the user ID islandoffthecoast. I don't know anything about this person other than the fact that/he she was willing to pay just over $1500 for a stained bit of concrete. Serio, for her part, is probably a little bit disappointed. She had been hoping to get as much for the bit of stained floor as did the seller of the infamous $30,000 grilled cheese-n-Jesus sandwich. She only wound up with about 5% of that lofty sum. Will she take that small amount of money or will she instead claim that it doesn't cover the cost of removing Christ from her garage and seek out some other way to make a few bucks off the Holy Smear? Will she keep the money for herself when she gets paid or will she donate it to charity?

We may never know.

We do learn from this, however, that if you're looking for someone gullible enough to buy any stained items you have around the house that appear to maybe possibly bear an image that looks just a little bit like Jesus when you squint your eyes and turn the lights down low, islandoffthecoast is your buyer!

Sphere: Related Content

Update: Grease-Spot Jesus on eBay

As of this morning, the Christ-as-grease-spot garage floor that I wrote about yesterday has found seven bidders and is up to $122.50 with a whole week left to go.

There is, indeed, a sucker born every minute!

Sphere: Related Content

Preparations

Today, my last outstanding invoice from eBay sales will be paid. In total, I've raised about $4K from sales of my book collection. I only wound up selling about a quarter of it; eBay is just too time-consuming. I may sell more of it once we get to Worcester, though. I do have some motivation for doing that until my stipend starts; the temp agencies I signed up with got me all of 3.5 days of work which paid all of $250. There just isn't much of that kind of work here, I suppose. I may still apply at a couple of them once we get settled in our new place, though.

We had one couple take a look at our bedroom set. Not the brightest folks; the woman's response was that it "looked much smaller in the pictures." Huh? So another person is coming to look tonight. She's just moved here and has no furniture yet, so it's a good prospect. Aside from a few book cases and a couple of computer desks, which will go on Craig's List in the next couple of days, everything is taken care of. We've even got some help loading the truck, which we'll be picking up a week from Saturday. I'm taking the car in for its tune-up tomorrow, and once I get it back I'll get the tired and brakes done, too. If all goes well, we'll be hitting the road early in the morning a week from Sunday.

Tonight, I'm going to my last UFS meeting at Aladdin's. It will probably be my last time there. That place will be one of the things I'll miss about Tallahassee. It's been a default hangout and second home for LL and I since it used to be Sheesha Nights. There's apparently a good-sized Lebanese community where we're going, though, so we'll likely be able to find a new place somewhat like it to call our own.

We've still got a good deal of packing to do, but since today is LL's last day at work we should have plenty of time to finish.

Hard to believe that our five years in Florida is almost over. I'm looking forward to colorful autumns and cold winters again. I don't think I've ever fully acclimated to the weather here, and I know I can live without the swarms of mosquitoes. Nonetheless, I'm going to miss the biodiversity here. The only solution, i suppose, is to work hard, find grant money, and get myself back to Trinidad!

I'm already having wonderful fantasies about taking LL for breakfast (and cheesecake!) at Junior's (the original one in Flatbush). I have great memories of the baskets of mini-danishes that come with breakfast there, in the same way that good restaurants give you a basket of bread with dinner. I haven't been back there in nearly 20 years now — since 1989 or 1990, I think. Aside from everything right in Boston, having relatively easy access to NYC is a big plus. LL and I have never been to the American Museum of Natural History together. You know, I can still remember the smell of the fossil exhibits like it was just yesterday. That museum literally reeks of history.

And I wonder... where in Greenwich Village does Rocky Horror play at midnight these days? I hear that the Waverly is long gone, but I can't imagine that there isn't a showing there somewhere!

Nine days left here in North Florida. Yes, the whole moving thing is stressful... but it will soon be behind us, and I think things are going to get better for us than they've been while we've lived here. Tallahassee is an alright town for what it offers, but it's a bit isolating. There aren't any big cultural centers near here. I think I'm at a point in life where I'm ready to trade some nature in for some culture for a few years... when I'm not helping out with research. It's all very exciting. LL and I really are counting the days. Could you tell?

Sphere: Related Content

Massachusetts Musings

LL receiving a bunch of maps and info about Massachusetts in the mail today. Technically, they were addressed to Tycho, but he's unlikely to read any of it. It's marketing stuff, sure... and it worked. Looking over the book of events and attractions generated a bit of excitement. We also pinpointed the place we'll be living on the map of Worcester, and it seems quite a good location. There are a couple of old cemeteries nearby (I'm a historic cemetery buff), restaurants, etc. The MBTA station is either a long walk or short bus ride away, and that can take us to either Boston or Providence and points in between. There's so much there that will be accessible to us, much more than there is now. We're seriously looking forward to the change of venues.

Planning for the move is going well enough. Our car needs work, of course. A tune-up, a couple of new tires, and the brakes are all necessities, as is replacing the left tail light, which decided to go out yesterday. On the other hand, I've now raised about $2000 in eBay sales and, if all goes well, I've found a buyer for the balance of my book collection, and that would bring in better than $4500 more. We'd be in very good shape indeed if that works out, so my fingers are crossed. LL will be getting a couple of paychecks from teaching and her graduate assistantship, too. Everything is going to work out fine, I think. The plan is that LL will drive the car and I'll drive the truck. We'll each have a set of directions and drive about 400 miles each day, meeting at a motel at the end. We'll have cell phones to keep in touch should any problems arise.

I wish we could take a couple of the raccoons with us. We're going to miss them a great deal. Strange as it may sound, we've gotten to be good friends over the past two years. We've gotten used to their company. There's at least one here starting at 2:00 every afternoon until about 7:00 the next morning. It's going to be odd not having them around anymore.

But... wow, Boston. We can take a train to Fenway and root for the Yankees when they're in town. I guess I'd better make sure my insurance is paid up before that!

Sphere: Related Content

Musings on eBay

As I prepare for moving from Florida to Massachusetts, I am in the process of selling off a rather sizable collection of books and works of art on eBay. I don't mention this in the hopes of finding buyers, but because of my experience with it over the past couple of weeks.

eBay has been both boon and bane for me. Due to the sheer number of items I'm selling in going from a small house to a small apartment, the process of listing items, answering inquiries, boxing things and shipping them off eats up far too much of my time. I find it a rather tedious process, truth be told.

Then again, I'm amazed at the amount of money eBay buyers are willing to fork over for the sundry books and artworks I'm auctioning. Two examples: one book that I bought for about $40 back in 1995 sold for over $500 and a second, which I bought for $15 and which one could purchase elsewhere (with some minimal research) sold for over $200. When all is said and done, the money I raise on eBay will pay for my U-Haul truck, all of the gas needed to drive it 1300 miles, and probably my first month or two of rent at the new location. It's as if some divine being were standing in the sky above me and casually dropping $100 bills on my head.

An old roommate of mine some years ago described eBay as "a service for people with too much money and too little brains." I don't necessarily agree with that 100%, but still I do feel a little guilty at times for raking in as much as I have been, and then reminding myself that this kind of spending is voluntary on the part of my buyers. Of course, the armchair psychologist in me wonders if there might indeed be some kind of compulsive behavior involved.

Then I remind myself that this money is making it possible for me to reach a goal I've wanted to achieve since the age of 5 — to become a scientist. The people who are buying what I list on eBay only think they're paying for books and statues and such. Unbeknownst to them, what they're doing is investing in my dream and, if it all works out, contributing to fundamental research.

I wonder what would happen if I simply listed that as an auction item. Would people invest in this manner if they knew right up front what it was they were paying for? Hmmmm...

Sphere: Related Content