Interview Fun (warning, potentially offensive content)

Natalie and I are exchanging interviews (for rules, see previous interview post). Here's what Natalie asked me:

1. Did anything cause you to decide you were an atheist?

I'd say yes and no. I can't ever remembering believing in God, but I remember thinking about what I believe when I was quite young.

A bit of background for those who aren't familiar with me: my father is Roman Catholic, my mom isn't really all that religious. My fathers side of the family is all religious (RC), and my mom's side isn't. Back when I was a kid, my dad would drag me to church, which I found long and boring, followed by Sunday school (ditto). On the way to and from church, my dad would swear at all the other drivers. (Yes, I know this isn't a feature of Roman Catholics.) He would also drive a bit like a madman... Sunday was the only day he really drove me places... his driving scared me. So you have a bit of an idea about why the whole thing turned me off... I had to get up early, it was time I could be doing other things, the trips to & from church were scary, and the services themselves were boring.

That still doesn't explain why I don't believe in God.

I'm very much a science-minded person, although I enjoy reading fantasy novels. I'd love to believe in magic, unicorns, and dragons, but I don't. I've never had a yearning to believe in God. To me, he's just another fictional character, and a lot less interesting. I figured that he was made up to explain things people didn't understand, and now that we have a better understanding, we can get rid of the make-believe stories.

Organized religion also turns me off. Sure, there are good things, but there are also a lot of bad things. Historically, there have been tons of wars and fighting based on religion. There's the crusaides, there's anti-sematism, so on and so forth. There's the protestants and catholics in Ireland. There's all that stuff going on in the middle-east. Although religion claims to be "the way to do good", it often ends up as "the excuse to do bad". I felt that I could be a better person by trying to do good, and to really *think* about my actions, rather than blindly following someone else's outdated rules.

2. How many allergies do you have? If you could eliminate one, which would it be?

How many do I have? Well, that probably depends on what day you ask, since some of them come and go. ;) For example, I these days I can frequently eat bananas, but when I overdose, my allergy comes back. (A couple of bananas a day on a regular basis causes my allergy to flare up.) With other foods, I can build up tolerances, and avoiding a food for a while causes me to lose that tolerance. That's how my corn allergy is. When I don't have a tolerance, about six corn chips is enough to make me sick. With tolerance, I can eat an entire microwave bag of popcorn, with the only bad side effect being the normal calorie condsumption issue. I regularly have people ask me what I'm allergic to so they can cook something I can eat. The list is too long, and kind of complex (ie, I can have eggs in cake, but not as mayonnaise or merangue), so I made a web page, and listed it under "humour". You can see it here if you want. It's a bit out of date, but not too bad. Note: the allergies from the older test still hold, I just didn't bother retesting most of them. (There's a limited amount of space on my arms.)

If I could eliminate *one*... man, is that a tough question. Most of my allergies aren't too bad... they're more of an inconvenience than anything. My season allergies are a major pain, but those count as more than one, because there's a million kinds of pollen and mold I'm allergic to. I think I'd probably say sesame seeds, because that's the only thing (so far) that's tried to kill me, and I'd rather live a while longer. Plus, then I could eat in (some) Chinese restaurants again. (Those that don't use MSG.)

3. If you could have one thing from home down here with you, what would it be?

My family. If that's cheating (since my family has more than one member), I'll go with my mom. Of course, that wouldn't be terribly fair to her and Bob, but then this isn't going to happen anyway. My mom and I have always gotten each other through the tough times (there were a bunch growing up). I think I could go off my antidepressants if she were here.

4. You have to chose between one or the other for the rest of your life. Do you pick yarn or your homemade pitas??

Grrr! You're *mean*! (This must be revenge for the "inhalation" joke...) I enjoy other crafts besides crocheting, but crocheting is also what I use to keep myself awake in lectures. I bake my own pita bread, because then I have a carb for lunch that is free from sesame seed contamination. I love a fresh bagel too, but they're frequently contaminated with sesame seeds.

Well, if I found a decent source of plain bagels that were sesame-seed-contamination-free, I'd go without the pitas... maybe. I tried baking bagels... they were, um, not bagels.

5. Do you have something you wish you could tell the whole world?

I don't think so... if I did, I'd post it here on my blog. Not that they'd read it, of course! ;) Maybe I'd say "stop all this fighting", or something along those lines. ;)

Alright Natalie, here's your questions:

1. Do you believe in God, and if so, why?
2. Do you believe in Evil? If so, what is an example of evil?
3. If you knew you were going to develop an allergy, and were able to chose one thing for this allergy *not* to be, what would that be?
4. Approximately how many Sharpies do you own? ;)
5. If a fairy godmother appeared and said she would grant you one wish, what would that wish be? What if the wish had to be frivolous?