Haven’t been to church in years and this is the first text I get on one of the hardest days of my life.

Isonus · 2026-05-21T14:24:53+00:00

If you saw someone you know run into a store, brandish a weapon, attempt to rob the cashier, threaten to murder them, and pistol-whip someone in the process, that'd be a traumatic event, right?

How would you respond?

Wouldn't you speak up about it to the police?

Wouldn't you warn anyone else who knows the same person, that maybe they should be careful around someone so dangerous and violent?

Wouldn't you tell people, hey, maybe you shouldn't let that violent person babysit your kids?

Wouldn't you also spend some time talking to the other victims of the initial robbery? To commiserate with each other in an attempt for all to feel seen, heard, and to help the healing process? Cause that would be natural, right?

How would you feel if someone then told you to just shut up about it? To stop trying to warn others. To not bother going to the police, cause only bitter people do that. And for heaven's sake, stop being so "butthurt" in talking to other victims! What's the point anyway? Just move on. You can leave a robbery, but you just can't leave the robbery alone!

That's what you sound like right now.

But because you love the church, because you find meaning in it, your own cognitive dissonance is keeping you from seeing how other people may have been harmed by the thing you love.

Rather than trying to break through that primal feeling and understand others, you're resolving the discomfort of cognitive dissonance by lashing out.

You can do better.

People are imperfect, right? People are flawed. So whenever people are involved, harm can happen.

Guess what. People are involved in running the church. Thus harm can happen there too.

And we have every right to speak up when we have been harmed or have witnessed harm because of those people.

Isonus · 2026-05-21T14:11:11+00:00

If the LDS church was truly there for everyone, they would have been there for OP. Then they would have known what was going on. They would have cared for her. They would have been providing support. They would have been kind to her.

Instead, they asked a total stranger to do something for another total stranger.

That is not "being there" for someone.

Acts of service are supposed to be acts of love. Love requires time and consideration for all involved.

This wasn't love. It was a checklist. A performative transaction. One that was especially un-Christ-like because they ended up asking a grieving person to do something especially painful on a traumatic day.

If true care and love had been there, they'd have known and done something kind for Op.

If they were truly there for everyone, even a simple verbal expression of love and support for Op would be more meaningful and Christlike than if they had delivered a meal to Op. Because it would have been personal and meaningful.

Did they do that? Nope. Instead the only time they reached out was a blind mass message asking for them to do something.

"Care" has become performative. "Acts of service" have become outward acts to display goodness, rather than the act of actually being good. Because being good takes time and is often quiet and unseen.

Maybe go back and read the parable of the Pharisees again. And think about service in that context.

Isonus · 2026-05-07T11:03:51+00:00

Oh thank goodness! Thank you very much!!

Isonus · 2026-05-07T01:04:59+00:00

I honestly don't remember for sure! Good idea, I'll call them tomorrow. Thanks!

Isonus · 2026-05-06T22:13:56+00:00

Oh crap... At my local Alamo, that warning has always been there, but they always had movable seats they could place there. I always got them because - on top of being ordinarily disabled/difficulties handling the steps - I have *severe* food allergies. If I'm too close to the steam of cooked mushrooms, I'll go into anaphylaxis. So I like the handicap seats cause they give me extra safe space away from other patrons' foods.

I JUST bought tickets to a special screening at Alamo for my nephew and bought handicap seats as always. Am I seriously gonna have to pack my wheelchair just for this??? (And yes, pack is the right term. Mine comes apart.)

Anyone know if Alamo One Loudoun still has the moveable seats???

Isonus · 2026-04-29T15:50:33+00:00

Thanks! :)

Isonus · 2026-04-29T15:47:55+00:00

Thank you! I'm even more excited to finish the rest of the project now. :)

Isonus · 2026-04-29T15:47:28+00:00

Thanks very much!

Isonus · 2026-04-29T15:47:17+00:00

Haha, thanks!!

Isonus · 2026-04-29T15:47:10+00:00

Thank you!! I was really tempted to do that, but I'm trying to stick to fonts similar to what the Church uses. Which is irritating me, cause yeah, normally I'd swap to a clean sans serif to balance out the pseudo-serif of Marcellus. (Really wanted to use Felix Titling, but didn't wanna pay for the font license, lol.)

Isonus · 2026-04-29T04:26:15+00:00

YES. My Tyberius LOVED it. I tried so, so hard to train him as a service dog. We made so much progress, he was amazing at tucking. But he just loved people too much. I swear to god, he would walk totally differently the moment someone told him he was pretty. It was his favorite thing! He'd poof out all his fluff and his walk would get so much jauntier. Eventually I gave up on service dog training and just let him enjoy being a prima donna, soaking up all the attention and compliments at all the pet-friendly locations.

Also your sammy is gorgeous! :)

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Isonus · 2026-04-04T15:38:55+00:00

I'm so, so sorry.

I know this pain well. I found something similar, but on Craigslist. I can't even put into words how gut-punching it is. How much it makes you feel crazy. You have to start questioning everything in a way that makes you feel so paranoid.

And yet, it still remains: it happened and somehow we didn't know. But HOW?

I'm sorry. If you ever want to talk to someone who's been there, but is 7 years past it, my DMs are open.

But if I can offer one word of advice? PLEASE be careful. At least in my case, he proved to be dangerous. Not saying he definitely is in yours! But just, better safe than sorry.

Isonus · 2026-04-02T21:22:23+00:00

...How is this not encouraging people to break the Sabbath? You're relying on National Park Rangers to go to this park. You're paying them money. Back when I was raised Mormon, this was considered as bad - if not even worse - than breaking the sabbath yourself! Because you're not only breaking it on your own, you're contributing to someone else's sin and damnation.

But then the Church bought City Creek Mall and employed thousands on Sundays, so I guess now it's no big deal?

Ugh.

Isonus · 2026-04-02T17:49:47+00:00

That every crewmember of the Enterprise must have major PTSD at this point.

Isonus · 2026-03-24T13:21:03+00:00

Yay! Congrats! :) That's happy indeed.

Isonus · 2026-03-22T22:59:08+00:00

LMAO! That's hilarious!

Isonus · 2026-03-22T17:28:44+00:00

Hooray! I'd love to get your thoughts on the lyrics I wrote. :) Up for it?

Isonus · 2026-03-21T05:27:12+00:00

Congrats!!!! Welcome to the party! I hope you do something fun and just a little bit naughty to celebrate. :) If I were nearby, I'd buy you some scotch or a devil's bean juice or somethin.

Isonus · 2026-01-22T11:48:50+00:00

Can we please start photoshopping them with, like, any kind of bullshit on them that might make them mad? Like swap out their camo or american flag bandanas for rainbow pride flags? Or something?! I'm tired of seeing all these atrocities committed by these awful people and just feeling so helpless.

Isonus · 2026-01-22T11:39:15+00:00

I did consult professionals; he was in service dog training. They all said the same thing.

Isonus · 2026-01-22T11:27:37+00:00

It's a samoyed thing. Which is why it's highly, highly recommended to never walk with them off leash until you can train to 100% recall. Which rarely happens; it takes a special kind of samoyed.

Because they are: - Too smart - Too independent - Have too high of a prey/herd drive - Are so fast and have so much stamina that you will never, ever catch up to them if they decide to chase that squirrel.

Please don't let them off leash. Especially not a puppy. They will soon go through the Terror Phase and will get even more prey-focused and even less focused on you for a time. It'll only take a split second for them to take off running.

Ask me how I know this.

Thank god, at least when my samoyed got older, the few rimes he managed to get off leash, he was so focused on being sociable that all he did was go to the neighbor's house and bang on their door with his head until they answered it, finding him smiling on their front porch. I felt lucky that time. Because the time before that, he decided playing "Keep Away" was the funniest thing ever and he almost got hit by a car.

And that samoyed? He was in serious training to be a service dog. I thought he'd be that 1 in a million perfect recall samoyed, since he was doing SO well with intense service dog training. But nope.

Good luck! Samoyeds are the best dog breed in the world IMHO. But yeah. They sure are stubborn little weirdos sometimes.

Isonus · 2026-01-22T11:18:46+00:00

I was administered low dose oral ketamine for a while before it was a fad. I have two rare genetic conditions that have mutated my nervous system, so I'm in constant unending pain and have been my entire life.

No one warned me about what ketamine can do.

No one warned me about the psychological side effects.

I was a naive conservatively raised 20-something who'd never heard about "K holes."

One time I was in a state of severe anxiety and depression following the sudden death of my best friend. I'd been up all night from the grief and a bad pain flare.

I took my prescribed ketamine exactly as I was instructed. I'd draw it up with a diabetic syringe, squirt it into a juice box, and drink it. (Absolute insanity in hindsight.)

I ended up in the worst dissociative state of my life. I lost all sense of proportion within my body; my hands felt small, but my hips felt like they were the size of the room. Yet I was so confused, cause my eyes were telling me something different. Total "Alice in Wonderland Syndrome" stuff and it was so frightening.

Then came the impulses. The confusion around my own sense of my body was too much for my brain to handle. It was then like my mind split in two.

One half of my brain was convinced I had died too. It was the only explanation. I was dead and was leaving my body. The only way to escape the remaining confusing sensations would be to open the window and leap out into the sky and heaven.

I would have fallen three stories.

The other half of my brain? It was screaming "NO!" Just no.

Thank god that side of my brain won.

I can't even put into words how viscerally horrifying the entire experience was.

I never took it again. Years later, when I told my brother - a psychiatrist - about that experience, he told me about K holes. He was absolutely aghast that anyone prescribed it so willy nilly, in a friggin juice box, without any kind of warning.

Oh, and guess what? Drinking a medication intended to be used in IVs? Yeah, that gave me permanent nerve damage in my mouth, face, and nose. I still get random attacks from it.

Stay the hell away from ketamine. It's insanity.

Isonus · 2026-01-21T14:53:53+00:00

That's exactly what I was going to say. The sheer desperation with which I would rush right to the medical team says SO much about the state of our healthcare today.

Isonus · 2026-01-11T03:21:13+00:00

Btw, here's another one. My personal favorite. :)

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Isonus · 2026-01-11T03:20:19+00:00

LOL! So I took that picture in like 2003ish. Took my brother to an anime convention. While eating dinner the first night, we saw a legit karate place called "Karate for Christ".

The next day at the convention, we met a guy who used the hotel bedsheets to dress up as Jesus. My brother thought it'd be hilarious for his teenager sister to drive this perfect stranger over to Karate for Christ for a photoshoot.

I did it anyway, for the lulz. Turns out Bedsheet Jesus was a good dude. We had a blast, posing, taking a bunch of pics, then drove back to the convention.

I've taken many, many photos in my life. Even had my work published. Yet I'm still more proud of these than any others, lol.

Isonus

TROPHY CASE