Penis theft panic hits city...

My sister wrote a blog about this article, and I had to share! It's so freakin' funny that I had to look up the article to make sure it's legit; here's the link. The last line of the article is perfect!

Penis theft panic hits city...

By Joe Bavier, Wed. Apr. 23

Police in Congo have arrested 13 suspected sorcerers accused of using black magic to steal or shrink men's penises after a wave of panic and attempted lynchings triggered by the alleged witchcraft.

Reports of so-called penis snatching are not uncommon in West Africa, where belief in traditional religions and witchcraft remains widespread, and where ritual killings to obtain blood or body parts still occur.

Rumors of penis theft began circulating last week in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo's sprawling capital of some 8 million inhabitants. They quickly dominated radio call-in shows, with listeners advised to beware of fellow passengers in communal taxis wearing gold rings.

Purported victims, 14 of whom were also detained by police, claimed that sorcerers simply touched them to make their genitals shrink or disappear, in what some residents said was an attempt to extort cash with the promise of a cure.

"You just have to be accused of that, and people come after you. We've had a number of attempted lynchings. ... You see them covered in marks after being beaten," Kinshasa's police chief, Jean-Dieudonne Oleko, told Reuters on Tuesday.

Police arrested the accused sorcerers and their victims in an effort to avoid the sort of bloodshed seen in Ghana a decade ago, when 12 suspected penis snatchers were beaten to death by angry mobs. The 27 men have since been released.

"I'm tempted to say it's one huge joke," Oleko said.

"But when you try to tell the victims that their penises are still there, they tell you that it's become tiny or that they've become impotent. To that I tell them, 'How do you know if you haven't gone home and tried it'," he said.

Some Kinshasa residents accuse a separatist sect from nearby Bas-Congo province of being behind the witchcraft in revenge for a recent government crackdown on its members.

"It's real. Just yesterday here, there was a man who was a victim. We saw. What was left was tiny," said 29-year-old Alain Kalala, who sells phone credits near a Kinshasa police station.

(Editing by Nick Tattersall and Mary Gabriel)

Maybe it's our marriage...

Last night, Tyler and I woke up around 4am-ish to our house shaking (by the way, I'm married now, I'll blog about that some other time). In a surprisingly calm and chill-lax manner, this was our following conversation:

"Hey... is this an earthquake?"
"No... couldn't be."
"How are you so sure?"
"It would be a lot stronger."
"Nu-uh! Earthquakes have different levels, you don't even feel some earthquakes."
"...Nope..."
"How do you know? Have you ever been in an earthquake?"
"... no... but I was in the movie Tremors..."
"...maybe it's our marriage..."

We both laughed, made some jokes about Kevin Bacon and our marriage being on shaky ground, and then went back to sleep. We had a 5.2 earthquake. Really not as exciting as I hoped one would be. I don't know what people from California complain about... whooses...

Nurses don't make good public speakers...

One thing that really sucks about nursing is the fact that even though I graduate with a nursing degree, it doesn't mean that I am a nurse. I first have to pass a test that was made to break the spirit and denounce your knowledge. Luckily, I passed! Two points for me! And I love my job! Two more points, and with a total of 4, I'm having a pretty good day!

But I remember a day this past semester that wasn't so good. Our professors thought it would be a great "learning experience" if we went to Nurses' Lobby Day in Jefferson City (which is couple of hours from St. L). That also happened to be the day there was that huge blizzard, and unfortunately we were already down there when it started ("fortunately" the school paid for a hotel for us, but that's a different story... nursing students are crazy...). The day consisted of getting tons of free stuff from nurse recruiters (yeah!) and sitting and listening for hours to different nurses lecture about the importance of being involved in government and different bills they were wanting passed related to nursing (nah...). But I realized something that day: nurses don't make good public speakers. What were they wanting passed? I don't remember. But I do remember two things said that day by two different speakers.
~"Everything that happens in life is controlled by the legislators; everything from what happens in your bedroom to what you put in your mouth..." I was taking a sip of water when the speaker said this, and I about spit it everywhere and died laughing! And my friend looked at me and said, "dude, did she just say that?!" Our government is a lot stronger that I thought! The speaker was trying to emphasis the importance of government on our everyday life, but I think someone should have proof-read through her lecture notes. And linking those two situations was not a wise choice; it leaves a lot open to interpretation...
~"Now don't put porn on that." A different speaker says to a student as she hands the student a 1 gig zipdrive prize for answering a question or something. This was done in front of about 500 people at this event, including some Amish people. The look on the student's face was priceless and the whole place was quiet. I, once again, lost it! It was so wrong, yet so funny!


Here are some pictures, once again, from grad. My older sis took these; they made me laugh.

Here's me saying, "See those obnoxiously loud people waving and acting like the paparazzi with the cameras? That's my family."

About to head down to get my diploma...

After I got my diploma...

Not paying attention during the ceremony now that I have my diploma...

Me, rocking out the graduation...

I finally freakin' did it!

Many of you may be wondering "what happened to Erin?" due to my lack of blogs. But no worries, I still here and I still care. I was just finishing up my last semester. After seven long years of undergrad, I am finally done. Well, with that phase, at least. I'm going back for my masters in Nursing Educations, so soon you can call me "Professor Erin". But for now, I gladly respond to "Nurse Erin". I got a job working part-time at Ranken Jordan, which is a non-profit childrens hospital in St. Louis, and I will be working with kids that have long-term problems. Also, I will "probably" be working part-time at Maryville University as a clinical assistant, educating and testing nursing students, and it pays for my masters (woo-hoo!). It's a "probably" because I have to pass boards before they can say I have the job; so keep your fingers crossed! It's kinda corny, but I get so excited telling people that I am a nurse when asked about my occupation. Hopefully I'll still feel that way years down the road!

You may be wondering, "why Erin, are those cords you are wearing?" Yep, I belong to Sigma Theta Tau, International Nursing Honor Society. I joined so I could look smart.

Opened eyes are so overrated in pictures.

Why the thumbs up? I graduated cum laude and I won the "Excellence in Nursing" award. All that butt-kissin' worked!


Here's me shaking the hand of some guy I don't know, who I guess is important to my school in some way. I could really care less, I just want my diploma and not fall like the girl in front of me did... tee-hee-hee...

easily distracted...

I decided to start my Spring cleaning early in hopes to encourage warm weather to head our way. Unfortunately, it brought an ice storm instead... sorry St. Louis, my bad... I'm quite the pack-rat, so I was rather proud of myself for throwing out/getting rid of a ton of crap that I won't need when I move (for those of you who don't know, I'm moving to Boston in September. Surprise!). The cleaning process always takes longer than it should cuz I get distracted by art books, photo albums, notes/cards from people that I love, essays that I have written, shiny things. I came across this reply to a letter a friend had sent me. The P.S. of the letter had asked the question, "How come cows don't fly?". This was my reply. I don't know where I come up with this crap. It's one of those "shake my head in disgrace" moments, but it still made me laugh. Enjoy.

Reasons why cows don't fly:
1. It would be harder to get milk due to the fact that the cows would be flying south for the winter. And we would have to resort to goat's milk or soy milk.
2. Trees and telephone wires are not that strong.
3. If cows could fly, pigs would want to fly, too. And if that happened, many unlikely things would start to happen. Example- guy asks girl, "want to go on a date?", girl replies, "yeah, when pigs fly."
4. The "cow" scene in Twister wouldn't be as funny.
5. Car and home insurance rates would increase. Think Windex commercial where the crows fly into the glass windows. Think hail damage is bad? Well, cows don't leave a simple mess that a car wash would fix...

Day of Fun at the Sculpture Park...

Kim (my lil sis), Jon (Kim's boyfriend), and I went to the sculpture park a few days ago. It was a good time; we took over 60 pictures, many are freakin' hilarious. Here are just a few pictures from our day. Enjoy.


Isn't my sis a little cutie?

Me and Kim doing our mock version of Britney Spear's perfume commercial. Sidenote: we didn't plan the whole "hand over mouth" thing; great minds just think alike. Kinda scary...

A random pole in the park... but I made use of it...

It's one of those "easier to get in than out of" situations...

I hit my head for this shot. It wasn't worth it.

Continuation of "Day of Fun at the Sculpture Park"...

There is an old proverb that says, "Keep your eyes on the sun and you will not see the shadows." It's probably cuz you go blind. Good idea, genius...

My impression of a groundhog. I did see my shadow, so that means that global warming is taking place. Isn't that how the story goes?

Me and Kim, trying to be "one" with the art.

This... is me...

We were pretending that we were getting attacked by the branches... but I was never good at pretending... looks like I'm laughing... but I tried really hard...