How to Use This Field Guide
Even a Safari Park has its hazards, and something as seemingly friendly as God spotting has its dangers. The observer need not be alarmed. Your guide found the way to the goal and I will relate the tortuous path I took to success. Prospective observers will come across many advisers providing conflicting ideas. This comprehensive guide is all you need. I will not confuse you by quoting the statements of pseudo-experts and religious organisations. The best way to learn God spotting is in the field with experienced God observers. The God Observers’ Club recommends this guide.
Before we go into the field, I need to discuss things such as, what equipment to take, exactly what we are proposing to find, identifying God, and proper etiquette to use in God's presence. As to equipment, the keen novice God spotter will want to run out and buy all kinds of things such as binoculars, maps, notebooks, “Furnace Fashions” fireproof clothing, “Pompadour Welding Helmets” auto–darkening to 15+ shade welding helmet, paranormal cameras, and overseas plane tickets. I suggest that self-restraint in these purchases will save you money and avoid embarrassment.
As I always tell my students as they leave the lecture theatre to do field work, be prepared to have fun. This may appear odd advice in this case because God spotting is often associated with a religious temperament that is tediously serious. This is the first hurdle to leap. You will find God is a joyous being and difficult to find in dull, boring or solemn places. God may well be there, as we will learn in the next chapter, but these are not ideal conditions for observation. Another reason I have not pursued a religious solution is that I am not religious by nature and cannot help you in that regard. I recommend to such readers more religious field guides, but unfortunately, I do not know of any.
I assure those students struggling to follow directions they think irreverent that my instructions are not profane, just not religious. This confuses them to a satisfactory extent to allow them to get on with their work. Besides, student protests at irreverence are an excuse to avoid work. They quite happily throw paper aeroplanes around the lecture theatre while I am trying to teach them the intricacies of how the observer can stay unobserved by the one observed. Incidentally, that module of field study does not form part of this guide due to its inapplicability to God observation.
This field guide is designed to be useful for all observers whether experienced or beginners. I remember one of my confused students, named Max Bradfield, who for all his lack of experience, lack of aptitude, and general uselessness, blundered in on God and made a glorious sighting. Max was thoroughly overcome for over an hour. One of my colleagues who lectures in comparative God observation was beside herself with hilarity at meeting the God she had taught about for years. Our task is made even more fascinating because of the extraordinary nature of the God we seek, which leads us into the next chapter.