The Contemplative Life - Update

I wanted to jot down a few notes on how my experiment in hesychasm is going. In a relatively short period of time I have found that the daily meditation has really helped me make the scripture (Psalm 51:10) my "own" prayer. There have been a few times that its words have popped into my mind when I've had to make a choice. For instance, I held my tongue during a conversation when it would have been so easy to criticize. And anything that can get me to keep my mouth shut for awhile must be a good thing!

I use a set of prayer beads that I made last year, slowly repeating the prayer as I move my fingers to the next bead. I keep my eyes closed. Some days I'm more focused than others, but then again, I bet Saint John of the Ladder didn't ever have the cell phone in his pocket go off when he was praying. But in general I experience very little distraction when I meditate, and what I do have settles down quickly.

I guess my biggest challenge right now is being consistent as I have missed a few days entirely. It's not easy to make the time as I hold down the fort while Lamont is away at the National Youthworkers Convention in Pittsburgh. I'll have to give her a pay raise when she gets back.

I'm leaving tomorrow morning for the justCommunity conference in Allentown, PA. I'm really looking forward to the workshops and hearing Dr. Peter L. Benson of The Search Institute speak. I'm also interested to see the effect the change of pace has on my practice of meditation.

Ask an Expert

Man, am I bushed today! Last night I was awoken about 2 am with a loud beeping sound. That got me up fast! A quick investigation around Experiment House revealed that the source wasn't my obvious guess -- smoke detector -- but our ancient electric range stovetop. My daughter, H--, had made dinner earlier in the evening and must have been playing with the timer. So I did all the obvious things to try and stop the beeping. A scan of the stovetop revealed that there were only four buttons associated with the timer: hour, minute, timer and clock. So how hard could this be?

I pressed the timer button. BEEP -- BEEP -- BEEP...

I pressed the clock button. BEEP -- BEEP -- BEEP...

I held down the timer button. BEEP -- BEEP -- BEEP...

I held down the clock button. BEEP -- BEEP -- BEEP...

I set the timer to 0:00. BEEP -- BEEP -- BEEP...

Getting desperate, I pressed every combination of the buttons imaginable. BEEP -- BEEP -- BEEP...

It was now 3 am. I decided a change in strategy was in order. I went to the world wide web and looked up the Frigidaire website. (Am I the only person who thinks it's weird to have a stove by Frigidaire?) Great -- you could download manuals. Not so great -- you had to type the model number into the search box.

BEEP -- BEEP -- BEEP...

So I go into the kitchen to get the model number off my stove. There's not one in the front. So I move the beast away from the wall, and wipe the cobwebs and grease away to get a better look. I'm screwed because there's no model number on the back, either.

BEEP -- BEEP -- BEEP...

I head back to my iBook and enter some random numbers in the search box. I do find some ranges, but they are newer and different models. By now it's 4 am.

BEEP -- BEEP -- BEEP...

I consider calling Lamont, who is at the National Youthworkers Convention in Pittsburgh, and decide against it.

BEEP -- BEEP -- BEEP...

I go back and repeat step one (pressing buttons at random) for awhile.

BEEP -- BEEP -- BEEP...

At 4:30 am I wake up my twelve-year old daughter and order her to the kitchen. Still 3/4 asleep, she shuffles into the kitchen and immediately shuts off the timer. She does it so quickly that I don't even see what she did.

Blessed silence.

Laundry, Driving Directions, and A Long Drive

Getting ready for the trip is the hardest part of going away. It gets harder after you are married and have kids... the family needs a little more caring for than a cat. Fill the fridge... o the laundry... send all the notes to the teachers... line up sitters... PRINT YOUR DRIVING DIRECTIONS... and try to get a good night's sleep. HA! It's 2:45am and the washer is still going strong.

But then I think for a minute... I'm getting away for 5 DAYS! I can drink coffee while I'm driving and chat on the cell with my best friend who moved to DC. I get to sit and listen - reflect and absorb -- and bring it all home. To share my 5 days with my family, friends and church folks. This trip may never end! In encouragement and enrichment anyway.

Go ahead and sleep - my holiday is just beginning...

The Contemplative Life

Lamont and I have been hosting a monthly spiritual formation group at Experiment House. Last Saturday night was the second session. We talked about the prayer-filled life and discussed many different traditions in the life of Christ and church history. At the end of the evening we all picked a different exercise to practice over the next month. I chose the hesychastic tradition, which means I'm going to pray the same prayer for fifteen minutes every day. I'm using Psalm 51:10: "Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me." The purpose isn't to create a chant or anything -- it's to really allow oneself to live within the prayer, to experience Christ in the words. I'll let you know how it goes.

Feeling Blue

I'm feeling so blue tonight. My Uncle Bud passed away in his sleep late Saturday night and I learned about it late last night. Uncle Bud was the Uncle with twinkling blue eyes, the comfortable lived -in house I always felt at home in, married to artsy Aunt Dolly (she spray painted a mural of Arizona on the inside of her pool privacy wall, let me ride horses from her barn, and took care of me when my sister was dying.), and Bud always told me how beautiful I was. I'll miss him so much. Those times spent at this house were some of my fondest childhood memories.

There is no money for a funeral - so he's being cremated and the memorial isn't scheduled yet.

Uncle Bud, thanks for taking me out for my first fried ice-cream.

Read This

I have had this book on my shelf for a long time and had forgotten about ir till' my husband started reading it a while ago. If you hven't read it you should, it's called "The Search for Signifigance". Maybe it's where I'm at right now, but the whole idea of having my life centered on God's grace and not my striving, fretting and desire to be "perfect" - really hits home with me. Consider picking it up - you'll want you own copy as you'll need space to write in the journal and quiz parts provided. They also mke a journal I picked up too - but you'll want to read the book first.

Sabbath Day

It is wonderful to have a day off to read, sleep, go grocery shopping, and get a haircut. I've need a day like today for a while - with no schedule or appointments. Days like today are what I like to call my "Sabbath Days".

Later this week I'm going to a conference for work and I'm excited to go and be around all those people and see some new things - but that time wouldn't seem so good without today.

Thank you God for Sabbath Days.

Thank You. Period.

Saint Paul instructed the Roman Christians to "...not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you."

So how do you take a compliment? Do you quickly blurt out a quick it was no big deal to get the attention off yourself? Or do you keep milking the moment until you're the only one left applauding? I'm teaching my kids right now how to humbly accept a compliment. Usually saying thank you is a graceful enough response. It allows one to feel good about a job well done without becoming prideful.

As I have discovered with most of my parent-to-child imparted wisdom, I should heed the advice myself. When complimented I still alternate between getting red faced or feeling the need to point out every minute effort that it took to complete the good job. Although they seem like polar-opposite responses I think they're both rooted in poor self-worth.

Think about it. Isn't downplaying a compliment really saying that I'm not worthy of it? Similarly, fishing around for additional compliments indicates a definite lack of self-worth. I hope that someday I will be able to strike the healthy balance that gets missed between these two unhealthy extremes.

Welcome to the Family

Today was the day that myself, Lamont and our daughter transferred our memberships into our "new" church. (That's kind of a joke because we've been attending there for nearly a year.) So did seven of our friends. I'm not really big on ceremony or anything, but it really occurred to me today as I stood there in the chapel that I'm really happy to be part of this group. Even more so, I feel like I belong someone for the first time in a long time.

Night Stalker

I caught the last third of ABC's remake of The Night Stalker last night. Wasn't impressed. This show has little to nothing in common with the original series. Kolchak isn't a lovable loser anymore -- he's more like Fox Mulder if he was an underwear model. He's also not a loner anymore -- he's acquired his very own Scooby Gang. I can't imagine how the producers thought this reimagining was going to work. At least there's one benefit to this new show -- it got the original classic series released on DVD!

September 29, 2005

Delightful
Breathe in crisp September air
Squint to see a light fragile shower --
Put on a comfortable sweater
Autumn

Fan-buechner-tastic

I just finished off the great book Son of Laughter last weekend. But my hunger for reading Buechner is unabated. So I dug into Brendan. I'm just a few chapters in and am already thinking this may turn out to be even better than Godric. Every sentence is so vivid and descriptive; every paragraph a mini-masterpiece. How does he do it?

P.S. If you're unfamiliar with this Buechner fellow I gad on about from time to time, go get indoctrinated at The Church of Holy Love, Inc.

Van Helsing

Okay... So I finally watched Van Helsing yesterday... Everybody already knows by now that this film pretty much sucked, so there's no point in my writing a review. Let me just make one point about the film that should have been obvious to the filmmakers from day one: If you're making a movie with Frankenstein, Dracula, the Wolfman, and Mr. Hyde it should be a horror film, not an action adventure epic. If you can't get that fundamental part right, nothing else much is going to work for the film, either. A wasted opportunity from Universal -- the company that created the horror film in the 1930s.

P.S. Who was the sleepwalker they got to play Dracula? I've seen scarier vampires in Count Chockula commercials!

Day off

Today is the first day off I've had by myself in a quiet house forever. All summer was spent running to and fro from camp, so there was little quiet there. The last few weeks at work have been hectic with short staffing and doing jobs I don't normally do. I realise that I've become so accoustmed to running that I'm not quite sure what to do when I'm not. Except sleep. I've been ill for the last week so I'm sure I need it. It's just that there are so many things screaming for my attention in this quiet house - that I feel more behind here than anywhere. This kind of time is so precious and small, that I hate to spend it sleeping/resting even when I need to. Whoever thought a quiet day at home could seem so loud.

My Million Dollar Idea of the Day

Picture this: Pizza Hut -- open for breakfast. The menu? Cold pizza. How could this miss?

Boogie Nights

Is it just me, or would the movie Boogie Nights been better titled The Next Big Thing?

The Sardonic Plague

"Abandon hope, all ye who enter here." For the plague has come to Experiment House.

Well, not so much of a plague really, but more like a flu. Actually, not so much a flu as a mild biological irritant. Think "The Caffeine-Free Flu", "The Flu Lite" or even "Flu Zero".

THE FLU has one barfing into a toilet at 3 am.
THE FLU LITE just leaves one mildly nauseated all the time.

THE FLU knocks you off your butt for a day or two.
THE FLU LITE just leaves one feeling slightly draggy all friggin' week, but not enough to call in sick or lay in bed.

THE FLU sets your ears, nose and throat on fire.
THE FLU LITE just gives you a little ache in the throat every time you swallow.

THE FLU gets you sympathy from friends and family alike.
THE FLU LITE gets you diddly squat, but keeps you in a constant state of irritation.

So everyone at Experiment House is sick right now, but not in a "singing the choir invisibule" sort of way. More like a "stuck in the dentist chair listening to the Starland Vocal Band" sort of way.

P.S. Plus J.D. won on Rock Star INXS and that hasn't helped our spirits, either.

Air

Air

I've been away too long.
It's like I need to breathe fresh air into this post so that it can live again.
Do I have the air?
Do I have the time?
Can I mix the right amount to make just enough rhythm and not too much rhyme?

I've been away too long.
I've missed this too much.
I'll take a nap, read a book and see what I can eat for lunch.

Then I might have enough breath,
to share them and bring life to these words.

Maybe if my feet don't shuffle too much
and I don't chew my gum to loud,
I could hold an audience and not scare away the crowd.

Crowd in close, don't let it escape.
The air, the words and whats on my chipped plate.

Lamont's dream

I had a weird dream this week that our family had moved into this huge house that never seemed to end. Only the property was plunked down in the middle of a brownstone development. All the neighbors had this huge housewarming party where they brought their favorite foods to share as well as gifts for me and my family. The whole dream had this "carnival' feel to it except I really was not into the whole experience - because people were bringing me things I diddn't want. Like week old lazagana, dead gold fish in a cruddy bowl, and a bunk bed set with torn up mattresses. I was freaking out as the stuff continued to pile higher and higher.
I tried to escape outside, only to find my Pastor setting up in the yard with a huge amout of sound equipment gearing up to do an outdoor church/welcome service.
What?
I was getting soaked by the sloshing water inside of the deceased goldfish inhabited glass dome, as I climbed up a spiral staircase that led to a high spanish style patio... and I woke up.


Let me know if you have any ideas about this one. I don't have a clue.

6 Reasons Why Friday Was Cool

WHY FRIDAY WAS COOL:

1.I was able to help a little with this whole Katrina stuff today at work by answering phones and giving folks info on how they could help the problems down in the gulf.
2. I gave sombody advice on how to further thier education and they took the info decided on a program.
3. I got to play with a 17 moth old baby that had no limit to laughs and energy.
4. I got to visit my friends at the WASU.
5. I had youth group and almost all new students attended.
6. I witnessed a miricle today and a prayer was answered.

I guess that makes any day great, especially a Friday!

Wittenburg Door #201

I just received the good news that my humor piece, Dr. Philemon, is going to appear in issue 201 of The Wittenburg Door. It comes out in September. The satire imagines that the Philemon of the New Testament book is actually one Dr. Philemon, a self-help guru who feels the need to complicate St. Paul's plea for simple forgiveness.

In case you've never heard of it, The Wittenburg Door is "the world's pretty much only religious satire magazine." It has been delighting and/or horrifying readers since 1971. You can find subscription info by clicking here. The magazine also publishes a free biweekly newsletter that you can sign up for here.

Badsterpiece Theatre

Bad movies seem to be coming back into vogue: Entertainment Weekly recently ran an article on the almost 40 year-old Manos, The Hands of Fate; Showgirls is out on a special collectors edition DVD; The MST3K gang -- er -- The Film Crew is hosting movies on Encore; and even my little hamlet of Jamestown, New York is screening Barbarella (!) in a few weeks as part of a cult film festival. At this rate I fully expect that the Medved Brothers are going to receive a congressional medal of honor or something.

I just saw a movie that has to be one of the worst movies ever. It's not one of those so-bad-it's-good movies I endlessly prattle on about, but one of those so-bad-it's-bad flicks.

So bad as in "I'd rather watch any incomprehensible dubbed horror flick on a Wizard VHS."


So bad as in "I'd rather sit tight for an entire Full House marathon."


So bad as in "I'd rather study Ice Pirates starring Robert Urich frame-by-frame."

This ninety minute nightmare masquerading as a children's movie was called The Adventures of Shark Boy and Lava Girl in 3-D. It was made by Robert Rodriguez, who I really admire. He made the Spy Kids series of films which I think are fantastic. Shark Boy and Lava Girl is technically awesome but falls completely flat in every other area. The story is incomprehensible. The acting is atrocious. I would go into more detail, but frankly I'm trying to block this film from my psyche.

The Adventures of Shark Boy and Lava Girl in 3-D = RUN FOR YOUR LIFE!!!

Eleven Good Things About This Weekend

On Friday morning I got up to discover that some sad individual had smashed in the window on our minivan. It comes at a time when we really can't afford any additional expenses, but I was determined to not let some anonymous vagabond spoil my weekend. And he/she didn't. In fact, here are 11 good things about this weekend:

• Volunteering at my church's concession stand at the Warren County Fair. The Salvation Army crew put the fun in funnelcakes.
  
• Catching a 20+ year-old rerun of Saturday Night Live completely by chance that had Joel Hodgson as a guest.
  
• The roast beef, mashed potato and gravy dinner that the Pomona Grange was selling at the fair.
  
• Hearing from an old friend on Yahoo Messenger.
  
• Our church picnic at Chapman Dam that found everyone in a great mood.
  
• My brother getting released from the hospital.
  
• An extremely productive day at work.
  
• Taking a walk in the great outdoors.
  
• Lemonade on a hot day.
  
• Non-scented soap.
  
• Driving home at 11 pm to the sounds of the Kinks' Village Green Preservation Society CD.

I.F.'s Weird Dream of the Week

I was the Pastor of Spiritual Formation at a church, but I was really old. My hair and beard were a lot longer than they are now and had gone all white, too. I was wearing a comfortable Harris Tweed suit w/vest and a nifty bow tie. I was also wearing a scarf. Think Gandalf meets Oxford professor from the 1950s. Anyhow, I also had this cool wooden cane/scepter. I would point it at people and shout (in the nicest way) GLORIEAL! This would be accompinied by a quick flash of lightening and the loudest thunderclap ever. But no one was hurt -- on the contrary, they were all rather blissed out afterwards. It was obviously a very good thing!

GLORIEAL!

Where's Chris Hardwick now?

What's up with the WB49 News at Ten? Every time I watch the show there's a different anchor and reporters. Last night's anchor was a Jenny McCarthy lookalike to the point of being distracting: it was a pretty heavy news night but I kept expecting her to pull a funny face or grab her boobs or something...

Someone call Guinness!

I think this may be my laziest Saturday of all time. My day began when Lamont came upstairs to see if I were still alive, because it was 1:30 pm. I came downstairs and ate a leftover hamburger for breakfast while I looked at the super cool Kiddie Matinee website for what seemed like forever. And now I'm posting to Blogger, wearing a bathrobe and not much else.

Life is good.

Review: Doctor Who Season One

The residents of Experiment House were some of the lucky few in the USA privileged to watch the new series of Doctor Who. The science fiction show airs practically everywhere else in the world -- including South Korea, for Pete's sake -- but due to the apathy of American broadcasters, not in the land of the free and the home of the brave.

How did we acquire our copies of the program? Well, every Saturday evening between March and June we would hear a wheezing, groaning sound coming from the back yard of Experiment House. By the time we would get out there to investigate, the source of the noise (whatever it was) would be gone. But we'd find a DVD of that week's episode and a jelly baby sitting on the steps. I bet you have stuff like that happen to you all the time.

I've been a Doctor Who fan since I first watched it on WOR-TV back when I was a fifth grader in 1978. I've read the books. I own the DVDs. I even have a complete run of the American comic book that Marvel put out in the mid 80s. I just say that so you have some perspective on my fan geekiness -- even though the program had long since disappeared from television (and the public consciousness) it was still something I very much enjoyed.

The wait for the new series was almost unbearable. But strangely, when I received the premiere episode, Rose, I was almost afraid to watch it! I remember thinking, what if it sucks? In other words, what if the BBC took something I have dearly loved for almost thirty years and bungled it up? (Think The Phantom Menace...)

I was pleased to discover that the new series was a worthy successor to the original series. The story telling was much more mature, the special effects were great, and Christopher Eccleston and Billie Piper made engaging leads. Experiment House is a busy place, but for 45 minutes every weekend everybody stopped to see what The Doctor and Rose were up to this week. What follows is my ranking of the first season by order of preference:

#1. The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances
It always amazed me that the classic series never did a story set during the London blitz. Writer Steven Moffat corrected that omission in his two-parter and proved what a great backdrop it made for an exciting story. This was the highlight of the whole season for me, with the perfect balance of horror and humor, action and character development. I'm afraid of the bombs, Mummy became the catchphrase of the my son for weeks after. I'm so happy to hear that Steven Moffat is writing a story for season two!

#2. Father's Day
The new series continually pushed the boundaries of what constituted a Doctor Who story. Perhaps no single episode illustrates this so much as Father's Day. I can't imagine anything like this being attempted in the classic series. A show that was equal parts Twilight Zone and X-Files, Rose goes back in time and saves her dad from dying, only later to discover the disastrous consequences to her actions. Milking the tearjerker ending for all it's worth, Billie Piper steals the show.

#3. Rose
Rose, the episode that (re)started it all, has been criticized by some fans as rushing to a quick climax. (If I had a dime for everytime a woman criticized me with the exact same words, too -- bada-bing!) Some people don't seem to comprehend that Rose wasn't really about an Auton invasion at all. That was just the backdrop to the real agenda: introducing a new generation to The Doctor's world through the eyes of an average person. Take for instance the careful buildup to revealing the interior of the TARDIS, rather than just the "it's bigger on the inside than the outside" speech that sufficed in the classic series. In the weeks leading up to the premiere I wasn't sold on the leather jacket wearing Doctor, but I found that I "bought" Christopher Eccelston's performance from the second he appeared on screen and never gave a second thought to what he was wearing. A splendid premiere.

#4. Dalek
Everyone knows that The Daleks are baddies numero uno, but as an American who missed the Dalekmania of the sixties I could never quite comprehend what the big fuss was all about. Writer Robert Shearman showed me by demonstrating the horrifying destructive force of just one solitary Dalek in this "base under siege" story. I have to confess that I'll never look at the villains quite the same way. And when a whole army of Daleks appear at season end, I didn't need The Doctor to tell me that this was very bad news indeed.

#5. Bad Wolf/The Parting of the Ways
I'll admit it -- we Doctor Who fans are even bigger geeks than Trekkies. So you can imagine how I loved every second of the final two-parter of the season. The Daleks, with their menace recently reasserted, drew more from their TV21 comic strip version than anything ever seen on the TV show. From the spoof of reality TV to the Dalek massacre on Game Station, everything seemed designed to allow fans to get their "geek on." Christopher Eccleston, we hardly knew ye!

#6. Aliens of London/World War Three
Series One excelled at making The Doctor's universe more "real." This two-parter was the one that finally showed the aftermath left in the wake of a person disappearing off the face of the earth with The Doctor. It's not pretty. The "proper" adventure concerned farting aliens, a spacecraft clipping Ben Ben, and a cameo by A Pig In Space. This is the one that had my son saying BEST EPISODE EVER and if I were eight, I would have agreed.

#7. The End of the World
Following on directly from the premiere episode, The End of the World has many wonderful moments: Rose having a borderline freak out by being surrounded by so many aliens, hints about The Doctor's past, and how The Doctor and Rose console each other at the end. This episode demonstrated to me just how different this new series was going to be in its storytelling: The Doctor and his compainion weren't superheroes -- they were real people.

#8. Boomtown
A Slitheen returns in this lighthearted romp. Was I dreaming or did The Doctor and company really gadabout like the cast of Buffy, The Vampire Slayer?

#9. The Unquiet Dead
This tale of the walking dead in eighteenth century Cardiff was enjoyable enough, but nowhere near the classic that many fans make it out to be. It seemed like an attempt to recapture the gothic episodes of the 1970s, but the fast-paced action seemed out of step with the atmosphere. (Lamont and my daughter disagree with this review citing The Unquiet Dead as one of their favorite episode of the season.)

#10. The Long Game
This was my least favorite story of the season, despite the fun of seeing Simon Pegg as a guest star. Oddly enough, The Long Game was really all I was expecting from the new series: The Doctor lands at wherever, finds some injustice, sets it all right and leaves. The Long Game isn't bad by any means -- it just suffered from being stuck in amongst so many other gems that it just came off as a pedestrian runaround.

The first season of Doctor Who far exceeded my expectations. Despite my ranking of preferences, I can honestly say that there wasn't an episode I didn't enjoy in some way. I can't wait to see what the production team has planned for season two!

Pax Somnium

I had the most wonderful dream last evening. My family and I were having a traditional picnic -- basket, blanket and everything -- on my mom's property a little ways from her home. As we were setting up, Lamont remarked how wonderful it was that there would be no more terrorism or wars or bombs because everyone in the world had simply agreed that it made no real sense in the end. All the weapons had been dismantled. As I sat there eating my cold chicken, reflecting on the world, it occurred to me that I was different too -- I had let go of the anger and hurt and resentments towards other people I had been carrying around. I felt an overwhelming sense of peace and realized that everyone else in the world was feeling it too.

Fangs For The Memories, AIP

I love my new job. One of the advantages of working closer to home is that I feel so much more connected to the people around me. I reckon in the last two weeks I've seen more people socially than in two months at my previous job. I was even able to hook up with misteroblivious for a combination picnic and DVD/CD swap last weekend.

I lent him copies of Manos - The Hands of Fate, the Star Wars trilogy, and my Tomorrow People boxed set. I fully expect to at least see a review of Manos on the blog sometime soon. I ended up with the ELO boxed set and Bryan Ferry's Taxi. Plus, misterobvious was finished with my Midnite Movies double feature of Count Yorga, Vampire and The Return of Count Yorga.

With Lamont traveling to George Romero country to retrive children from summer camp, I spent my evening down at my mom's house. Steak dinner, swimming at the pool, nap and movie... It really doesn't get any better than that. My mom had requested that I bring along a movie to screen on her gigantic Phillips widescreen television. We had recently exhausted all the Hammer horror classics, so for a change of pace I brought along The Return of Count Yorga.

As a horror film fan, my adoration of the genre really runs towards the aforementioned Hammer films and Roger Corman's Poe series. But there's something about American-International Pictures of the early seventies that really fascinates me. No one will claim that the seventies found AIP at the top of its game. So maybe it's nostalgia that fuels my interest -- I remember catching a lot of them on TV back in elementary school, or maybe it's just knowing that these movies were the last gasp of fangs and castles before the genre was taken over by demon possession and mad slashers.

Take the Return of Count Yorga for instance. The acting, cinematography and makeup really aren't that great, but somehow the film hangs together as an experience much more than the sum of its individual parts. Scenes of Robert Quarry in pancake makeup running in slow motion should induce laughter -- instead, it's terrifying. The vampire brides attack on a family during a wind storm is particularly unsettling, even if it looks like their fake fangs are going to slip out of their mouths at any moment.

It was dark by the time the movie had finished and we all thought we could faintly hear the Santa Ana winds...

Like most AIP films of the era, The Return of Count Yorga is just plain fun, and isn't that what watching movies is all about?

That's Easy For You To Say

REDNECK:
ah was tryin' t'do some freelance writin' today, but ah developed a splittin' haidache. ah thunk thet perhaps ah c'd write a bit on th' blog an' thet might git th' creative a six packs flowin'. Alas, no luck. Shet mah mouth! So ah jest said, "th' heck wif it," an' came acrost this hyar right fine website which translates o'dinary text into diffrunt dialecks.

HACKER:
"i was tryuing to do some rfeelAnc ewriting troday,, but i drevelopde a splityingh Eadache i Thought that perhaps i could writ3 a bbit on the lbfg andthat m1ht fget tyeh creative juices fl0\/\/ing.. ALAZ,N OP LUXR0!!!!!!11~~ so i jusT saiD, 'Teh heX0r with 1t," and cam3 acorsz thia 733y wbes1re which transl8s oirdinary text into diufferent dialecs... LOLOLOLOLOLOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!11~"

JIVE:
I wuz tryin' t'do some freelance writin' today, but ah' developed some splittin' haidache. ah' dought dat puh'haps ah' could scribble some bit on de blog and dat might dig de creative juices flowin'. Alas, no luck. Ya' know? So's I plum said, "de heck wid it," and came across dis waaay coo' website which translates o'dinary text into different dialects.

ORIGINAL POSTING:
I was trying to do some freelance writing today, but I developed a splitting headache. I thought that perhaps I could write a bit on the blog and that might get the creative juices flowing. Alas, no luck. So I just said, "the heck with it," and came across this cool website which translates ordinary text into different dialects.

Surf on over to THE DIALECTIZER and check it out!

Quote of the Week: Kindness

"If you want to be holy, be kind." -- Frederick Buechner

Table Fellowship

Lamont and I went to a cookout last night with twenty of our friends from church. It was nice to spend some time with them with no other agenda than just "hanging out." Today we're doing a fundraiser dinner at church and Lamont went for extra credit for buying tickets for my extended family. It must be the weekend for eating and talking.

It's got me thinking... I think there would be fewer problems in the world if more people ate together. People may disagree about finances, lifestyles, politics, but pretty much everyone can agree that chicken tastes delicious and that pecan pie is a good idea.

Maybe fast food isn't just physical malnourishment, but spiritually and emotionally debilitating as well.

Read the Gospels and notice how many events (and miracles) take place around food. For instance, what churches now call communion started as a Passover dinner that Jesus threw for his friends in a rented banquet room. The first miracle took place during a wedding reception, for Pete's sake.

Start world peace -- invite someone over for dinner tonight!

The Name Game

Celebrities do some pretty strange things, from mouth-kissing Larry King on TV to wearing a swan costume at an awards presentation. And don't even get me started on Michael Jackson. But I still find it hard to believe that famous people are giving their babies such whacked-out names as Banjo, Apple and Moxie CrimeFighter. My pet theory? That celebrities publicize these bogus crazy names so their offspring can be protected from stalkers and other people that would otherwise invade their privacy...

But what do I know. My parents named me I.F.!!!

Beam Me Up, Scotty

It's 4th of July week and it seems like everyone is on vacation -- even celebrities. I tuned into Larry King Live tonight and the subject was:

UFO's -- REAL OR FAKE?

I guess in lieu of celebrities or actual news makers Larry had to slip into Art Bell territory. Maybe he'll interview Sasquatch tomorrow.

Mood Music

I commute. A long way. I've spent the last seven months or so listening to just about every Book on CD that the Prendergast Library has had to offer. But summer is here and it's just not the same cruising down the highways and byways of Western New York with The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People blaring out of my speakers.

It's time for music.

Here's my top five picks for music that never fails to put me in a good mood:

1. Delirious - King of Fools
2. The Kinks - Village Green Preservation Society
3. The Soundtrack to Rushmore
4. Roxy Music - Avalon
5. "Pretty much anything by The Beatles"

So what music makes your commute go nicer? Leave a comment and let me know.

Welcome to the 21st Century

From the perspective of being a child growing up in the seventies, I have to say that the 21st century sucks. Moon Bases and Jet Packs my butt! So I got myself a cell phone yesterday because it was the most futuristic thing I could think of. I feel the world owes me.

SWITCH

SWITCH

Last night I thought my head would explode-
but sleep and excedrin seemed to break it's tight hold.
Feel my relief.
SWITCH

Morning light, blurry dirfting sleep-
to day running like mad.
Feel my heart beat.
SWITCH

Eating and drinking as the rains' pouring down-
then sweating in the sun with my sunglasses on.
Feel my skin warm.
SWITCH

Walking into a hall, everyones' standing at the side -
stepping onto the center, people gather close by.
Feel my deep sigh.
SWITCH

Today I might think things are loss or in vain -
but tomarrow they could become new yet again.
Some things I can change and others cannot -
taking a step to flip them is better than not.
Hear my reply.
SWITCH

Rainy Day

A Friend of ours tragically lost his little niece yesterday. Our thoughts and prayers are with you.


I wish it were sunny today -
then maybe the news on the front page wouldn't seem so sad.
I wish it were sunny today -
then the light coming in my window might chase away the sad.
I wish it were sunny today -
then the warmth of the light would fill up my heart.
I wish it were sunny today -
so that the reign of meloncholy wouldn't have a place to start.

Sad rain, sad news makes me want to put on walking shoes --
and keep walking till I feel warm spring sunshine on my face again.

For: Steve

That's Entertainment!

Went to the theater today and caught the trailer for Mr. and Mrs. Smith. It stars Angelina Jolie. And she wears a garter belt. This may possibly be the greatest movie ever made.

2 peas in a pod

I was taking with a friend about a couple that have been married for years (at least 40) and I noticed how tenderly he spoke about his wife that broke her wrist earlier this week. He still calls her "Sweetheart" and you can tell he means it by the look in his eyes. It really touched my heart.


Two peas in a pod
Two peas in a pod - so cozy and close.
A lifetime of memories cacooned us just so.
Travels through Europe two time over, and
once to the west coast to make sure that we're covered.

Everything big and everything small.
Everything now seem so small so meek,
when I compare how lost I feel without
you beside me.

So many people searching so hard to find
a love that is lasting, caring and kind.
I've found what their longing and wishes fulfill-
a love that grows over a lifetime lived to the full.
Care for your loved ones, hold them all dear
as illness, anger or death can make them disappear.

Show you love the best that you can,
then you can tell stories like mine and sweet Mary Ann's.

For Frank

Quote for the day

"It is when I turn to Christ, when I give up myself to His personality, that I first begin to have a personality of my own"
C.S. Lewis

ANAGRAM #1

Heres a little something to clear out my writing cobwebs. Enjoy!

Lamont


Anagram #1

T-ime fills up and empties out too fast. That is something I can't get past. Ticking, tocking and draining like grains of sand.
Wishing and wanting to hold onto it with my two hands. Time marches on, today's almost past. Live life to the full. Don't let it get past.

A-rt provides a place for me, with color and content - a kaleidoscope that's free. Free from limits and free from time. Art is only limited by my imagination and mind.

R-elationships with others: taking, sharing and supporting each heart. Important and precious, but perilous to start. Beginning again seems as possible as finding a four leaf clover that really works ... how impossible. Not starting is really the only impossibility. Relationships are like H20 to me.

A-ngles, direction and GPS. How do I know what way is the best? Prayer, petition, planning and pride - push me on to pursue what is muddled to find. I'll sit on these steps of the journey familiarly new, hoping to come to a place to renew. Reflect on the faces that were once all brand new, remember the lessons that have brought me to you. Rhyme, reflection and some revision help me take the next steps on my traveling commission

The Next Step in my DVD Collection's Evolution...

Misteroblivious and I have wasted a lot of air discussing what programs aren't on DVD yet, such as the Adam West Batman series, Get Smart and Max Headroom. But someone at A&E Home Video decided to throw a bone to the geeks and release The Tomorrow People on DVD!

The Tomorrow People was made in Britain between 1973 - 1978, but didn't air in America until the early 1980s on Nickelodeon. (Yes, they had Nickelodeon when I was a kid!) It's about a group of teens who find they have superpowers like being able to read minds, appear and disappear, and levitate things. Like any one of us would do in a similar situation, The Tomorrow People set up a base with a talking computer in an abandoned subway station and confront alien invaders.

This show is for fans of classic Doctor Who. And I mean that in a good way. All the hallmarks of the more well known series are evident in The Tomorrow People -- shot on video, wobbly sets, cliffhangers, low production values, aliens who invade the English countryside, and quarries that double as alien planets. Believe me, if you ever just happened to catch a snippet of the show while channel surfing, you'd expect to see the TARDIS somewhere in the background.

This is one series I never, ever, ever expected to see on DVD in the USA. Heck, I never expected to ever see the show ever again. You can bet I'm saving my pennies now for the release of the boxed set next month -- all 26 episodes of the first two seasons! I can't wait to see how my memory of the show holds up!

The Man-Friendly Church

Look around your chapel on any given Sunday and it becomes quickly apparent that the guys are in the minority. It’s no wonder. Everything about today’s church going experience just screams FABULOUS, from the flower display on the altar to the portraits of a fey Jesus hanging on the wall of every Sunday School room.

Churches have tried a lot of innovative things in the last few years to pack a few more dudes in the pews. Super Bowl Parties, Promise Keepers rallies, and giving away John Maxwell books by the metric ton on Father’s Day were all steps in the right direction. But the church still has a long way for to go before it becomes a serious threat to staying home and mowing the lawn.

I recently gathered data in an exhaustive survey of nearly a dozen men and am now fully qualified to present:

TEN EASY STEPS TO A MAN-FRIENDLY CHURCH

1. Make the fellas feel more at home by dismantling those uncomfortable pews and replacing them with individual La–Z–Boy recliners.
   
   
2. Watch dad’s face light up at the nursery when you toss him a BlackBerry instead of that chintzy plastic childcare pager.
   
   
3. “The quickest way to a man’s heart is through his stomach.” So along with the bread and wine, consider serving a side of ribs and a baked potato.
   
   
4. Forever ban the part of the service where the pastor says, “Let’s all get up and HUG someone this morning!"
   
   
5. All disagreements in church business can be just as easily settled at the poker table than at a board meeting.
   
   
6. Revise the program of Women’s Ministries Sunday to include ample time for women jumping on trampolines.
   
   
7. PowerPoint slides during worship feature a continuously-updating stock ticker at bottom of screen.
   
   
8. Ditch the coffee fellowship and hold a weekly outdoor pig roast in its place.
   
   
9. Women ushers. Hooters T-Shirts. I don’t think we need to elaborate.
   
   And the number one step to creating a more man-friendly church…
   
   
10. Hold the guys’ attention during the sermon: Swap the tired Biblical analysis with the occasional sports metaphor for sports analysis with an occasional Bible metaphor.

A Pleasant Sunday Afternoon

I went to visit Pleasant Township Elementary School on Sunday afternoon with my mom and N--. It is one of four or five schools in my hometown that will be closing this year due to declining attendance. I had attended elementary school there from 1975 - 1980, and my mother went there as a first-grader way back in 1942! The cliché is true: everything does look smaller! It was nice to walk the halls again after 25 years... It was rather strange to walk in old classrooms and see them changed around -- with computers and everything. You see, the rooms had been perfectly preserved in my memory all these years and it was kind of a shock to walk into my sixth-grade classroom and not see Mr. Holcomb at his desk or to see the library bereft of the paper mache statues that Mr. Bertolini's class made. Somewhere deep in the back of my mind I thought I would see my friends like Mike, Tim, Brian, Shannon, Bobby, Rick and Robbie -- but that was a long time ago. I didn't expect it to be that emotional inside that building... and I realized that perhaps elementary school was the last time I actually felt good to be myself and to just be happy.

I had a few great memories come back to me:

• Herbie crawling under a table, covering every square inch of his skin with chocolate pudding, then jumping up and yelling "I'm a negro!" (remember, this was like 1976.) Hilarity and punishment ensued.
  
  
• Cub Scout Pack meetings in the cafeteria.
  
  
• The best pizza in Warren was the kind our lunch ladies made.
  
  
• Learning how to play chess from Mr. Bertolini.
  
  
• Dressing up like Pilgrims for a second-grade play. (The other class had to dress up like turkeys!)
  
  
• The principal, Mr. Marino, doing these 1930s-style radio shows over the PA system.

Shipwrecked

I read a story
of a boat
a storm on a sea
and a supernatural rescue.

I can't see You anymore amongst
the wind
the waves
and the rain.

Can You rescue me if my ship is already dashed against the rocks?

April (snow) Showers

I live in Jamestown, New York. Today is April 24. Today's weather forcast says it's only going to warm up into the mid-30s. It's also going to snow. This is all you need to know about living in Jamestown, New York.

Contemplate THIS!

I was thinking about Catherine of Sienna yesterday, specifically her comments on doing all things prayerfully. It all seems so unattainable -- and even unrealistic -- to me. For instance, how do you drive prayerfully? I guess the question of the last few days has been:

"Is it possible for a guy living in the 21st century, with a family, job, mortgage, and car payments to reach any sort of level of contemplation?"

But I remind myself that true contemplation isn't an escape from the world. Just like with Abraham, Moses, the Desert Fathers (and Mothers) a person that makes contact with God becomes more engaged in "real life."

Sigh. I know all about real life. I find myself very distracted by my work right now. There never seems to be enough time to accomplish everything I would like, and I find myself continually wrestling with distracting thoughts even in the evening and on weekends.

It has occurred to me in writing this that I am very contemplative: I contemplate problems, the things that stress me, people that piss me off, my failures, and all sorts of crises real and imagined. If only God could be as present to me as my current distractions and trials... I'd be the new Thomas Merton, I guess...

I Didn't Build It For Me

I went to Mount Saint Benedict's Monastery in Harbor Creek last night for their first Spiritual Connections group of 2005. The program was about Saint Catherine of Sienna, who lived a full life that was an intriguing combination of mysticism, servanthood, and activism. In Catherine's eyes, prayer wasn't just a way of petitioning God -- it was a gateway to a mystical union with God. It was integrated into every area of her life so that it was a continual "stream of living water." I contrasted that with the modern view of prayer as a way of "recharging" before a person goes back into secular life, i.e., the real world. It also made me consider my own steps into mysticism... Am I using spirituality to escape from the realities of life? Saint Catherine would say that the more spiritual a person is, the more that person should be engaged in the world. We ended the evening in the chapel of the monastery where I prayed for a deeper hunger for God, and for God to fill that hunger.

This morning as I was working through Celtic Daily Prayer, I was struck by how lowly and humble was the ministry of Christ: "...who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death -- even death on a cross!" (Philippians 2: 6 - 8)

I guess what amazes me is how the church is obsessed with big, slick ministries, when its founder was born in a barn, lived a life in service to others and was executed as a criminal. I know that some people would argue that "you have to tell 'em to sell 'em," meaning that you have to compete with the best entertainment and advertising to get people's attention so you can get them in the doors of your church. And to a point I agree -- after all, I was a public relations whore for five years. But at what point does it just become self-promotion and self-aggrandizement?

Last evening and this morning weren't messages that I wanted to hear. Perhaps that's all the more reason to be mindful about heeding them...

Space Age Technology Makes It Possible!

During Benny and Joon last night, a commercial for Victoria's Secret came on touting -- gasp -- THE WORLD'S MOST ADVANCED BRA!!! And to think I didn't hear about this on CNN...

I need to preface the rest of this article by saying that I have had practically zero experience with bras, short of taking them off of some people -- and even that doesn't amount to much experience. Damn those clasps! But I digress.

I realize that no woman wants to go back to the days of jungle vines and coconuts, but now that we've advanced out of that stage by a few thousand years, what else is there to perfect? How different can one bra be from another? It's not like they have thousands of moving parts or there's a lot of options in design. Hey fellas, let's try one with three cups this time! It's not going to happen. So how can one manufacturer lay claim to the "most advanced" crown?

I'd like to find out more about THE WORLD'S MOST ADVANCED BRA. For instance:

• Is there a proud mother somewhere right now talking up her son's accomplishment at bridge club? "Going to work for Victoria's Secret was the best move my Harry ever did after college. Do you know the World's Most Advanced Bra couldn't have happened without him? He's like the Albert Einstein of bras or something!"
  
  
• How exactly do scientists field test a bra? Do they rent out a MIT lab? Do they use caged animals in cruel experiments involving lace? Or do they recruit actual humans? Does anything ever go horribly wrong? Houston, we have a problem!
  
  
• Will bored junior high students someday have to write a midterm paper about it in history class?
  
  
• With The Salad Shooter at one and A Cure For Cancer at ten, where will historians place THE WORLD’S MOST ADVANCED BRA on the scale of great inventions?
  
  
• How do I get a job on the design team?

I Have Seen My Future And It's Not Pretty

I've had this tooth pain that's been really aggravating me for awhile, but I really started to feel it this weekend. I prepared myself for the worst -- a root canal or a filling -- and went to the dentist office. Or as I like to call it, The House of Pain. Turns out that it was nothing more than receding gums (which is perfectly normal for my age) and can be treated by using Sensodyne when I brush.

I should have been relieved that the problem can be taken care of simply by using Sensodyne, but I've left the office feeling even more troubled. Sensodyne = old. I mean, as long as I'm picking up a tube of Sensodyne at Wal-Mart, shouldn't I just go ahead and stock up on some
Ben Gay and Preparation H for the inevitable?

I'd write more but I gotta go install a Clapper on the lamp next to my bed...

Walking on Water

After spending a great deal of time working on my "kid's club" lesson for the week, I was pleased to have a good number of kids (and teens) participating in the singing, lesson and activities tonight. Our memory verse for the night was "Fix your eyes on Jesus" from Hebrews 12: 2A, so I made a giant pair of sunglasses and my team member plunked the verse under each cut-out lens for the kids to peek under.
When all was said and done - sunglasses embedded with too many stick on jewels, kids faces little hug stained, and hands full of whatever snacks we had on hand at the church - we were ready to go home.

When I drop off kids, I usually try to reinforce the lesson by asking questions, singing songs that we learned and so on. It isn't unusual for the kids to recite their idea of the scripture verse - and much of the time they really do well in remembering the information we pour into them for 1 1/2 hours every Wednesday.

On my next to last drop off tonight, I asked each of the four children in the house what the memory verse was. Kid #1 got the verse dead on. Kid #2 got the concept, but some words were switched about. Kid# 3 nailed the verse and the reference! Great, we're on a roll! Last but not least was little D. With all the enthusiasm I could manage to muster as I asked him, "D, what was our Bible verse tonight?"

With all the confidence of a five-year-old, he grinned and thought about my question for a moment. I repeated my question thinking maybe he hadn't heard me. He heard me just fine.

With sparkling blue eyes, fuzzy blond hair and a toothless grin - D exclaimed, "CHIPS!"

D cherish the blue foil package of potato chips he carried home from church, to his small house by the creek.

D never you worry, God has a lot of potato chips at his house.

Quote of the Day: Busyness

"How thin can I stretch myself until I'm no longer there?" -- The Grateful Dead

Yee-haw!

As if George Bush and trailer parks weren't enough, I now have conclusive proof that the South really won the Civil War: a Dukes of Hazzard movie opens on August 5. And it has Burt Reyonlds in it.

Mark it on your calendar...

...I'm actually too exhausted to blog!

Time is Money

I wish I could come up with a million dollar idea, but I don't imagine I every will. I don't know why.... I mean, it didn't take a degree in rocket science to come up with ideas like charging someone $3.50 for a cup of coffee, pet rocks, or Krispy Kreme doughnuts. I guess my problem is that I overthink the whole thing... The trick seems to find something people already do, like drink water or wear blue jeans and convince them to shell out big bucks to do the same damn thing. Isn't that what the bottled water and designer jeans people did? So what are some other products people use everyday that I can charge ten times their worth? Toilet paper? Toothpaste? Gum?

What I really wish I could do is come up with a way to make a 25 hour day. Now that would be a million dollar idea!

Apple Mentioned on New Doctor Who Show

I saw another Apple reference in the popular media... I've been following the new British Dr. Who series and last Saturday's episode took place far in the future. A character was showing off archaeological treasures from the past and wheeled out a fifties-style jukebox and said, "This was called an iPod."

Come to think of it, shouldn't Apple have used a Tom Baker-era Doctor in its Think Different campaign?

Blue Uniform TV

BLUE UNIFORM COMEDY TOUR

Salvation Army goes mainstream with new tour, movie and television program

What the average American knows about The Salvation Army could easily fill a small paragraph in an encyclopedia. Seeking to raise awareness about the 140 year-old church and charity in an increasingly competitive marketplace, Salvation Army leadership has enlisted the help of comedians Jeff Foxworthy, Bill Engvall and Larry the Cable Guy.

“It’s about time our denomination brought in some outside help for a little public relations,” said Colonel Humbug, a high-ranking officer from the organization’s national headquarters. “It’s embarrassing to have new acquaintances continually ask if I really go to church inside a thrift store.”

The idea for the unlikely partnership came about when Salvation Army top brass chanced upon an episode of Blue Collar TV on The WB. Col. Humbug explains: “We noticed that Foxworthy and friends took an otherwise ignored segment of the population—namely, rednecks—and made them downright popular. So we got to thinking, why not us? I mean, they must be doing something right. The size of their studio audience alone easily dwarfs our church’s national membership numbers!”

Many rural fans, still traumatized from the Garth Brooks/Chris Gaines fiasco, have expressed doubt that the comedy trio’s act can withstand the transition from country corn to Salvationist slapstick. But a recent try-out of the new Blue Uniform Comedy material at a Salvation Army community center left the audience clamoring for more. One man exiting the corps commented, “It’s not really that different once you get past the little changes, like Larry the Cable Guy. He’s now Larry the Kettle Guy and goes around yelling GIT-R-RUNG!”

Foxworthy, Engvall and Larry aren’t the only ones who are adjusting their act. The Salvation Army itself is making some adjustments in anticipation of welcoming the trio’s existing fanbase to its denomination. For instance, the organization has traded in their massive emergency disaster vehicles for pickup trucks with gun racks. And the iconic blue uniform now comes in a special sleeveless version with hunting boots.

The Blue Uniform Comedy Tour, which is being filmed for an upcoming theatrical release, begins its tour of Salvation Army corps next month. Blue Uniform TV will premiere this fall on The WB. In related news, Target has announced that it won’t sponsor the show.

* * *

…YOU MAY BE A SALVATIONIST
If walking into a department store without a bell makes you feel naked…
If you can have coffee and doughnuts ready at a fire scene even before the fire trucks show up…
If you’ve ever misused Psalm 132:9—“be clothed in righteousness”—to defend uniform wearing...
If your calendar is divided into only two seasons: Christmas and Almost Christmas…
If you assume that making a person listen to a sermon is a prerequisite to eating a bowl of soup…
If your offering and United Way pledge end up in the same place…
If you regularly wrap and deliver more gifts at Christmastime than Santa …
If you believe baptism and communion are traditions you can easily get along without, but think the church will fold if it doesn’t keep the tradition of uniforms and brass bands…

***

THE RED KETTLE DICTIONARY
HORNY - adjective. How our brass band sounds.

***

HERE’S YOUR SIGN

A couple of months ago I went to a meeting of my local pastoral association. A guy took a look at my uniform and goes, “Hey, y’all the pastor of The Salvation Army?”

Nope.

I’m a Congregationalist who likes to cross dress as a meter maid.

Here's your sign.

THE END

Okay, everybody -- we confess: This a late April Fool's Day joke by I.F. & Mr. X!

And the ten-thousand dollar prize goes to...

...the Experiment House Family of Jamestown, New York!

Or at least that's what the announcer of America's Funniest Home Videos would have said if we only had a video camera handy! Lamont tells me that last night I had a snoring fit, which our shepherd-collie took to be dog language and carried on a conversation with me.

I.F.: SCNARRRRFFFFF!

DOG: RA-ORF?

I.F.: SCNARRRRFFFFF!

DOG: AAA-EERF.

I.F.: SCNARRRRFFFFF!

DOG: RIFF!

Sigh.

Uh, I guess you had to be there.

Tw-eet

I love Spring, or at least what passes for it in Western New York. This morning as I laid in bed, quite possibly more asleep that awake, I heard some birds singing outside my window. The passage from Saint Matthew popped into my head, "Look at the birds of the air, that they do not sow, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them." A nice reminder for a guy like me who worries about everything -- my job, the kids, the car, my health. I had one of those perfect moments of clarity and realized how foolish this is. I rolled over and caught a few more ZZZZs...

Doctor WHAT?

My favorite TV show, Doctor Who, returned to TV last Saturday after a 15 year hiatus. So here's the update:

1. The show premieres a few days ago on the BBC to 10.5 million viewers. It's a hit!
2. Critics love the new show.
3. In a surprise move, the BBC immediately commissions a Christmas special and a second series of 13 episodes.
4. Christopher Eccleston, the star of the show quits after one episode! Click here for the official scoop.

The More Things Change

I couldn’t sleep last night, so I decided that a trip to the overstuffed bookshelves in the Experiment House library was in order. I finally settled on my Seven Habits of Highly Effective People Workbook that I used during some training back in the summer of 2000.

I have a lot to do at work in the next two weeks -- which was probably the cause of my insomnia, come to think of it -- and I guess I thought that I could glean some wisdom from that great bald guru, Stephen Covey. What I found was quite something else entirely.

The workbook is really a summary of the best selling book, and is a great way to review its principals in bullet form. But it also has plenty of space to journal and write and it was amazing to see where my head was five years ago.

Some of my plans, like a regular date night with Lamont never happened. I was also surprised to see how positive I was about our old church -- I can’t think of the place without hurting now -- and it was fun to remember that ministry when truly anything seemed possible. I was also surprised to see the seeds of who I am today keep popping up again and again...

I couldn’t believe how many times I found myself writing about, well, writing! “What would I do if I could had all the time and money in the world...” etc. I honestly don’t remember writing being that much a part of my life back then, but I guess the desire was already there. I’m still working on acquiring the “all the time and money in the world” part, though!

The other surprise was my answer to the question, “What is the one most positive change you could make in your personal life?” I wrote down meditation of all things! Which is pretty amazing because I don’t recall knowing anything about meditation at all in those days. I don’t think I had even read any Richard Foster yet, let alone made regular trips to a monastery... but the desire for something that has become an integral part of my life was already there five years ago.

I also took a look at my mission statement -- too long to reprint here -- and saw how my life has changed in five years to really internalize its ideals. Maybe it’s time to write a new one to carry me through 2010...

A Hair Raising Experience

With tomorrow being Easter and all, I decided that some grooming was in order. So I went to the hair salon. The thing that always amazes me is that the first thing a stylist asks a guy is how do you want your hair styled. Listen ladies, give it up because we men don't have the slightest idea how to answer that question. We just don't obsess that much about our hair. And it's not like we're going to ask for highlights or anything. The fella in the chair next to me gave the best answer to the question ever. He just said short. Which I guess was a lot better than my mumble about using a razor and then pointing towards the general area of my head.

My stylist attacked my head with the razor as if there was a secret message written on my skull and she couldn't wait to read it. Suddenly she began gagging. I asked her if she was all right and she just ran out of the room yelling, "Gross!"

When she came back she explained that the razor had somehow shot my hair into her mouth. But she was OK now. She put the electric razor away and started on me with the scissors. A few seconds later she yelled ouch and dropped the scissors on the floor. She had cut her finger pretty good and had to go clean it and bandage it up. She came back a few minutes later and finished me up. I decided against asking her to groom my beard -- I pictured her putting her eye out or something.

I gave her an extra buck for hazzard pay. Who would have ever thought hairstyling would be such a dangerous profession?

Hype

It amazes me how over-hyped movies are these days. I just saw a piece on Beauty Shop, which noted that the movie opens March 30. I was already familiar with the cast and many of the scenes. I really thought the movie had already came out last fall!

Roxy Music

I have a rather long commute to work, so I decided at the outset last November to redeem the time by listening to books on tape. I made it through Slaughterhouse Five, The Care of the Soul, How to Win Friends and Influence People and a whole lot of others. I listened to some cool Mike Yaconelli talks I downloaded off the 'net. It was a great way to pass the time and I learned some things, too. But no more. What did me in was listening to The Bible, of all things. Driving forty miles every morning and afternoon listening to a monotone voice droning on so-and-so begat so-and-so can do weird things to a person's psyche. Believe me.

So out went the book of 1st Chronicles and in went Roxy Music. Ever heard of them? They started in 1972 and were sort of a cross between glitter and prog rock. By 1982 they had somehow transformed into a dreamy sounding pop/rock combo who recorded the perfect album of all time, Avalon. I wasn't introduced to the band until the mid 80s, when it was already long gone. I can't imagine what it must have been like to come across a Roxy Music album when it was all new, sitting in the same record rack at Jamesway with The Captain and Tenille and B.J. Thomas.

Do yourself a favor and listen to some Roxy Music today!

"If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land." -- 2 Chronicles 7:14

"I would do anything for you, I would climb mountains, I would swim all the oceans blue, I would walk a thousand miles, Reveal my secrets, More than enough for me to share..." -- Roxy Music

George Lucas -- You Need Closure

Starting in 1977 with Star Wars, George Lucas made three of the most successful films of all time. In 1997 he re-released the orignial trilogy to theatres with new special effects. The DVDs that came out last year had even more changes. Well, never one to leave well enough alone, George Lucas has announced that he will use new technology to recreate all six Star Wars movies in 3-D... How I wish I were making this up... He said to expect the first rerelease in 2007...

Where will this all end? Channeling the psychic powers of the Mighty Carnac I was able to find out:

2007
The six Star Wars films are released in 3-D. Audiences discover that Jar-Jar was bad enough the first time, but positively horrifying in 3-D. Admissions to psychiatric units triple in the first week of The Phantom Menace's rerelease.

2017
George Lucas perfects technology that allows audiences to smell the films. After previewing the movies, audiences are given barf bags to use every time a Wookie appears on screen.

2027
For the fiftieth anniversary of Star Wars, Lucas proudly announces that there's not one single frame of the original movie left in the film, all actors replaced by lifelike animatronic robots... Industry wags notice that Lucasfilm has patented a process that would allow audiences to taste whatever is shown onscreen. Fans of the series eagerly await the newer, tastier installments in 2037...

The Future's So Bright I Gotta Wear Shades

I noticed that all of the scriptures I read this morning in Celtic Daily Prayer had a common theme: the future.

Psalm 121: 3 - 4:
"He will not let your foot be moved, he who keeps you will not slumber. Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep."

Ecclesiastes 3: 1 - 3:
"For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted; a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up..."

Matthew 9:17:
"Neither is new wine put into old wineskins; if it is, the skins burst, and the wine is spilled, and the skins are destroyed; but new wine is put into fresh wineskins, and so both are preserved."

I wonder what the future holds for me? And "the happenings of my lot"?

Holy (Bat) Crap

There's no justice in this world... I just read that Doogie Howser M.D. got a DVD release while the Adam West Batman show is still rotting in a film vault somewhere...

Who are the Brain Police?

The other day I noticed that one of my favorite blogs had disappeared from the 'net. After a quick e-mail to the author, he let me know that he had just changed his address. Some people from the ministry he works at got wind of his blog and almost had him fired.

Turns out that blogging is "self-centered." And being self-centered is an indicator that he's in poor spiritual health.

I just can't stand the way some Christians feel it's their duty to see everything in the most negative light possible... For instance, his blog is "self-centered" -- why not "introspective"? Or "self-examining"? Or even how about "a hobby"?

Thank goodness that the finger-pointing brigade has set all of us straight on the spiritual dangers of blogging. Now that's done perhaps they can concentrate on feeding hungry people, welcoming strangers, clothing the needy, and looking after sick people and prisoners.

As long as none of them blog.

Pizza

I got a pizza from Little Ceasar's today that was so good it could have been from Dominoes...

Quote of the Week: Religious People

The funniest thing I heard all week came from my coworker, M--, at work yesterday afternoon: "Jesus would still be alive if it weren't for religious people."

Ten Things To Be Thankful About Today

I.F.'s Ten Things To Be Thankful About Today:

10. New episodes of Doctor Who soon!
09. Nice coworkers
08. Roxy Music has reunited to make a new album
07. Payday
06. I've almost moved everything from my "in-box" to my "out-box."
05. The best night of TV viewing ever: The Avengers/The Saint/The Persuaders back-to-back on BBC America
04. The book Celtic Daily Prayer
03. Pizza eating and Mac troubleshooting tonight with Mister Oblivious
02. A happy, healthy family
01. ...And did I mention IT'S FRIDAY?

Review: Holy Ground

Happy Saint Patrick's Day!

My friends, S-- and V--, recently passed along to me a copy of Holy Ground - Celtic Christian Spirituality by Deborah K. Cronin. It's a nice introduction to the subject that is written in such a way that I oftentimes felt like I was taking a peek into the author's personal journal. It's a positive view of spirituality that is defined by the mantra it is good rather than the "crises" we face. Cronin goes beyond the history lesson and suggests ways that we can adapt this ancient view of life in the land of work and Wal-Mart franchises. Recommended reading!

My only disappointment with the experience had nothing to do with the actual book itself: I found out the author used to live in my area and I never had the chance to meet her!

Travel without TARDIS

It occurred to me during morning prayer that my time traveling isn't just to the summertime. I've been doing my share of traveling both to the future and to the past.

I'm responsible for a rather large project that I feel never comes any closer to completion, despite my best efforts. If I wanted to wax all poetical about it, I would use a word picture like spinning my wheels on the ice but poets don't write about cars, do they? I just want to move onto the next phase and dream of the time when I'm finally onto the next thing. "It will be different in the future," I tell myself. But this leaves me very dissatisfied with the present.

It's also becoming more apparent to me how much healing I need from the past. Even though things have gone great with the residents of Experiment House since the closing of our ministry, too often my mind wanders back to the struggles and betrayals, character assassinations, and hurts of the last year... I am fine for days and then something stirs a memory and I see how truly bound I am to that "big ball of pain," in spirit if not in body. I'm sure I miss the good things about the present sometimes because I'm reliving a broken dream.

That's the thing about time travel. In movies and on TV, the narrative always follows the traveler into the past or future. So you never realize how much of the present they miss.

I read in the scriptures today, "If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free."

That's a promise, isn't it?

23rd Psalm

Psalm 23


A psalm of David.
   1 The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not be in want.

    2 He makes me lie down in green pastures,

    he leads me beside quiet waters,

    3 he restores my soul.

    He guides me in paths of righteousness

    for his name's sake.

    4 Even though I walk

    through the valley of the shadow of death, [a]

    I will fear no evil,

    for you are with me;

    your rod and your staff,

    they comfort me.

   

    5 You prepare a table before me

    in the presence of my enemies.

    You anoint my head with oil;

    my cup overflows.

    6 Surely goodness and love will follow me

    all the days of my life,

    and I will dwell in the house of the LORD

    forever.

This passage was read today at the funeral of an 18 year-old-girl, that happened to be an honor student with much promise and hope for her future. This girl was in the wrong place at the wrong time and was murdered early last Friday morning.
One of my current students was her friend, and I had the honor of escourting him to the services this morning.

There was so much sadness, overwhemling the family and friends by audible moans of grief and dispair over thier great loss. You could touch, taste, feel and see the affect of this violent and horrible act.

But more than the loss, I witnessed a funeral that was standing room only. It was filled to the brim with people who loved Sam. Teachers, friends, family and even a few strangers like me - but I didn't feel like a stranger when I caught the tear-filled eyes of an old friend saying, "Thank you so much for coming." God was in that room today. In the embraces, in the hands held, and in the words read.

    6 Surely goodness and love will follow me

    all the days of my life,

    and I will dwell in the house of the LORD

    forever.

Sam, may you rest knowing the love others had for you. May goodness and love follow you throughout eternity. I know that you have a beautiful mansion in heaven. You are safe, at peace, and at home there. Your life gave so many others the opportunity to hear about Jesus - I pray that they heed what was said.

Peace and Love,
The Stranger that wasn't a stranger -
Thanks.
Lamont

Sunshine

Tired.
So tired of snow.
So tired of scraping my windshield.
So tired of taking it easy on curves.
So tired.

God played a trick on me this morning.
Sunshine came dancing through my window
and landed on me, all snuggled up in my blankets.

I closed my eyes and traveled
not in space
but in time.
Summertime.

A lovely day.
I can get up
and walk through the grass
go swimming with my son
cook out on the grill
and the only ice
will be in my glass of lemonaide.

Some day soon.

Am I lost - or are you?

I was considering a statement shared with me the other day, because the sheer impact of it caused me to have such a strong reaction.

"I met so-in-so from your old church the other day. They said they knew you really well and that they really felt they lost you to your new church."

I was shocked to hear this statement, and was unable to have a very graceful reaction. Actually, I think I said something like, "Really? They said that? Wow, I never would have thought they'd say that. Well, it's a long story. A really long story."

Smooth, wasn't I? So I changed the subject asap and tried to brush it off.

I find that as soon as I make some serious steps towards healing over some of those old hurts - someone (usually unbenounced to them) pokes me in a tender spot. Never mind who said these words, never mind if I think they "knew" me at all, but the words associated with "lost" were too great a reminder of all the losses over the last few months. Not surprisingly - the word "lost" stuck with me.

I really don't want to rehash the past anymore. I've been praying for God to continue to heal my heart and help me to start over in challenging new opportunities, and I feel that the process of healing has begun. But then this little word "lost" causes my mind to spin with all the old memories. I was beginning to feel rather lost in the midst of all this flashing back, but in a moment of clarity the compass of my mind took another look at the words that were said.

"They lost you (me)." I didn't lose anything at all. They were the ones that "lost" someone.

Wow. After all the prayers, pleading and passion for our old church -- they were the ones that lost. They lost our gifts, our many hours of hard work, our interaction with staff and community and... well, us.

I still have my God, my family and my work. As challenging as it can be - God preserved the ministry opportunities and our security. God kept us from becoming or being lost.

There is a scripture that says something like this ... "things men intend to harm others with, God redeems for good."

I know that there are memories from our previous ministry that will always stay with me and those are things that will never be lost to me. God has worked out this whole situation -- and I know this is where I'm called for the present time. The only thing I want to lose is the strain I feel when people try to pull me back to the place I was a few months ago.
I've moved on. You've lost us. Let us go.

God has redeemed our lives for good, and that is what I want it to be. A good life.

Blind to the Bind

Sometimes I feel like I'm a character in a Stephen King novel or a David Lynch film. I've been doing lay ministry in my hometown, about 20 miles away from where I currently reside. I love my hometown. It's nestled down inside the Allegehany Mountains, which means it's pretty scenic no matter the season. But I just can't shake the feeling that a black cloud is hanging over the whole town. The shadows all seem deeper than I remember them. The chill seems to have more of an edge to it.

Lamont and I thought that our ministry in Jamestown had pretty much prepared us for anything, but we're amazed at the depths and complexity of the needs with which we're now faced. It just seems that everyone we meet is "at-risk" with either poverty, abuse, or mental health issues... or sometimes all three!

I worry about the kids growing up viewing these problems as "just the way life is" and not seeking an alternative, because they've never seen a viable one. It doesn't help that in the weekend paper that a local government employee was quoted as stating that "only 1 in 4 jobs require a college education." Now that's a great message to pass along to these kids!

When faced with such overwhelming problems, how do we know where to even start?

The first thing I do everyday -- even before I step out of bed -- is pick up the book Celtic Daily Prayer, a devotional/prayer guide compiled by the Northumbia Community at Lindisfarne. Today's reading said:

"Lord show us the things that are binding the work
You have called forth on Holy Island.
Help us to loose YOUR work,
and let it go
in resurrection power."

May that be the prayer in my little corner of the world, too.

Doctor Who - Rose

Well, the rumors are true... The premiere episode of the new Doctor Who series, Rose, has been leaked to the internet. I know, because I saw a copy over the weekend. After peeing myself from excitement, I thought I'd jot down my impressions...

The first thing you need to know about the premiere is that Russell T. Davies and company got it right on every single count. It will erase your memory of the Americanized Fox TV movie from 1996 and most of the episodes after Tom Baker left the show. It's still Doctor Who, but bigger. It's shot film-style with great production values and nice special effects. The characters are much better drawn than they ever were on the original series. But it retains the humor and the sense of absurd that made the original show so much fun to watch.

I wasn't sure how Christopher Eccleston was going to pull off the Doctor, but he won me over instantly in the premiere. Witty and very fun to watch -- somewhat like Tom Baker, but not quite as manic. From the moment he appears in the episode he is the Doctor.

There have been some very negative reviews of this episode popping up on the Ain't It Cool News website... All I can say is that some people get Doctor Who and some don't. One reviewer actually said something to the effect of "the show is too damned British!" Also, much has been read into Sci-Fi Channel's passing on the show... I'm going to say that they're going to regret this after the Hitchhiker movie comes out and creates a nice market for quirky British sci-fi...

Don't be mislead... Doctor Who is back!

Don't Just Do Something -- Sit There!

Just when insipid reality shows had almost convinced me to swear off TV forever, comes the news that my two favorite television shows are returing to the air, albeit in very different forms...

Mike Nelson, Tom Servo, and Crow from Mystery Science Theater 3000 are scheduled to pop up on the March 14 episode of ESPN Classic's Cheap Seats. It airs at 10 pm. This is their first appearence on TV since MST3K got cancelled in 1999. Here's hoping a revival of the show isn't far away!

Internet rumors abound that the first new episodes of Doctor Who in 16 years are set to premiere on the BBC on March 26. Let's hope that BBC America or Sci-Fi channel get these episodes stateside ASAP!

Quote of the Week: On Being "Real"

This week's quote was a short comment I came across on Sacred Space: "It is harder to live one sermon than to preach a dozen."

Extra! Extra!

The oddest events can inspire a piece of writing. I guess this blog has been living proof of that. Last October, the gang here at Experiment House passed away an idle weekend by taking Enneagram Personality Tests. After confirming to ourselves that we are a rather strange bunch of tabby-cats, Mr.X and I got to joking about how it would be helpful it would be if there were personality tests specifically for church members... We sat down at the iBook and an hour or so later finished the piece "Enneagram Types for Church Members." Almost on a lark we sent it to the satire magazine The Wittenburg Door and were quite surprised to see it accepted. Although I've had hundreds of public relation pieces published over the years, this is the first piece I've written for fun to get published for profit. And it's the first piece of writing Mr. X has written for the general public that didn't involve a magic marker and a bathroom door...

Anyway, if you want to pay for the damaged wit you already get for free everyday in this blog, it appears in the March/April issue of The Wittenburg Door #198. It's carried at trendier stores like Borders, etc.

Serenity

For all the hype Lucasfilm is generating for Star Wars - Revenge of the Sith, I'm still much more looking forward to the modestly-budgeted Serenity... Browncoats rule!

The Key To (Wasting) Time

Well, my daughter and I completed our long-desired goal of the Doctor Who 500, meaning we watched all 26 episodes of the Key to Time DVD boxed set in one weekend. Our reflections?

1. While it is possible to watch that much television in one weekend, it is not recommended!
2. Tom Baker made that series. No matter how pathetic the special effects, no matter how wobbly the sets, no matter how bargain-basement the monsters looked, Baker elevated the show into something special. Good luck, Christopher Eccleston -- you've got your work cut out for you!
3. Fan favorites like The Ribos Operation and The Pirate Planet left us kind of cold.
4. Serials that were considered turkeys like The Androids of Tara rocked. The much-maligned Power of Kroll had us all quite engrossed -- I don't know where they shot it, but it was one of the few locations the series used that was actually believable as an alien planet rather than a quarry in England.
5. The only thing that got us through the plodding six-part Armageddon Factor was our desire to complete the marathon.
6. This is the season that the show began its slide into farce, and it's all the poorer for it. Let's see the Hinchcliffe/Holmes Era in season-by-season boxed sets!

The Doctor Who 500 is not an experiment that we plan on repeating anytime soon -- but then again, I just got a Mystery Science Theater 3000 boxed set yesterday for my birthday, so is anyone up for another marathon?

Quote of the Week

"There's a bit of magic in everything, and some loss to even things out." -- musician Lou Reed

One Two Three Day Weekend

As I get older I find that I am having a harder time shaking the winter blues. I just want to feel the sunshine on my skin, the grass under my feet. I want to open the window for some fresh air. Some day I'm going to have to move out to the southwest.

With Lamont heading out of town for a retreat, the kids and I decided to spend our long weekend visiting my mom. No bringing work home, no comparing grad schools online, no agendas... Just a little time devoted to family, rest, and re-creation...

My daughter, H--, and I decided that this weekend was perfect for a pet project of ours we wanted to do for a long time: THE DOCTOR WHO 500. I can't remember how we coined the name, but the gist of it is that we're going to watch the whole 26 episode Key to Time DVD boxed set in one weekend. We've made it up to episode thirteen so far! Hey, it's important for a family to set and attain goals. Even if they're, well, kind of pointless...

I realize that we can't just watch TV all weekend. We discussed the need for alternate activities and chose eating. This isn't a hard activity to engage in at my mom's house. Although my mom is fit, trim and healthy and only shares her house with a cat and my niece who is hardly ever there, her kitchen is stocked as if she's waiting for Y2K and still wants to be able to throw a Superbowl party as the world slips back into the dark ages. We've already had chili, cornbread, peanut butter pie, french toast, sausage, hot wings, pepperoni balls, and cheeseburgers and we've only been here for twenty-four hours.

If this doesn't sound like a very productive use of time, well, it's not meant to be... My new job is going great, but the long commute on icy roads is killing me... I just decided to stop for a few days and chill out.

P.S. Does anyone say "chill out" any more? Or did that go out with Arsenio and no one told me?

Magnetic Personality

Now I've seen everything... On the way drive home from work this evening I passed an injury lawyer who had a magnetic sign stuck to his car. I wonder if F. Lee Bailey ever did that?

It's Sunday

Praise God...

...for the gift of life
...for community
...for revelation!

Treasure of the Broken Land

I was listening to some old music this afternoon that I hadn't heard in ages. I came across Chagall Guevara's cover of Treasure of the Broken Land from the Mark Heard tribute CD. This recording is arguably Chagall's finest moment as a band, but even more than that the words really connected with me:

Treasure Of The Broken Land by Mark Heard

I see you now and then in dreams
Your voice sounds just like it used to
I know you better than I knew you then
All I can say is I love you

I thought our days were commonplace
Thought they would number in millions
Now there's only the aftertaste
Of circumstance that can't pass this way again

Treasure of the broken land
Parched earth, give up your captive ones
Waiting wind of Gabriel
Blow soon upon the hollow bones

I saw the city at its tortured worst
And you were outside the walls there
You were relieved of a lifelong thirst
I was dry at the fountain

I knew that you could see my shame
But you were eyeless and sparing
I awoke when you called my name
I felt the curtain tearing

I can melt the clock hands down
But only in my memory
Nobody gets the second chance
To be the friend they meant to be

I see you now and then in dreams
Your voice sounds just like it used to
I believe I will hear it again
God how I love you

Mission Accomplished!

Well, it took me twenty years, but my collection of Doctor Who is finally complete. Marvel Comics published a comic based on the BBC program when it was at the height of its stateside popularity in the mid-eighties. The comic didn't sell terribly well -- especially after Peter Davison replaced Tom Baker in the strips -- and it folded after a short two-year run. I consoled myself with the knowledge that I had the entire twenty-two issue run in mint condition.

I was browsing a comic price guide a few years later and discovered, much to my dismay, that Marvel had actually produced twenty-three issues. Rats. Over the years I would occasionally check comic shops for the elusive issue twenty-three, but nobody ever carries back issues of Doctor Who.

With the new series reviving my interest in all things Doctor Who, I decided to make an attempt at locating the issue via the internet. You know, before the new series appears and Doctor Who becomes the most popular thing ever, making the price of its collectibles go sky high... (Yeah, right...)

I found the issue on sale at Mile High Comics in Denver. Now, seven dollars poorer and a week later, the collection I began at aged 16 is complete just shy of my 37th birthday. Mission accomplished!

Nerd is the Word

Here's living proof that I am a 37 year-old nerd, based on my Friday evening:

1. Walked around all day with a 256 MB Flash Drive dangling from a lanyard around my neck.
2. Bought polybags at Books Galore in Erie.
3. Ate dinner alone...
4. ...at Bob Evans!
5. Watched my favorite 3 hours of television on BBC America: The Avengers, The Saint, and The Persuaders!
6. Read a Doctor Who graphic novel
7. Arranged my six-year collection of The Wittenburg Door in numerical order.

Looking back, it was a pretty good night!

P.S. I would have posted to the blog, too, but Lamont had the iBook with her.

The Parade of Life

The parade of life
Includes some strife
But isn’t limited to it.

The steps we take
May quiver and shake
But some we strongly make.

Our arms can fly
In our face
Or carry us to a
Better place.

Our feet can stall
And stall and stall
Or move with precision and determination.


The parade of life
Includes some strife
But isn’t limited to it.

(Note: I need to look for the possibilities, unstead of the limitations. Don't listen to the dream stealers!)

The Fourth Estate Continues To Get More Impressive By The Day...

I watched 60 Minutes tonight because comic creator Stan Lee was on. Stan was whining about only making a million dollars a year off of his comic creations. But enough about that. The thing that really struck me was the wording of a question asked by the journalist:

"Do you feel like you got screwed?"

Is it just me or does that seem like a real casual way of speaking by a CBS newsman? Would that question have been worded the same way a few years ago? I doubt it. Here's my timeline of news speak with some speculation of where this increasing casualness will end up:

1985: "Do you feel that Marvel Comics has treated you fairly in regard to royalties owed you?"

2005: "Do you feel like you got screwed?"

2025: "F@ck#n' A! You dere b*tch or sumpin'?"

And I also predict that news anchors in the future will end all newscasts not with a "good night" but by flipping off the camera...