The revelation struck Jen yesterday when she took our princess out to the park. It's a park that we've had our sights on for the last year and a half and had high hopes of eventually bringing our playing baby to, once the weather and her aptitude permitted. And so, for the last week, my wife brought our daughter (sometimes with daddy in tow) to this cute little baby/toddler park with the cushy ground. (Remember when we were kids and the concrete under the monkey bars was softened by jagged rocks, broken bottles and syringes? No more. The floors here are so soft, you could use them as pillows. In fact...)
Jocelyn is learning how to walk. Or, at least she gives it the ol' college try. One foot in front of another while holding on to mommy or daddy with her fingers. As she was leading the way (and she is getting really choosy about the things that she comes in contact with), she was getting excited about following a group of kids that Jen noticed were smaller than her. But apparently, these kids could move all on their own.
The three little ones are having a good time at it with a lot of back-and-forth rapport, and the mothers start talking. One of the mothers asks my wife how old our daughter is. "Eight and a half months." Jen asks in return.
"Sixteen months."
We knew she was tall. But. Wow.
Wow.
But it was connecting with other things I was noticing. While on the swings a couple days before that, she was looking and laughing at a girl beside her who had obvious verbal skills (you know, like sentences and queries and the whole bit) and I noticed that Joss had to be nearly as big.
And her neck has just started showing up. It's identifiable, no longer hidden in folds of baby-chin. It's definitely my neck. Long and skinny. But with her cute hexagon-shaped head on top of it, she looks like a pumpkin on top of a tooth-pick. And with both mine and Jennie's Irish family roots, things just don't bode well for her.
And her legs. I was changing her yesterday and noticed her legs are about as long as a Rockett's. But baby-chunky, especially in the thighs. The length, at least, is another thing she got from me.
[W]hile Obama's personal image is more favorable than Clinton's, certain social beliefs and attitudes among older, white, working-class Democratic voters are associated with his lower levels of support among this group.
In particular, white Democrats who hold unfavorable views of Obama are much more likely than those who have favorable opinions of him to say that equal rights for minorities have been pushed too far; they also are more likely to disapprove of interracial dating, and are more concerned about the threat that immigrants may pose to American values. In addition, nearly a quarter of white Democrats (23%) who hold a negative view of Obama believe he is a Muslim...
One-in-ten voters believe that Barack Obama is Muslim; 14% of Republicans, 10% of Democrats and 8% of independents think he is Muslim.
(AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAArrrrrrrrrrrrgggggggggggghhhhhhhh! Not that it should matter. But the guy constantly states that he is NOT a Muslim. Hillary Clinton's "not as far as I know" doubt-infusing comment notwithstanding.)
Nearly six-in-ten Democratic voters (57%) believe that Obama is most likely to win the party's nomination, while 28% expect Clinton to prevail. Last month, 70% said Obama was most likely to win, while 17% expected Clinton to win.
Among other dirty, low-down, deceitful tricks and messages that the Clinton campaign has brought us recently, here's one of the lowest:
``He would not have been my pastor,'' Clinton said at a press conference while campaigning in Greensburg, Pennsylvania. ``We have a choice when it comes to our pastors and the churches we attend.''
Thanks for once again adding to the noise and confusion of race tainted by doubts, race-baiting, xenophobia, allegations of disloyalty, fear-mongering...
Is Barack a Muslim? "Not as far as I know."
On "remembering" being under threat of sniper fire a decade ago in Bosnia (and her claims of experience): "I may have misspoke."
On the fact that her campaign has gained no traction since early February: "You know, the people of Ohio spoke. And the road to the presidency goes through Ohio."
On the fact that she has an outside (10%'s the buzz-word) chance of securing the nomination: "And also remember that pledged delegates in most states are not pledged. You know, there is no requirement that anybody vote for anybody. They're just like superdelegates." [Which is what this whole smear-campaign is about, anyway. Make Obama look so bad that the delegates will have no choice but to switch allegiances to Clinton.]
Former President Bill Clinton putting down the Obama campaign for a charge that, really, his wife's campaign is accusing Obama of: "This is what this should be about, two people (McCain and Clinton) who love America. Not all this other stuff that gets in the way of it." [And then he says the same thing today about getting back to the "real" issues. Which, btw, Obama has been doing but has largely been ignored for, since it's really just not sexy enough.]
A top, top aide (hound-dog Jimmy Carville) on New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson's timely endorsement of Obama: "He's a Judas."
Let's hold up there.
A Judas is one who betrays who he loves, one who betrays her cause. I'm sorry, but looking at the fact that the Democratic Party is internally bleeding right now and what looked liked a freight train to the White House is now looking like a streetcar named Desperate, I think I know who the traitors are. If John McCain is leading in the popular opinion polls (by two points in a head-to-head match-up against either Dem candidate) and he hasn't even started flinging the mud yet, if Rove's job as-is is phenomenally too-easy, I think we all know who's been stabbing who in the back.
I choose not to listen to your garbage anymore, political machine. Please, let Barack Obama be Barack Obama. Take the high-road for a turn. We do have a choice. I think that America is ready to be treated as adults. Please stop treating us as children. Call out to our better selves. We just may listen, this time.
After originally refusing to play politics with this issue, it’s disappointing to see Hillary Clinton’s campaign sink to this low in a transparent effort to distract attention away from the story she made up about dodging sniper fire in Bosnia. The truth is, Barack Obama has already spoken out against his pastor’s offensive comments and addressed the issue of race in America with a deeply personal and uncommonly honest speech. The American people deserve better than tired political games that do nothing to solve the larger challenges facing this country.
Easter weekend was weird for me. I didn't post not because I was being extra sanctimonious, pietous, meditative or even fasting from posting. I was just out of sync. And I guess I might just use the Pentecost season as the time to contemplate the death, resurrection of Christ and also how it affects me in the world around me. Here's some starter kits, though:
N. T. Wright - I don't think I'd trust another theologian to write a better piece on Easter than he, but I haven't read this one yet. So, it's here so that I will. "The Uncomfortable Truth of Easter." (Btw, I'm not sure if what's at the bottom half of the page should be there. I may just copy and paste it somewhere else before someone takes it down...)
While driving home from a night out at a bar in January, 51-year-old Pat Dykstra of Fox Lake, Wisconsin, was persuaded by her boyfriend that she might be too drunk to drive (by his own admission he was in no condition to take over), so she did what she apparently thought was the sensible thing; without leaving the road, she called 911 and explained the situation, providing her name, a description of the vehicle, their location, and the time they'd likely make it home. Sheriff's deputies arrived at the house not long after the couple did and gave Dykstra a breath test; sure enough, she was well over the legal limit and soon faced a $740 fine and the possible loss of her license.*
This story leaves me just a bit conflicted. On the one hand, I hate drunken driving with a passion. On the other, I like honesty. So, let me weigh the balance here:
Yeah... she's dumb.
But wait... there's more! ("More?" you ask. "How can there possibly be better news than this? Is everything all right in Fox Lake?")
The call came in at 12:29 a.m. Sunday on the county 911 line as a hang-up call from a cell phone, [Sheriff Todd] Nehls said.
Dispatchers used a reverse 911 directory and called the phone, which was answered by a woman who identified herself as Patricia Dykstra, 51. She said her boyfriend made her call, because "somebody seems to think I can't drive home straight. "
Well, she can't think straight. But who says you need judgment to drive? Ha-ha, that's just ludicrous.
When the dispatcher asked her why, she said, "He seems to think I'm too intoxicated to drive. "
During a relatively pleasant conversation with the dispatcher -- a recording of which Nehls released Monday -- Dykstra gave her name, location and vehicle description before saying she should probably hang up because "I don 't like being on the phone while driving. "
Asked by the dispatcher if she had too much to drink, she said "I don 't think so, ma'am. "
And if you thought that that was a deal, well, hold on to your seats, folks!
She said she was almost home and gave the intersection. Throughout the 3 -minute call, however, the dispatcher did not suggest the woman pull over. Nehls said the dispatcher assumed the woman had already stopped, although her last advice to Dykstra was, "So Pat, drive carefully, OK?"
Yeah. That and the woman said that she's "driving"!
One last piece to close the deal here, folks:
Sheriff Todd Nehls says Dykstra did the right thing by calling them. “I think a judge will look at her and say 'you know what, you stepped up to the plate. You did the right thing.' I think it’s commendable,” he said.
She did??
*"News of the Weird", Chuck Shepherd; The Chicago Reader; March 13, 2008; p. 133.
Speaking of which, Dan Kimball at Vintage Faith has a post on the Missional St. Patrick, noticing how he had been scorned by the officials in Rome and England for hanging around scoundrels and sinners, rather than making enclaves in the pagan Ireland. (And yes, this is being posted on Tuesday - sadly, late - while St. Pat's day was supposed to be celebrated on Saturday due to Holy Week. But I think it's a nice culmination of events.) Here are a couple other links on poor misunderstood St. Patrick, the one-time Briton slave and then missionary to Ireland (who did not, apparently, drive out the snakes via the Pied Piper). Blarmey!
They're magically delicious.
Tony Jones is considering why Liberal and Conservative Christians are so boring.
James Dobson wonders, "Where have all the cowboys gone?" No, wait. Who will lead the conservative Christian movement now that the Grahams, Falwells and Colsons are fading away? Here's another question: Will there be a conservative Christian movement in a similar form as there is now in the next generation? Or will American Christianity (in particular, Protestant Christianity) be more fractured than ever before. Or rather, hopefully, find more common ground and begin acting as a large unit?
The Christian Vision Project this year is asking, "Is our Gospel too small?" I think that's a great question. Tim Keel responds that the word "Gospel" is now short-hand for many of a truncated view of how one gets to heaven.
Asking "Is our gospel too small?" implies that something is off kilter—that somehow we have gone off course in the way we answer "the gospel question." But it may not be just our gospel that is too small. It may be that we have been living in a world that was too small—the small, reduced world of modernity.
One of the features of the modern world was "reductionism": the belief that complex things can always be reduced to simpler or more fundamental things. To reduce something is to take it out of context and to take it apart. Church leaders have become experts at reductionism. Ministries that are successful in one context are reduced to "models" that we try to duplicate in other contexts. Sometimes such reductionism is effective. But when we use reductionism indiscriminately, we end up in a world so simplified it is barely recognizable.
So in a modern world, we tend to reduce the complexity and diversity of the Scriptures to simple systems, even when our systems flatten the diversity and integrity of the biblical witness. We reduce our sermons to consumer messages that reduce God to a resource that helps the individual secure a reduced version of the "abundant life" Jesus promised (John 10:10).
And the gospel itself gets reduced to a simplified framework of a few easily memorized steps.
Scot McKnight's response is that our vision of the gospel needs to be more robust, more fully-dimensional. I'll include two of his "8 Marks of a Robust Gospel":
2. The robust gospel places transactions in the context of persons. When the gospel is reduced to a legal transaction shifting our guilt to Christ and Christ's righteousness to us, the gospel focuses too narrowly on a transaction and becomes too impersonal. We dare not deny transaction or what's called double imputation, but the gospel is more than the transactions of imputation. The robust gospel of the Bible is personal—it is about God the Father, God the Son, and God the Spirit. It is about you and me as persons encountering that personal, three-personed God.
Indeed, more often than not in the New Testament, the gospel is linked explicitly to a person. It is the "gospel of Christ" or the "gospel of God." Jesus calls people to lose their life "for my sake" and, to say the same thing differently, "for the sake of the gospel" (Mark 8:35; 10:29). Paul preached the "gospel of God" (1 Thess. 2:9) and the "gospel of Christ" (3:2) and "the glorious gospel of the blessed God" (1 Tim. 1:11). Paul tells us that the gospel is the glorious power of God's Spirit to transform broken image-bearers into the glory of God that can be seen in the face of the perfect image-bearer, Jesus Christ (2 Cor. 3:18–4:6). In our proclamation, too, the focus of the gospel must be on God as person and our encountering that personal God in the face of Jesus Christ through the power of the Spirit...
7. A robust gospel includes the robust Spirit of God. How often do we hear about the Spirit of God in our gospel preaching? To our shame, the Spirit has been defined out of the gospel. But notice these words from the New Testament's most notorious gospeler, Paul: "For I will not venture to speak of anything except what Christ has accomplished through me to win obedience from the Gentiles, by word and deed, by the power of signs and wonders, by the power of the Spirit of God, so that from Jerusalem and as far around as Illyricum I have fully proclaimed the good news of Christ" (Rom. 15:18–19). For Paul, the gospel, the power of God unto salvation (1:16), was also the "power of the Spirit of God." Again, "In him you also, when you had heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and had believed in him, were marked with the seal of the promised Holy Spirit; this is the pledge of our inheritance toward redemption as God's own people, to the praise of his glory" (Eph. 1:13–14). Jesus, too, said, "But if it is by the Spirit of God that I cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has come to you" (Matt. 12:28). The gospel is animated by God's powerful Spirit, and its result is Spirit-empowerment for new living.
Having been a youth leader and teacher most of my adult life, in a sense, the secret lives of girls isn't really new to me. After all, having read so many barely-shielded journals of teenagers (and definitely hearing more than my share of unsolicited out-loud thoughts), nothing should shock me anymore. But yet, I'm always shocked, frustrated, angry and saddened reading these types of thoughts (which mostly 10-15 year old girls posted on a page in Allykatz).
“Some times I want to shoot myself...”
“I'm sick of being lied to. I'm sick of being betrayed. I'm sick of putting other people's burdens on me and thinking it won't hurt me. I wish I had some true friends, not just one or two. I wish I could have one of those big groups of friends like EVERYBODY does at school. I wish. But I only wish...”
“all right i am in love with a guy who has a gf and i dont know if i still like this other guy my family drives me nuts and when i get annoyed by them they yell at me and i just wanna go into my room and cry sometimes but when i am in my room sometimes my dad will walk in and see what i am doing so i cant cry because they will find out i just need him so much i want him to be able to tell me everything is okay. ”
“i have a crush on my brother”
“my bffs mock me, we wer @ a slep ovr an di was asleep but 1/2 awake.. my eyes closed i herd the mtalk about me lke "yea hshe listens 2 since u been gone! lol" and then moked the song!!! i hte u guys now! 2 of ya r on here! and omg, this all sucks.......i wanna die.... like suicide now! and i wanna b out of this house.. free on my own! w/ my frends u kno rent a duplex w/ my bff she shares the house w/ me.. omg we even r plannning on that! =) good times...... until my BF and ibroke up got back 2gethr and stuff ever since that....... they hate me, sadly they(my bff and othr bff) got him & me 2getrhr!!!!! it makes me wanna kill myself”
But some of the secrets posted here (for the benefit, btw, of other female teens and tweens who are going through similar emotional turmoil) are funny -intentionally or not.
“im goth on the outside but on the inside im a preppy. Like secretly if i could paint my room i woould paint it pink.”
“I lyke a jerk!! Dunno y either! Just so hot i guess!! ”
“I want to be emo but I want to be preppy. sometimes I 'll wear stuff from AERO or abercombie and fitch. And sometimes I'll wear stuff like skelanimals and I just dyed my hair black... EMO OR PREPPY????* UGHUGHUGH”
“don don doooooonn guess what my secret is? i want a pet MONKEY!!!!!!!!! but everyone thinks im CRAZY!!!!!! oh and im obsessed with saying i like pie!**..."
I can see why all the Catholics were flipping out of St. Paddie's Day. The streets are crazy here.
me: yeah, and me without my colt
Jennie:
colt?
you mean kilt?
12:49 AM me: all the irish wannabees
why, did jesus ride to jerusalem in a kilt?
i missed that translation!
Jennie: hah!
me: find something new all the time.
Jennie: right! no, act I think the colt had the kilt. ;)
me: new irish translation
Jennie: hah!
totally!
12:50 AM me: best in show?
Jennie: the celtic gospel
absolutely!
me: gospel according to scrooge mcduck
It's amazing that we conversed so much via instant messenger before we got married (really, for like five months, it was our main method of communique).
"Don't be sad," Packer head coach Mike McCarthy told fans, many of whom began crying audibly, shaking their heads, or turning away at the news. "You should be happy for Brett. He is in a much better place now. He has many of your other favorite Packers, really great Packers like Reggie White and Ray Nitschke and Max McGee, to keep him company. And he even has a coach—Vince Lombardi is on that farm, too."
Although Packers officials gave no specific details of the farm, its location, or the family who will now take care of Favre, Thompson confirmed that it is "far, far away, beyond the football fields we know, in a very happy place where Brett will never be cold or get sacked ever again."
"There are no winters there, and no injuries, and no interceptions, and even though people will play football with Brett all day, they all have so much fun that no one remembers who won or who lost," McCarthy added.
According to Brad [the creator], the 12-foot SkyWalker is so strong that it can easily take a 500-pound pilot, a little trivia fact that makes me imagine a Fantasia hippo driving one.
"Girls that lived in more disadvantaged neighborhoods were four times more likely to be in these high viewing groups. And boys in disadvantaged neighborhoods were two to three times more likely to be in this high-risk group," said Barnett.
Scott Gomez filed a lawsuit in January against authorities in Pueblo County, Colorado, alleging (among other things) that they failed to take precautions to prevent him from breaking out of the county jail. Gomez claims he injured himself in January 2007 when he fell 40 feet while trying to climb down one of the building's exterior walls. The suit contends that the facility was easy to get out of, but they "did next to nothing to ensure that the jail was secure and that the Plaintiff could not escape." *
It couldn't have been that easy, no? I mean, dude had to scale down at least one four story building. That would be my argument.
On January 10, 2007 at approximately 11:30 P.M., two inmates escaped the custody of Pueblo County Jail. Medical personnel working in the jail reported to security that they had heard a loud “thud” on the outside of the building.
Sergeant Mark Lightcap immediately responded to the outside of the facility and apprehended an injured Scott Anthony Gomez DOB 03/22/1985. Sergeant Lightcap then preceded obtaining medical assistance for the injured Gomez and activating security procedures in the jail.
Gomez, as you may recall, was one of the two men that previously escaped through the ventilation system of the Pueblo County Jail and was being held on escape, parole violations and aggravated robbery...
The alleged escape route includes an area of the jail that is currently under reconstruction efforts. The entire ceiling area in all secured areas of the jail is being fortified to prevent escapes. This particular area of the jail was identified by security and maintenance as needing repairs...
Preliminary investigative effort indicates the inmates removed a vent screen from the shower area and climbed through utility and venting areas to the roof.
*"News of the Weird" reported by Chuck Shepherd; Chicago Reader, p. 101; Feb 14, 2008.
Because my computer's at the shop again, I haven't really been able to write nearly as often as I would like to. Subsequently, most of the blogging that I have done has largely been politically-motivated - because I am filled with fear, dread, anger and - most importantly and relatedly - hope. It seems that a historic campaign is turning into another precedented campaign (or rather, campaigns), one that took place some forty years ago. I'll let Stephen Colbert explain the relationship between George McGovern and Barack Obama.
(Sorry, video won't work. Click here for the page.)
Add to that, the Clinton's lack of response to a bone-headed and stupid ploy to race and gender-bait Obama's supporters. So, it worked; I'll bite. I'll add one more piece of noise to this ongoing argument:
It is because Obama is a black male that he has the experience that he does - that has helped to make him into the person that he is, and in his case, would make him a truly great candidate.
But, let’s take another spin at this, eh? If he were white and still came across the way he does now, still have the ambition, charisma, intelligence, talents, and dreams that he does? That’d still be historic - after all, the last two white men with that combination were assassinated in the '60s. But they had the extra backing of a paternity that designed itself from day one to reach the highest public places. You see Obama would most likely have less opposition and fewer people nipping at his heels. This election would be a rollover and my guess is that Ms. Clinton would beg to be his running mate.
John McCain has just recently got Karl Rove on his side. I don't think he needs him. The Democrat Machine is doing a fairly good enough job of imploding on its own.
Seriously. I don't think that this administration has as much power to shine out human rights violations as - well, the Land of Lady Liberty should.
And ignoring China? Good call on Russia and Putin, though. Especially since they're not economically viable to us...
"Countries in which power was concentrated in the hands of unaccountable rulers remained the world's most systematic human rights violators," said the report.
Stop... Hammer Dance Video Time! (M.C. Hammer's started up a dancing YouTube, complete with battles [disclaimer: the one battle I saw was retrograde lame]). h/t to Ypulse.
I'm just outright stealing this quote from Josh Brown, who got it from Abraham Heschel, who, I believe, I quoted at length here before. Rabbi Heschel was a Hebrew scholar whose works and work had a tremendous influence on Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. But this is beautiful and I think that every Literature (and Math, Science, Spanish, History, Social Sciences...) teacher should have this committed to memory and hanging above their workspace.
The Greeks learned in order to comprehend. The Hebrews learned in order to revere. The modern man learns in order to use. To Bacon we owe the formulation, “Knowledge is power.” This is how people are urged to study: knowledge means success. We do not know any more how to justify any value except in terms of expediency. Man is willing to define himself as “a seeker after the maximum degree of comfort for the minimum expenditure of energy.” He equates value with that which avails. He feels, acts, and thinks as if the sole purpose of the universe were to satisfy his needs. To the modern man everything seems calculable; everything reducible to a figure. He has the supreme faith in statistics and abhors the idea of a mystery. He is sure of his ability to explain all mystery away.
Oops. National Grammar Day (i still don't know how to spell grammar. Bad English teacher I is.) has passed and I failed to mention that there momente-ous ocassion. Worry not, dear sailors. Their's still time for yous. Hopefully, you won't be to effected to do something about it.
Is Clinton supported by the Archie Bunkers? Says one Chicagoan (who probably didn't vote for Harold Washington either), "If Obama gets in, it's going to be a black thing and it's going to be all blacks for blacks,'' said Victoria Mikulski, a 63-year-old clerk in Edison Park. "Everything's got to be equal.'' (I think I'd stick with the Meathead vote, if that's the case.)
And, just in case you didn't know: Republicans may echo attacks on Obama made by Clinton (Duh!).
Hillary Clinton was up early today, appearing on the morning television shows a day after her primary wins in Texas, Ohio and Rhode Island and suggesting that she and her opponent, Sen. Barack Obama, might share the Democratic ticket -- with her in the No. 1 slot.
"That may be where this is headed," Clinton said. "But of course we have to decide who is on the top of the ticket. I think the people of Ohio very clearly said it should be me."
Yes, and as Ohio goes, so goes the nation? She's a bit... nervy I guess is the word for it.
Maybe she just needs more sleep...
At least the cartoonists aren't as pro-Clinton biased.
Win Ben Stein's Intelligent Design! (Actually sounds smart and enticing, according to this review at least.) h/t to Jeffrey Overstreet
Moms Everywhere and the Lone Ranger (hmmm... maybe I should rework that description...).
Apparently, this is a hit with middle-aged moms and the morning talk-show crowd. It's pretty funny. I saw a little bit of her other stuff, but I really could not relate to that. It's not as mainstream.
And another Will.i.am vid for my man, Obama:
Not as catchy, but emblematic of the raw hope he is giving to people. Btw, one of the biggest reasons that my wife and I are such supporters of him and his movement is because we believe he can help to reshape the image of the U.S. Something that Jessica Alba, of all people, brings up. I also like the fact - although it may or may not be too late - that there are a lot of Latino voices in this video. h/t to Staycspits
Like an artist making headway into your personal and social realms using guerilla tactics, this semi-celebrated semi-supergroup burned out before they faded. Or maybe they faded out into obscurity when their rabid fan base was ready to chew them down.
Chagall Guevara begins the album with a "Murder in the Big House", a death knoll for, well, maybe pop Western society, maybe for the music industry these CCM vets just left for MCA, maybe for the status quo. It seems that Steve Taylor and Co. are serving notice to listeners with ears: This may be you. It's an apocalyptic call worthy of Marley and the Clash, with shimmying and rollicking guitars riding over a thick-as-walls bass line put down by____. Recalling the last night of Babylonian rule recounted in Isaiah and Poe's "Fall of the House of Uscher"
"Escher's World" is a tour-de-force of mismatched lyrics decrying the insanity and inanity of the world we occupy and define, using a few lyrical and musical twists and turns inspired by the artist and his stairwells.
A host of swirling and crunching guitars supplied by guitarists and backing vocalists Lynn Nichols (who, among other things was an A&R rep and a producer for Phil Keaggy's seminal Sunday's Child, as well as a song-writer and guitarist in his own rights) and Dave Perkins (who helped to produce Taylor's iconoclastic I Predict 1990 and was in the same label group as Mark Heard back in the mid-80's that tried to break out of the Christian music ghetto) and a backbeat to beat the dead skins from your ears.
"Hey, don't I know you from some other life you were wide-eyed and green and a little bit taller and you didn't look away when spoken to... deaf from the din of your self-righteous babble... I think you've been blinded by your own light
And like a surgical cut in a back-alley, Taylor breathlessly asks, "Was it sudden / was it clean / were there a lot of shades in between" before he implores, begs and demands his subject to "step away... and looose yourself".
Musically, "Play God" is the most intriguing, with a horn section arranged and played by Taylor, Nichols and Perkins to send chills down the spine of music geeks everywhere. The song is another sarcastic masterpiece, evocative of Dylan during his electric years. Taylor sneers, "And you still play God / how'd you get so good / so almighty / so mighty misunderstood." "You ought to swim the Channel / you stroke so fine." The horns twirl and flut away to a swirling oblivion.
Google voice mail and phone numbers for the homeless. Actually, it sounds like a really good idea. Hopefully, more municipalities will team up to offer this nationwide. h/t to Relevant
How do you read (i.e., understand) the Bible? Do you see it as if it were set in stone (or tablets, as it were) or as fluid and interpreted by committee? Intriguing quiz from Scot McKnight and Leadership Journal.
The authors of this NY Timesop-ed piece argue that there are other ways of counting the gap between the haves (in this case specifically, the top one-fifth) and the have-nots (the bottom one-fifth) of the American economy. Count what they spend. The difference is quite surprising. What do you think? via KruseKronicle via Scot McKnight.
Sometimes, I want to be an inventor. I'd like to invent two distinct, yet similar brands of substitute butter. I will put them up on the shelves of every grocer next to other leading brands of imitation spread.
One will be called, "So!?" and the other "Who Cares!?"
Across the aisle will be a tub of cheese-product named, "You Sure As Heck Won't Believe This Is Cheese!"
Novelist extraordinaire Raymond Chandler on the art of movies at Atlantic Monthly. Sixty years later, as prophetic as the day it came out.
The point is not whether there are bad motion pictures or even whether the average motion picture is bad, but whether the motion picture is an artistic medium of sufficient dignity and accomplishment to be treated with respect by the people who control its destinies. Those who deride the motion picture usually are satisfied that they have thrown the book at it by declaring it to be a form of mass entertainment. As if that meant anything. Greek drama, which is still considered quite respectable by most intellectuals, was mass entertainment to the Athenian freeman. So, within its economic and topographical limits, was the Elizabethan drama. The great cathedrals of Europe, although not exactly built to while away an afternoon, certainly had an aesthetic and spiritual effect on the ordinary man. Today, if not always, the fugues and chorales of Bach, the symphonies of Mozart, Borodin, and Brahms, the violin concertos of Vivaldi, the piano sonatas of Scarlatti, and a great deal of what was once rather recondite music are mass entertainment by virtue of radio. Not all fools love it, but not all fools love anything more literate than a comic strip. It might reasonably be said that all art at some time and in some manner becomes mass entertainment, and that if it does not it dies and is forgotten.
Josh Brown has a great post on false modesty and the pride of being green. But to be honest, I think he's doing great things on a small scale.
Larry Norman - one of the original purveyors of Jesus Rock, which subsequently got watered down to make CCM - has passed. I know that one of his few albums stated that he was only visiting this planet, but still... [Edit: Andy Whitman has a great tribute to the conflicted father of Christian Rock.]
Nader's running. Again. (Sigh. This time, I don't think he's needed. Maybe I should hear him out first. But I think we've got a wonderful chance with at least one of the three running. In case you don't know where my loyalties lie... here.)
I drink your malt - or yogurt. Preferably a frozen yogurt. They're yummy and have less fat.
Didn't get to watch the Oscars. My guess is that they're finishing up.
Instead, while doing laundry, I saw several scenes from what can only be described by using language of a sixth grader. Please do not take offense to this.
It was like watching a weight-lifting, twisting and turning version of Cirque de Soliel. On Steroids. Only a thousand times more gay.
But I'm happy to hear that the song from Once won for best original song.
If you don't know or haven't been in a while, this is the Jasdye family blog. Seriously, the cutest baby in the world. I don't know how to say that without sounding like just another cocky parent. But what can I say? I'm sincere. We wish you a happy, belated and late Valentines Day.
According to a January Los Angeles Times dispatch, residents of Beijing remain fascinated by competitions involving crickets. Cricket fights, in which a pair of the insects square off in a terrariumlike ring and use their mandibles and forelimbs to throw each other aroung, attract enough gambling interest that top fighters may sell for as much as $10,000.
Something tells me that Mike Vick got into the wrong sport.
First rule of Cricket Fight Club: There is no Cricket Fight Club.
"When you wish upon a bout..."
"Got the Eye of the Gryllidae / It's a rhythm of life..."
I could go all night, people!
But wait, there's more:
Contests for singing crickets - the lougest entrants, measured close up, can hit 106 decibels, or nearly the volume of a lawn mower heard from a few feet away - aren't as lucrative but are taken seriously enough that doping has become an issue [editor's note: This despite this typical warning, "Don't let your cricket take drugs. Anybody caught cheating will be disqualified."]: some handlers have been known to administer drugs causing their crickets' wings to vibrate more slowly, resulting in a deeper-pitched song.
So that's why Barry Manilow has been hitting those notes.
Under oath, in front of members of the House Committee on Steroids Abuse among Lawn Bugs, Jiminy - with assistance from his lawyers - testifies that he did not receive injections for any sort of illegal steroid or hormone.
And lastly...
Barry Bug.
Kevin Eubanks, everybody!
"News of the Weird" compiled by Chuck Shepherd, The Chicago Reader, February 14, 2008; p. 101.
Can I just come clean here? My mother has bipolar disorder. It's a huge, complicated and twisted affair. And just to be honest, none of her kids really understands what she goes through. None of us. But what's worse is that since she moved from Chicago to the Bible Belt, she's had a hard time trying to find a church that would accept her for all of her eccentricities and quirks and tough times, and times when she would scream profanities and her pill-popping and the imaginary people and demons and her flights of fancy and her struggles with forgiveness and all that her bipolar disorder entails.
And it's scary. But the one thing that you need in such circumstances is some stability. And as much as we Christians like to talk about God being our Rock (and he is), his love and stability and presence is demonstrated and felt through the actions of his people. Oftentimes, this is a wonderful thing. Sometimes, some big times, it falls way short.
In the online version of Relevant Magazine, there is an article by a Karen Bowlby on her experiences as a church-goer with bipolar disorder. Excerpts from the article are in Trebuchet font. Reader responses for the article are disbursed throughout and in blue font. Hold your applause (or breath) till the end, please.
Bipolar in a World of Healers
“Do you want to be healed?”
The question cut through the pregnant silence that followed my plea for guidance, and a lump formed in the pit of my stomach–a reaction to the metaphorical kick I’d just received. The young couple positioned themselves around me–I’d been in churches long enough to know what was coming.
OJ wrote:
"Pregnant silence?" Please. This is a very dramatic piece of writing. But then I see you majored in Theater.
Since my first encounter with this small band of Christians, I had waited expectantly for the stones I felt were always just around the corner...
[A]s ugly as stigma can be, there is nothing uglier than stigma in the Church. It is the opposite of grace in that it judges, condemns and carries out the sentence in the blink of an eye. We live in a rapidly changing culture that embraces differences in sexuality, race, class and religion. Yet, as fast as our society rids itself of its stigmas, the Church stagnates, holding on to them tighter than ever, tiptoeing around issues like mental and emotional illnesses and disorders, medication, and addictions to drugs, alcohol sex and pornography.
As a result, the Church is currently filled with Christians ... who suffer and struggle in silence to avoid being stigmatized–leading lives that are rarely joyful–using dysfunctional survival techniques to deal with feelings of loneliness, guilt and shame. Is it any wonder then, that both substance abuse and self-mutilation are on the rise in not only our society, but our churches, too?...
Justin wrote:
But on the other hand, lets not demonize the church.
I was diagnosed with rapid-cycling Bipolar Disorder at the age of 22–in the midst of self-medicating via alcohol abuse and prescription drugs. I fought my diagnosis for three years through alcoholic binges, a blackout-related car accident, a suicide attempt and severe depression. In fits of euphoria, I would declare God had healed me, the ups and downs were just a part of my creative personality and I didn’t really need my medications. In the doldrums of depression, I would fight suicidal thoughts, feel indefinitely disconnected from God, end friendships and retreat into whatever un-reality I created in my mind. I prayed unceasingly for God to take the symptoms away...
Kendall wrote:
I think all comes down to the personal relationship with God. If you have total trust in His plan, you would be off medication because of His healing. Healing isn't just lip-service; if you don't doubt His ability, you will ultimately be healed. I have experienced this not just on my own, but with others too.
If that young couple had only taken the time to know me first, before praying physical healing over me God might have shown them it was not my body that was broken and in need of healing, but my trust in an unconditionally loving God as illustrated through His people. Instead, I went off my meds in response to unsolicited pressure, and spent three months feeling as though I lacked the faith to make my symptoms disappear, before finally beginning to seek and accept what God had intended for me to find all along: Peace.
Now, back on my meds, and two years sober, I have discovered that in my own story, giving up control of my health and trusting God is trusting that He has provided and blessed me with the doctors and medicine necessary to live a stable, joy-filled life...
Eric wrote:
So you believe He is a healer, but you are content with pills and symptoms and telling others how they may cope?? Yes Jesus is far more concerned with the healing of the soul, but every affliction is spiritual in nature (Eph. 6:12).
Eric wrote:
We might as well hand out Bibles at a Triple A meeting and inform them that they are going to have to cope with their sickness.
I thank God for this woman's story. Unfortunately, the fools (and well-meaning but blinded individuals) that responded above are fairly representative of the misguided, misanthropic and maladjusted xenophobia of many within the Church. Of course, they are part of the Church and it's the crazy cousins and uncles locked up in the attics that we have to live and deal with that make the Church feel like a tangible, broken, messed-up family. I would also like to point out a few other commentators. They are beautiful and broken people as well. And they also represent the Church.
kaylee wrote:
wow, great article, thanks for talking this. Been there too, I'm hypoglycemic, was "healed" of it once. a few years later, on the edge of a fullscale breakdown, mentally and physically, I had to admit that I was still hypoglycemic. But I've learned to love GOd through the quesitons, and stay away from those who don't accept all parts of me.
Melody wrote:
I just spent an entire day at conference about how each Christians shows God in a unique way and how He didn't create us to all reflect Him exactly the same...and yet, I walked away knowing I'll never tell anyone at that church about my depression/self-injury, I'm too afraid of how they'll react, if they'll ban me from leadership or patronize me...
Dave wrote:
I was diagnosed with Bipolar about 10 years ago, and went through some of the same things. I've been prayed over plenty of times and I know God could heal me if He wanted to, but God can't be put in a box. I've felt ashamed of myself for not "having enough faith". Yet, perhaps what needed more attention is the unrest in my soul by other factors. Susanna wrote:
I've just recently wondered if I have a mild case of the same disorder....struggling with depression and thoughts of suicide for 8 years now, but always feeling "unchristian" because of it. hearing many christians say, "how can a christian be depressed?" and having been one all my life, I've struggled with that shame as well. good to not be alone!
There were two interesting and somewhat interrelated articles in the Chicago Reader last week. In The Straight Dope column, Cecil Adams replied to a letter on sugar highs and their effect. In the cover story, a Freudian literature professor writes a book about over-diagnosing what used to be known simply as shyness. Both, I think, are worth a gander.
Q: I'm always hearing parents talk about the sugar rush their kids get after eating sweets: "Uh-oh, watch out! Little Ignatz just had two M&Ms!" I thought I had read somewhere that this effect is either greatly exaggerated or nonexistent. What's the story?
... your classic controlled double-blind affairs: two groups of kids, one fed a bunch of sugar, the other given a placebo (i.e., artificial sweetener), everyone kept sufficiently in the dark as to who'd gotten what, etc. The results? No discernible relationship between sugar ingested and how the kids acted. It didn't matter how old they were, how much sugar they got, what their diets were like otherwise — nothing....
... For a crucial piece of the puzzle we turn to the Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology and a 1994 study by Daniel Hoover and Richard Milich, in which they looked at 31 boys ages five to seven and their mothers, all of whom had described their offspring as being "behaviorally affected by sugar."
The mom-son teams were split into the customary two groups: the moms in one were told their sons would be given extra-sugary Kool-Aid, while the others were told their kids were in the control group and would get a drink sweetened with aspartame. In reality, though, the same artificially sweetened stuff was administered to both sets of kids while the women got a sheaf of surveys to fill out. Mothers and children were then videotaped playing together, after which the moms were asked how they thought things went.
What did Hoover and Milich find? You guessed it: the moms who thought they were in the sugar group said their sons acted more hyper. In addition, they tended to hover over their children more during play, offer more criticism of their behavior, etc. The mother-son pairs in the other group were judged by observers to be getting along better. What's more, those moms who, going into the experiment, most strongly believed their kids were sugar-sensitive also scored highest on a test designed to gauge cognitive rigidity....
[Ya ever heard of this thing called Self-Fulfilling Prophecy? It happens a lot. And now for the disclaimer and closing:]
I should stress we're not talking here about attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, which is its own freestanding issue; studies have suggested there's some correlation between ADHD and diet, so maybe every so often you'll get a kid whose condition really is exacerbated by sugar. And there are plenty of other good reasons to limit children's consumption of sugar-laden food. But when a parent freaks out because a swig of soda has allegedly made his kid uncontrollable, it's quite possible he's not just seeing the behavior he expects to see, he's helping create it.
[Christopher] Lane, a Victorian literature scholar and professor at Northwestern, had... published a book on misanthropes in the Victorian era, which he says “had a relatively high tolerance for eccentrics, reclusives, hermits, and scolds.” He wanted to carry his study into the 21st century. But when he began asking psychiatrists about the fate of contemporary misanthropes, the response he got was that they’d likely be medicated...
It looked to Lane like the much more common trait of shyness, which Victorians had actually valued as a sign of modesty and a contemplative mind, had been transformed into something called social anxiety disorder. People who dreaded giving speeches, or blushed when they were the center of attention, or who, like Lane himself, needed a certain amount of their own company, were popping pills that promised to turn them into breezy extroverts. How had this happened?
[Hint, check the distinctions between the DSM II and III, which was first released in 1980.]
The correlation that I understood is that these types of emotional/psychological/physiological 'maladies' are actually in the head - that in these instances (as opposed to say, clinical depression), Western (or at least American) society tells us that we need to come up with a solution for every conceivable problem - and so we make them up. The problem that is diagnosed isn't a real problem. But something else, something deeper and not really related may be the real problem, the real threat.
So, keep your eyes closed, swallow these pills, stay away from sweets, lock the doors in your car when you're going through a bad neighborhood. Medicate yourself, you'll be all right.
Peanut Butter & Jelly is not only good for the soul, but for the environment as well. (But a black bean chili may be just as well. For the environment, that is. I guess that's like, if you're allergic to peanuts or something. Because I can't ever see being tired of pb&j.)
Hillary's people respond to Barack's sea-shifting video. And it reminds us of the fight song from Appalachia State. (Yet another tip o' the hat to Ypulse.)
You didn't believe me? You had to watch it? That's what you get.
Yes, ladies and gentlemen. Both Hilary Rodham Clinton and Appalachia State University are HOT, HOT, HOT!
We are about ending poverty, not simply managing it. We give people fish. We teach them to fish. We tear down the walls that have been built up around the fish pond. And we figure out who polluted it.
This is what I think community should be about. Not all communities. And not all capacities. And I think, in a sense, it's what I think teaching should be about, if I were to holistically live it out. Which I think I'd rather do than the paperwork. (But then again, easier said than done.)
From The Irresistible Revolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical, Shane Claiborne (pdf file excerpt here)
Jimmie knew that he needed to go fishing, to feel the cold, shaven wood and old rugged paint on the top ridge of the boat, to run his fingers through the mud and find his own god-damned worms, to shield his eyes from the barely-recognizable sun with a silly hat, to hold the weight of the anchor as if he were going down with it. Jimmie knew it was a bit cold for this. He knew that the fish may not bite. That, in fact, the waters would still be fairly choppy and still iced-over in parts of the lake where the fish were most likely going to reside.
This event - the connection of boat and lake, line and bait - has been grinding in the back of his mind for a moment too long. Maybe him and Stanley. Maybe a couple other guys. Just shooting the breeze, bullshitting all day and early into the night. Till the end of Saturdays and the only thing left to do is to mosey on back home and make a big stink about gutting the fish. Which he never does. Leaves it there to rot, Avrey says. Jimmie forks back up with a shot of orneriness, Hell, no. It's better aged. But they both know the truth, the fish is going to be in the garbage by Sunday morning. Jimmie won't be up yet, the fish is going to rot - with or without its head - in the fridge near the Arm & Hammer baking soda. But that box won't be enough to protect the kitchen from the stench of unforgiving bass.
He and Avrey went on a midnight run last night. And it was well later than midnight when they stopped at the convenience store for some Raisenettes and a Baby Ruth. Jimmie missed the taste of Baby Ruths, but being up late was a perfect excuse for a bite. Somehow he could wiggle in an excuse to buy a super-sized one. One last one. As they were making their way to the register, he distinctly heard the bell at the door and turned his neck just in time to see her. A girl with black hair. Blacker than the night. She wasn't familiar in the way he thought she might have been, but somehow he felt he did cross her path before. Or, wanted to.
Although it's warming up with the sun beating on him now, Jimmie's hands are bitterly cold. Since he's finished baiting the hooks, he puts the mitts on his cracked hands. Looking like a gol-danged fool. He should just take it like a man. Be rugged like the boat.
But nobody else is that stupid. No other man would dare risk unnecessary frost-bite to his hands. Jimmie's sure that Jesus Christ himself wouldn't have put on gloves on in the boat rides he always took in the Bible. Jimmie looks across the lake to notice that he's still the only one out on a Thursday morning.
Back at the gas station, he had turned away, back to the mundane, approachable and fantastic. Jimmie was going for the Baby Ruth. He thought of quickly turning a look to the jet-black haired girl. But no sooner had started that idea and function than a loud boom came shattering through that same area. He looked outside. Everyone looked outside. The whole neighborhood looked outside and saw a fire hydrant encased in a maroon Hyundai. Water pushing out everywhere. Glass. Shards of car. Metallic glimpses. And he's sure blood and flesh.
Jimmie looked at Avrey. He always turned to Avrey in these moments. And every moment. Because she was his home. Avrey knew Jimmie was gonna call in sick.
Jimmie, go sink in that line. Jimmie, go find yourself again.
That's right, baby-girl. Not only do you get to EAT the cake, you can be the cake! Because that's what you are. You ARE the cake, baby-girl. Don't let nobody tell you otherwise.
This guy thinks that: 1) The King James Version of the Bible is the only authentic version of the Bible; 2) pissing against the wall is manly; 3) the editors of such blasphemous modern day translations of the Bible as the New International Version not only don't piss against the wall, they do so sitting down! Shame on the emasculated editors of a translation of the Bible that no one really uses anymore!
Samurai Jesus? It's about time! On the rise of Manga depictions of the Bible:
The medium shapes the message. Manga often focuses on action and epic. Much of the Bible, as a result, ends up on the cutting room floor, and what remains is darker... In "The Manga Bible," whose heroes look and sound like skateboarders in Bedouin gear, Noah gets tripped up counting the animals in the Ark: "That's 11,344 animals? Arggh! I've lost count again. I'm going to have to start from scratch!"
Abraham rides a horse out of an explosion to save Lot. Og, king of Bashan, looms like an early Darth Vader. The Sermon on the Mount did not make the book, though, because there was not enough action to it...
The book is meant to be a first taste of the Bible, which many feel too intimidated to read, Akinsiku said. Every few pages, a small tab refers to the biblical verses the action covers.
"For the unchurched, the book is to show that this thing, the Bible, is still relevant," he said, "because it talks about what human beings do when they encounter God."...
The goal of [niche-marketed] Bibles is not just to win people to Christ, but to particular ways of thinking, said Jason BeDuhn, associate professor of religious studies at Northern Arizona University. Akinsiku said the biblical message he wanted to underscore was justice, especially for the poor.
Again, h/t to Ypulse
Interesting series at PoMoMusings on the Kingdom of God with guest authors like Brian McLaren, Phyllis Tickle, Ryan Dobson (yes, son of the Doctor James) and Tony Jones giving a fresh, new and - dare I say - for the most part emerging/post-modern spin on a topic that, quite honestly, I did not hear enough of growing up in the church (in fact, I think until the last couple years, mostly I only heard about heaven and/or hell). No one is going to agree with everything here, but these are good thoughts/questions to have. I look forward to reading through them in the coming weeks.
At least 82 youths have died from the so-called "choking game," according to the first government count of fatalities from the tragic fad.
In the game, children use dog leashes, bungee cords wrapped around their necks or other means to temporarily cut blood flow to their head. The goal is a dreamlike, floating-in-space feeling when blood rushes back into the brain.
As many as 20 percent of teens and preteens play the game, sometimes in groups, according to some estimates based on a few local studies...
CDC officials urged parents to be aware the fad exists, and to watch for possible warning signs like bloodshot eyes, marks on the neck, frequent and severe headaches, disorientation after spending time alone, and ropes, scarves or belts tied to bedroom furniture or doorknobs or found knotted on the floor.
Yeah, I'm still getting over the whole cutting phenom.
OK, one last one from Ypulse:
Hip-hop duo ATMOSPHERE are... publishing their own children's book.Atmosphere rapper Slug has written the 40-page tome, which will be illustrated by sketches and accompanied by lyrics to the band's songs. The U.S. group will release the book with their new LP When Life Gives You Lemons, You Paint That S**t Gold later this year. (article, of which I quoted almost the entire thing)
Yessir! And don't forget, little men, to piss against the wall!
It's like, sometimes you feel the weight of the world. And it's so heavy and it's bringing you down. Oh no. But you, gotta get up, you gotta get up:
