Jun 11, 2008Ah, it’s only been 10 months. I thought my vacation would have lasted longer.
I needed to post this. For no other reason than I found it to be enjoyable.
That is all.
Category: DiversionsMay 01, 2007So I was reading tonite, Kate went to bed early, reading tonite in the basement with some music playing softly, but not so softly that I couldn’t recognize what was playing, and I just sat down at the computer to take note of what I just finished reading, I’ll tell you about it sometime, if you ask, it’s in the sidebar, under “Greene”, and I noticed that the song, singular, song had been repeated 45 times, as I’d inadvertently left iTunes on single-track repeat.
I’m one who would usually notice something like that, or maybe I’m not.
The end.
Category: DiversionsJan 22, 2007Here is nothing ponderous, nothing, at the surface, but the temporal and fleshly, the eat-drink-and-be-merrily: I love blood oranges.
You may have seen them used before, somewhere, probably on an Iron Chef, probably garnished with sea urchin roe or alongside sepia-stained noodles, and most assuredly topped with a paper-thin slice of black truffle. Instantly, your eye is drawn to the color. On the surface, a common orange, but opened (in typical Iron Chef ginsu-fashion) its bloody flesh glares at you like a wound, your mind reeling, attempting to imagine what kind of demoniac tree might have borne such hideous offspring.
You wonder, does it taste like an orange? Blood? Smell? Is it warm? Does it have a pulse? The answers: Yes, mostly. No. Orange. Can be. No.
I’m not sure if I was lucky with my purchase, or if they all taste this good. They’re very sweet, for oranges, and they have a slight berry taste, which comes from the anthocyanin (typically found in red berries and flowers). Hence the color. And the name.
Oh, and the name. Some of the more timid grocers (read: those who actually want to sell them) mark them as Moro Oranges. That is, I guess, their name. But that doesn’t really capture it at all.
Category: DiversionsDec 21, 2006Google Search: the answer to life, the universe, and everything
Category: DiversionsAug 18, 2006Containing what is possibly my favorite lines from a children’s story, Ginger & Pickles makes a Beatrix Potter Collection a worthwhile addition to your library. Not to mention Squirrel Nutkin, Timmy Tiptoes, or Mrs. Tittlemouse, which are invaluable on their own.
Ginger and Pickles were the people who kept the shop. Ginger was a yellow tom-cat, and Pickles was a terrier.
The rabbits were always a little bit afraid of Pickles.
The shop was also patronized by mice—only the mice were rather afraid of Ginger.
Ginger usually requested Pickles to serve them, because he said it made his mouth water.
“I cannot bear,” said he, “to see them going out at the door carrying their little parcels.”
“I have the same feeling about rats,” replied Pickles, “but it would never do to eat our own customers; they would leave us and go to Tabitha Twitchit’s.”
“On the contrary, they would go nowhere,” replied Ginger gloomily.
Beatrix Potter Ginger & Pickles
Worthy to be placed on the shelf next to your anthology of Milne’s Pooh Stories, when they’re on the shelf at all (which they aren’t).
Category: DiversionsJul 05, 2006In 34 hours, my sphere of potential causality (or Light Cone) will reach Xi Ursae Majoris.
Category: DiversionsMay 17, 2006“Those New Zealand farmers had a theory: Make the livestock work for us, not have us working for them,” said Sayre, 79, who runs Waffle Hill Farm with his son, Ned. “When you’re growing corn for silage, we’re doing all the work.”“We work all spring planting,” he continued. “We work all summer praying for rain. We work all fall harvesting. Under Sayre’s grazing program, the cattle are harvesting the fields. They are even spreading the manure.”
Baltimoresun.com: Making environmentally friendly farming economical
Category: DiversionsMay 17, 2006Some guy named centuri0n (cute) is discussing paedobaptism vs. credobaptism from a Baptist’s POV. He promises it to be a summer-long thread of posts. Should be interesting.
Category: DiversionsMay 09, 2006Until Christian music stresses art over agenda, it can never be anything but second rate. As a music editor at the Chicago Tribune, I have a responsibility to turn my readers on to the best art out there. And as a Christian, I have an obligation to tell the truth at all costs, as I see it. If it’s bad, awkward, mawkish art that Nashville keeps shipping to me like so many day-glo W.W.J.D. bracelets, what choice do I have? I would rather be the voice of one crying out in the wilderness than win the approval of any cabal that is convinced — for all the wrong reasons — that the majority of “Christian” music serves a noble purpose.
Michelangelo makes us cry by depicting the finger-touch of creation in a majestic image. Johnny Cash could break your heart by revealing the serrated edges of his brokenness. Bono makes you wrestle and challenges all assumptions that God is of the right or left wing. None of this is a “business model” to be emulated. These are ways of approaching art and life we are talking about, meant to be done with all the fear and trembling of someone trying to point the way to a higher truth while walking a narrow path. (Chicago Tribune Music Editor, Lou Carlozo)
Also, from a related article:
- Our popular culture is unworthy of imitation because it is mindless & soulless, yet Christians get excited, even when they don’t yet meet the “fallen” artistic standards of the culture.
- Popular Culture is not about thoughtful art or craftsmanship, it is about money & profits generated through reaching the lowest common denominator, yet Christians get excited, because based on that standard, they’re even MORE financially successful than their secular counterparts.
- The real standard, the one that should matter, seems to go unmentioned and unmet. I’m referring to our uniqueness as created in God’s Image, which provides deep and rich spiritual, intellectual, creative, relational and moral capacities.
Fallen culture meets imitative culture and everybody gets rich and goes to the bank. And I’m supposed to be excited about this why?
Both articles were spawned by a third article (from the New York Times Select, which has no free online equivalent) which focused on Mercy Me’s latest Tour/Marketing Push. Like the author of the second article says, this is nothing I have against Mercy Me specifically, but more the Christian Music Industry in general.
Category: DiversionsMay 01, 2006Revised for clarity. I should learn how to write. -m
Anyone who reads this must think that all I do is read Doug Wilson’s blog. I assure you that this isn’t entirely true. But I’m drawn to it, because he says things that I find to be insightful, at least within my own experiences:
One of great mistakes I made was that of not recognizing that different doctrinal positions (on different subjects) are like different chemicals. And when you change one of them (and have all your Bible verses in a row) you need to be aware of the new interactions between that new position and some of your old positions that were previously just sitting there.
And, as a bonus, he has a short note on the Greek system of temperaments:
Another milestone screwup had to do with a particular theory of temperaments. A Christian writer named O’Hallesby had popularized an ancient Greek notion of temperament, in which the human race is divided up into four basic temperaments—sanguine, choleric, melancholic, and phlegmatic. Or to take the insights of another great writer on the human condition—Tigger, Rabbit, Eeyore, and Pooh.
He goes on to say that he found the Greek system too limiting, and the categories were too definitive, i.e. a Sanguine can never act like a Phlegmatic, etc. In this, I’m inclined to agree. I was first introduced to the Greek temperament system via Kim Stanley Robinson’s Red Mars (good sci-fi, if a tad liberal and preachy). Robinson plots the temperaments against Greimas’ semiotic square (a better illustration here). In Robinson’s application, there was much more room for a “fuzzy” assignment of temperament. For example, not everyone is wholly sanguine—everyone has times of introversion to some degree. Or so I hope. By the end of the paragraph, Wilson seems to be supporting this view as well, though he has discarded the utilization of temperaments in favor of a… well, he doesn’t really favor any temperament system at all. Which is, I guess, his prerogative, but where are we without our shortcuts and generalizations? Mr. Global/Analytical would like to know.
Eagle-eyed readers, and people who have short term memories of over 15 minutes, will notice that I’ve completely removed the last sentence of this post in favor of this rather long-winded notification of the fact that the sentence was removed. In the aforementioned sentence, I implied that like-minded people tended to make each other “soft”. Which to an extent I still agree with, but upon further review I realized that this is not necessarily always the case, and that many times like-minded people can goad each other on. Helping each other “Further Up and Further In” as it were.
Category: DiversionsDisclaimer: No, I don't agree with everything I link to. When I am in total disagreement, I will (hopefully) (try to) make note of that fact within the post. However, items of interest that I mostly agree with will tend to slip by without any further warning than what you're receiving now. At all times, if you're not certain of my stance on a particular topic, I ask that you please comment (read: tup·pence) or email me directly for clarification. Thank you.
