Faux Satanists to piddle in Christians’ punchbowl

Rapidly becoming the Westboro Baptist of atheism.

Let’s face it: these people don’t believe in an actual Satan. Yeah, I know, there’s an esoteric philosophical system that calls itself Satanism, but I doubt any of the yahoos behind this could actually articulate it. All the symbolism is deliberately chosen to create revulsion among Christians. That’s it. They only adopt the trappings of Satanism because Christians have learned to ignore atheists spitting on their sacred things.

I keep thinking of a quote from C.S. Lewis’ The Last Battle:

There goes one who had called on gods he does not believe in. How will it be with him if they have really come?

I don’t really get excited about the coach’s prayers one way or another. He’s not hurting anyone, but it wouldn’t hurt anyone if he stopped, either.  It seems to me there are more important things to worry about. But for this bunch, it’s all about the hate.

You know what they say about honest politicians

Once they’re bought, they stay bought.

So hands off that gearshift, mister!

Spotted while "touring" Britain on Geoguessr:

Using Google Street View's whiz-bang time machine thingy, it looks like it's been that way at least since 2008. Really on the ol' stick there in Worcester, aren't we? (So to speak.)

Trust no fox in the green meadow...

... and no Christian on the Internet.

It’s funny, when I first started this blog, it was an outgrowth of apologetics discussions I’d been having with Protestants, especially Calvinists, like Tim Challies and the Bayly Brothers. The hostility level usually stayed low, but it was really clear that they and I weren’t singing out of the same hymnal, so to speak.

The times, they are a’changin’. Today I almost never get into arguments with Protestants. In fact, my best friend’s mother, a Fundamentalist whom I would have expected to find firmly in the Pope-as-Antichrist camp, frequently sends me links about Catholic things that she’s really impressed by.

Say what you will about militant atheists, they’ve caused the various Christian sects to bury the hatchet, and not between some heretic’s shoulder blades. Those people despise us all equally. The more ignorant they are, the more vitriolic their denunciations. I don't know for certain that all of them are atheists by philosophy; some may just be jackasses who get off on the idea that they're somebody's moral and intellectual superior. Sort of like they accuse us of being, but for real.

It’s not all that far from this:

to this:

Go check out the originals here and here, if you’re strong of stomach. Streicher and Betty Bowers could probably find a lot to talk about.

A few thoughts, and jolly well about time, too

Note: I have no idea what to do about the font on this post. I messed it up and nothing seems to put it right. Sorry for the dissonance.

In another month and a half, it’ll be a year since my last post. I’m durned if I’ll allow my blog to go to seed that long, so it’s about time I put some thoughts into pixels. In no particular order:

1. My posting hiatuses (hiati?) seem to coincide with a change in my ADD medication. I’m back on my old drugs now and I have a feeling my ability to write will return along with it.

2. My job situation went on a roller coaster ride last winter. I won’t go into details – I make it a policy not to talk about work anyplace I can get dooced – but the upshot is that I’m back at the Greatest Paper in the Northwest™ doing page layout and copy editing. I’m not complaining about that part; I like the work and I’m good at it. It’s just the ride there that left me feeling slapped around like a white-trash housewife the morning after payday. I’m working evenings, which is proving an adventure for my Lovely and Brilliant Wife as well as the three HFA kids she wrangles into bed every night while I’m gone.

3. I’ve become addicted to GeoGuessr. It makes my inner map geek turn cartwheels. Basically, it plunks you down somewhere in the world on Google Street View and you have to work out your location from signs and other externals. I find the USA and UK versions fun for idle amusement, but some of the other maps pack a real challenge. (Have you ever tried to get your bearings in the middle of the Russian steppe or the Brazilian highlands?) There are no actual rules about looking things up but I limit myself to having Google Maps open in a second tab so I have a larger area to look at. Not for everybody, maybe, but I love it. It’s kind of fun seeing all these places I would never have sought out on my own.

4. The Grille from Ipanema in Coeur d’Alene is fantastic. Yummiest Brazilian barbecue I ever threw a lip over.  I recommend it highly. My only regret is that they don’t serve Xingu.

5. I have another grandbaby. Drama Queen and her husband presented me with an adorable granddaughter in November. Okay, technically she’s their baby, but I think of them as merely her caretakers when I’m not playing with her. Seriously, take a look. Is this not hyperconcentrated cuteness?

6. I also lost my last grandparent, my grandmother, last month. She was 94. We had her memorial on what would have been her and Grandpa’s 75th anniversary. Eternal rest grant unto her, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon her.

7. Covarr just got word that he has a role in the Masquers Theatre’s upcoming musical.

8. I hate wildfire season in central Washington. Not just because of the smoky air and the people losing their homes, but because there’s nothing but fire photos to put on the front page, and there are only so many things you can do with them. It’s like trying to find ways to make tuna casserole new every meal.

9. I think I need to post my political stuff here more rather than Facebook. I’ve had several people unfriend me over political stuff. I really don’t understand people who do that.

10. We took the kids on a family vacation this summer for the first time in five years. Went to the Cannon Beach Conference Center and then down to see the in-laws in California. The drive home was 16 hours. My butt is permanently shaped like a minivan seat.

11. Still waiting for SSI to kick in. The kids qualify and the functionaries we talk to keep assuring us it’ll be any time now, but we haven’t seen any money yet and some bills are starting to stack up. If I have any readers left, some prayers would be appreciated.

12. My Lovely and Brilliant Wife has taken up art and is beginning to post some of her creations on her blog. Amble over and take a look and let her know if you see anything you like. Yes, it’s for sale as soon as she gets set up to make prints.

13. I hate Caps Lock. Even though I use it every day. I especially hate retyping entire paragraphs because I forgot I had it on. Grr.

14. I still have my comments prior to 2012 exported from the now-defunct Haloscan system, but I haven’t figured out how to import them.

15. My ten-year blogiversary was in April, and I totally missed it. Yay me, I guess.

16. God continues to be good, the Catholic Church continues to be one, holy, catholic and apostolic, and I continue to be a mediocre Christian at best.

Now to tidy up the sidebar and fix the kids’ ages. And we’re back in the Blogosphere!

Sort of a 9/11 post

Everybody's posting their 9/11 reminiscences today. Most people seem to have watched the whole thing on TV and wept or stood in shock. Oddly enough, I didn't. I had no idea anything was amiss until I got to work and saw my co-workers huddled around the radio. As it became clear that this was big, my first thought was "I hope Mary [my editor who was in D.C. for a visit] got some good photos."  Then the enormity of the whole thing struck me.

Such is the thought process of a newspaperman. And that day, our little afternoon daily actually scooped the big metro papers that had all gone to press before the attack. We were on the other side of the country, not any sort of a target for even the most hateful enemy. What are they going to do, terrorize our potato fields?

So I don't have a lot of memorial stuff. What I do have is a snippet of a column by Dorothy Rabinowitz that reminds me why America is worth preserving:

There are other faces of Muslim America. Five years or so after the terrorists drove their planes and passengers into the twin towers and the Pentagon, a cab driver from Pakistan remarked, as we drove past the rubble where the towers had stood, that he could never pass this place without trying to see them again in his mind. A painful effort, for all that it brought back. What was not painful, he added, was the memory of certain people in his neighborhood—a mixed but mostly white area of Queens, with many Italian-Americans, some Jews, and he thought some Irish. After the attacks, some of the men had come to him.

"My wife doesn't go out without a head cover," he explained. The men had come to tell him that if anyone bothered her, or his family, he must come to them.

"I must tell them and must not be afraid. Do you know," he said, in a voice suddenly sharp, "what would have happened if Americans had done this kind of attack in my country? Every American—every Christian, every non-Muslim—would have been slaughtered, blood would have run in the streets. I know the kind of country this is. Thanks be to God I can give this to my children."

Thanks be to God indeed.

NYT: Hey, maybe the Klan had a point

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

(Do I even need to mention what political party the two have in common? Nah.)

If Jonathan Edwards were a feminist nutcase

I mean, seriously, doesn't this have the same cadence as Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God?

Men, homo rapiens, you scum, you filth. There is no word to describe the extent of your evil, you are pure evil, pure lechery. I hate you, how I hate you. In the 250,000 years of your rotten, defunct existence, you have managed to kill 5 million years of life on earth...

Whew! I'd beg for mercy, if only it were possible for a homo rapiens wretch like me. RTWT, if only for an appreciation of the sheer artistry of the rant. I've known plenty of Fundamentalist preachers who couldn't approach that level of pulpit-chewing, mouth-foaming intensity. (No disrespect to Fundamentalists intended.)

This, incidentally, is the same womyn-spirit who wrote the roundly-mocked screed about how all sex (at least, any that could possibly fulfill its natural function) was rape. Go ahead and read that one if you like, but you'll want to take a shower afterward.

Akubra tip to V the K.

National Tom Lehrer Week

Well, it should be.

He turned 86 last week. Who knew? Here's an excellent article on the notoriously publicity-shy genius.

And this song never really becomes dated:

You gotta know when to hold 'em...

...know when to fold 'em, and most importantly, know when to stagger away from the table and vomit in the alley before your buddies can come up with a bet like this.

Of bakers, sociopaths and brownshirts

On the religious freedom/anti-harassment bill in Arizona, V the K at Gay Patriot writes:

There are several personality traits that define a sociopath. Some of the key ones are: Superficial charm, Untruthfulness and insincerity, Lack of remorse and shame, and Pathologic egocentricity and incapacity for love,

A sociopath is not led by facts and reason to a conclusion; they are not relevant, only the conclusion is relevant. The sociopath wants what he wants. Often, what he wants is ego gratification through forcing others to capitulate.

You can’t argue with sociopaths. They don’t care about reason, or liberty, or freedom. They only care about getting their way; which in this case means forcing Christians to bake cakes and arrange flowers for gays. Because that will mean that they win and Christians lose, and that’s all that matters; the Power. And they know that their fellow sociopaths in politics, business, the media, and the courts… career fields that reward and celebrate sociopathic behavior… will be only too happy to grant them that power.

Normal, reasonable people are capable of getting along without constantly having to stir sh-t up. But Drama Queens (which, when you think about it, is just another word for sociopath) love stirring sh-t up and turn people against each other for their benefit and amusement.

Before I get into the main topic, let me first say that the next person who uses the phrase "Jim Crow" will be clopped upside the head with a history book. Jim Crow laws prohibited merchants from serving customers across the color line. They were a restriction on the freedoms of business owners, closer in intent to the "civil rights" legislation currently in place than to this attempt to mitigate their coercive nature.

Most opponents of this bill probably know only what they hear in the news, which is to say, nothing. The bill does not allow businesses carte blanche to deny service to gay people. No restaurant, no cab driver, is going to be permitted to turn away a gay customer. Even the baker and the florist cannot refuse to make a cake or arrange flowers for gay people simply because they're gay. All it does is close a loophole in existing law, to extend to religious believers the same protection from punishment by individuals that they already have from punishment by government.

Now to the meat of it. What kind of person opposes that protection? The word "sociopath" is a strong one, not to be used lightly.
In other states that have no protections, it has become a trend for gay customers to approach, say, bakers who feature their Christianity prominently in their advertising,  and order a wedding cake. The baker refuses politely, explaining that his religion forbids him to participate in blasphemy, and refers the customer to another bakery. The gay people take their wounded feelings first to court, where they bankrupt the baker, and then to the news media, where they all join in a chorus of "Ooh, those awful Jesus Freaks!" In the meantime, some other baker has made them a cake for free by way of consolation.

Here's where sociopathy comes in. If the stated purpose is true, that the goal is to buy a wedding cake, there are plenty of bakers out there to choose from. The customer has the choice of buying from one of the many who do want his business, or the one that doesn't. He chooses the unwilling one. At this point, it's not just about the cake, but about getting the cake by force. When a man does this with sex, we call him a rapist. When it's commerce, he's hailed as a courageous activist. At bottom, they're both sociopaths.

But I doubt very much that the cake is the issue. The issue is whether people who are different may be left alone, or must be ostracized and punished. Targeting a small minority – and Christians with this scruple are a minority – in order to put them out of business is (pace Godwin's Law) the same method used in pre-Holocaust Germany, albeit on an individual basis rather than a wholesale one. The law is merely the cudgel with which to beat the undesirable people. And the people who engage in it are still brownshirts, whether they display swastikas or rainbow bumper stickers.

A sociopath wants to harm people to feel powerful. A brownshirt wants to harm people because he hates them personally. Two different kinds of two-legged vermin.

No, child protective agencies don't have too much power

Why would you say that?

(And remember, if you do, your kids could be next. *cough*Wenatchee*cough*)

Akubra tip to Mark Shea.

Things you need to know #462:

My friend Lazarus Lupin was found dead in his home two nights ago. He and I became friends in middle school, bonding over mutual geekery. He introduced me to bad movies, thud-and-blunder fantasy literature and the eldritch horrors of H.P. Lovecraft. He had the bizarrest sense of humor I've ever encountered (and looking at my other friends, that says a lot). We lost touch after high school and only reconnected a few years ago on Facebook and in the blogosphere. I wish I could have seen him one more time.

Travel in elephants, Mike. That is all, maho maho.

Not dead yet!

I know, I know, I haven't posted since Christmas Eve. Mea culpa.

Part of the delay has been my new job. I'm no longer a one-man department at the (former) Greatest Newspaper in the Northwest™. Rather, I've been promoted and am now a one-man newsroom (and composing department and everything but ad sales) at the NEW Greatest Newspaper in the Northwest™. (The link in the sidebar will be changed to reflect the re-ranking as soon as the new paper's website is up.) It's a monthly agricultural news publication covering all of Central Washington. It's owned by the same corporation as the paper I just left, but it's kept carefully separate. This is the sort of challenge I've been working for for the last 17 years, and so far I'm loving the bejabbers out of it.

Trouble is, there was a major project (the actual term I use for it is a bit more pungent than "project") that I was still working on at the other paper. I've been trying frantically to get it out while hitting the ground running at the new job. That latter part isn't helped by the fact that my predecessor here left abruptly and took her staff and most of her archives and information with her. Frustrating.

Meanwhile, we seem to have settled everything with the bank and are going to be able to keep our house. We also were approved for SSI for Visigoth and Ostrogoth, which is good because they're the reason my Lovely and Brilliant Wife can't accept a job outside the home. It's hard to work when maybe one day out of three you get a call from the school to come and pick up a melting-down child.

You may notice a few changes in the sidebar. I'm taking out the blogs that haven't posted in forever and I've got a few more to bring in. I'll try and introduce the new ones as I add them.

You're now up to date, you few, you happy few, you band of readers who still wander by here occasionally. Thanks for your patience!

Repost: The Play of the Nativity of the Child Jesus

Bringing it back from last year, not just because I'm crunched for time, but because it was a really, really good (non-) Cheesy Christmas Movie!

I've been saving this one for last, because it's decidedly not cheesy.

If you're looking for a plain old Christmas pageant on screen, you're going to be caught a bit off-guard, especially by the dialogue. This isn't some hokey Hollywood bastardization of the Christmas story. This is modeled after the medieval Nativity plays.

The archaic, rhymed dialogue and the lighting give this an overall tone of reverence and age befitting to such a holy narrative. Notably, the commercials are only at the beginning and end; the play is uninterrupted.

Such a solemn, joyful treatment of Christmas on TV is impossible to imagine today. I doubt it was commonplace even in the early 1950s. If you've watched none of my Cheesy Christmas Movie series, watch this and leave me your thoughts in the comments.



Available for streaming and download here.

Let's get childish

After the festival of banality that was the last Cheesy Christmas Movie, here's a bit of a palate-cleanser. Santa's Magic Toy Bag is a cute little TV special from 1983. The characters all appear to be Muppets, but not connected with Jim Henson. (What would you call those? Pseudo-muppets? Muppetoids?) There seems to be some connection with the TV series ALF.

The protagonist is a good-hearted bumbling elf called Sherman, who has managed to make a shambles of every department at the North Pole. He expects to be sacked, but instead is trusted with Santa's titular bag. Hilarity ensues.

It's cute. It's lightweight. It's a pleasant half-hour. Drop the whole adulthood thing for a bit and get childish.
Part 1:

Part 2:

Because every dead horse deserves one more flogging

I'm getting a late start on the Cheesy Christmas Movies this year, because I'm trying to branch out a little bit and find some new films. That means I actually have to watch these stinkeroos, at least enough to be able to review them a little bit.

Let's kick off with a fairly recent one: The Christmas Clause (2008). Apparently somebody in Movieland had a brilliant idea: "Hey! How about this for a premise? A person is unhappy with their lot in life and a guardian angel changes the past to give them an entirely different one! And they end up appreciating what they had so much more!"

It was magnificent in It's a Wonderful Life. It was even pretty good in The Family Man. But for heaven's sake, can we just let the horse corpse decompose in peace?

True, Lea Thompson gives a fair if not overly inspired performance. The viewer can feel the frazzlement right along with her during the first pivotal scene in the mall. (The hot chocolate incident alone would make Mother Teresa drop-kick the kid across the food court.) And I really, really hope that husband of hers turns out better in the second half of the film, because he's a bit of a useless oaf in the opening.

One thing they must have gotten right is that her new-and-improved life is much more unappealing than her old one. I'd take Jimmy Stewart's non-existence over her two-dimensional fantasy any day.

Presented for your revilement:




As always, do please leave a comment.

It's Advent! And you know what that means...

Time for Cheesy Christmas Movies! I'll probably recycle a few of the same ones from years past, simply because I like them and it's my blog, dagnabbit! But I'd love some suggestions for some new ones to add.

They should be public domain if possible (although I probably won't be as picky about that as in years past), embeddable from the Internet Archive or YouTube or some other source. Preference goes to older or more obscure films. Leave your suggestions/links in the comments.

"I pray for my grandchildren to die"

Or words to that effect.



A/T to Creative Minority Report.

As I was saying...

... below:

Akubra tip to SondraK.

Whoo!

Bill Whittle is in fine form:

The KKK was formed by Democrats, after the Civil War in which the Republican Party freed the slaves. It eventually morphed into the Jim Crow south whose laws were written by Democrats, and all of those guys turning the hoses on the Civil Rights marchers – guys like Lester Maddox, Bull Connor and George Wallace, were all Democrats turning the same hatred on Republican Martin Luther King as they had a century earlier when the Democrats in white hoods turned it on Republican Frederick Douglass, who said: “I recognize the Republican party as the sheet anchor of the colored man's political hopes and the ark of his safety.”
Now of course, modern Progressives say that’s all true, completely true, 100% true, absolutely and undeniably true -- but in the 60’s the two parties switched sides, you see? In other words, if Florida is beating Florida State 60-0 at half time, and then the Gators score 72 points in the second half… the Florida State fan says the Seminoles really won because at half time both teams went into the locker rooms and switched uniforms. They actually believe this.

Preach it!

Unintended consequences

At least we know the kids are paying attention.

Here comes the bride

Okay, so I'm a  few days overdue. My Virtuous and Excellent Daughter, who took the photos on Saturday, had to have some time to get them posted on Facebook. I stole a few good ones.

The lovely Drama Queen:

The unlovely old goat giving away the bride:

And the happy couple:

The ceremony went fairly well. Ostrogoth had a meltdown at the rehearsal but did beautifully at the ceremony, strewing her flower petals with great care. Visigoth and Octopus Boy were ringbearers and (mirabile visu!) stood still voluntarily through most of the wedding. My wife's family wasn't able to come up from California, alas, but my parents and all the siblings except Long Drink were there. (He's in a phase of not wanting anything to do with his family. It's either typical teenage stuff or his mother messing with his head. I'll never know for sure.)

It wasn't the grand affair she was hoping for, but the end result was the same: she got a good husband. And I think he will be. They're both young, but he's made of excellent material.

Three to get ready...

Heading out shortly for Drama Queen's wedding rehearsal. For the second time this year I get to walk a beautiful young lady down the aisle and hand her over. (I'm not supposed to heave an audible sigh of relief, but I can think one.) My Virtuous and Excellent Daughter will be photographing; I'll post pictures as they become available.

In honor of the date

Try and watch this without grinning. Go ahead, I dare you.

Shutdown horror

Okay, shutting down veterans' memorials and evicting people from their homes was bad enough. But this is going too far.

Where will the madness end?

The Apocalypse of St. Cassandra the Awesome

The end is nigh.

And I saw when The Lightworker opened one of the seals and I heard, as it were the noise of thunder, one of the 232 beasts saying, "Come and see".
And I saw, and beheld a white horse: and he that sat on him had a face of orange; and Lo! a bomb was strapped to his chest. And he rode forth to wreak havoc upon the economy in the midst of the worst Recession since, well... ever, really.
And when The Lightworker had opened the second seal, I heard the second beast say with the false consciousness of a token Hispanic, "Come and see".
And there went out another horse that was sickly red and reeking of coded racism and ill concealed misogyny: and power was given to him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth and free contraceptives from struggling Georgetown coeds and bread from the mouths of innocent babes, the elderly, and the near-poor. 

Tolle, legge!

The Elwha tragedy

It was thirty years ago today, and every Washingtonian can tell you where he was when he heard about it. Read about that harrowing night here, and listen to the song written in tribute.

Never forget.

The last of his kind

One of the original science fiction writers, editors and fans has passed.

Frederik Pohl was a founding member of the Futurians, along with Isaac Asimov, Donald Wollheim, Damon Knight, Cyril Kornbluth and others of blessed memory. He edited Galaxy and If magazines, in whose pages I had my first introduction to the joys of sci-fi pulpdom. His 1978 memoir The Way the Future Was is a fascinating insight into the history of my favorite writers and literature.

Even at the age of 93, the man simply could not stop writing. His blog covered on sci-fi, politics (from a very left-wing perspective) and other topics, often several times a day. He blogged Monday morning, and died Monday afternoon, a departure befitting his life.

Travel in elephants, sir.

Come-a-come-a down-doo-bee-doo-down down...

Breakin' up is hard to do.

I love it when atheists get history

I can get along really well with this guy.

I love to totally stump them by asking them to present me with the name of one - just one - scientist burned, persecuted or oppressed for their science in the Middle Ages. They always fail to come up with any. They usually try to crowbar Galileo back into the Middle Ages, which is amusing considering he was a contemporary of Descartes. When asked why they have failed to produce any such scientists given the Church was apparently so busily oppressing them, they often resort to claiming that the Evil Old Church did such a good job of oppression that everyone was too scared to practice science. By the time I produce a laundry list of Medieval scientists - like Albertus Magnus, Robert Grosseteste, Roger Bacon, John Peckham, Duns Scotus, Thomas Bradwardine, Walter Burley, William Heytesbury, Richard Swineshead, John Dumbleton, Richard of Wallingford, Nicholas Oresme, Jean Buridan and Nicholas of Cusa - and ask why these men were happily pursuing science in the Middle Ages without molestation from the Church, my opponents have usually run away to hide and scratch their heads in puzzlement at what just went wrong.

Bonus: A graphic that he declares (and ( concur) The Stupidest Thing On The Internet Ever. Go read it all.

Once again. life imitates classic movies

Where have we seen this before? Oh yeah... here.

A fantastic film, and one that lets Olivia DeHavilland move beyond her Maid Marian persona into some serious drama. Watch it if you can find it.

I really wonder how this real-life example will end up. Despite the changes in technology, the problem is the same: how can they possibly prosecute?

Just so we're clear...

Laws that hurt gay people's feelings: International outrage.

Churches burned and Christians murdered: Ho hum.

It's all about who matters and who doesn't.

An apology letter to Mr. Obama

I am not worthy to link to this. (But I will anyway.) I can't possibly excerpt it; you'll just have to go read it all. Akubra tip to Heroditus Huxley.

Quote of the Day

Totalitarianism does not consist of iron law; it consists of capricious law, because those in power get to decide when it will not apply.

Found at Ace via SondraK.

Cluck away!

My Virtuous and Excellent Daughter (see here for gorgeous photo) has resumed blogging at Clucking Catholic. Check it out!

Thinking of amputating...

... Visigoth's dialing fingers. I just answered the door to find a mobile computer tech on the porch. She had apparently gotten a call from my Lovely and Brilliant Wife, to come fix a faulty laptop port. I called her and lo and behold, she hadn't.

It didn't take much to put two and two and nine together and figure out that it was Visigoth. To his credit, he didn't try to deny it. Which (combined with the fact that we weren't charged for the visit) is the only reason I haven't stuffed him in a box and mailed him to Tristan da Cunha or some equally inaccessible place.

Mmmmm

Nothing says "Happy Birthday America" like chickens being cooked in an undignified position vis-a-vis a beer can. With tequila, lime juice, garlic, onion and jalapeno.

About frimpin' time!

What's the point of being in the desert if we can't have real summers? For the weather we've had this year, we might as well have been in (God forbid) Seattle.

To the lake this weekend!

D-Day post

Sixty-nine years ago today, 160,000 men gave it all they had and saved the world. Every time I do this, it gets harder to find enough of them to link here.

This day is call’d the feast of Crispian.
He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when this day is nam’d,
And rouse him at the name of Crispian.
He that shall live this day, and see old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,
And say “To-morrow is Saint Crispian.”
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars,
And say “These wounds I had on Crispian’s day.”
Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot,
But he’ll remember, with advantages,
What feats he did that day. Then shall our names,
Familiar in his mouth as household words –
Harry the King, Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester –
Be in their flowing cups freshly rememb’red.
This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne’er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remembered –
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition;
And gentlemen in England now-a-bed
Shall think themselves accurs’d they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.

Thank you, gentlemen. Just... thank you.

And here she is!

As you can see, my Virtuous and Excellent Daughter was absolutely breathtaking. (Pay no attention to the geezer next to her.)

The wedding went off fairly well. Ostrogoth had a meltdown on the way out the door and had to be dragged bodily to the car, but was all sugar once we arrived. Not so Octopus Boy, who pitched the mother of all tantrums halfway through the ceremony and had to be removed by Drama Queen. I kid you not, I could hear his screams all the way in from the parking lot. That kid has a set of lungs that would make professional hog-callers wince.

We had a little confusion when VaED announced that the cake-cutting would be at a neighborhood park, forgetting to mention it to her new husband beforehand. But he's pretty used to rolling with the punches, which is exactly the sort of husband she needs. They fit well together.

Minor bobbles, but they ended up married in the end. And that was really the whole point of the exercise, wasn't it?

Ding dong, the bells are gonna chime

Tomorrow, I get to walk my Virtuous and Excellent Daughter down the aisle and hand her over to her new husband. She's his problem source of joy now.

One down, seven to go.

A credit to his cassock

Father Andrew Greeley travels in elephants.

A highly-regarded sociologist, preternaturally prolific author and unabashedly liberal Chicago priest, the Rev. Greeley regularly took his church to task in both his fiction and his scholarly work. His non-fiction books covered topics from Catholic education to Irish history to Jesus' relationships with women.

The Rev. Greeley authored some 50 best-selling novels and more than 100 works of non-fiction that were translated into 12 languages.

His racy novels and detective stories, which often closely paralleled real events, aired out Catholic controversies and hummed with detailed bedroom romps that kept readers rapt and coming back for more. Best-sellers like "The Cardinal Sins" in 1981 earned him millions of dollars, much of which he donated to the church and charities.

I'll be honest: Father Greeley was generally a mediocre novelist, with two or three passable plotlines that he recycled perpetually. His politics were as opposite mine as you can get. His theology (or that of his leading characters, anyway) has often struck me as borderline heretical.

None of that matters a whit to me. Shortly before I started looking seriously into the Catholic Church myself, I read several of his novels. The faith that pervaded them was tangible. It was human. Even priests (and at that time, I'd never actually even met one) were ordinary people in his books. Catholicism was simply a central fact of life. (So were his heritage and hometown. In his books, everybody who was anybody was either from Chicago or Irish, and usually both.)

It was that matter-of-fact approach to the Church that made it seem more accessible to me later. By the time I began my journey to Rome, I had reference points for some of the things I was about to encounter for the first time. God used Father Greeley to soften me up, as it were, for the plans He had for me.

The other quality I absorbed from his books was a certain integrity. Two-dimensional though his characters often were, they were true to themselves. His priests really believed what they preached, and if they strayed from their vows, they did so knowing it was wrong. His laypeople sinned, but they knew right from wrong. I could have done with less sex in the books, but even there, the moral dimension was always present. As too few writers do (Orson Scott Card is another), he knew how to treat religion as more than just a personality quirk. That's because to him, it really was everything.

And finally, he had an optimism and friendliness about him that may be priestly, or it may simply be Irish. I dunno. But in spite of the critical things I said about him in this post, I think I'd have liked him immensely.

Thanks, Father. Partly thanks to you, I'll see you 'round.

Note: This is one of the few Andrew Greeley novels I can recommend. Yeah, it's not great literature, but I still enjoy rereading it now and then. Sappy, romantic, and genuine.

Re: Joyce!

I just discovered via Mark Shea that my high-school Sunday School teacher, Joyce Crain, is not only a Catholic convert, but is leading a plethora of ministries at St. Francis Parish in the San Juan Islands. She was an awesome teacher in the 1980s (and especially patient with the teenage pissant I was back then) and I have no doubt she's just as wonderful today. Her husband was the one who gave me the copy of "Mere Christianity" that triggered my decision to embrace the faith I'd been raised in. Otherwise, I shudder to think where I would have wound up.

Joyce blogs here. I've just started reading it, but she's got some rich material. Check it out!

Finally! Now we can tell what they're saying

Jim Goad at Taki's has bridged the gap between liberals and ordinary people with the Progressive Glossary. Never let a conversation be derailed again through vague terminology!

DIVERSITY—A magical incantation used to divert your attention from the fact that it is strikingly similar to the words “divide” and “division.”
DOG WHISTLE—A high-pitched screech from the enemy that only progressives are able to hear. Lately this term has been deemed offensive to canines and should therefore be replaced with “coded speech” wherever possible.
ELITES—Wealthy people on the political right. This term is never used to describe wealthy people on the left who control much of the media, government, and academia.
EMPOWERED—Loud and annoying.
GUN NUT—Anyone who owns a gun yet doesn’t belong to the group that actually commits the majority of American gun violence.
HATRED—Anything that we hate.
HERSTORY—The part of history that is usually ignored because not much really happened.
HETERONORMATIVE—Sexually normal.
HOMOPHOBE—Someone with a distaste for sex that involves feces and AIDS.
LOOKISM—A term used by ugly people to explain why beautiful people won’t [fornicate with] them.
REDNECK—A racial slur used to describe people we assume are always using racial slurs.
SOCIOPATH—A non-socialist.
STARTING A DIALOGUE—Starting a monologue.

Go read the whole thing. Ambrose Bierce would be proud.

Yes!

Arlene's is fighting back!

Barronelle Stutzman has decided that the best defense is a good offense. Stutzman, 68, is the owner of Arlene’s Flowers and Gifts, the Richland, Washington, business being sued by state Attorney General Bob Ferguson.
Ferguson is suing Arlene’s because Stutzman declined to violate her faith by doing the floral decorations for the wedding of longtime customer Robert Ingersoll and his partner Curt Freed.
Stutzman filed a countersuit yesterday against the attorney general, arguing that his suit violates her rights under both the United States and Washington State Constitutions, as well as violating the federal Civil Rights Act.

Bullies have to be stood up to or they'll keep finding new victims and new ways to torment them. Read the whole thing.

If only teachers could marry! If only women could be teachers!

This sort of thing would never happen.

What she said!

I thought I had a pretty good command of invective, but Heroditus Huxley comes up with phrases here I'd never have thought of. I'm in awe. Also in agreement with every unrepeatable word of it.

A shot at the new frontier

If I were twenty years younger and had no family responsibilities, I'd be doing whatever it took to be in on this. Yeah, yeah, nine chances out of ten it'll never go anywhere. But that tenth... ah, to be one of the first.

Heard around Boston

"Hey, I've got the day off. Wanna go downtown and get legless?"

Horrible. Stipulated. But sometimes grim laughter is all you can manage in the face of the need to weep. And I don't know when I'll have much more to say after spending yesterday afternoon in the newsroom waiting to hear if the runners from the Moses Lake area had come out safe. As of now, we've heard that two of the four are fine.

They're just cops

What could they possibly know about guns and crime?

Today's prize...

... for the most fatheaded claim about the Catholic Church goes to Slate. See, it doesn't matter how far-fetched a statement is, if it involves the Church trying to take all the fun out of sex, people will believe it implicitly.

Akubra tip to Creative Minority Report.

"Maybe it’s time for the Catholic Church ... to come out swinging"

This has needed to be said for years, but nobody outside of a few Catholic bloggers (and who listens to them?) dared utter it above a whisper:

Almost everything the media say about the Catholic Church is a lie. A deliberate slander intended to obscure the facts and besmirch good people with the filthiest possible stigma.

So why isn’t the Church launching a counteroffensive? For every accusation of molestation, why aren’t they publicizing the very existence of false accusations? What sort of misguided piety and humility prevents it from publicizing case after case after case of priests who were exonerated after falsely being accused?

If they really wanted to fight fire with fire, they should issue weekly press releases about the fact that the president of an organization that’s been antagonizing them ceaselessly—the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests—neglected to call the policewhen his older brother, a priest, was accused of molestation. Why are they sitting on that bombshell?

And since many of their antagonists are of a secular socialist bent who’d like to portray themselves as the sole protectors of the poor and disadvantaged, why doesn’t the Church shed a layer or two of humility and more aggressively publicize its global charitable work? Why does it shy away from quantifying the billions it spends to feed the hungry and heal the sick? Why doesn’t it challenge the socialist types to demonstrate they’re doing remotely as much to uplift the poor?

Read it all.

Bergoglio?

That surprised me. I really expected somebody younger.

Habemus papam!

Watching Twitter, Google News and AP feed to find out who it is. No name yet.

Nope.

Smoke is still black. Next voting will be at 9:20 Pacific.

And... they're off!

The conclave begins and the world will wait with bated breath to see which cardinal will be reviled by the news media as a terrible disappointment.

Let's be honest: the new pope is not going to make any of the changes that the media are so frantically insisting the entire Catholic Church desperately wants. Catholics know this. Orthodox Protestants know this. Mormons know this. Atheists (those who actually have read anything more informative than The God Delusion) know this. The only people who don't know it are muttonheaded media mavens who have no concept that religion is anything but a fashion statement.

So for those folks, here it is in simple words: The pope has enormous authority but relatively little power. He appoints bishops to their respective dioceses. He acts as a symbol of the eternal, universal Church. And occasionally he defines some point of doctrine that has been in dispute, usually for centuries. What he does not do is change doctrines already defined, nor does he pull fresh doctrines out of his... er... cassock.

Gay "marriage" ain't-a-gonna happen. Neither is female "ordination." Those things aren't even issues. No matter how "liberal" (read, trendy) a pope might be personally, he can't screw around with sacraments. At the very least, he'd engender a schism that would make 1054 look like a squabble over what color to carpet the sanctuary in.

That's not to say he can't make an enormous impact. When John Paul the Great was elected, it started the communist bloc on its inexorable slide onto the ash heaps of history. The Poles had held (one might even say clung bitterly) to their Catholic faith despite being sandwiched between a Protestant power and an Orthodox one for centuries. That went a long way toward making them the weak link in the red chain. Even at that, their vibrant, colorful Catholic faith was slowly being dulled by the drab sameness of Marxism, coupled with a sense that the rest of the world just didn't give a damn what happened to a bunch of Polacks.

But when one of their own was set on the throne of Peter, it galvanized the Poles. Here was a man who had worked as slave labor under the Nazis, studied in underground seminaries during the war and walked the razor's edge of being an archbishop in the Soviet shadow before becoming the moral lodestone of the world. For the first time in centuries, Poland had a national hero.

I expect the next pope will be chosen for similar reasons. So what's the big bugaboo menacing Christendom today? Islam. Yeah, yeah, I know. Religion of peace and all that. And I'm sure that holds true for individuals Muslims, and I mean no disrespect to them. But Christians in Muslim countries are currently getting pretty universally crushed. Even Egypt, which until recently was pretty decent to the Copts who predated Islam by centuries, has begun abandoning Christians to Muslim mob justice.

Now, I could be totally wrong. In fact, I've been thinking all along that the most likely candidate would be Angelo Scola, Archbishop of Milan. (Not my preference, but nobody asked me.)  But what if the cardinals are smarter than I give them credit for? What if we get, say, Jean-Louis Tauran, currently the President of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue? His homeland of France has a large culture war going with Islam. Even more provocative would be John Onaiyekan of Nigeria or Luis Antonio Tagle of the Philippines. Can you hear the heads explode across the Islamosphere if the dhimmis suddenly had their own pope?

The next few days could well be the most significant in the 21st century. Pray hard. (Note: Check out the semi-complete slate here, by one of the best-informed Vatican-watchers in the world.)

Update: The smoke is black. No big surprise there. More voting tomorrow morning.

A good neighbor moves out

Richard Briers travels in elephants. The Telegraph has the best memorial I've seen so far.



 The Good Life (or as it was called over here, Good Neighbors) was probably the first Brit-com I saw, and the one that got me hooked on them. Penelope Keith and Paul Edgerton as the beleaguered and sorta-snooty neighbors were all right, but it was the chemistry between Briers and the adorable Felicity Kendal that made the show worth watching, and whetted my appetite for all things televised and British.

Thank you, Tom, for making the good life look a little bit better.

Sounds reasonable to me

Quote of the day:

"Given Sandy Hook, you have to make reasonable compromises."

Accepted. In exchange, gay men should make reasonable compromises over Penn State. They will simply have to accept being registered and kept a safe distance from children. This isn't a violation of their rights. It's just common sense.

RTWT.

Keeping Faith

The other day, I got into a discussion on Facebook with an agnostic friend (shameless plug for her business) about Jehovah's Witnesses and blood transfusions. She related an anecdote she'd heard about a Witness church leader (I'm not sure of his actual role) who was in the hospital, and loudly and publicly refused to receive a life-saving transfusion. But later, when it was just him and his family, he accepted the procedure secretly.

Now, obviously I don't share his scruples about transfusions. If I ever need it, a hospital can pump my veins full of walrus piss for all I care. It's not about blood. It's about faith.

Faith is one of the most misused words in the language. If you ask a non-believer, they'll usually say that faith is believing something with no evidence. (And if they're a Fundamentalist Atheist, when they say "evidence," as often as not they mean "absolute proof." If you can't prove a religious tenet beyond any possible doubt, they consider it proven false and worthy of ridicule. But I digress.)

Even Christians often think of faith as a set of statements. A person being baptized will affirm the Apostles' Creed and we say "This is the faith of the Church." And in that context, I guess it's applicable. But it's only one small aspect.

Faith isn't about things you believe. Faith is commitment. Faith is loyalty, to a person or an institution, placed ahead of one's own welfare. We use it idiomatically all the time: keeping the faith, acting in good faith, and so on. Faith isn't just believing; it's sticking to what you're committed to. Faith is a man sticking by his wife as she's dying. Faith is a soldier obeying orders that may well get him killed. Faith is St Damien of Molokai, taking on certain slow, miserable death to take care of people who would never be able to repay him. "I know Whom I have believed," says St. Paul. Not "what," but "Whom." Faith is, at bottom, faithfulness.

That's where this guy failed. He may well have believed all the religious doctrines about transfusions, but when the rubber met the road, he wimped out. He had committed his life to his God, but when it was actually required of him, he broke that commitment.

(Mind you, I'm not saying I'd have done better if I'd been in his shoes. I hope I would, but I've never had to find out.)

When it came to the Crucifixion, only one disciple, John, stayed with Jesus. Peter may have famously denied Him, but all of them ran away. In that, they broke faith as well. But in the years that followed, all of them (again, except John) died violent deaths. Andrew was crucified. Peter was crucified upside-down. Jude and Simon were beheaded. Thomas was martyred nearly three thousand miles away, in India. (So much for "Doubting Thomas.") They could have saved their own skins easily enough. Most people would say they were fools not to. But they didn't. They were committed to a Person, not to a set of beliefs. And for that Person, they would face anything.

That's what faith is. That's the real faith of the Church. We are proud to profess it.

The irony?

How much you wanna bet a lot of these are Feminist Studies majors?

Traditional Proclamation of the Birth of Christ

The twenty-fifth day of December.
In the five thousand one hundred and ninety-ninth year of the creation of the world
from the time when God in the beginning created the heavens and the earth;
the two thousand nine hundred and fifty-seventh year after the flood;
the two thousand and fifteenth year from the birth of Abraham;
the one thousand five hundred and tenth year from Moses
and the going forth of the people of Israel from Egypt;
the one thousand and thirty-second year from David's being anointed king;
in the sixty-fifth week according to the prophecy of Daniel;
in the one hundred and ninety-fourth Olympiad;
the seven hundred and fifty-second year from the foundation of the city of Rome;
the forty second year of the reign of Octavian Augustus;
the whole world being at peace,
in the sixth age of the world,
Jesus Christ the eternal God and Son of the eternal Father,
desiring to sanctify the world by his most merciful coming,
being conceived by the Holy Spirit,
and nine months having passed since his conception,
was born in Bethlehem of Judea of the Virgin Mary,
being made flesh.
The Nativity of our Lord Jesus Christ according to the flesh.

The Play of the Nativity of the Child Jesus

I've been saving this one for last, because it's decidedly not cheesy.

If you're looking for a plain old Christmas pageant on screen, you're going to be caught a bit off-guard, especially by the dialogue. This isn't some hokey Hollywood bastardization of the Christmas story. This is modeled after the medieval Nativity plays.

The archaic, rhymed dialogue and the lighting give this an overall tone of reverence and age befitting to such a holy narrative. Notably, the commercials are only at the beginning and end; the play is uninterrupted.

Such a solemn, joyful treatment of Christmas on TV is impossible to imagine today. I doubt it was commonplace even in the early 1950s. If you've watched none of my Cheesy Christmas Movie series, watch this and leave me your thoughts in the comments.



Available for streaming and download here.

Yee-ho-ho-ho!

Today's Cheesy Christmas Movie really does live up to the name. It's not bad in the same sense as the last one, but it will make your eyes roll so hard back you may need a crowbar to retrieve them.

Down the Wyoming Trail is a typical Tex Ritter singing western, with a bit of a holiday twist. It's Christmas Eve, and Tex has (of course) just ridden into town and been asked to play Santy Claus. A local badman overhears that Tex is going to be the jolly old elf, and dons a suit and whiskers to rob a ranch payroll. In the process he kills a man. The dying man fingers Saint Nick as his killer, and Tex narrowly misses getting lynched. In a fashion that would be the envy of O.J., he sets out to find the real killer.

Every western has to have a pretty girl, and Joan Leslie's big sister Mary Brodell is exactly that, in one of her few credited roles. And speaking of credits, it's a never-ending source of amusement to me that White Flash is so often credited higher than any of his bipedal co-stars except Tex himself. I'm only about halfway through this one, but there's a twist beginning to form I won't give away. I'll update this once I finish previewing.



Available for download or streaming here.

Update: Yep, the twist is a good one, but still leaves the whole thing pretty predictable. Yes, and cheesy.

Randy Stonehill: Christmas at Denny's

This is probably the most heartbreaking Christmas song I've ever heard. Well worth a listen.

A hero

Mary-Ellen at Hopefully Ever After has written an absolute must-read piece, pouring her soul out in pixels.

What are you waiting for? Go read it. Then come back. (Warning: it's extremely descriptive in places. But necessary.)

I have three things to say about this piece.

1. Mary-Ellen is a hero. More on that later.

2. I've inveighed more than once on the witchhunt that has developed around the pervo-priest scandals. I still maintain that many good men are unjustly accused and that many people have profited handsomely from the Big Lie that priests are all potential molesters.

But big lies often grow from small but deadly truths, and this is one of those. Fr. Leo Riley was indeed a child molester. (Mary-Ellen wasn't his only victim, though she may have been his most long-term one.) Which makes it all the more despicable. A stranger who lures a child into a car is vile enough. But when a trusted family friend, a man whose job it is to model virtue, destroys a child from the inside out, it is an unspeakable evil. The same hands that held Christ's body every day snaked over an innocent child's body at night. The same lips that spoke the words of Jesus told manipulative lies to a little girl. This is one of those sins that cry out to heaven for vengeance.

And the ripple effect, while not as personally devastating, is far-reaching and possibly unerasable. A few vermin like Fr. Riley have tainted the reputation of priests for generations to come. The very word "priest" has become a snickered synonym for "hypocritical pervert." His behavior has made the Catholic Church, not just a laughingstock, but a stench to much of the world.

3. I don't know Mary-Ellen's parents, but I'm reluctant to judge them very harshly. The thing to remember is, in the '70s and '80s, child molestation was just beginning to be talked about openly, and lots of people had no idea how to deal with it when it came to light. In my family, there was an uncle who couldn't keep his hands off his nieces, and I don't think anything was done except to keep a close eye on him at family functions. (He died before I was born, thankfully.) The same thing applies to the bishops who kept shuffling accused priests around. Often, they just didn't know better. It had always been done that way.

In fairness, Mary-Ellen's parents did believe her and put a stop to her abuse, even if it was too little to late, and the Stigmatine Order did cooperate with police after policies were put in place in the early '90s. We know what to do now. But back then, the times they were still a'changin'.

Okay, back to point 1. Lots of people have memories of childhood abuse. Lots of them go public about the abuse later. That doesn't make them heroes. It just makes them veterans. It's what they do with their victimhood that counts.

Most people, with a history like Mary-Ellen's, would spend their lives bitter and cursing God for betraying them. (Which, in a way, I suppose He did. At least His representative betrayed her on His behalf. God gets the credit for the good things, and at Calvary He took on Himself all the blame for evil done by Man. In all cases, it comes back to God.)

I would have abandoned a God that I felt had allowed those things to happen. I probably would never have set foot in a church again except to spit in the holy water. Yes, I know intellectually about one bad apple, yada yada yada. That knowledge doesn't bind wounds or soothe fear.

But Mary-Ellen is able to separate Fr. Riley and his evil from the good God that always loved her. She is faithful to the Church that failed her. She talks about her parish's pastor who is the polar opposite of Fr. Riley, a good and Godly man who keeps his vows and works with her where she is.

Mary-Ellen has faith that leaves mine in the dust. She loves God more than she hates her abuser.

That's what makes her a hero.

From the country that brought you Sartre and Camus

Teacher assigns suicide notes for homework.

And speaking of Sartre...

(A/T to Cassandra for the second link.)

Santa Claus Conquers the (choke) Martians

Today's Cheesy Christmas Movie is dedicated to Lazarus Lupin, who first introduced me to bad cinema more than 30 years ago. Full disclosure; I've never actually sat through more than half an hour of this abomination without trying to chew off my mouse arm like a trapped coyote to escape. My Akubra is off to anybody who can.



Available for download or streaming here.

A note on movies

If you're not aware, the movies I post are all at the Internet Archive. From there they can be downloaded in various formats for offline viewing. And since they're all public domain, it's as legal as Sunday School.

I'll start tagging them with the link forthwith.

A Christmas Without Snow

I did promise more Cheesy Christmas Movies, did I not?

This one isn't really all that cheesy. It's a made-for-TV movie from 1980 that features a handful of known names (meaning ones I recognized) and a fair number that I didn't. It gets sentimental at times, but it's not on the level of "Santa Claus Conquers the Martians," or even of the last film I posted.

This film doesn't have a whole lot in the way of plot, being more a collection of "day-in-the-life" snapshots. The setting is a generic-Protestant church's choir, where they have obtained a choir tyrant of professional caliber and are preparing for a performance of Handel's Messiah.

(Okay, can I just stop there and say that this alone would have sold me on the film? I frimpin' love Messiah. Back when I was a single father, Wharf Rat and I would see how many performances we could catch every year.)

Anyway, the story centers mostly on a divorcee from Nebraska who is trying to get herself established in San Francisco while her son stays behind with Grandma. But along with her we see a minister who takes his parishioners' troubles as his own, a sweet 30-something spinster who is so lonely she's gone a bit north-northwest, a young black man living with his grandmother who just wants to make his way in a world where skin shade still matters a little bit, and so on. Parallel illustrations of the human condition.

A few things to watch for:

This movie has a plethora, not so much of Christian themes, as of Christian incidentals. Hymns are sung without embarrassment. The preacher is neither a closet pervert nor a platitudinizing milquetoast. The church doesn't make vocal stands on social issues; it's a house of worship first and foremost. Not something we see anymore. (Incidentally, notice that when Reverend Lohman is being pastoral to a newly-widowed church member, the background music is "Comfort Ye My People." Nice touch, that.)

The little one-sided catfight over the soprano solo is fun. There's a self-described opera singer who is miffed that anybody else would even audition, and when a soft-spoken Korean woman gets it, Miss Diva leaves in a flurry of fur. The Korean character, incidentally, is the only listed screen appearance of Daisietta Kim. Her audition piece is "I Know that my Redeemer Liveth," and her rendition gives me goosebumples just thinking about it.

The pastor's son is the quintessential PK, a good-natured young man who just one day can't take it anymore. Preachers' wives get the job they signed on for, but their children often find their identities submerged. This kid fits that to a T. The spinster is worth a cringe every time she opens her mouth. And even for 1980, her dress looks dated to me. Am I wrong, ladies?

Enough. Watch the film and leave your thoughts in the comments.



Also available for streaming and download here.

Joe Santa Claus

Today's Cheesy Christmas Movie is short (a half-hour TV special with the commercials removed), but there's a lot packed into it. Ray Montgomery and Maria Palmer turn in competent performances, but for anyone who's seen "Dark Passage," it's a little disconcerting to see Houseley Stevenson playing a kindly old janitor. Little Jeri Lou James redefines the word adorable.  

It's sappy. It's predictable. And if you don't choke up by the end, you have a stone where your heart should be.





Also available for streaming and download here.

Okay, a little more Yogi

Because of this post from HH.

A little touch of Yogi in the night

I'll have a cheesy Christmas movie to post a little later, but for now, here's a little something to get holidayish with:

War stories

The 7 Types of Failed Relationship Understood Via U.S. Wars

I can put names to a few of these. In some cases, I can put the same name to multiple wars. What can I say? I'm a slow learner.

No comment needed.

A/T to SondraK.

Genius

Caffeinated snack food for kids. What could possibly go wrong?

Get that thing off my roof, fat boy!

Here at the Greatest Newspaper in the Northwest™, the Christmas season (yes, I know it should be Advent) begins in mid-November with the usual mountain of gift-sale advertising.

I say "begins," but actually what it does is plow into us like necrotizing fasciitis on meth, leaving nothing but douglas-fir-scented, tinsel-bedecked wreckage in its path. I used to like the holiday season when I was young. At least, I'm pretty sure I must have. Now I just go around humming this:



Incidentally, does anybody still read this blog and want another round of Cheesy Christmas Movies? I have some ready to put up if anybody cares. Maybe it'll take some of the sting out of the season.

The best part? Somebody probably fell for it.

This totally looks like something Momma Fargo would do:

A tip of the Akubra to Miss Cellania.

The End

A mite overdramatic, but just about how I feel today:

Andrea stood at the side of the bed. The beep, beep of the heart monitor pulsed quietly in the background. It was nearly time. The nurse sat back quietly, giving Andrea space and privacy so she could she could give her uncle her undivided attention. The attending physician ducked into the room to check on his patient. Andrea looked over to him, hoping above all hope the doctor had better news. He didn’t. He shook his head, sadly.

“He went terminal in November of 2012,” he said. “There’s really nothing more we can do.”

Read the whole thing.