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Saturday, December 27, 2003
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WHAT'S THAT CLUNKING SOUND? THAT'S DON TELLING JOKES
Don of Anger Management has posted his "Mostly Useless Guide to Not Being Funny".
Unfortunately, due to a series of typographical errors and a premature
smacking of the "post" button, it wound up titled something else.
It's some 4-year old attempts at humor, and I point them out as encouragement to new bloggers: everyone sucks when they start out, but with practice, you'll eventually be asked to post Drink Alerts on your entries.
Read, cringe, and laugh at the occasional working gag.
Heh. "Humping my leg".
posted by Harvey at 4:42:34 PM permalink HOME
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WHAT IS THE MATTER WITH THE LIBERALS?
Liberals used to have a place in this country's political debate, but
lately, in their quest to knee-jerkingly oppose anything that Bush says
or does, they've wound up defending perpetrators of the most grotesque
atrocties imaginable in Afghanistan and Iraq. Or at the very least, not
opposing them as they would if those atrocities took place in America,
especially considering how vocal they are on the few lesser versions
that can occasionally be found. I've heard this point brought up on
occasion, in one form or another, but I really like the way Lynn of Reflections in d minor phrases it as a pair of "no honest answer available" rhetorical questions:
************
Where are all the Liberals who believed in secularism and women's
rights? Where are all the Liberals who cared about the poor and
oppressed? They have abandoned the real oppressed and choose instead to
pretend that they are the oppressed ones just because they live in a
society where people are free to disagree with them
************
I swear, I'd just like to sit at her feet and have her read to me for hours. She gives me goosebumps.
posted by Harvey at 4:32:58 PM permalink HOME
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LATE BUT NOT FORGOTTEN
I love the Carnival of the Vanities. Trouble is, I don't always get a
chance to read it as soon as I'd like. I finally made my way through #65 at Drumwaster's. There I found one of the gemmiest gems I've gotten from a Carnival in a long time. Lee of See the Donkey took the story of the Three Wise Men and gave it a Suessian poetical twist including lots of illustrations.
The overall effect is quite delightful, and no more blasphemous than
the way the Revised Standard Version of the Bible knocks all the beauty
and poetry out of the KJV for the sake of clarity.
I also like the fact that he gives a summary of the Three Wise Men story for the benefit of the biblically challenged.
posted by Harvey at 4:21:39 PM permalink HOME
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TECHNICAL ANNOYANCES
I have no idea how it happened, but Internet Explorer took a crap on me today.
Recently, some assmaggot website hijacked itself into being my new
homepage. I could re-assign a new one, but the pirate page would come
back upon restart. Deleting my cookies did no good, and my limited geek
skills gave me no other clues.
Well, this morning, I started tweaking my security settings and my
firewall to try to block this stinking browserjacker, but all I managed
to do was make IE inoperable. The shortcuts still exist, but the
program simply will not fire up.
I did manage to snag a copy of Mozilla prior to compete software
implosion, though, and that's working ok. Good enough, in fact, that
I'd be willing to give up on IE altogether, if I could figure out how.
I tried Googling for "remove internet explorer" and the top page I
found sounded
panicky and mentioned the importance of making back-ups of this, that,
and the other before even allowing yourself to speak the words aloud.
Apparently, uninstalling IE is an agonizingly delicate and complicated
process akin to removing a spinal tumor. Not something I want to try
when there's blogging to be done, and my geek of choice (Blogless
Brother Tom) is not available to supervise.
Meanwhile, Mozilla is servicable, even if a little more creepily
Netscapish than I'd like. And I hooked a copy of Opera... just in case.
posted by Harvey at 4:03:54 PM permalink HOME
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PRAISE? MORE LIKE FIGHTING WORDS
Religiously, I'm "none of the above", but Beloved Wife is "one
of the above" (or "three of the above", I'm kinda fuzzy on that
part), so I've been dragged to church on occasion, kicking and screaming (at
least on the inside). Once those big wooden doors shut, I resign myself to my
fate and try to make the best of things.
One way I do that is to try figure out just what exactly the folks who
attend voluntarily are getting out of this exercise. Usually it's
pretty simple with the sermon. The preacher picks a bible passage (more
or less at random, as far as I can tell), connects it to a current news
topic, whether local or national, and then comes to a conclusion about
how to apply the particular bible verse to your life to make yourself
happier.
Then come the hymns. And these I just don't get. Look, I realize they were mostly written a couple hundred years ago, but they're still just horrible.
They keep calling Jesus "king" and "lord" and "sovereign" and "master".
I think the original intent was to make the singer feel some sort of
subserviant reverance toward a higher power.
But I'm an American. My
forefathers fought battles to topple kings & lords. A sovereign in
my country is answerable to his people. He is not necessarily better or
smarter than I am, he's just a guy doing a job. When I hear the word
"king", I want to smash his crown, not fall to my knees. It makes me
rebellious rather than reverant.
Which leads me to ponder, what would be a more appropriate, modern,
American analogy? President? Congressman? CEO? Quarterback? When it
comes to wielding absolute power, do we trust anyone who holds it? Do
we respect and admire anyone who attempts to acquire it?
Nothing comes to mind. Every position of authority in America is
ultimately answerable to some person or group of people. Checks and
balances aren't found only in the 3 branches of Federal
Government, they have applications in all walks of life. Vote the
President out of office, impeach a Supreme Court Justice, fire a CEO,
bench the quarterback - there are no kings in America.
So, what term of reverance would fit Christ in modern America?
I really don't know. I think Vince Lombardi
did a pretty good job as a benevolent dictator, but somehow "Hark the
herald angels sing, glory to the newborn Vince" just lacks singability.
I guess I'll just have to ponder on this some more.
posted by Harvey at 3:49:01 PM permalink HOME
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