If We Only Knew What Made for Peace

This will be it for some time.

By "it" I mean the last post of my interwebs journal.

But no one needs to feel abandoned or that this is any kind of end. If the past is indicative of the future, I would bet any future posts could be distilled to the following:

We are prone to believing self-serving fictions.

We are reluctant to be wary of our motives.

Our voodoo is faith, their faith is voodoo.

Boy, we like to be certain.

If history has any lessons, as a movement, we evangelicals today are probably on the wrong side of justice.

A mix of the above is the most insidious of idols.

We sacrifice real people to these idols.

The good news is God offers freedom from this trap.

As far as freedom goes, we have to make it up as we go along and this terrifies us, so we opt to believe self-serving fictions.

and...

I like my wife and kid.

So there we go.

My Last Album Isn't Coda, Thank God
Talking Heads:77- Talking Heads

I Thought It Was Supposed to Help You Stay In the Game

Alternate Take

So Rick Warren canceled an appearance on the news show This Week yesterday. He claimed health and fatigue issues were exacerbated by inhaling fumes from a newly completed pulpit.

That happens.

I struggle buying the idea that Rick Warren is more a pastor than a certain type of entrepreneur. Following that, it's hard for me to see his role as more than reaching a certain type of consumer. He's got a job to do, he's got a customer to keep satisfied. He knows what sells, what to put on clearance, and what to never stock. He does pretty well, I'd say.

If that's seems ungracious to you, know that I see myself in the same light and think that perspective comes only by grace.

Whatever. Maybe that's just my problem, or maybe there's something to it. Or maybe it's my problem because there is something to it.

I've found in my own life that it's hard to mess around with these "things of faith" and stay the same.

I will grant that maybe he really is exhausted. One can only hold the tension between what Christ does and what you will for so long.

"If one drinks much from a bottle marked poison, it is almost certain to disagree witth one sooner or later."

I Thought It was Supposed to Help You Stay in the Game

Well Rick Warren and I have more in common than I ever would have guessed. I am sickened and exhausted by his public speaking engagements as well.

This could be serious. Maybe it's the chemicals from the beard dye.

Ow My Freakin' Ears

The library was going to open late this morning so the fire alarms could be tested. That makes good sense. You don't want people being confused or unsettled by horrible noise in a library of all places.

Unfortunately that testing was not done... not even started by the time we opened.

So the testing was done... is being done with a library full of patrons and employees.

It's loud.

Loud... no, that doesn't communicate what exactly it's like...

Let me think. If there is a tranquil, still, quiet center of the universe, we are at the point furthest from-
Yes- especially if it is, in fact, an infinite universe-
We are infinitely proceeding away from quiet stillness.

It's like a jackhammer and Fran Drescher had a baby- and this baby had colic- that's kind of how it is in here.

If loud were to be weaponized- it would be this.

It's so loud my eyes hurt.

It's so loud I am going to stick sharpened golf pencils in my ears and welcome the forever nothing that follows.

It's a loud that can induce vomiting.

It's the devil's loud.

It's a loud that transcends the meaning of loud because loud suggests hearing and this loud makes hearing impossible.

So why don't I just get up and leave? Good question. That's what any reasonable person would do.

I have.

Again and again.

I think I'm done for the day.

Finally! No Wonder You're Going Out of Business

Blockbuster has shipped The The Mystery Science Theater 3000 Collection, Vol. 2 - Pod People

You're invited.

Jesus Is Our Following Jesus

Speculum- ... so I was so overcome and convicted by my own role in that whole stinkin' process that I bought as many newspapers as I could and ripped that picture out- I mean the picture of that dad crying over his dead little girl's body just overtook me- and so I ripped it out- out of each newspaper and wrote "This is the face of our sin" on each one with a magic marker. So I'm running up and down the street-
The Curator- Like a crazy person?
Speculum- Like a crazy person- and giving these- I guess flyers, giving these flyers to everyone and finally, you know a group starts to gather around me, and so I just ask myself- I ask us all- I ask how we cannot confess this as ours? I just ask why we say this is necessary and good- how we can live with ourselves if who we are depends on this kind of death- I mean this death, even this one specific death- if who we are is worth this one little girl let alone how many countless others, And I say, "we have to know this little girl, we have to know what we've done to her"-
The Curator- And you don't think that was a bit extreme?
Speculum- ... well...
The Curator- Do you think that's what people wanted to see? Do you think that picture was going to get people to listen to what you had to say?
Speculum- I don't know if it was about getting people to hear me... I thought it was about- I dunno I was just confronted with what it means if i seriously think I'm following Jesus
The Curator- If it's not about getting people to hear you then why say anything? You do want people to hear you. You have a very important message to offer them, but you will only drive people away with this...
You have to remember the heart of your message- the heart of our message: Jesus is our peace.
Speculum- Yeah but, well I guess, yeah Jesus is my peace, it doesn't seem like I'm not saying that-
The Curator- But you might be turning people off though, right?
Speculum- I suppose-
The Curator- And how will people hear your message if you've turned them off. How will they know that good news if you've sent them away? Our message is Jesus.
Speculum- Sure, right. I don't suppose they could- but... Well no. Isn't their being turned off a matter of their being committed to death? I mean if we're going to turn from death-
The Curator Jesus is our life.
Speculum- What? Yes. No- wait, there's going to be a bit of feeling bad- I felt bad when I was confronted by this picture- I don't see how I couldn't if it's a matter of really being confronted- if it's a matter of sin being overcome-
The Curator Jesus overcomes our sin.
Speculum Sure, but I don't think you would say "Don't confront a man whose beating his wife because he'll feel bad and won't want to listen to you"-
The Curator Jesus is our response to domestic violence.
Speculum What?

Objectivity

Said in line at Stater Bros.- Ugh, Valerie Bertinelli beach body at 48? Yeah it's easy when you have a personal trainer, cooks, and get to work out all day...

...

Before purchasing-
Off-Brand Drumsticks
Spaghetti Sauce
Frozen Pizza
Diet Coke
Lay's Potato Chips
2 Healthy Choice Soups

The Morning Lasts All Day

The Lovely Elizabeth is singing the chorus to Life in a Northern Town these days. A lot. It makes the Qweenbean happy.

She admitted that it makes her hurry home from work now. The soft inference is she previously did not come home as quickly as she could. Whereas I, the good parent, can't wait to get around our little spawn's filled diapers, inarticulate articulation of wants, demand to be held, need to be constantly watched, and all that fun stuff.

...

A student asked if I enjoyed parenting and I said I do not. I love The Lovely Elizabeth. I want to do everything I can to take care of her, think of her when I'm away from her, like the little person I see developing, want to treat that responsibly, am excited about being with her in the future, and who knows what all else. I like that I am her parent as far as that goes, but I don't think I could say I like parenting. Other, better people, may like parenting as a concept and try somehow to develop that dynamic with people whose parents they are not (was there a better way to write that?). I am not one of them. I can't imagine myself waking up 5 times a night for... well you, dear reader as an example. I don't see myself doing the things I do as a parent as enjoyable in themselves.

Do I?

No. I think I stand by that. And I think I can say that the joy I find in knowing The Lovely Elizabeth, the strange feeling of elation that wells up in my chest when she smiles, when I hear her little voice, when she lunges toward me to give what seems like a hug, the fondness I feel for her, the concern, interest etc... is all carried by our knowing and getting to know each other rather than through being part of some preformed template for a relationship that we may call "parent" or doing "parenting".

There's a difference?

This may seem a silly difference to point out, but the silliness has broader implications.

As we hold out certain concepts as good: parenthood, dating, marriage, what have you- we obscure its reality that includes awfulness, ugliness, sadness, suffering, etc... I don't mean that we don't perhaps know that any set of relations will have difficulties, I mean our putting the relations forward as an ideal, especially as an ideal to which we say folks ought to aspire can lead to despair or guilt for feeling things that are a part of living with and knowing someone, let alone raising someone.

Whatever, it's not like the confusion someone may feel at being sad when everyone tells them them they are experiencing the greatest joy ever is a big deal.


The Lovely Elizabeth is the one with the goatee.

I'm That Guy?

So I'm waiting for a friend in front of a local eatery* last night and I am jerked out of the moment. I catch myself resting my hand on my chin and staring at something far away yet not within the horizon. I don't know exactly how long I'd been like that, long enough to somehow get from the corner of Citrus and Alosta to "but if we say we have something to say to matters of sexuality then we're really affirming the reality of a world in which that exists and that seems wholly parasitic on modes of dominance that don't correspond to how we actually live and negotiate our lives with each other, let alone how we ought to if "church" means anything good, and that's what I mean by suggesting we ought to repent of heterosexuality if we imagine we have anything to say about homosexuality..."

Really.

So I snapped out of it because in that moment, in the warm, clear, early evening, the foothills in the distance- temporarily lush, the soft drone of traffic, people all around me coming and going, I was reminded of my college days and walking with a friend past a tired-looking man sitting outside a cafe. His skin was pinched hard around his mouth and eyes as he said to no one, "What your data fail to include is the effect of gravity on the observer..."

I now realize his words were especially for me.

* Eatery? Really?

A message from R-2 appears on the small monitor screen in front of
Luke. He smiles at the monitor and speaks to R-2, as he pulls a black
glove on to cover his wounded mechanical hand
Section 27 (Mental Cabaret)- The Polyphonic Spree
Sea Legs- The Shins
Donatello- Jawbreaker
Come on Eileen- Dexy's Midnight Runners

Nuts and Gum, Together at Last

I've just seen this. It's the trailer for Where the Wild Things Are.

I like Where The Wild Things Are, David Eggers, Spike Jonze, and Arcade Fire...

Yet something doesn't sit well... I know it's just a trailer but it seems far more mopey... wan... maudlin... wistful... emo-soaked... than the book has ever seemed to me.

Is it the pall of golden light? That world strikes me as more vibrtant.
The sad pale little boy peering sadly around the corner or longingly out a schoolroom window? Max always seemed more confident to me.

We'll see. I like to be surprised. (Remember I said that when you leap out at me from a dark corner.)

There are people that make it possible for me to be a Christian.
There is one less in the world.

"We need to understand that no theology can escape the epistemological characteristics of its time, even if it intends to oppose them."

Marcella Althaus-Reid, 1952-2009

Pomona Matters

Before the Lovely Elizabeth was born, The Qweenbean was much more sympathetic to the idea of moving to Pomona. She's thinking maybe south Claremont is the most we could handle.

She's so bourgeois now.

It's got a bad reputation around here, so you may be surprised to know that its property crime levels are at about the national average. It's violent crime, on the other hand, is higher than the national average. That's because of its gang and drug problems.

So don't do drugs or join a gang and you'll be fine.

In any case I used to think that it would be important for folks that care about where and why they live, folks like me and the Qweenbean, to choose places like Pomona.

Now I think, "Maybe not as bad as Pomona".

It turns out the president will be visiting the Edison electric car center in Pomona this Thursday. That seems like the kind of visit you get from your great grandkids... when it's not Christmas.

If the president's coming by on Thursday, I expect the city to be walled and under the control of The Duke by Saturday.

It Takes One to Know One

"The funny thing is, of course, that socialists know that Barack Obama is not one of us. Not only is he not a socialist, he may in fact not even be a liberal. Socialists understand him more as a hedge-fund Democrat -- one of a generation of neoliberal politicians firmly committed to free-market policies."

Billy Wharton of the Socialist Party USA in the Washington Post.

Told ya.

A Facebook Game and Open Letter to The States I've Not Visited

Alabama
Alaska
Arizona X
Arkansas X
California X
Colorado X
Connecticut X
Delaware X
Florida
Georgia
Hawaii
Idaho
Illinois X
Indiana X
Iowa
Kansas
Kentucky X
Louisiana X
Maine
Maryland
Massachusetts X
Michigan
Minnesota
Mississippi
Missouri X
Montana
Nebraska
Nevada X
New Hampshire
New Jersey X
New Mexico
New York X
North Carolina X
North Dakota
Ohio X
Oklahoma
Oregon X
Pennsylvania X
Rhode Island
South Carolina
South Dakota
Tennessee X
Texas X
Utah X
Vermont
Virginia X
Washington X
West Virginia
Wisconsin
Wyoming

The rest of you states, really? C'mon.
Missouri only made the list because it was in the way, how do the rest of you have a chance?
First of all, I'm from California, the one state that has everything the rest of you can only offer piecemeal. Beautiful deserts, forests, beaches, mountains, farms, ghettoes, Beverly Hills and Brawley, Berkley and Newport Beach, 40% of the Pac-10 (or half if you count soccer), the Pacific Ocean?!
Over-crowded prisons? We've got them.
Under-funded schools? Check.
Except for you, Kentucky, we don't have a Big Bone Lick; I'll grant you that.
The point is, other than my own wanderlust or a magnanimous visit, there's no reason to see most of you.
Alabama, if I want depressing poverty and racism, I'll go to San Bernardino.
Thanks anyway, Nebraska, we have our own oppressively featureless landscapes.
Secondofly, I've met enough of your folks here to know what I'm not missing.
North Dakota, I know folks who had the talent, ambition and wherewithal to leave Bismarck, why should I go to see those left behind?
Slack-jawed yokels, hippies, old money, white supremacists, debutantes, illiterate Oaxacans, Persian Jews, movie stars, middle-management nobodies. We've got it all covered.
Don't take this to mean I think you don't matter.
Mississippi, what would we be without you? California would be just one place closer to dead last in spending per pupil.
Florida, without you, California would be that much closer to being first in the number of divorces.
So keep on being what you are and doing what you do, rest of the U.S. California will keep on doing it better.
Sincerely,
[skybalon]

A Whole Lot of Funny In One Quote

One white supremacist leader, describing himself as moderate, professes alarm.

"There is a tremendous backlash" to Obama's election, said Richard Barrett, the leader of the Nationalist Movement in Learned, Miss. "My focus is to try to keep it peaceful. But many people look at the flag of the Republic of New Africa that will be hoisted over the White House as an act of war."

LA Times

Learned, Mississippi.

Naturally.

Maybe They Should've Built a Cracker Barrel Instead of The Chili's

My brother was recently assaulted by a couple of Bros just west of the Glendora country club. According to him, some Bros started yelling at him from their truck and followed him from the Glendora Marketplace to Route 66. He was initially confused- wasn't sure if he knew these guys or what, and then they started shouting the N-word and making some sort of gesture. He likes The Rap Musics and listens to it pretty loudly so I guess that makes some kind of sense. When he pulled over and got out of his car, they self-corrected and used the phrase "Sand-N-word" instead. If you've ever seen me or my brother, that makes more sense.

He should've stayed in the car.

The other day a friend of mine told me one of his students was called a N-word Lover for sporting an Obama '08 sticker on his car. This was at the Glendora Marketplace, too.

My response then was something I've said before and and will now say again:
"30 miles east of Los Angeles sometimes may as well be
2000."

Now I Understand What So Many Others of You Were Feeling This Week

So this is how that hope everyone keeps talking about feels.

You Want This, Don't You?

The hate is swelling in you now.

And I Proudly Stand Up...

Please join Citrus College, City of Glendora and Azusa Pacific University in Saluting our Veterans.

The Ceremony will begin at Citrus College Center Quad at 11:00 and end with Flyover and Landing of US Army Helicopters at the APU Football Field



SALUTING OUR VETERANS
Thursday ▪ 6 November 2008 ▪ 11:00 AM to 1:30 PM



Musical Prologue
Covina Concert Band

Welcome, Proclamations, and Remarks
Dr. Jeanne Hamilton, Vice President of Student Services at Citrus College
Karen Davis, Mayor of Glendora

Presentation of Colors
American Veterans State Honor Guard (AMVETS)

National Anthem
Dani Bustamante, Cameron Lanier, and Frank Rodriguez, Citrus College Music Students

Moment of Silence
Chaplain Rick Givens, Azusa Pacific University

Salute to Fallen Veterans
American Veterans State Honor Guard (AMVETS)

Keynote Address
Congresswoman Hilda L. Solis

US Army Helicopter Flyover

Closing Remarks
Dr. Jeanne Hamilton, Vice President of Student Services at Citrus College

US Army Helicopter Landing at APU Football Stadium

We command people to go and do things that no human should do, to subject themselves to the worst we have to offer, to be bound to a way of being that requires death and destruction, but I would be seen as the jerk for saying this event meant to honor anyone seems like a whole lot of nothing. I guess we do what we can.

Wake Up Whuate Payple

So it was raining this morning, now it's cool, cool enough to require a jacket, at least when compared to last week.

My dogs are barking at people coming up here to vote.

I think this shows that creation is trying to suppress the Glendora vote.

Also- I should reconsider writing longer posts when I'm so tired- which is all the time these days.