Around St Blog's: August 2004 Archives

Mama Owl and Papa Honk should name their new baby Pio Goliath!

Alas, I was too late with this inspiration, and Davey's little brother has been named Thomas Matthew. Thomas and his mommy are back home now.

...I said, "how do you explain how bad things are now compared to the way things were before the Council?". And she had a ready reply that I didn't expect - she said that Protestants were much better before the Council too, at least as measured by divorce rates and crime and other indicators.

It appears that it was the culture that swamped the Church and I've suspected that one way to have avoided the culture's devasting influence was not to blame the Council but to have avoided affluence. Affluence brought us the suburbs, which brought us out of our Catholic ghetto and into the larger culture. When JFK became president and Catholics were perceived as acceptable, we seemed to lose our way. We became influenced by the culture instead of influencing the culture. And the cost has been enormous.

Dear Mr Luse emerges from the rubble to tell us about his experiences with Hurricane Charley, complete with jaw-dropping photograph.

It's a boy!

I got a call from Papa this afternoon! Davey's little brother was born at 8:58 this morning. They haven't picked a name yet; I naturally suggested Pius but Papa wasn't sure he liked the ring of "this is Davey and his little brother, Pius."
But perhaps he will reconsider.

The little one weighed in at 8 pounds 4.3 ounces and is 21 inches tall. Mama's birth plans did not go quite as smoothly as she had hoped, but overall she and Papa are much happier with the way things went this time around.

They asked me to pass on their thanks for prayers; they do ask continued prayers for Mama's recovery and for their little one. Little Pius is in the neonatal step-down unit; there were some worrisome signs and they are making sure he doesn't have an infection. But hopefully he'll get to go home on schedule.

Stopped by Dylan's this morning to see if there was any news, and indeed there is -- great news from Dylan's mom, Marylou, posted last Friday in the most recent comments box:

today is Friday the 13th...good day..
Just wanted to let everyone know..
Dylan is finally out of the hospital..
Thank you for all the prayers and concerned for him...
Soon you will be hearing [from] him..
don't know exactly when.. but I'm sure soon..Its been a very long road ....
Have a good day everyone...
Dylan's mom{Marylou}!

MUST remember this next time someone starts prating to me about overpopulation:

On the issue of overpopulation and starvation, I know an equally viable and more profitable way to bring that to a close. The world governments can set a mandatory death date of 60.5 years. On that day, the government agency will euthanize you for no charge in the presence of all your loved ones. Think of all the money we would save on medical care for you. Then after your loved ones leave, we will send your corpse to a rendering plant where it will be turned into a savory paste.

Actually, this used to be accomplished naturally, before the anti-smoking push and the advances in medicine and palliative care. Smokers would pay into society's coffers all through their working years, and then perish of cancer right as they approached their retirement years, never to draw a penny of their pension. But now fewer people smoke, and those that do live longer if they get sick. So perhaps a more expedient solution -- dare I say a modest solution -- to "overpopulation" is to subsidize cigarettes and ration health care for chronic illnesses. (That seems to be Russia's plan, anyway.)

Just think -- quitting those anti-smoking ads would free up additional funds for other public health projects, like persecuting the obese. This plan would also help to address the problem of urban sprawl, as it would make it more profitable to farm tobacco instead of selling the land to developers.

...to Joshua Claybourn on the loss of his mother.

Every so often, we get a hit from someone searching for

Franklin + Jennings + blog

I'd been trying to come up with something amusing (it's been a while since I did a funny search string post), but I'm happier to be able to just supply the link at last.

“I’d like to learn more about classical music but haven’t any idea how to go about it. What would you suggest?”

I would suggest heading straight over to Vociferous Yawpings, where Mark Windsor has started a great series of posts answering precisely that question

Classical Music 101
Classical Music 102

Kathy the Carmelite and her husband!

We had a gully-washer of a thunderstorm yesterday afternoon. In my neighborhood, there was a lot of rain, but it came and went quickly. The sun was actually coming out when my husband called, wanting to know if we were okay.

I told him, yes, we'd had a little rain, but nothing terrible. He didn't seem to believe me so I told him again, yup, just some heavy rain.

That was when he told me that in his office in downtown DC, he couldn't see across the street (and the Smithsonian museum across the street is hard to miss) for the wind, the rain, and the marble-sized hail. That must have been the same storm that took out Zorak and the OO's car.

I need to run some errands this afternoon, and then plan to lie low as we get a taste of Bonnie. I've added intentions for those in the paths of the two hurricanes to the Assumption Novena.

Sparki has all the details about Zooey's awesome Pirate Birthday Party! Arrrrr! And may ye be havin' a happy birthday, Zooey!

Our dear hobbit neighbor Zelie Bramble (formerly known as Jordan of A Call to Adventure) posted that recipe for Lemon-Herb Crock-Pot slow cooker chicken I asked for. While you're over there, perhaps you'd like to update your bookmark to her new spot?

Mark Shea
and
Papa Honk! (aka Davey's Daddy)

Courtesy of Erik, of course.

Erik presents these as a "belated" Friday Five at the end of a reflection on current politics. (Why admit to "belated" when one could present them as "early"?) Don't miss his notes on Alan Greenspan, jazz man, and Senator Clinton, embodied alien. The whole entry reminded me of a cocktail that somehow involved gin, a memoir, and the Weekly World News.

So here we go:

1. List in the comments' boxes seven people who should be held up to God as reasons not to smite Massachussetts.

Dylan. Dylan's mom, Mary Lou. Dom Betenelli. Kelly the Pew Lady. The nice people at Orchard House, Concord who let us use their phone again and again when our car got stuck there.

2. Help! Harvard lost some of the biggest fruitcakes on its faculty to Princeton. In honor of the occasion, create some sort of award for Cornel West.

Wachowski Prize for Cinematic Dilettantism Presented as Pompous Post-modern Profundity

3. Write an all-rhymed acceptance speech for Professor West.

When we learned he was the One
The good part was done.

More later if I have time and inspiration

4. Earn a chance at being a sportscaster for a day! California and Massachussetts seem locked in a fanatical battle to lead the world into complete moral decay. In your best adrenaline-charged voice, narrate events. C'mon. Give it your all! Give it all you've got! Give 110% and don't forget the basic fundamentals. Remember the goal of this football game is to get the football, to move the football over the goal line, and then to kick it between goal posts. It all boils down to the team that does this the most, wins the game. Any comment, Pat?

I'll have to get back to this one. Is almost complete ignorance of football going to hurt me? My husband's true love is shown by how, in each and every one of the six football seasons we've been married, he patiently explains first downs and second downs and third-and-goal without getting testy.

5. Describe an experience you had with Moxie or fiddlehead ferns.

I saw fiddlehead ferns in the woods once, and in the freezer section another time. Oh, and I learned about them in Botany 103.

Thanks to Steven for this link to Notes From A Writing Coach.

It was interesting to read the author's critique of a lazy reporter's error-ridden article about guns. Yesterday, my husband mentioned an article from last week's Washington Post about the government's budget for a particular project. The reporter had apparently talked to a liberal lobby group's PAC and had dutifully written down their numbers (which, of course, showed how wicked and tight-fisted the Bush Administration is.) Apparently, she couldn't be bothered to give the goverment agency a call to check those numbers (or look them up on the Web); if she had, she would have found out that she either completely misunderstood what the group had told her, or that the group had played her for a fool. (My husband's department handles this group's funding.) The story was just plain wrong.

Remember when the Jayson Blair story broke? I remember seeing an interview with someone close to one of the events that he'd spun stories about (I think it was someone involved with the sniper investigation.) He was asked, didn't you suspect something when you saw this bizarre story in the Times? He replied, no, we're used to seeing stories in the paper that have nothing to do with what we saw with our own eyes.

Tom of Disputations wrote about the same thing in his old "Praying the Post" blog.

I don't trust newspapers, particularly the "leading" papers. Do you?