"Maybe we'll have some salmon on our salad on Friday...

...or maybe you can go to In n Out right now and then come home and make a cocktail."

- The Wife

The Fruit Flush didn't last. It's one thing to be hungry. It's another thing to have a headache from the hunger. It's another thing to be dizzy from the hunger. Especially when you're raising five kids (one of them nursing). Maybe another time.

Back to my beloved toxins...

What to do...

...with abusive priests?

Thirtysomething

I didn't see much TV as a kid, and I only ever saw about ten minutes of one episode of Thirtysomething. I was a teenager, and if ever there was a show for old people, that was it. Golden Girls had more fun and sass. What I remember: two guys on bicycles, and then, later, one of the guys ordering a bran muffin, saying something to his buddy about fiber. The scene has stayed with me over the years, a terrifying reminder that as the body ages, you may benefit from things like ordering bran muffins and thinking about fiber. Gad.

So the Wife is doing a Fruit Flush, which involves three days of protein powder, some salad, exactly one smidgen of meat, and lots and lots of fruit. And no alcohol or coffee. Pretty much what Purgatory will be like. Gentleman that I am, I offered to join her, as long as I could complain the whole time. And of course, I'm remembering Thirtysomething. I am old.

Meanwhile, Immaculate Direction is writing about an entirely more wholesome-sounding sort of fasting:

"The intent of the fast was to identify with the poor and to offer this sacrifice in union with Christ’s. By modern standards it was austere. I won’t share more than this. It was not intended to eat organic food, so we could feel good about ourselves, and then tell you how good we feel about ourselves. The intent is to share that perhaps there are greater cost and health benefits from changing from the normal diet. It was simply an accidental side effect of the fast’s original intent. I’ve concluded that without the austerities this diet can be extended to year round. But most importantly, and why I share this personal thing, it might help families improve their domestic lives. Perhaps there is more benefit than just saving oil."

Kakutani Brings the Harsh

The NYT's chief book critic calls Jonathan Franzen's latest (a memoir) "an odious self-portrait of the artist as a young jackass." And she's just warming up. Here's how she ends things:

"Just why anyone would be interested in pages and pages about this unhappy relationship or the self-important and self-promoting contents of Mr. Franzen’s mind remains something of a mystery. In fact, by the end of this solipsistic book, the reader has begun to feel every bit as suffocated and claustrophobic as Mr. Franzen and his estranged wife apparently did in their doomed marriage."

Two things to note: One, a remarkable quotation: "He describes reasoning that 'not having kids freed me altogether' from having to worry about things like global warming: 'Not having kids was my last, best line of defense against the likes of Al Gore.'" This sounds like he is saying that not having kids helped him to regard himself as an island. Kids: the anti-solipsist?

Two: "There are two extended riffs in this volume where Mr. Franzen momentarily puts aside his fascination with himself to give the reader some wonderfully observed musings on two subjects that have long preoccupied him: Peanuts cartoons and bird-watching." I could stand to learn more about bird-watching, but I put repeat this here just to express a sort of friendly jealousy. When you've written a National Book Award-winning novel, you get to do something like riff on the brilliance of Peanuts (and back in the day, it really was brilliant) in a memoir, and folks will still line up to publish it. Not that it's not worth writing, or reading - not at all. I think it is absolutely worth writing, and reading. But fame has a way of granting legitimacy to one's endeavors. People are more likely to accept that a thing is interesting because you, the famous person, are interested in it.

I'll stop now.

Funny Papers

"Love me, love my rubble."

- the ruins of the torn-down school, after Linus has lamented its destruction.

Movie Chat

"Oh, Hi. You're young, you got your health - what you want with a job for?

- Evelle, Raising Arizona

Gods

Okay, so I can't actually recommend that anybody rush out and rent Season One of Rome - I find the graphic depictions of sex problematic, much moreso than, say, The Sopranos. Lots of eye-averting at Casa Godsbody. It's a pity, really - I Claudius managed to depict decadence in all its fleshy indulgence, yet steered clear of coitus on camera.

BUT, that's not what this post is about. This post is about why Rome is so much more interesting than Troy. Well, one of the reasons. Or rather, a bunch of them: gods. No, Rome doesn't feature meetings in the heavens, a la Clash of the Titans, but it does feature religion as it functions in the lives of people, and a host of differing attitudes towards it. (Troy seemed to take a scalpel to that part of the Iliad.) You've got Marc Anthony, who clearly doesn't believe in any of it, tolerates religion as a formal show. You've got Pullo, who prays when it suits him, has no use for priests, and is willing to blaspheme when the gods don't perform. You've got Caesar, who clearly doesn't think much of religion - he bribes the chief auger - but who sacrifices to the gods when he needs help, and who spares Varenus' life because Varenus seems to have "powerful gods on his side." And you've got Varenus, who's straight-up pious. Honors the priests, honors the gods - even has faith in them.

And those are just the men. The women also sacrifice - and almost more interestingly, they make curses. When they cannot act for themselves, they ask the gods to strike for them.

Rome is that much stronger, that much richer, for its willingness to treat religion as a real part of human life, and to present a world in which certain events could be interpreted, by those with eyes to see, as being signs of divine action.

Godsbody - Yesterday's [Fake] News Today

Yeah, Casa Lickona fell for this, to the extent that the ol' family calendar even has a notation on Sunday to go out and look for Mars. (Whose handwriting? Not tellin'.) Thank heaven (as it were) that I'm a lousy parent and forgot to let my chlidren know about this astonishing event. Instead, we attended a fantastic concert given by friends down at the main library (The husband has a new CD out, guitar-lovers.) Then out to pizza, then over to their house for ice cream. Music and food - better than Mars.

End note: I tried, I really tried to keep Third Son from planting himself in front of the House of the Dead game at the pizza joint. But the thing had guns attached. He would not be stopped. "Wanna SHOOT!" Well, of course you do.

(No, I did not actually let him play the thing. He just watched the intro, and pretended to be blasting off zombie limbs. Sigh.)

The Anxiety of No Influence

Or rather, the anxiety of utter and total insignificance. Sorry folks, nothing new today. The dimmest star in the Catholic blogosphere just got a little dimmer. And since People of the Book notes that the blogosphere is doubling in size every 200 days, it shouldn't be long before the great black empty swallows me up completely. In the meantime, I'll try to get back to flickering tomorrow.

And Remember...

The colorization of old movies remains a proof that the mere existence of a technology is not in itself an argument for its use.

Book Meme Redux

JOB has weighed in on the book meme:

"One book you'd want on a desert island. Me too, the Bible: Without Genesis, myth would be whistling in the dark; without the Psalms, sonnets would be hollow; without Macabees, epics would be trite; without Song of Songs, eroticism would be joyless; without Lamentations, elegy would remain frustratingly grave; without the book of Job, faith would be merely existentialism; without Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, the truth would be a cicerone holding a lamp up in the darkness of a tomb..."

Be Careful What You Wish For Dept.

Third Son - the chaos-bringer - is the first two-year-old I have ever encountered who is NOT HELD BY CARTOONS. The others - all neutralized. But he wanders forth, chaos on his mind...

First Son, Justice-Bringer

After hearing a Spanish short story in which a bandit robs and shoots a man with a wife and children, thus condemning the family to starvation that winter. The bandit dies in the end, but First Son was deeply affected by the story:

"I don't like it that a man can kill a hundred men and then be hanged only once."

Mercy is no small thing.

The New Victory Garden

Over at Immaculate Direction, Cubeland Mystic recasts the Victory Garden as a means for overcoming "typical Catholic despair":

"...in the temperate southern states across the US, most folks can plant a cold hardy winter garden starting in mid-September. In the big scheme of things it won't make a big difference to oil prices, but what it lacks in material value it might make up in symbolic and spiritual value.

Here is a suggestion to consider. Depending on the climate, a winter garden could survive until spring. If done correctly a small plot could yield enough produce to make a nice vegetable soup. Carrots, onions, celery, swiss chard, spinach, broth, and a handful of pasta or beans. Sounds like a simple Lenten meal to me. Perhaps for Lent next spring give up processed food. Replace it with food you grow. I leave it up to you if you think this saves oil or serves as a Lenten sacrifice. But I think it is worth considering. If enough of us do it, it would make a difference."

Plus, it tastes amazing. We planted a half a dozen different heirloom tomatoes this year - things you don't find in supermarkets. Amazing, amazing flavors. Russian Black - yum. And gorgeous to behold. Second Son composted the soil, cleared it of weeds, helped in the planting. Watered and weeded. And picked. An excellent project, one which gave satisfaction to him and brought delight to the family.

Across the country, potatoes, dug from the ground at Red Rose Farm, tasted like no potatoes I've ever eaten. There was simply more to taste.

Gawker Will Eat Itself

Gawker's Already Over feature trains its world-weary gaze on its own town:

"Right now, as you read this, millions of kids around the world are thinking, I'm going to grow up and move to New York, where people will understand me. Those kids are douchebags, but, more importantly, they're right: They will be understood by the douchebags already here. They will also be resented, backstabbed, and made fun of for their unfamiliarity with the ways of the city by people who have conveniently forgotten their own, slightly less recent, unfamiliarity. New York is, at this point, a giant recycling factory, unable to contribute anything new to the culture while proclaiming that the latest remix is actually a bold step in a new direction."

Self-loathing is the new boosterism.

(Language gets a little blue if you follow the link.)

Shatner

Celebrity roasts tend to get pretty blue, so I'm not gonna post any links here. If you want to see clips of the William Shatner roast that aired Sunday, you'll have to go poking around on YouTube, etc. on your own. But I do enjoy me some roast celebrity. I've seen more than one reference to Shatner's weight-gain, but, unbelievably, I haven't seen anyone make the following crack:

"What happened to you? It looks like they set phasers on Bloat."

Okay, I'll stop now.

Symbols and Sacraments, Writerly Edition

People of the Book links to an essay that argues for the compatibility, perhaps even the advantage, of a Catholic sensibility in the literary realm.

Teaser sentence: "Without a sacramental theology, and specifically a theology of sacramental action, Protestant writers cannot do justice to this world or show that this world is the theater of God’s redeeming action."

This put me in mind of John Updike's Introduction to Soundings in Satanism (can you tell I once had a contract to write a book on the devil?). The intro begins: "Most of the contributors to this volume are Catholic or European or both; an American Protestant feels an understandable diffidence at leading such a parade, as it confidently marches from the mustering ground of biblical exegesis into the weird mashes of possession, exorcism, and witchcraft and onto the familiar firm terrain of psychopathology and literary criticism...Can evil be a personal, dynamic principle? The suggestion seems clownish; instinctively, we reject it. If we must have a supernatural, at the price of intelluctual scandal, at least let it be a minimal supernatural, clean, monotonous, hygenic, featureless - just a little supernatural, as the unwed mother said of her baby...Alas, we have become, in our Protestantism, more virtuous than the myths that taught us virtue; we judge them barbaric."

Kids Make You More Loving

You come to realize that it's not enough to put them in the same house with clothes and food and then expect them to dress and feed themselves in the morning. You come to realize that if you do not walk the extra mile, the authorities will discover them, naked and starving in their rooms, their faces masks of puzzlement over the fact that somehow, contrary to logic and expectations, reading comics and bickering failed to provide for their most basic needs.

Kids Make You Smarter

They teach you focus. This from my eight-month-old: "See, Dad, you're trying to keep me from crawling toward the computer and swatting at the keyboard as you sit here on the floor, ostensibly minding me. BUT, you're also trying to read something on that computer, and manipulate that keyboard. You lack focus. I, on the other hand, have but a single goal. And I've got nothing else to do today."

Kids Make You Better

For example...

They wake you up after four hours of sleep - ah, the joys of changing time zones - just to let you know how happy they are to be home, and how much they want to spend time with their father. They believed you when you said you missed them, and they give you a chance to show it, to strive after that great consistency between word and will and deed.

From The Red Rose Theater

The You & Me Band appeared at the Rose Theater last night to send off the California Lickonas in grand fashion. Here's the lyrics to "In Dreamland" by lead singer Finian Lickona (with cousins Monica and Kateri as back-up chorus):

In Dreamland
I can drive the tractor by myself (by myself)
In Dreamland
I can drive the tractor without help (without help)

I activate it with the key
Push the pedal (hee hee hee)
Turn it up to Rabbit speed
No - need - to - take warning
No - need - to - take heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeed yeah!
I drive it around and around the fields
The steering wheel and pedal I wield

In Dreamland
I can drive the tractor by myself (by myself)
In Dreamland
I can drive the tractor without help
(with - out - heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeelp!)

The audience went nuts.

And the back-stage after-party totally rocked. We ate brownies, drank lemonade and danced to Michael Jackson, Cyndi Lauper and Wham (courtesy of the Theater's new ten-dollar turn-table and speakers).

Y'all come back now, y'hear?

Busted...

....thanks, once again, to the Power of the Internets!

So the WSJ did a story on the Ave Maria School of Law, a story which recounted some of the deep, deep troubles at the place - troubles which I will not attempt to explain here, becuase they are treated with much more knowledge and detail elsewhere. Fumare, for example, is all over the recent non re-hiring of Professor/Former Board member Charles Rice. (Be aware - they definitely take a particular side in the debate.) And because they are tracking the story so closely, they noticed a post-publication change in the story as it appeared online. This:

A number of professors have resigned; some have launched lawsuits; the contract of a prominent emeritus professor from Notre Dame was not renewed. Faculty reported the college's administration to the Department of Education for fraud involving financial aid in 2002. (The school denied any wrongdoing, but paid back about $300,000; the investigation hasn't been concluded.) And now one of those professors has been told that he must recant his testimony to department officials if he wants his contract renewed. (A university official acknowledged this was true, which may leave the school open to criminal conspiracy charges.)

Became this:

A number of professors have resigned; some have launched lawsuits; the contract of a prominent emeritus professor from Notre Dame was not renewed. Faculty members reported the college's administration to the Department of Education for fraud involving financial aid in 2002. The school denied any wrongdoing but paid back about $300,000. An investigation by the education department's inspector general hasn't been concluded.

Gosh, what happened to those last couple of sentences? Fortunately, Google caught, er, cached the the original version.

Again, I'm not breaking this story, and I repeat all this here because it's kind of fascinating, journalism-wise.

Funny, Elsewhere, Comix Edition

Okay, so last time I did a link to a mildly sacreligious comic strip, I got in a little trouble with my commenters. But I laughed at this.

Improving the Past

For its 10th anniversary, Homestar Runner fires up the ol' culture loop and animatizes the original story. I just wish I could remember where I found the original cartoon, the one where Strongbad steals Homestar's Star and Homestar and Pom-Pom have to wrestle Strongbad and Strongmad to get it back - if only because it explains something about Strongbad's appearance. But nothing, thank God, explains the boxing gloves. Mystery must there be.

Bachelorhood is Overrated

At least when, or perhaps especially when, you're married with kids. "You can do whatever you want." But you don't. You kind of go to pieces.

The exception to this was when the Wife took the kids away to let me work on finishing the first book. THAT was fantastic. I was all on fire and such, full of notes and drive and with nothing but time to get it all down. (Yes, as little as that book was, it took some doing to get it done.)

No such luck this time. Thank God she comes home tomorrow. So tonight, I'm going through the accumulated mail, trying to pay some bills so she won't have to. Chucking stuff into the recycling - what's this ridiculously thick little catalog? Good grief, is that Christmas crap on the cover?

Mindless flipping....crap...crap...crap...GOOD GRAVY, WHAT'S THIS? That's right. It's the Original Butt/Face towel. Half brown, half white. "A great way to keep track of where each end of your towel has been!" Accessorize with Butt/Face soap - brown on one side, white on the other. Both towel and soap are labeled as well - "You'll never get confused on which end to use!"

Words fail me. But words don't fail the good folks at Lakeside: "Great for the beach or bring it along to the gym." I'll leave you to imagine the scene - beach or gym, your pick.

Hello...

So yesterday, I made it down to St. Joseph's Cathedral downtown for The Last Mass in the County - 6:30 p.m. Not looking for much, just trying to fulfill my Sunday Obligation, giving thanks that my faith at least requires me to haul my carcass to a particular place at least one hour a week out of regard for my God. The opening hymn met my expectations perfectly - a mediocre hymn, performed in mediocre fashion.

But then, out comes this Brazilian priest I've never seen down there before, and what a joy. First, placing the Mass in a kind of context - "This Sunday is the 20th Sunday in Ordinary Time, and the Church asks us, as it has asked us for the past two weeks, and will ask us again next week, to contemplate the true presence - body, blood, soul, and divinity - of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist." Oh - that's right. Suddenly, I'm drawn in a little further than I might have been, and I'm grateful.

The Mass proceeds, and we get to the homily. Father reminds us again about what the Church is doing, asking us to contemplate the true presence, "because the Eucharist is the central mystery of our Catholic faith. If we can believe that - that the body, blood, soul, and divinity are truly present - then the rest of our Catholic faith follows and makes sense." It's not exactly a shocking revelation, but it's still a delight to hear it proclaimed at Mass.

Father tells a story about going out to breakfast with a couple of priests, one of whom tells his story. "I was born and raised a Lutheran. I attended college as a Lutheran. Then one day, I was passing a Roman Catholic Church, and I decided to go in and see what was going on in there. When I entered the church, I felt the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ. He was in the church. I said to myself, 'This is the true church. Jesus Christ is here.' I converted to Catholicism, and now I am a priest."

"That man was lucky," said Father. "How many of us feel the presence of Jesus Christ when we enter the church? He's here, whether we like it or not, but how many of us have felt His presence?" Out of sympathy, then, he read an extended account of the Miracle at Lanciano, in which the elements, at the words of the consecration, actually turned to blood and flesh. This was back in 700 AD. Father began to relate how, as the priest - who had been plagued by doubts about the true presence, and had prayed fervently for release from those doubts - turned to the congregation and invited them to draw near and witness just how close their God really was, when he was moved to speak an aside. It interrupted the flow of the story, but still, the man was teaching.

His aside explained why the priest had needed to turn around to address the people. "Throughout, the language of the Mass is addressed to God the Father. The people are praying to God the Father, and the priest is praying to God the Father. You are not talking to me; I am not talking to you. We are both praying to God the Father, and so that is why we both faced the same way. That is why the priest had his back to the people."

He returned to the story, read the part about how the blood and flesh had not decayed, were still visible today. (He had seen them himself, a year ago.) How they were tested in 1970, and how the tests revealed that the blood was human blood (type AB), and the flesh was human flesh - specifically, heart tissue. "At holy Communion, Jesus gives us a tiny sliver of His heart - the organ of love."

I'd heard the story before, but again, hearing it proclaimed gave it a different character.

Then he moved on to the first reading: Wisdom has spread her table. "Throughout the Bible, Wisdom is associated with the Virgin Mary. She has prepared her table for the sacrifice of her son. She is calling all who are simple - who are without sin - to come to the table." A bit of Scriptural commentary - imagine.

I'll stop now. You get the idea. I'm grateful to have attended.

CCH

Brick

The wisdom of youth
Sees past sophistication
Guides the parting shot

An absolutely remarkable ending. I'd yammer on, but I don't want to spoil it.

The Book Meme

...I thought I'd dodged this one, and if I hadn't stopped by atp's place and read that she tagged me, maybe I would have. But anyway...

One book that changed your life: Up in the Old Hotel, by Joseph Mitchell, one of the greats from the glory days of the New Yorker. Served as a model and an inspiration for the sort of journalism/writing I strive for in feature writing. Letting quotes tell the story, the writer providing shape, setting, and structure, and then getting out of the way. There are plenty of others, but that seemed like one that might not get mentioned elsewhere.

One book that you've read more than once: Scoop, by Evelyn Waugh. The antidote to any grandiose ideas about journalism. Simply hilarious, near perfect.

One book you'd want on a desert island: See, the neat thing about the Bible is that, besides being revelation, it's a whole library - poetry, history, pensees, etc. So please accept the seeming cop-out.

One book that made you laugh: you mean, besides Scoop and the rest of the Waugh canon? The list is long. The Thurber Carnival has some choice bits. But for absolute, laughing myself stupid, can't even finish reading the sentence out loud to my brother funny: Culture Made Stupid by Tom Weller.

One book that made you cry: hm. Nothing coming to mind. There are books that have rocked my world, twisted my gut, broken my heart. But cry? I'll think on it.

One book that you wish had been written: Jesus Christ explains it all by The Risen Lord Jesus Christ. I know, I know, "Blessed are they who have not seen and have believed." But sometimes, it'd be nice.

One book that you wish had not been written: A bunch of stuff by Nietzsche.

One book you're currently reading: Volume One of Stannard's biography of Evelyn Waugh

One book you've been meaning to read: Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather

Tagged: the Korrektiv

Today in Porn, Hollywood Edition

I have almost no idea what to make of this, except to say that it surely means something when Jeff Bridges signs on to a film about a bunch of small-town losers who set out to make an "innocent, amateur" adult movie. Duly noted.

Today in Porn, Sports Edition

David Foster Wallace, writing about tennis demigod Roger Federer in the NYT:

"...that’s one example of a Federer Moment, and that was merely on TV — and the truth is that TV tennis is to live tennis pretty much as video porn is to the felt reality of human love."

See You in the Funny Papers

When I was a kid, I (naturally) worshipped Bloom County. Call it Doonesbury for kids, call it Peanuts for Gen X, call it the precourser to Calvin & Hobbes, call it the template for Liberty Meadows, call it what you will - I adored it. Ye Olde Small Towne News-Paper didn't carry it, naturally, preferring such ribald fare as Henry and Hi and Lois. But the New York Daily News carried it, and my maternal grandfather was a devoted reader of both the News and the NY Post (He lived in Albany). Every week, I got an envelope stuffed with the previous week's strips, an act of charity which has almost assuredly gained the man a higher cloud in heaven. I didn't save those strips, sadly - I was content with the published collections. But this person did, and, as a result, can show you the strips that didn't make it into the books. Good, good stuff.

BONUS: the site also includes a bunch of rare Bill Watterson/Calvin & Hobbes material, including the most awesome Ralph Steadman homage I've ever seen.

Gibson Redux

Yesterday's News Today, people. So Denis Leary and Lenny Clark drop in on the announcers during a Red Sox game and proceed to rough up Mel Gibson, keying off the presence and play of the Red Sox's Jewish first baseman. Seth Mnookin has the transcript (that's the link). Let's take a look, shall we?

***

Denis Leary: Now, Youkilis, is he a Greek kid?
Jerry Remy: No, I don’t think so.
Don Orsillo: I think he’s Jewish.
JR: He’s Jewish, yeah.
Lenny Clark: Really?
DL: that’s fantastic. That’s one bottle of whiskey away from being Irish Catholic. They got the Manischewitz, we got the Jamesons. It’s the same guilt, the same bad food. That’s fantastic, we got a Jewish first baseman! I didn’t know that. This is fabulous. …I’m so proud to have a Jewish first baseman. i didn’t even know!

[Godsbody: Oh, come now, Mr. Leary. You can do better than that. "One bottle of whiskey away from being Irish Catholic" is funny. "It's the same guilt" is funny. But the same bad food? You grew up Irish Catholic, so you know whereof you speak on the food thing, but I've had some fantastic meals in Jewish homes, eating traditional Jewish dishes. Gifeltefish aside, isn't there a stereotype about Jews eating well? And comparing Manischewitz with Jameson's may be some sort of blasphemy. I've heard Jews lament their days being forced to choke down that sweet, syrupy wine. But the Irish love their whiskey, no? (I know I do.) No one makes jokes about being forced to drink Jameson's - sometimes, they make jokes about how much they miss the stuff. I'm right with you on the similarities between Irish Catholics and Jews, but what came after was a swing and a miss.]

LC: I hope Mel Gibson doesn’t come into this park. We’ll run him out of here on a rail.

[Godsbody: Here's the thing. Everywhere I run into a story about this on the Internet, I read how Denis Leary laced into Mel Gibson. But from where I sit, it's Clark doing most of the attacking. Read on and see what you think.]

Mnookin: Jerry Remy begins hacking; it sounds as if he might be on the verge of losing a lung. Sean Casey hits a ball sharply in between first and second. Youkilis snares the ball from his knees and tosses to Curt Schilling for the out.

DL: Nice! Yeah, where’s Mel Gibson now! Where’s Mel Gibson now, huh? He’s in rehab! he’s in rehab and Youkilis has got first base, alright Mel! (Don Orsillo giggles uncontrollably.) You happy Braveheart, huh? You see that grab, Mel? I hope in rehab they’re showing replays of that. A Jewish first baseman makes the play, Mel Gibson! Good luck when you come out. Call Jeffrey Katzenberg and ask for a job when you get out. We’ll have a whole Jewish infield by the time he gets out. Bring back Sandy Koufax, Mel Gibson, huh? Braveheart, my ass. Thatta boy, Kev.

[Godsbody: I dunno. This reads more angry than funny. It's a fine line, making anger into humor. Most of the very best humor is born out of rage and suffering, I think. But this doesn't seem to sparkle much. After all, Gibson said that Jews were responsible for all the wars in the world, an accusation which was a long way from what Leary is implying here. Leary seems to be saying that Gibson doesn't think Jews are worth much - is Gibson supposed to be surprised that a Jew is a good ballplayer? Gibson, when drunk, suggested that Jews were capable of orchestrating events of massive historical consequence, of influencing the governments of multiple nations. If he really believes those things, then you don't have to tell Gibson that Jews are capable of highly skilled activity. I'm starting to think that people think this rant was hilarious just because it was ballsy. And it was only ballsy because of the context - this sort of thing isn't supposed to be the topic of conversation at a baseball game. Actually, it's not that ballsy to kick a man when he's down. It can be funny if done well, but it's not that ballsy. ]

LC: We should have Sandy Koufax pitch at Mel’s head.

[Godsbody: Whoa. This is what I mean about Clark being the one really going after Gibson.]

DL: That should be his community service, get in the box against Sandy Koufax. Guess who’s at first base? Kevin Youkilis!

[Godsbody: Better. Funnier than Clark's line, which is just mean.]

LC: Now what other Jewish players are there, because I’m not aware.
JR: Gabe Kapler, I think.
DL: Gabe Kapler! We got two Jews on this team, Mel! Where’s your father now, huh?

[Godsbody: Leary seems to being agreeing with Mark's notion that what came out of Gibson's mouth that night was, in some respect, the Voice of the Father.]

LC: How about that, Mel?
DL: Yeah. It feels good to get that out, didn’t it?
LC: We’ve got quite a team.
LC: Are we in trouble?
DL: No, we’re not in trouble. They don’t have TVs in rehab.
LC: Oh, I don’t care about Mel.

[snip]

DL: Boy, I’m so happy about that Kevin Youkilis thing.
LC: And Kapler! I didn’t even know!
DL: Well you know what’s gonna happen, Gibson’s gonna make amends: ‘Oh, I love the Red Sox! I love the first baseman!’ Oh yeah, sure you do. Sure you do Mel.

[Godsbody: Wow, Denis - for someone who once said, "I've been a Catholic or a lapsed Catholic all of my life" (according to this site), you don't put much stock in contrition. But that's your call, I guess.]

LC: If I were Youkilis and Kapler I’d say, well, listen, am I in your next movie?
DL: Can we put some blue paint on our faces? Come on, Braveheart, huh? Look, I don’t know Mel. Why are we jumping all over him, you know what i mean? He had a little bit of tequila. You know those days. You were there.

[Godsbody: See what I mean? This is practically compassion for Gibson, unless he was being completely sarcastic. But I don't think he was, because suddenly, Clark gets defensive.]

LC: Now wait a minute, I never got personal. I never went with religion.
DL: No you didn’t. You always went with the face and the ugly and the fat and the nice dress and your girlfiend.
LC: It doesn’t matter what religion, you treat me good I’ll treat you better.
DL: That’s right.

Curt Schilling throws to Youkilis to pick Craig Monroe off of first.

DL: Ahhhh! Mel gibson take a look at that!
LC: Mel Gibson, eat your heart out! Youkilis tosses the ball to a fan in the stands. And look at that! The ball went to a fan! That’s more than Mel Gibson’s ever done!

[Godsbody: And you know that how?]

DO: See you later.
DL: Hope we didn’t get you in trouble.
DO: Thanks a lot, guys.

And…scene.

***

Here's the thing: I'm not a big Gibson fan. I wasn't a huge fan of The Passion of the Christ. I've even smiled at a local radio station's dig at the man. But the praise I've seen heaped on this exchange just strikes me as weird.

Trivialities

Gen-X ascending, dipping back into its collective childhood: methinks this cover from the band AFI bears a striking resemblance to a scene from this sequence in the 1978 animated film version of Richard Adams' Watership Down (a great favorite of mine). (Sorry, couldn't find the exact image - but if you've seen the film, you might recall - the three rabbits form a ring and start spinning round while Art Garfunkel sings "Bright Eyes." And while we're at it, isn't Bright Eyes the name of another band?)

Elsewhere - with a bonus T-Shirt of the day!

Mr. Mitsui is on fire again over at The Lion and the Cardinal. This sort of discussion - Renaissance v. Medieval art - fascinates me, especially when the participants seem to be informed by facts and history, as seems to be the case here. A sampling (but do go read the whole thing):

"Catholic iconography needs a revival - the sort of revival that Gregorian Chant had at Solesmes in the early twentieth century. The Benedictines of Solesmes may or may not have been correct in the details of their interpretations - I am not knowledgeable enough to say. But they were correct in principle; they realized that the music of the Church had become corrupted in recent centuries, so much as to be almost unrecognizable as the music of Catholic history. Their solution was an intense scholarly study of extant records predating the corruptions, and a workable codification of their content.

A similar study - if not by monks, at least by individual artists - is needed to revive the lost iconography of Occidental Christendom, to use it as the basis of a renewed Catholic Culture. Admittedly, such a project requires its participants to admit that the Roman Catholic Church has been wrong about something for a very long time, and that the Eastern Orthodox Churches have been correct. This grates on the triumphalism of most traditionalists, but I have no problem with it, as I see the Catholic faith primarily as a deposit guarded by tradition, rather than as an exercise of power by those with God-given authority.

I am worried to see traditionally-minded Catholics defer to the wisdom of secular art history in their judgment of the treasures of the Church. I am worried to see Notre Dame architecture professors advocating a return to Classical principles, since most of their layman admirers hear traditional instead of Greco-Roman-Renaissance in the word Classical. I am worried to see men publishing books entitled Where Have You Gone, Michelangelo: The Loss of Soul in Catholic Culture - I can think of no artist, pre-Modernism, whose work was more irreverent, more egocentric, more iconographically incorrect and less appropriate as an example of the soul of Catholic Culture than that of Michelangelo Buonarroti. I am worried that traditionalism will continued to be baffled by the contradictions of Catholic history, and becoming merely a general enthusiasm for anachronism will fail to create a meaningful alternative to modern secular culture."

***

On an appropriately trivial side note (our specialty here): Mr. Mitsui also discusses The Bishop Fish. He might be interested to know that he can purchase a T-shirt.

Colbert - Captain Catholic Critiques Contraception

Of course, he doesn't actually critique condom use, but he does make it funny.

Yesterday in Porn, Vanity Edition

Flying home from New York on JetBlue, I took the occasion to channel surf, and came across this amazing scene on some sort of slice-of-life show: a pin-up gal, getting a tattoo of herself in a pin-up pose on her hip. How is she going to feel about that tattoo in ten years? Twenty? What she used to look like, memorialized on her own aging flesh. It's almost short-story material.

Hello...

Lots of interesting stuff going on with this review by Scott Eyman of Simon Callow's second installment of his Orson Welles bio. First up, and the part having the least to do with Welles, is the tiny note at the bottom of the page: "A condensed version of this review ran on page 19 in the 8/21/2006 edition of The New York Observer." A condensed version - because newsprint is expensive, people. That and production and distribution and all the rest of it. It's not quite to the point where what sees paper is jsut a teaser for what's online, but it's a step in that direction. "For the full story, the real deal, check out our website!" I have seen the future, and it is the Internets.

Second, I will never understand why, given that seemingly everybody and anybody who's into movies acknowledges Chimes at Midnight to be both one of the greatest Welles movies AND one of the greatest Shakespeare movies, nobody has pulled out their digitial restoration miracle-gadgets and cleaned up the sound (and some of the visuals), and released a fan-dabby-doobie DVD. I'd buy one. Oh, wait. Still, there's work here to be done for the good people at the Criterion Collection.

Third, it's a bang-up review of what sounds like a bang-up book. Viz: "Mr. Callow comes as close as anyone to defining the core problem when he writes that Welles was 'an experimental artist, deeply unconcerned with commercial success or indeed with the idea of a finished art-work—finished either in the sense of being completed or of having a smooth veneer.' This trait becomes most obvious in the later stages of his career, with the distressingly random, ragged nature of the self-financed projects he took up in the last 15 years of his life, after the great Chimes at Midnight."

Eyman does criticize Callow, however, for not making more of Welles' personal life during the period covered in the book - he was married to Rita Hayworth at the time. Which reminds me to link to this little bit of genius from Lileks.

Farm Poetry

Waxwing Swamp

As dusk-light falls, mosquitoes rise
The muck-born princes of the air
A crowded cloud bedevils, plagues us
Despoiling the evening peace.
But the heavens rest above the skies
And angels have Dominion there
Bats and Waxwings stoop to save us
A hum, a flap, a dart - surcease.

Intro to Berry

At the risk of sounding crunchy, and with the possible exception of the ever-so-slightly contentious tone of the first paragraph, I really enjoyed this introduction to Wendell Berry in The New Pantagruel. Elegant, clear writing, says I.

Loose Ends

So I wrote a song. And my brother wrote a melody and sang it. And we got guitar wizard Bill Wilson to play a little bit. And brilliant producer Allan Phillips to make a record out of the thing. We had a blast, and the result is here. If you like it, tell your friends.

(A permanent link to the song can be found in this website's Etc. section, which you get to by clicking that little sun icon at the top of the page.)

Edison Force

This needs to become a new buzzword - the standard term used to describe an artist slumming for a paycheck. I'm wandering the shelves at Lackluster, and I notice this little gem. It takes a second to get past LL Cool J's shiny pate, but there in the background - is that Academy Award Winner Morgan Freeman? And next to him - is that Academy Award Winner Kevin Spacey? Direct to video? They couldn't even rely enough on Justin Timberlake's rabid fanbase to go for a theatrical release? On a "rogue, renegade cop" flick? Wow.

So remember - the next time Philip Seymour Hoffman takes on the role of Walter Bamberger, The Man Who Invented Twinkies for a Food Channel Original Movie, he's having an Edison Force moment.

Today in Porn, Separation Edition

Back in '04, when the NYT ran a piece on porn legend Jenna Jameson in their Home & Garden section, this seemed a noteworthy paragraph:

"Ms. Jameson and Mr. Grdina were married last June by a former priest who is now a justice of the peace, in a Roman Catholic-style ceremony in their backyard. Mr. Grdina has always considered himself a practicing Catholic; Ms. Jameson said she is returning to her Catholic roots. Mr. Grdina said his family, Catholics, has come to support the work they do."

I always wondered what, if anything, would transpire as a result of Jameson's "returning to her Catholic roots." Sadly, it seems that the return may have been delayed somewhat, as there are reports that she is now separated from Grdina, and going about with Dave Navarro.

(And no, I don't read Star Magazine, or its website. But they seemed to be the source on this one.)

Missing

So the Wife stayed in New York when I came back to California. And what does my dream life kick up as a tender remembrance of my dear one? Some Depression-Era crooner noodling over this bit of nonsense:

Once, without a care, my love
'Ere the world was made
Still I found you there, my love
Drinking lemonade

Thanks a lot, psyche. Now I feel lonesome AND silly.

Noted

Wherein Godsbody becomes even less on-point than usual...

It's true that my town is on the edge of a large city in Southern California, but it is still arresting to be rolling down its main drag on a Friday night and then swerving to avoid a poorly parked black Lambourghini Countach outside the local Mexican restaurant.

"Hello, what's this?"

Growing up, it was the utlimate expression of automotive extravagance. Something we learned to pronounce long before we ever actually saw. Now it's parked outside a joint that puts too much Sprite in its margaritas.

Elsewhere

Read this from Michael Novak on Kennedy and McCarthy over at the First Things blog. Read it all, though I will note two bits:

"...Senator McCarthy was a close friend of mine. We had met and talked a number of times, both of us 'Commonweal Catholics,' and from the first talked as old friends talked, citing the same books and similar experiences. Gene had attended St. John’s in Collegeville and was an exceptionally literate and gracious Catholic. He had read with pleasure and intelligence hundreds of serious Catholic works by Claudel, Peguy, Yeats (maybe most of all, Yeats), Flannery O’Connor, Walker Percy, Graham Greene, Francois Mauriac, G.K. Chesterton, Belloc, Maritain, Yves Simon, Romano Guardini, Sigrid Undset, Heinrich Böll—all the writers of the 'modern Catholic Renaissance.'

Good gravy - if that's what it meant to be a Commonweal Catholic...

Also, this:

"And the Christians seemed to me to live in a deeper, darker night than they much speak about, closer in many ways to unbelief than to belief—at least so far as feelings go. There are many days when the believer, trying to become conscious of God’s presence within, feels nothing at all, sees nothing at all.

Sometimes it is easier to act as a particular way of life demands than to say one believes in it. And it may be a quite noble way of life, indeed."

Holy Crap

From today's Mass readings, the psalm:

"Learn then that I, I alone, am God,
and there is no god besides me.
It is I who bring both death and life
I who inflict wounds and heal them."

Yeep.

Farm Poetry

...is gonna be a feature until it's out of my system. It's a special place, by golly.

The barns here are a serious red
No candy-apple frippery, but something dark
As if the grime of sooty earthwork made its mark
So as to say, "Here the goats are fed."

In the far barn, the crooked stalls remain
The goats share one, the others yawn and wait
For new additions, the egg-hens and their mate.
The far barn earns its blackened crimson stain

But in the near barn, the somber shade's a ruse
The picture window, the weathered floor swept clean
The canvas cloth, hung to make a movie screen
Tells the joke with Technicolor hues.

A hit! A palpable hit!

So Loyola Press found itself with a hit on its hands in the form of Father James Martin's My Life With The Saints, and decided to push things along with a clever roadside ad campaign. The move made the Chicago papers, which isn't super-surprising, given that Loyola is based there, but it also made the Washington Post. Nicely done.

Yesterday in Porn

I read this profile of Mr. Girls Gone Wild a while back, and it's since been linked from here to the hinterlands, but still - gotta be thorough. One noteworthy bit:

At 33, and after almost a decade as the king of soft porn, Francis says he wants to leave this twilight existence and wade into the mainstream. He is quick to list the projects he says he has in the works: a feature-length film, a series of "Girls Gone Wild" ocean cruises, a "Girls Gone Wild" apparel line and a chain of "Girls Gone Wild" restaurants. He says he's producing a new line of videos called "Flirt" that will be racy, but not explicit, and could be sold in mass-market retail outlets such as Wal-Mart and Target.

Ah, the lure of "mass-market." Kind of like when Gregory Dark decided to stop directing harcore porn and switch to Britney Spears videos. You gotta ease 'em into it...

I know, I know...

It's the NYT. It's the Thursday Styles section. Hardly the barometer for America. But still, I found this article on teen fashion a little creepy, particularly this bit:

Paradoxically, their desire to look older is stoked in part by designer fashions — baby-doll dresses, shrunken blazers, schoolgirl jumpers and the like — that have an emphatically youthful demeanor. Often on the runways, “there is no real delineation of what is ‘child’ and what is ‘adult’ anymore,’’ said Gloria Baume, the fashion market director of Teen Vogue.

"No real delineation of what is 'child' and what is 'adult' any more." Great.

By the way...

I try to keep this blog from getting too self-conscious, but there's a point to it this time...

My elder brother wrote:

Apparently my brother is too well-bred to bring up the distasteful subject of Melancholy Gibson's recent mis-adventure--or perhaps the matter was simply judged not to be old enough news yet for Godsbody. In any event, it looks like it's been (intentionally?) left to me, the less-refined of the Lickona brothers, to step up and do the dirty job that somebody's got to do.

As the official custodian of this blog's "Today in Porn" feature, I take umbrage at the notion that I am the more refined of the Lickona brothers. Breeding has nothing to do with it - I simply didn't have anything intelligent to offer. Which doesn't always stop me, but discretion scored a victory in this case.

In other news, I'm back in California, and hope to post more regularly.

What Remains

Terry passes along word that yesterday was Philip Larkin's birthday, and passes on a link to his poem Church Going, which concludes thusly:

A serious house on serious earth it is,
In whose blent air all our compulsions meet,
Are recognized, and robed as destinies.
And that much never can be obsolete,
Since someone will forever be surprising
A hunger in himself to be more serious,
And gravitating with it to this ground,
Which, he once heard, was proper to grow wise in,
If only that so many dead lie round.

In other words, the heart hungers for the infinite. But if there is no God, then whence this hunger? It's not a new argument, of course - there really is nothing new under the sun. But sometimes, it helps to keep a soul hanging on.

Gibson

Apparently my brother is too well-bred to bring up the distasteful subject of Melancholy Gibson's recent mis-adventure--or perhaps the matter was simply judged not to be old enough news yet for Godsbody. In any event, it looks like it's been (intentionally?) left to me, the less-refined of the Lickona brothers, to step up and do the dirty job that somebody's got to do.

Actually, I don't intend to do much more than to give everyone here who's been aching to vent, kvetch or otherwise hold forth on this subject the forum in which to do so--other than getting the ball rolling with my two cents: I've got a sinking feeling that Gibson doesn't have the best sort of relationship with his father. If Gibson is indeed an alcoholic, i.e., deeply troubled--if he really is someone with a "dark side" which he rejects when he's in control but which takes control when he's not--his upbringing likely has something to do with it, as it usually takes a parent to really screw somebody up.

Why do I suspect it's Dad rather than Mom who's the trouble? Because of the anti-Semitic tinge to the madness by which Gibson seems to have been possessed. In that moment of despair it seems to me he was lashing out like his Dad would have lashed out. In other words, I'm afraid he may have Dad's voice in his head, so to speak--an affliction often suffered by sons of fathers with strong personalities--and in that moment of weakness this was the voice he was listening to.

Many of Gibson's films feature a man who can't be put down no matter how badly he's beaten. I don't think I'm the first to wonder whether this is because Gibson experiences himself as oppressed, whether the stories he tells are his way of fighting back, of refusing to knuckle under. If that were true, then the question would be: By whom is he oppressed? Indeed, who could oppress Mel Gibson? God? Or perhaps the one who represented (represents?) God to him?

Love and hold forth as you will. And pray for him.

'Cuz everyone's my friend/In New York City...

...And everything is beautiful/When you're young and pretty...

Had a very productive meeting within sight of here.

Shopped here, and found just the volume I was looking for - Volume One of the Stannard bio of Evelyn Waugh. The Wife found the second volume in a library cast-off box, and now I'm curious to see how the story starts. A truly great bookstore - simply astonishing collection, but not overwhelmingly huge. Didn't notice the massive Edward Gorey collection until they were closing. Next time!

Prayed here.

Ate here. Good shrimp fra diavolo. Excellent soundtrack.

Found it.

Here.

Decay

Otherwise known as nature coming in and taking back its own...

Out here in da country, you get a much stronger sense of a house being a thing that is carved from nature and stands against it. And of nature's continual workings to bring that house to ruin, should you slack off. The forest taking back the pasture, the snow collapsing the roof of the barn, the weeds overtaking the garden.

But gosh, is it beautiful up here.

Farm Poetry, Yet Again

I'm writing these for the kids, honest...

A bullfrog bloats and bellows
Unto his froggy fellows
And the bullfrogs answer back
Echoing through the black
They do their joking
With ricocheted croaking
All day long they waited
Their bullish breath was baited
Saving stories about birds
Whose silly songs they've heard
A hundred thousand times
As they wallow in the slime