146 thoughts on “Our Daily Thread 9-22-12”

  1. Good morning everyone. I would also say that a good marriage is also based upon how well the husband is obedient to Ephesians 5 and in keeping his vows. Marriage and church are synonymous. You get out of it what you put into it.

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  3. I checked my answering machine yesterday, and – besides the usual election-related request for my involvement (I don’t know in what – I hit delete as soon as I hear “voters”) – I had a call from someone at my son’s school. Now what, I wondered. It was the third call from his school this week.

    The first one was telling me his glasses had fallen apart where I had duct-taped them at the bridge, and they couldn’t get them to stay together again. As it turned out, someone did end up getting them to stay together, though they used a lot of duct tape. I redid the duct tape, and hoped the new pair I ordered would come in soon. (They haven’t yet.)

    The second call was from his “responsibility teacher” – she is assigned to any student with an IEP. She is planning the annual IEP meeting, and now that he is a teenager they need a questionnaire filled out related to his future after high school. That wasn’t too bad, except that we only had two days to do it and I had church activities both evenings. I ended up taking my son with me to church on Wed. just so we could talk about the questionnaire in the car on the way there and back (25 minute drive each way).

    The third call was a surprise though – a nice one. After identifying herself as being from his school, she said it was a “good news” call. She is his social studies teacher, and she wanted me to know what a good job he did in class Wed. when they were acting something out, especially as he was so well prepared with background information.

    I think I have once before gotten a “good news” call, but they are rare so I had forgotten about the practice.

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  5. Chas, I agree with you on the importance of choosing well, but I think any couple can make it work if they choose to. God does change people. I wouldn’t counsel anyone going into marriage to count on God changing the other person in a particular way, but I wouldn’t want someone to give up on a marriage just because they had “chosen the wrong person” to start with.

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  6. Not having been married in a while I probably shouldn’t comment except I do think it is sometimes true that women fall in love witht the “potential” of a man rather than the man himself. What is that old saying, “Women get married hoping to change the man and men get married hoping the woman will never change”?
    I find this particularly funny because last Saturday Mr. P and I went kayaking and out to lunch then back to my house to watch football. As we were paddling up the river I was chatting away about being happy that I spent the last four years alone. The first year I was miserable and cried a lot, but after that things started getting better and I was happy being single, blah, blah, blah. He said something about joining the local fitness center and starting his exercise program again. As we were headed home I went back to the conversation and told him that “women fall in love with the potential of what a man can be, but I loved him just the way he was”. Little did I know he had the engagement ring hidden at my house.

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  7. Great quote.

    Chas- Today we are adversaries. Mizzou travels your way for a game against your roosters. May neither team be chicken and have a fair contest. And may the stripes beat the feathers again (the Tigers are 2-0 all-time against South Carolina, with the last meeting being in a 2005 bowl game).

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  8. 🙂 D3 turns 18 today! Her cousin/best friend is here from Southern Missouri, as well as D2. Later, the other children and grandchildren are coming over. Do I feel old? Not yet. Ask me in a year or so when my son turns 30.

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  9. Peter, it will be 2-1 by 6:30 eastern. 🙂 I remember that bowl game, the Gamecocks let it get away in the second half. Too many Tigers this year. 😦

    I know that I have bored those of you who have bothered to read my post about 3 John 3.
    Becky is not the only one who makes me proud. But Becky has the blog. There was an accident Wednesday and she could have taken a different, “Why does everything happen to me?” attitude, or how life is tough. But, rather, a spirit of gratitude.

    I am so very thankful for God’s hedge of protection on our lives. A definite reminder that he prompts us to make decisions in order to keep us safe. I work on Monday’s EVERY week. This week I had a meeting on Wednesday so I changed my schedule. The meeting was canceled but I decided to head on to work anyway. If I had been home my car would’ve been hit as well. Brian had been home just 10 minutes prior to this accident to get Collins some medicine to take to school. EVERY afternoon Caden and Addison play outside in the driveway while I cook dinner and they wait for Brian to get home. The basketball goal was also destroyed. Had it been an afternoon I shudder at the thought of what could have happened. God is good…all the time!

    http://www.beckymuller.blogspot.com/

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  10. Yes, Chas. I try to remind myself of situations like this when I seem to catch every red light or I get behind a slow vehicle. I could try to speed up to catch a green light or I could pass the car but I take a deep breath and imagine there could be something worse up the road. A couple of times I have ended up passing accidents and thought, “that could have been me”.
    God is good. Life is good.

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  12. I thought the secret to a good marriage was chivalry.

    For instance, take your average medieval knight errant.

    He would tie his lady-love’s handkerchief on his lance, before bravely riding out to joust some enormous, sinister knight in black armor, whose main professional mission was kidnapping chaste and beautiful maidens wearing weird conical hats, and then cruelly torturing them at night in his grim and hoary castle, by tickling their toes with a feather, and singing Gregorian chants to them, in rap.

    So, anyway, like a doughty, love-struck knight of old, I regularly tie one of my wife’s socks on the radio antennae of my pickup truck, when I leave in the morning to go to work at the pallet factory.

    One time I could not find one of her socks to use.

    So I used something else of hers that I DID find, but I got in a LOT of trouble when I got home, and subsequently had to spend the night in the stables.

    Being chivalrous is not always greatly appreciated, even by the lady-love.

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  13. Peter L,

    You better enjoy it while you can. Once Brendan Nosovitch takes over as a starter, beating the Gamecocks will be alot harder. He’s a local kid, I’ve watched him play 6 or 7 times and he is good. Really good. After the 1st time I watched him I ask my buddy Jimmy “Are you sure his last name isn’t Manning?” Yeah, that kinda good.

    http://bleacherreport.com/articles/765142-south-carolina-football-qb-brendan-nosovitch-commits-to-the-gamecocks

    “Brendan Nosovitch, the Gatorade Player of the Year (as a junior) in Pennsylvania and the quarterback that both Steve Spurrier and G.A. Mangus had as a top prospect, will be a Gamecock.

    With Connor Shaw, Tanner McEvoy and now Nosovitch on board, the future at the quarterback position looks very bright.

    According to Scout.com, his intangibles are second to none. He is a leader and a winner, who is as mobile as any quarterback in the 2012 class and has excellent pocket presence.”

    “He is an athletic 6’2″, 200-pound prospect who runs a 4.5 40-yard dash and has not lost a game in two seasons. As a junior, he completed 60 percent of his passes, for 3,100 yards and 43 touchdowns while rushing for 1,647 yards and 25 touchdowns.

    For those that are bad at math, that is a grand total of 68 touchdowns.”

    Chas,

    Here’s some video of the new kid while he played at Allentown Central Catholic. You’re gonna like him.

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  19. I remember that among the topics our pastor touches on in his popular 4-week marriage class is the answer to the question about how to tell if your husband or your wife is really your “soul mate.”

    The answer is yes — since God has providentially brought you together.

    As the old rock song put it, your commitment now is to “love the one you’re with,” especially when you start thinking you “missed” your soul mate out there somehow. He’s done his share of marriage counseling through the years and has no doubt heard all manner of discontent expressed with people’s spouses and marriages.

    Happy fall everybody.

    Pauline, what a nice phone call to get. 🙂

    And I’m still trying wrap my brain around Gregorian chants done in rap. …

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  22. I woke up this morning. I think I am awake. Alternative question of the day (AQOD): What kind of music do you prefer? What kind of music do you dislike? Among different types of music, or even within different examples of the same kind of music, what is the basis for describing one piece of music as “better” and another type of music as poorer compared to each other? Oh, oh, that is eleventy-seven question of the days pretending to be one question. I guess I am not awake. I guess I better go and check the atheist web site where everybody else is also asleep.

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  24. I like a variety of musical styles, but am not too fond of jazz or rap.

    On the radio, when I’m working in the kitchen, I like the station that plays a lot of 70s rock, & some early 80s. They used to play more 50s & 60s rock/pop, which I also liked a lot, too. Having been a teen in the 70s, that’s the music I most relate to – The Eagles, Chicago, Boston, America, Tony Orlando & Dawn, & lots of others.

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  25. I like classic rock (Chas now says, “That’s a contradiction!”); and a host of other random styles, everything from Gregorian chant (the non-rap version) to Broadway show tunes to pop.

    On the CD I recently made for my car, I have songs by Coldplay, Randy Newman, the Rolling Stones, Barbra Streisand, Steve. &. Eydie Gorme, Sammy Davis Jr., Dean Martin, Natalie Cole, Earth Wind & Fire …

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  26. I was a teen in the mid to late 60s but was in college in the early to mid 1970s so I seem to like the 70s music more (including some of the harder rock of that era, like Led Zeppelin & the Who).

    I continued listening to rock/pop stations into the early 80s, but then slowly transitioned to other formats. So somewhere after ’82-84, somewhere around there, (I think Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” album was probably the last contemporary album I bought) I lost track of what was really hot 😉 and became on oldie but a goodie kind of gal. Sigh.

    I like a lot of jazz, too. And some of the more robust classical symphony pieces.

    I don’t like a lot of the country music, though, for whatever reason. Or opera.

    And I love (old!) classical church music, acapela psalms, Anonymous 4 … I also have a CD of old Shaker songs/hymns. 🙂 (‘Tis a Gift to be Simple, etc.)

    I’m pretty much all over the map when it comes to music I guess.

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  29. May I make a suggestion? I’ve been checking the prayer request posts early in the day and adding them to my prayer journal, but I haven’t had time to read the Daily Thread every day. I came here very late yesterday and saw a couple of requests for prayer kind of lost in with all the chatter. I think it would benefit those in need of prayer to also mention their request on the daily prayer thread, to ascertain that all the prayer warriors are aware of their need.

    BTW, I do like that we have a daily prayer thread instead of just a weekly one now, but I’d still like it if folks posted God’s answers, too.

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  30. I was a teenager in the era of AM only radio, when pop music stations played everything from Tommy Dorsey to Bill Haley and The Comets to Ferlin Husky to Andy Williams to Montovani. The end result is that I like all kinds of popular music, except Rap and what’s presented as “Country” these days [it’s Pop, Keith Urban and Faith Hill can’t hold a candle to George Jones and Patsy Cline].

    I also like quiet classical, such as Yo Yo Ma, and good jazz, especially Miles Davis.

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  32. A couple of days ago, responding to my silly series imagining whether children brought up without knowledge of God (though with knowledge of contemporary empirical science and some basic “do’s” and “don’ts” of ethical behavior based mainly on empathy) would come up with the concept of God, Tammy wrote:

    It’s already been done. The Planet Earth. Original humans.

    By your understanding, no one told them about God. Their children grew up without being explicitly taught about God. But, they managed to reason and believe their way to Him anyway..

    As I said at the time, I thought Tammy’s answer was more interesting than most of the other replies and comments, and incorrect in more interesting ways than most of the other responses.

    Before you read my nonsensical response, you might want to watch this video, prepared by a Christian group [Asia Harvest, a Christian organization serving in Asia.] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zm2N51MtvPY

    Tammy: Original humans. Me: While the theory of evolution [not appropriately labeled “Darwinism” by the way] is not as easy to verify as the theory of gravity, the evidence (in my opinion) vastly supports the assertion that humans evolved from ancestors of contemporary primates over thousands of years.

    While what I call “empirical science” is a fairly recent development in human history, involving people such as ancient Greek pagan Aristotle and Franciscan Friar Roger Bacon, humans have always been empiricists. In prehistoric times, one man said, “Look! Deer tracks! Let’s follow them! Good eating tonight!”

    Another man said, “Don’t follow the deer tracks! Tiger tracks! Following the deer tracks! Tiger will eat well tonight! Eating us AND the deer! Behold! I am a prophet! I have foreseen the concept of a balanced diet!”

    The first man said, “I am going to denounce you as a false prophet! We will starve listening to your false prophesies.”

    The second man said, “You are a true false prophet! You will get us all eaten with your delusions. I will burn you at the stake to save us all!”

    While they were all screaming and shouting, the tiger, attracted by the noise and commotion, pounced and ate them all. Except one little boy, who escaped in the confusion and chaos. After he was raised by a neighboring tribe, the little boy (now a man), created a religion based on worshiping a tiger. His religion, among the Nakhi people of Tibet [who later wandered into China], evolved into a variety of other false religions. If you watched the video, you can see that Christians are now straightening them all out about the correct and true myth, called Christianity.

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  33. I agree with Kay, there is good stuff in all kinds of music. The Kid has even gotten me to listen to a little Hip Hop and Rap. Also when we were stuck at the apartment without cable one of the few station we were able to get was CMT. I kind of got use to some of the New Country.

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  34. My musical tastes cover just about everything- old & new rock, metal, classical/baroque, jazz (both traditional and “smooth”), easy listening, etc. I can take country for a while, I can do big band a little longer. Don’t care much for sappy pieces from Broadway musicals, but enjoy a few of them. But hip-pop and rap? Are those really music?

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  35. Yesterday I stopped at the post office box on my way to work. As I approached the small area where the little glass doors are lined up, I saw two men standing outside. One had his hand on the other’s shoulder. It looked like they were praying.

    I ducked around them and into the lobby, but through the open door heard the sinner’s prayer. I stopped out of sight and prayed right along as a new soul entered the kingdom.

    When the “lead guy” said, “amen,” I shouted the same and went on my day with a smile all over.

    I don’t think I’ve heard someone become a Christian in a long time and it was a total blessing!

    Thanks be to God!

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  36. Kbells: I don’t dislike “new country,” it just doesn’t sound “country” to me. Of course, Johnny Cash didn’t sound “county,” either, but he could do no wrong musically.

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  38. As for Broadway, I love the fast upbeat tunes — not the slow, sappy or melancholy ones (same goes for symphony pieces).

    Give me clashing cymbals, thundering drums … and maybe 76 trombones.

    And I do now enjoy *some* of Johnny Cash. 🙂 And some rap is OK. So I’m comin’ around.

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  39. Kay, there is a setting for that — when you open the comment box to make a comment, it should have those options below your login avatar — uncheck them.

    Michelle, what a blessing you had — in making just a simple trip to the Post Office. …

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  42. I don’t dislike “new country,” it just doesn’t sound “country” to me.

    It has sounded like that since the 70s when the genre called “crossover” cam along.

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  45. Ajisuun,

    What Donna said.

    🙂

    When you click the comment box to make a comment, it’s in the bottom left corner of the drop down box under your name. Just uncheck the box.

    The same thing happened to me. But since I’m the administrator, I got one every time anyone made a comment. It took me about 400 or so emails before I figured out how to turn it off.

    😯

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  46. Thank you for the comments about music. Apparently, there is no reason for preferring one type of music over another other than “I like this kind of music.” Except I heard it when I was young and my brain was young and impressionable. For example, when I was young my brain really seized up on “Love is strange” by Mickey and Sylvia.

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  48. Music,

    Most of what I like, most here would most certainly not. Loud, fast, and screaming guitars. If you can add in an orchestra, like Trans Siberian Orchestra or Queensryche, even better. No orchestra, 5 Finger Death Punch would do. For something more mellow, maybe Bush, or Ratt. But I’ll listen to Marty Robbins and Johnny Cash Too.

    But not so-called new country. (shudders)

    Since I like you folks, I’ll be gentle. Some of you have heard this before. Here’s a good example of what I like.

    And yes, I’m well aware that this is way to early for Christmas music. But for some reason, I can listen to anytime.

    Let’s try that again. Chevelle was first. Oops.

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  50. The box under my name says “Notify me of follow-up comments via email,” and has been unchecked since the second time I came here. What I am receiving are emails that tell me that a new thread, such as “Daily Bread,” or “Prayer Requests” has been started for the day, I presume by AJ.

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  51. That’s the 2nd box that shows up under my comment field — “Notify me of new posts via email” It’s unchecked by me and I’m not getting any emails. Do you have another box other than the ‘follow-up’ comments option Kay? There should be 2 of them that appear.

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  54. Blame Random, he asked.

    Looking up at the sky to see if a big hammer is coming down.

    When I was about 14, I was living in Wisconsin, listening to stations from places like Memphis and to “Wolfman Jack” performing on XERF-AM in Mexico, a radio station so powerful that “Birds dropped dead when they flew too close to the tower. A car driving from New York to L.A. would never lose the station.” The other kind of music that imprinted on me was blues and gospel. As far as I know, nobody ever filmed Robert Johnson playing blues, but I suspect there’s a direct trail from his ambiguous song “Crossroads” to “Sympathy for the Devil” by the Rolling Stones and to [insert your favorite rocking bluesy gospel musical group].

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  55. I meant to embed Crossroads, but instead if you stick with the video a bit, you eventually end up with some gospel by Sister Rosetta Tharp. It might be good for your soul. Doesn’t help mine much, but I like her gospel enthusiasm none the less.

    Also, I am close to dementia. Bummer. If I am saved while demented, does that count? Seriously. According to my sister, my mother was.

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  56. Nope, only got the one check box. I am commenting using my WordPress account, what account are you using, Donna? It lets me change to Twitter or Facebook, but I’m not going to

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  57. AJ, You have woken me up from my nap.

    Yes, Chas. The place is in Texas, just outside of Decatur. By the way, you have done a good job of teaching your Gamecocks to play football. I really like the punt returner. However, judging from your team, there must be a shortage of barbers in South Carolina.

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  59. Yeah, watching the game. SC is crowing while Mizzou has some growing to do.

    And the rest of the clan arrived, so it’s time to spoil grandchildren.

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  62. So I logged out, went away from this site & came back and logged in again. The “notify of new post” question was there even before I logged in, but it’s not checked. I’m not going to do anything until a new post is made, if I get an email, I’ll check the box, log out, log back in, uncheck it and wait to see what happens the next day.

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  63. My best friend and her daughter are here to spend the night while Hubby is off on a dove hunting trip. BF lives in Houston, but our houses are an hour apart, so we don’t get to see each other very often. She started a new teaching job in August, so our phone conversations have been limited as well. BF is now napping while the girls are swimming in the backyard. I’m looking forward to catching up with her when she awakens. I love when they come over for a visit b/c it’s one of the few times my girls actually play with each other. Her daughter is three years younger than my oldest and three years older than my youngest, so they all play together.

    Regarding the quote of the day: How true this is! My spouse and I spent about a year in marriage counseling a couple of years ago. We learned how to truly forgive each other in therapy. It has made a profound difference in the quality of our relationship.

    Alternate QOD: I’m 41, but I love ’70’s music, especially James Taylor. I listen to a lot of Texas Country when I’m alone in the car. Unfortunately, when the kids are in the car, the radio is usually turned to “Radio Disney”. That gets old real quick, but they love it and at least it’s clean!

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  64. Annms, sounds like you’re going to have a good visit! I have a friend like that and it’s always so good when we get together a couple times a year (we also live an hour away and she’s also a very busy teacher — and now a first time doting grandmother to boot!).

    My college boyfriend was a big James Taylor fan, we attended one of his outdoor concerts at the Greek Theater way back when. Taylor wasn’t one of my favorites, but I wound up hearing a whole lot of his music in those years that we were dating! 🙂 Joni Mitchell was another one of his favs.

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  65. Random,

    Do you understand the difference between empiricism (as an overarching epistemology) and empirical proof (as a particular method of knowing within the framework of a broader epistemology)? Perhaps you do understand, but you equivocate when you talk about them.

    Also, if you ask me what kinds of music I most enjoy and what kinds of music I think are best, they wouldn’t necessarily always be the same answer. If a child’s favorite literature is Captain Underpants are you willing to claim that the literary value of Captain Underpants is equal to that of Dostoevsky because Bobby enjoys the former every bit as much as his literature professor father does the latter–and maybe even more so?

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  66. 🙂 Ree, I’ll bet Bobby enjoys Captain Underpants a lot more than father enjoys Dostoevsky because he doesn’t have to think about things like sub-plots and hidden meanings the way grownups do

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  68. I can like almost any musis from Beethoven toBerlioz to REM to Hank3 to Led Zeppelin to Acid Rock to Druggie Rock, but I cannot like RAP

    DONNA If your pastor looked into the root of “soul mate” he would not use in in a marriage counseling setting. The idea of the “soul mate” is someone who comes into your life to teach you a lesson. A soul mate is not a forever person. Your “twin flame” is your forever person. It is all a bunch of mumbo jumbo.

    Of course I had the strangest afternoon when ex-husband and future husband were high fiving each other, picking at Baby Girl (tonight is homecoming check my facebook for photos) and ex even hugged future and told BG “I like P listen to him”.

    Of course it got even stranger when George asked what the wedding plans were and why I could not get married in the Anglican church for three months, so I may get married in the Baptist church…Ya just can’t ever tell…..

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  69. Aww, Ree, you are just jealous because I said nice things about Tammy.

    I confess to using “empirical” carelessly. My punishment: to be sentenced to study for years at the Library of Congress, where I will be banned from reading anything not in the “BR” section (Look it up.) However, I refuse to equivocate about being darned.

    As a pragmatist, I agree that the the literary value of that old gloommonger is greater than the literary value of Captain Underpants. But I fail to grasp what “objective” value such a claim has. I fail to see how such a claim has any objective reality besides a subjective opinion.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQFKtI6gn9Y

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  70. Being in the SEC will help recruiting for Missouri.

    Yeah, now they’ll not get players rejected by Texas. Now they’ll get the ones rejected by LSU and the other SEC power houses. Just kidding. I look forward to Mizzou playing in a better conference.

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  71. I like a lot of Christian Pop/Rock/CCM music including Rebecca St. James, Barlowgirl, Britt Nicole, Kutless, Michael W. Smith, Tenth Avenue North, David Crowder Band, Newsboys, etc., etc. Most of my CDs and the songs on my computer and phone are from this genre. But occasionally I get bored with that, so I listen to other things. I like listening to old-fashioned four-part acapella sometimes (this is what my church uses, and I enjoy singing this way, but I listen to this style much less since I usually want something different, so this is partly why I enjoy CCM). In secular music, I mostly like catchy pop-rock and pop-country, such as some songs from Kelly Clarkson, Katy Perry, Carrie Underwood and, especially, Taylor Swift. Also I like Owl City (electronica/synthpop). I also like some songs from Linkin Park (alternative rock), and a few from hip-hop/R & B groups, like Akon’s “Don’t Matter” and Nelly’s “Just a Dream”. The only secular CDs I have are by Taylor Swift and Owl City.

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  72. Another evening at the Nest. The little folk had their stuffed animals out but got sent to their rooms for a few minutes as they had begun throwing them in the house. The big boys just came in from working construction on their hunting mansion. They saw the toys and could not resist. A couple of them picked up some puppets (Barney was one) and began a puppet show behind the couch. The little ones came out to watch, the other older ones joined in and we watched an impromptu by five too cool for life fifteen year olds and a thirteen year old. They were laughing and giggling as hard as the younger ones. I love my life.

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  74. I suspect they will. They really do enjoy each other’s company.

    Miscount. There were only three fifteens and a thirteen, with a sixteen videotaping.

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  76. Mumsee–thanks for sharing that precious moment.

    I grew up listening to my mom’s favorites: Judy Garland, Frank Sinatra and even Elvis Presley’s, “You Ain’t Nothing But a Hound Dog”. My folks had a record of that last song and I still recall my dad singing it around the house. I liked some of these types of music.

    I heard some classical in grade school and loved that. I was exposed to folk in junior high/high school and liked that.

    I always listened to the local station that played rock ‘n roll. I was teen in the sixties into the seventies. I still like a lot of 50’s & 60’s rock. I never liked the hard rock and still don’t.

    I never knew anyone who listened purely to country until I got married. I learned to enjoy it very much. Most of the new stuff is pop. Once in awhile I will like a newer country song.

    Now I hear a lot of Bluegrass and like that, too. I actually like a cross between bluegrass and classic country. I like to be able to distinguish the instruments that are being played. I hate a mishmash of noise.

    We have quite a few people who are new to classic country or bluegrass come to music jams. It is easier for them to jam with a group, so they work to adapt.

    I like show tunes, too, and some CCC. Some classical music is an absolute joy. I cannot imagine life without music. I have only known one person who absolutely disliked listening to music.

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  77. When we were stuck in the apartment with CMT one of the song they played A LOT was “Mean” by Taylor Swift. It is one of those songs that gets in your head and won’t go away and the Lyrics go some thing like, “Someday I’ll be living in a great big city and all you’re ever going to be is mean”. Now it is a running joke between Hubby, the Kid and I to sing that to each other when some one is being mean.

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  78. Kim, my pastor was using “soul mate” only in the common/popular usage in our culture today — a phrase I’m sure he hears frequently in counseling with people who are in unhappy marriages and claiming someone else is their “soul mate.”

    Put another way, though, they’re questioning whether they’ve married the right person.

    Our pastor’s point being, if you’re married to this person it was, in some way, bought about by divine providence so, yes, you’re married to the ‘right’ person.

    (That doesn’t preclude permissible divorce in instances, of course, where there winds up being abuse or infidelity or desertion).

    And someone made a good point about music we “like” versus “good” music. They can be entirely different things. 😉

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  79. Anyway one thing that I find annoying is music snobs or people who think they are smarter because they like Classical or cooler because they like Rock or more wholesome because they like country and on and on to Christians who think people like a different kind of worship music are less Holy. Lyrics can be bad but a tune is just a tune.

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  80. Judy Garland was good. I think she died when I was a kid or young teen — and I don’t remember my parents being fans especially — but I find myself fascinated watching the old TV specials she did maybe in the early 1960s? She really could belt ’em out.

    Sinatra, too, I enjoy watching from when he was in his heyday.

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  81. If I’m going to listen to music, I prefer classical (especially Baroque) by far. But if I have a choice what to listen to, what I really like best is silence. I don’t hear nearly enough of it.

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  82. I went to a Bioethics conference today and the producer/director/writer of Eggsploitation was the main speaker. We got to see her film. I had no idea of how unregulated the industry is. I looked up the movie on Worldmag and found the trailer at the end of the short article. My eyes were opened to another evil in our world today. http://www.worldmag.com/2011/07/eggsploitation

    The director shows the film on college campuses and it does bring left and right together about this wrong. She said in showing it to law students at places like Yale and Harvard that there are always some young women who faint during the showing. No one in our group fainted today.

    Several different groups were represented including the Catholic and other evangelicals. Even within the Catholic community there are a number of opinions as to what to do with the frozen embryos.

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  83. Random,

    And by that, you mean you fail to see how Crime and Punishment is empirically better than Captain Underpants? Good point. And yet we both recognize a standard that makes it clear that it is better. Demonstrating the fact that empirical proof isnot the only standard for truth the human mind can grasp.

    But you’re probably right about the jealousy thing. A little sweet talk my way might just entice me to ditch this Christian stuff, to convert to atheism, and to become your number one disciple. Or maybe not.

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  85. Kay,

    Maybe, but since I made hypothetical Bobby’s hypothetical father a lit professor, I sure hope he enjoys literary analysis! If not, I feel sorry for his hypothetical students.

    😉

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  86. Ree,

    . . . maybe not.

    If you danced to this song, one of us is the wrong age for the other.

    “we both recognize a standard that makes it clear that it is better.”

    Speaking of an old meme and an old joke, do you remember the old radio and television show about a Texas Ranger (called the “Lone Ranger”) and his Indian companion, Tonto who called LR “kemosabe” (dubiously translated as a native American word meaning “trusted friend.”).

    One day LR and Tonto find themselves under fire from a horde of hostile Indians. LR says, “This looks really bad, Tonto. We’re surrounded and outnumbered.”

    To which Tonto replies, “What do you mean ‘we,’ Kemosabe?”

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  87. Pauline @ 9:47pm: But if I have a choice what to listen to, what I really like best is silence. I don’t hear nearly enough of it.

    Wish I could hear silence again. Tinnitus causes me to hear nothing but ringing if there is no other noise around. Thus, I now have to have a radio plying quietly if I want to get to sleep. Then I fall asleep quickly. Otherwise it takes a while. But there are time s when just the ringing sounds good.

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  88. Alternative Question of the Day (AQOD) (I live in another dimension where the days are different.) Christianity has been described as the most popular religion in the world.

    1) I have not done a census of all the people on Earth, but I find this assertion credible. (Call it taking it on faith.) Pupulation (7,041,099,132).

    Chr – 2.1 Billion 33%
    Isl – 1.5 Billion 21%
    Irreligion 1 Billion 15%
    Hinduism 900 Million 14%
    Buddhism 375 Million 7%
    …Others I am ignoring
    Mormonism 14 Million .21% (about the same percentage as Jewish).

    AQOD – Why is Christianity the most popular religion on earth?

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  89. Christianity is the only faith that is based on the living God. The Holy Spirit draws people to know Jesus. People who are given the ability to try out different religions find that Christianity offers truth that is not found in the other religions. Christianity is based on faith and not works. Salvation in the Lord Jesus is a free gift to all people. It is not based on a never-ending ever escalating series of works in which a person can never quite get to what the God requires for perfection. Jesus is perfection for us. He lives up to the standard which God requires that we could never reach on our own. He fills in the gap between us and God making God accessible to all. What is there not to prefer about Christianity when compared to other religions or belief in oneself as a god? We love Him because He first loved us.

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  90. I’d make a distinction, Random, between admitting to a standard when backed against a wall and recognizing and submitting to it in the reality in which you live. One can deny a transcendent standard in a philosophical discussion but no one consistently denies it in real life. They couldn’t keep from bumping up against it if they tried.

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  91. Go O’s.
    AJ, hubby’s boss does that to his house every Christmas. He’s an ubber-geek and spends all year programming it. It is a lot of fun to see, though.

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  93. Good morning.

    I have no connection with the content on the URL listed below. It takes a long time to listen all the way through, and the way it is presented seems at the very least, rather disingenuous if not downright sneaky and misleading. The person who put it up claims to be a Christian. I have my doubts, but I don’t know. As I volunteer for the Red Cross (though I am speaking only for myself here), the topic is of interest to me. (The topic is preparedness for disasters. I consider it likely that my area will have a major earthquake and tsunami at any time. My reasons for expecting such a disaster is based on purely secular and empirical information.)

    I am not going to spend the money for the information offered for sale. As far as the cost — he is very coy. In that regard, I’ll save you a lot of time listening all the way through. After claiming it is worth over $200, the author claims he will sell it for “only” $37. And he claims he will give you your money back (up to 90 days) if you ask for a refund.

    So here it is. I am not connected with the person making the offer. I do not trust him. I would not give him my credit card number. If you take him up on the offer and lose money or suffer any harm from dealing with him, I will not refund any of the money you lose and I am not liable in any way. But if you take him up on his offer and buy the material, I would be curious about your experience and evaluation. If you ask for your money back, I would be curious to know if you get it.

    Modesty Press aka Random Name aka / Stephen Kahn
    On Whidbey Island, Washington.
    A hard core atheist and not slightly a Christian.

    http://soldoutaftercrisis.net/index6_is.php

    is the dubious web site

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  94. Kim, I’d like to be your friend on Facebook, but can’t figure out which Kim Cotten you are! Do you still have my email address so you can let me know? I’m so excited for you on your upcoming nuptials! You gave me a lot of encouragement during a difficult time. Your fiancee is a very lucky man, indeed!

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  96. We’re having this weird extra warm, humid spell again (it was 90 in my area yesterday). Every year when we get one or two of these days, I somehow wind up with a bunch of flies inside the house. Not sure how they get it, probably just a gap in a screen somewhere, but it’s always so annoying.

    So this morning I’ve been whacking them, one by one, with my sandal. I’m not a bad aim.

    I’m jealous of you guys who are getting all that early season cold weather right now.

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  99. Random’s question:
    Our pastor is preaching a series on What We Believe . This morning, he preached on evidences for God. You’ve heard them all: First Cause, Design, Moral Law, Personal experience.
    There is nothing to convince a person who doesn’t want to believe.

    Toward the end, he discussed the “attributes of God”. You are also familiar with them: Holy, eternal, powerful (he didn’t mention omniscient, love-though that is implied), and personal.
    It occurred to me that this is what separates Christianity from the rest of the world, a personal God. Every other religion gives God the other attributions. Christians are the only ones who believe in a God who cares. That is, a personal God.

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  104. Well, that’s the wedding done with – everything went well and I didn’t break down while playing the music (though I accidentally taped one of the prelude pages upside down – what can I say? I was dead tired when I photocopied and put it together).

    Speaking of music, I like the best of just about any genre, though as a rule, I listen more to old music than to new music because the older is less artificial – thus I prefer the small Baroque and Classical ensembles over the larger Romantic orchestras, acoustical instruments over electronic sound and folk themes over pop culture.

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  105. Do I need a new Bible>/i>? My current i>Bible>/i>is the New International Version, copyright 1978 by New York International Bible Society. (How can the Bible be copyright? If anyone holds the copyright, wouldn’t it be God?)

    I subscribe to The New Republic a sort of Jewish, sort of liberal magazine mostly about politics and public policy, but with quite a bit about areas such as about the arts, society in general, and religion. In the current issue (October 4, 2012) I just read a review titled “Making It New” of the The English Bible, King James Version. There are two volumes,>i> The Old Testament and The New Testament and the Apocrypha..

    A brief quote from the on line version of the review:

    After all, our canonical translation of the Bible is, as Herbert Marks observes in the preface to his extraordinary edition of the KJV Old Testament, “by far the most influential English book ever published, a formative presence within the history of English literature, high and low, and within the very weave of the language.” The pervasive ineptitude of the sundry English versions produced in the second half of the twentieth century by Jewish, Protestant, and Catholic scholarly ecclesiastical committees reminds us through sheer contrast of how fine was the work of the learned divines convened by King James in 1604.

    I am not sure if you (as a non-subscriber) can read the review. If you can, the following link will take you there.

    http://www.tnr.com/article/books-and-arts/magazine/107222/making-it-new

    The review (to my inexpert eye) seems intelligent, knowledgeable, and sensible. The review seems to consider the new edition of the Bible well worth getting and reading. However, I am not quite sure that the tone of the review, and its reason for recommending this edition, is quite reverent enough for Christians at Wandering Views.

    In the same issue of the magazine is a review of a book titled, The Unintended Reformation: How a Religious Secularized Society. Again, it’s difficult to summarize it briefly. (It seems to be written more from a Catholic point of view, if a “lapsed Catholic” one than a Protestant point of view. Again, I am not sure you can read it on line. http://www.tnr.com/article/books-and-arts/magazine/107211/wittenberg-wal-mart

    Good grief. It’s Sunday. With all this reading about religion, you would think I spent the day in church.

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  106. Hmm . . . “your comment is awaiting moderation.” Is this something new at Wandering Views? Is it for everyone, or just for me? I had received one warning a few days ago, but everything seemed peaceful and copacetic. I hardly think a notice of a review of the Bible should cause distress or unease. Well, I have other stuff to do, and it’s lunch time as well, so I presume higher powers will decide my fate wisely and fairly.

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  107. Music: I was big on pop music in the late 70’s/early 80’s (when I was in high school and college), but I don’t care for music of that era much anymore, as I find the lyrics of most of those songs to be much more questionable than I ever believed them to be at that time. I was mostly wrapped up in the beat, instrumentation, melodic line, the sound of the singers, and so forth, but hardly paid attention to the lyrics. Not so now.

    Classical music is what I prefer now. There is nothing like the cheerfulness of upbeat Baroque music in the morning, or the peaceful quiet of a chamber work at the end of the day. I can find so much classical music that suits my every mood. It’s very therapeutic for me, as are many old hymns, I should add.

    Donna, I like Anonymous 4 as well.

    Phos/Roscuro, glad to hear playing at the wedding went well. I had to snicker a little at the page turned upside down comment. Did you have to stand on your head to read it? 😛

    Just kidding! 😉 I was reminded of the movie Amadeus, when Mozart had his back to the keyboard and bent backwards, bringing his arms up and over his head and laying his fingers on the keys, he played an entire piece “upside-down”! 🙂

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  108. 6 Arrows, we will start the Anonymous 4 fan club here. 🙂

    I remember seeing a CD advertised on TV some years ago — Cleaning to the Classics — which had all the whip-you-up, crashing anthems that I guess they thought were just perfect as a soundtrack for mopping those floors, dusting those tables and chairs and scrubbing the dishes.

    Random, I had a ‘waiting moderating’ notice here the other day, I think it’s automatic for posts where some links need to be checked first. ?

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  109. Phos, so when you noticed the page upside down was it at an interval when you could switch it? 🙂 Glad the wedding went well.

    Are you all ready for the big trip?

    We had a good morning at church as well, continue in Romans 2. Our home groups start up again this week and I’ve been able to switch to one that’s closer to home, which should help my attendance.

    It’s at the home of my elder and his wife which is virtually in my same neighborhood. That gives me a chance to stop off home (every-so-briefly, though) to flip on some lights, maybe get the animals quickly fed.

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  110. Donna & 6 Arrows, the prelude was made up of several pieces and the upside-down page was the last page of one of the pieces, so after fumbling for a half a second in trying to read the inverted music, I played an improvised final chord. Just at that moment, someone came up to speak to me, making it look like I had broken off at their interruption, so I don’t think anyone really noticed what happened. After the person went away, I resumed playing with another piece.

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  112. Sounds good to me, Donna. 🙂

    A few years ago, I bought a 3-CD set entitled The Mozart Effect: Music for Children, which contains music by Mozart that was selected to enhance creative and intellectual development in children. Volume 1 (Tune Up Your Mind) contains, for example, excerpts from Eine Kleine Nachtmusik and Variations on Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star. Volume 2 (Relax, Daydream & Draw) and Volume 3 (Mozart in Motion) also have excerpts from several of Mozart’s works that are fitting for those sorts of moods and activities.

    Cleaning to the Classics…hmm, sounds interesting, especially the “crashing anthems” with “scrubbing the dishes”! 😀

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  113. In answer to your other question, Donna, I’m not at all ready yet – I will resume preparations, which had been temporarily suspended to prepare for the above wedding, tomorrow. The word insanity describes my life at this point 🙂

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  115. Phos, well done with that upside-down page! You never know when you’ll be called on to improvise. 🙂

    Here’s a story the musician in me found interesting to hear. Someone once told me about an accompanist who was playing for a high school choir (I think that was the age group). The choir was performing a piece that had an extended a cappella section at the beginning of the work, followed much later by the accompanist’s entrance to finish out the work. Well, the choir, in the long a cappella section, got so off from the key in which they were supposed to be singing, that at the time of the accompanist’s entrance, the girl at the piano, recognizing how their pitch had slipped, started playing in the key in which they were actually singing, transposing her music at sight to complete the piece!

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  116. You were a teenager when Judy Garland died, Donna. I babysat the night before she died and saw her on an old Johnny Carson rerun. I remember being so surprised to read the paper the next morning, thinking, “but I just saw her on TV last night.”

    That was the only time I ever babysat for whomever that was but the night sure stayed with me–though I can’t remember how many kids it was–because I read a long article in a magazine at the house about the effects of LSD on the brain.

    I’d never heard of LSD before that. Curious how the oddest things stay with you!

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  118. After church this morning we went to see Trouble with the Curve. There is cursing but no sex (you may assume it happened after one scene but it isn’t it your face) and the father and daughter make up and all is well that ends well. I would sit through it again.

    I wasn’t looking and Clint Eastwood suddently got OLD. It makes me laugh though to think the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, and Harrison Ford are all about my dad’s age.

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  120. Phos, your story 🙂

    It reminded me of the one and only time I played for a wedding. The church was small, the aisle short, the music long. So I had cut out large parts of the wedding march and had it timed quite well at the rehearsal. Come wedding day the bride didn’t wait for the intro to finish and almost ran up the aisle. I had to go straight from the intro to the last line! I’m not good at improvising so I was lucky that I picked the right spot to go into the last line.

    I was told once after making a mistake during worship that if I hadn’t made a face, no one would have been the wiser. :S

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  122. Now, get your tissue before you click on the above link. This is Nicole the young woman with cancer. Her husband is sitting on her left and you can see him wipe away a tear.

    I have heard her sing before and she has a beautiful voice…she sounds a little different this time though.

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  123. AnnMS – Being friends with Kim on Facebook, I went to her page & saw her new friend with your initials, from Texas. That’s you, right?

    I sent you a friend request. My name includes my maiden name, which starts with a K & is German.

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  125. Not much seems to be going on on the politics thread, so I’ll ask my question here.

    Was there a good reason that Republicans voted down the Veterans’ Jobs bill?

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  126. BTW, Michelle, I don’t know if you’re around, but if you are . . . when you were doing research for the dogtrot cabins, I know you said you saw one somewhere. Was it in the Smokies by chance? I saw one, recognized what it was, and thought of you.

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  127. Random,

    Normally I’d say Donna’s explanation was correct. It was the link.

    But in your case, it’s not. It is in fact a VAST right wing conspiracy to limit your ability to annoy people. It was only a matter of time before you showed up on their radar. I know you think I’m a big shot because I carrry the coveted title of blog administrator, and an elevated post that is, as you yourself are aware. You think that at my whim, poof, I disappeared ya’. But alas Sir, this is false. As you know, we are only little people, and there are much greater forces at work in the blogospere. You had the unfortunate experience of drawing the attention of a, while useful, somewhat unforgiving one of those forces. The dreaded SPAM filter. While your post was an innocent victim, sometimes those are necessary in order to save readers from learning of discounted shoes and Louie Vattan? Did I spell that right? handbags. This same force also saves us from finding out how to date millionaires, and incorporating your business in Vegas. It is a necessary evil.

    But the SPAM filter is also a benevolent force at times, and as such has agreed to allow me to approve your post. You should be thankful. Next time I might hit delete just to hear you yell “Censorship!”.

    😯

    Or not, depends on what my co-conspirators say.

    🙂

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  130. I’d sure like to understand how people make their names into hyperlinks here. Driveguy’s and AJ’s names link to their blogs, Pauline’s and Chas’s to their Gravatars, and Kim’s to her Facebook page. I’d love to have my name go to my Facebook page, but don’t seem to have figured out how to do that. Any tips?

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  131. Hah, now it works, even though it didn’t work a few minutes ago.

    Janice, here in WordPress it seems faces always go to the beginning of a line. I don’t think anyone’s figured out how to put it in the middle of a line. I’m typing the first frownie face in this post right after this sentence, but it probably will end up somewhere else. 😦 And I’m typing the second frownie face at the end of this sentence. 😦 But it too will probably end up somewhere else. Now I’m going to put a smiley face at the end of this sentence, and then start a new paragraph. 🙂

    So here’s the new paragraph. Let’s see where all my faces end up…

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  132. I just went back and noticed that Wandering Views cranked up on Aug. 29, 2012.
    Is there a one month anniversary party in the works? Seems like AJ deserves at least a virtual scepter and a cake. Thanks, AJ, for all you have done here.

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  133. I’m 🙂 putting 🙂 a 🙂 smiley 🙂 after 🙂 every 🙂 word 🙂 in 🙂 this 🙂 paragraph. 🙂 I 🙂 think 🙂 it 🙂 will 🙂 put 🙂 all 🙂 the 🙂 ones 🙂 I’ve 🙂 put 🙂 on 🙂 a 🙂 line 🙂 at 🙂 the 🙂 beginning 🙂 of 🙂 the 🙂 next 🙂 line.

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  136. You know, Kevin, that the smiley face can be overused. And since Wal*Mart used to use it in its advertising, I really got sick of it. Now I am having a relapse. So, how about you be my substitute teacher tomorrow?

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  138. Okay, sorry, guys, but it was necessary for the cause of Science to probe the mysteries of what WordPress does with smileys. I will go buy my own equipment and create a secret underground lab so I don’t gross you out next time.

    😀

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  139. Just got back from a goodbye party for our local dog sitter who is moving — good time seeing some folks I hadn’t seen in a while, the old dog park gang.

    And it also helped that our hosts live in our town’s million-dollar neighborhood overlooking the ocean; just 5 minutes away from my house, but an entirely differently world. 🙂

    Beautiful, sitting out on the patio, watching the orange sunset on the ocean’s horizon, the Disney cruise ship gliding by at one point.

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  141. I am pleased to here there is a “vast right wing conspiracy” assigned to me. Actually, I am on assignment from Barak Obama, Joe Biden, and dozens of their henchmen and henchwomen to distract you. You have my permission to delete any comment I post at any time. The thing about Internet discussion boards is that the emotions (at times) may be similar to the emotions to cause young hoodlums and gang members to shoot each other, Internet weapons only fire blanks.

    True confession. I actually sent $5 to the Obama campaign. Obama claims to be a Christian. I’d like it better if he was an atheist, but a guy’s gotta do what he’s gotta do. America will eventually and inevitably elect an atheist, but I won’t still be alive to chortle with wicked glee. However Obama is far more of a Christian than a Mormon candidate. Mormons are no more Christians than I am. At least I don’t pretend to be one.

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  142. hear. My dyslexia and incipient Alzheimer’s is getting worse.

    The New Republic has a lively comments section; with for the most part everyone ignoring each other, but especially me. There is one comment poster who clearly is in dementia. After some exasperation, everyone has learned to kindly ignore him. Hmm . . . everyone is ignoring me. Even the chickens. (They pay far more attention to my wife.)

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  143. Cheryl– I don’t remember when I learned about dogtrot cabins–it must have been part of my genealogy research and a discussion with a friend from Texas. Since writing the book, I’ve been surprised at how standard they really are. Putting the wide breezeway between the two small cabins, or pens, really made them cooler in the Texas summer.

    Here are some pictures on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dogtrot_house

    I even made my own video to demonstrate! 🙂

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  144. Michelle, I remember your video. I just remember your telling us that you actually saw one somewhere, and if it happened to be in the Smokies, I thought it would be cool if you’d seen the same one. I was able to tell my husband what it was called.

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