75 thoughts on “Our Daily Thread 6-22-19”

  3. It’s tomorrow! Time to head for the weight room. I have started getting ready for Australia in just a few more days. Tried on my capris and jeans as I don’t wear them here.

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  6. This probably belongs on the politics thread, but:
    Re “California gas tax” from yesterday evening.

    Tax won’t do it. There ain’t enough money to do what California wants to do.
    They will beg Congress to bail them out. But they made this…………..

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  7. It is hard to be from California. I am tempted to find somewhere to move to. But I have gone to the same church for 46 years. It is home and two of my children are there. For taxes I know I have to live in my home for 2 years. But California is hard.

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  8. Woke up to rain again. This has been the rainiest June of my life, and probably by a long way. Now, the May in Nashville that began with 13 inches May 1 and 2, that might well be hard to beat for May. But June is Phoenix usually didn’t see a drop, things were usually entering the summer drought in northern Indiana, and we’ve probably had rain nearly every day in June, one notable day four inches, so it is crazy wet and I’m ready for some “dry” again. Now, three weeks ago it was getting dry here, but that is no longer true and hasn’t been for a good long time now!

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  9. Rain is a typical subject for Atlanta weather reports again. We had the short drought which I welcomed after one of the rainiest years ever. It does keep everything green and growing. That means more grass to cut and vines to pull. Everyday I try to do a bit of weeding. Now I think the mosquitos are back. I did not miss them during the drought.

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  10. It’s been rainy here as well. The river finally went down, but the flood gates are still in place. There have been several breeches in the levies since the river has been at flood stage so long. The Army Corps of Engineers says the levies were not built to hold back the water for this long and that is why there have been more breeches than usual.

    Oh well. The caves are dripping with water so it helps the formations grow.

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  11. Beautiful morning here. Grass is wet, in the forties but should get up into the mid to high sixties so the grass should dry and I should get some mowing done. Then maybe my socks won’t get as wet when I go out to do my morning chores tomorrow.

    Seventeen year old ought to be sworn into the Navy by now, haven’t heard from him. He did drop by a few days ago, even slept in his bed, to ask for his passport. Of course, if he fails to complete the academic portion of the youth challenge, he will be escorted out of the Navy with a general discharge.

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  12. Morning! It is drizzling rain here this morning and strong thunderstorms are expected this afternoon and evening. They closed our only access two lane hwy last evening due to lots of rain and hail…drivers were having a dickens of a time trying to get home. Thankful I wasn’t out in that mess. The forest is so green and lush right now with so many wildflowers. The yellows, purples, blues, whites and oranges dot the landscape and the deer aren’t gobbling them up…instead they ate my begonias. Hey, why eat the free stuff when this crazy lady pays for delicacies?!! Wonder what that gal up there on the header is munching on?!! Stinkers!!

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  13. Congratulations, RKessler on your acceptance to nursing school. Will the program be shorter for you since you already have a background in paramedics?

    I am currently trying to look for work. It is proving difficult. The school gave us a list of job posting sites, but it must have been an old list, because most of them are no longer valid. The internet has changed since the last time I went job hunting, and job postings are more scattered and less clear. For example, one posting on a health organization website did not even state where the job was located (beyond the fact it was somewhere in the city) or who the job was with (just “a busy practice”). Addressing cover letters is difficult if you do know where or to whom to address it.

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  15. Laughing, Jo. When we lived in Hawai’i and had to return to the Mainland, the question was always, “will our jeans fit?”

    I think I ask my husband once a week, “When can we leave?”

    He laughs and says, “Has God called us somewhere else?”

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  16. A good VBS is now over. I survived the wild sixth grade boys and learned to count to ten in a few different languages.

    Our theme was “The Incredible Race,” with the traditional weak curriculum, but we spent a day on each of five continents. Since I was in charge of before-VBS teacher childcare and then regular older kid recreation from 9-11:30, I began each day with the four rules:

    1. Do not get hurt
    2. Do not die
    3. If you think you are going to get hurt or die, please tell an adult.
    4. Have fun.

    I then taught them to count to ten in the following languages, followed by jumping jacks–10, in the new language.

    Monday: Spanish (almost all knew this one)
    Tuesday: Japanese
    Wednesday Swahili
    Thursday Italian (easy for me. “Hey, that sounds like Spanish,” called more than one child)
    Friday Algonquin (honestly, I couldn’t pronounce Navajo or Apache!)

    It was fun. I’m glad I’m done and most of the junk, er, tools of the trade, are now recycled or put away.

    I’m going to write a blog post on the experience which will run on Tuesday.

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  17. Our VBS splits the 5th and 6th-grade boys and girls into two classes.

    My husband taught the boys and had quite an interesting time. Our pastor was his assistant the first two days with a wise elder who teaches high school science, the last three.

    He had a splendid time.

    He covered the lesson in the first hour and during the second hour of teaching time, told the boys to ask him any questions.

    They were full of great questions. So many, he finally said, “Don’t put up your hands, we’ll just go around the circle.”

    They wanted to know about angels, demons, hell, creation, science, Navy stories (“next Bible question, please”), and so forth. They were intrigued by the “just right” universe.

    Thursday was the Gospel presentation day. R led off with “the bad news, because you can’t appreciate the good news if you don’t know the bad.”

    But, he told them the bad news–about hell and who goes–and then stopped for prayer.

    “No, no!” shouted the boys. “We need the good news!”

    “You’ll get it after prayer.”

    All seven boys had the same prayer requestion: “The good news.”

    What a great week.

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  18. Last time I taught VBS, I stuck to the text and didn’t do as your husband did, Michelle. I have regretted it ever since. Let that be a lesson for anyone else who teaches VBS or Sunday school. Answering questions that are actually being asked is far better and more productive. I knew that, but for some reason let myself be waylaid. OTOH, maybe God did have a reason for that, too.

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  19. Never count your money before you leave the closing table. My listing (the house I wanted) is going back on the market. Inability to obtain insurance. The insurance companies continue to rape us on the coast because of hurricanes, they will look for ANY reason not to ensure a house.

    MICHELLE The Baptist Church Minister’s Wife who is in my Sunday School class tells us their daughter is in Portland doing a church plant. She says the people are lost and looking for something. E rides public transportation and talks to people. Several have told her they don’t know what it is but they are drawn to her. The mission field is all around us.

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  20. Kim – I read an essay by a southern pastor. He said that folks in the south are just as lost as those in the north, but they know how to talk as if they aren’t. They may even go to church. He says that is more dangerous spiritually – knowing how to talk the talk without walking the walk – as they don’t even realize that they don’t really believe in the Truth.

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  21. Re: iMichelle’s VBS teachers.
    I used to teach SS. (Over 2000 lessons). I always told my class that I didn’t mind chasing rabbits. “What’s on your mind is more important that what I had prepared to say.”

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  23. What’s an extra thousand …

    Congratulations to rkessler, i read that post last night just before going to sleep.

    The gas taxes are so frustrating, but at least I’m not driving as much as I used to (working from home). But still, I hate having to stop at the gas station anymore, it’s become painful.

    And last night coming back from the grocery store I noticed my “check engine” light was on again. I’d gotten that fixed (small emissions leak) in February to make sure the Jeep passed the smog test. The shop that fixed it said if the light comes on within 6 months (he assured me it certainly shouldn’t) to bring it back and they’d fix it for free. I think I’m still within that time frame so I left a voice mail with them last night. Probably is the shop is close to my old office — but now it’s not close to anything, not my current office nor my house. So it’ll be an inconvenience to take it over there, especially if I have to leave it overnight as I did last time.

    But back to California’s trajectory toward annihilation … I do think we’ll start to see our political tide start to turn back toward something more reasonable. We’ve been governed by a single party for many years now and I sense that the regular people who live here (there are many) are hitting the wall. A recent school bond proposal in LA, adding even more to our property taxes, once again, was easily slapped down by voters in June. The district was stunned.

    Perhaps we’ll see at least some centrist, financially responsible Republicans begin to make some headway politically in the coming years?

    One big fear is the Democrats’ yearning to rescind or tinker with Prop 13. For many of us, seeing our property taxes jump more than they already have even with Prop 13 in place will be disastrous and would probably force us to move out of the state.

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  24. And speaking of taxes, I see where Maxine Waters is having a news conference at my high school alma mater today to announce more spending for low-cost housing.

    My former (conservative) editor’s email quip: “Hey look, they’re gonna ‘end homelessness in America’ as soon as they spend $13 billion. Gonna go out on a limb and say, ‘yeah, not quite enough.’ “

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  26. We always kind of laugh about how many times politicians have pledged to “end homelessness” — as in forevermore, completely. Our mayor seems to be the latest voice pledging that. Why promise what you know is simply not deliverable, even in a perfect world?

    Just one more tax …

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  28. Michelle, I know the post wasn’t about this, but an interesting fact:
    Enoch and Elijah never died. Two prophets, according to Revelation, will preach before the Lord returns. They are killed, then resurrected.
    Just an interesting fact.

    Liked by 1 person

  29. Thanks for the information Kizzie. Living in the south as I do I am a little sensitive. We are racist, fundamentalist Bible thumpers, anti-woman. We are practically the area of the country most equated with the Handmaid’s Tale. I had a visitor from Philadelphia who was somewhat worried about being closer to Alabama than Miami but was pleasantly surprised.
    I apologize for being so blunt. I’m just tired of the disdain shown to where I live. People hear my accent and automatically deduct IQ points. My own husband tells me that i am inherently racist and don’t realize it. I am sick of hearing CNN all the time. I am just tired.

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  33. Kim – No offense intended in that comment. I am not anti-southern. I’m sorry if it sounded that way.

    As you are sensitive about things said about the south, I can be sensitive about some things that some southerners say about northerners.

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  36. Kizzie. The difference is southerners are joking because they have been put down so long. No one ever calls you ignorant inbred rednecks and question your IQ or are afraid to come to your state due to their own ignorance. Are people coming to your state capital to protest dressed in red with white hair covering?

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  37. Many Africans and other blacks are scared to come to Idaho because of the rumor mill and fourteen skin heads twenty or thirty years ago that were run out of town. We heard about it from the folks from Zaire.

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  41. Kim – I’m not sure how to take your latest comments. Are you angry with me for my comment about what the pastor said? Or my reply to your reply? As I said, I meant no offense, and did not mean for that to be anti-southern in any way.

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  43. Re: how government spends money. Many years ago the state of Missouri voted in a lottery. Then Gov. John Ashcroft, a Conservative (W’s Attorney General until just after 9/11) was against it, but promised the revenue would go toward education if it passed. When it did, the Legislature cut education funding because of the extra from lottery sales. So guess what happened? Yep. Education lost a lot of money. The position I had at a community college was state funded, so that got cut and the college did not enough for my salary. Thus the move to the job I have now.

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  46. Morning, Chas. up and at em.
    Raining here and this is the dry season. Just went online and got my Australian visa.

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  48. When I was preparing to move to Nashville, before my actual move, I stayed with a friend for two or three days while I found a place to rent. She told me the lottery had been put up for a vote multiple times, and had failed each time, but there was another election this week and it would probably pass this time because it was for scholarships for students and people were just getting worn down–and indeed it did pass. But why should scholarships come off the back of the poor (the ones who buy lottery tickets)? The lottery is harmful and wrong, no matter who it “benefits.” It doesn’t help any but those who reap the profits (the politicians, I suppose). But that’s like saying only a bank robber benefits in a robbery!

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  49. Last night I was tired and wanted to get to bed, so I didn’t take the time to do this, so now I want to explain why I wrote what I did at 11:02am yesterday.

    The lady Kim mentioned saw the people of Portland (Oregon, I assume, although there is Portland, Maine on my coast) as lost, probably because their lostness is obvious. That Portland, from what I understand, is a very liberal city, and a lot of the people have New Agey ideas. (Portland, Maine is probably pretty liberal, too, being a big city.)

    That reminded me of what that southern pastor had written – that the south is just as much of mission field as the north, but doesn’t seem so on the surface because so many know how to “talk the talk”, like a cultural thing. He said he found it more difficult to minister to people who already think they are saved.

    I’m sorry if my comment seemed anti-southern. It wasn’t meant in that way.

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  50. People in many states will point out how their legislatures had voted in new taxes or fees on various things purportedly for the roads or for education, then dipped into those funds (or put them in a general fund), and then voted in another new tax for the roads and/or education, and then it kept going in the same way, time and again.

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  51. The lottery and casinos are also supposed to help with education here. However, in my personal opinion, our education system would run much better if we spent less money and kicked out more children for misbehaving.

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  52. I read the same piece Kizzie did (@9:53).

    In the same way, most of America in the 1950s *seemed* very Christian because most everyone had a church tie (whether they attended every week or not or read the Bible or not or knew anything about the faith beyond the false notion that it simply meant being “nice people”). The positive aspect of that ‘culture’ outwardly was that community standards generally reflected what we would consider good morals (at least outwardly as the ideal) and communities seemed more stable.

    But underneath it, many remained pagans although they understood enough to ‘talk the talk’ and seemed to be ‘good Christians’ to their neighbors. They were comfortable with occasionally stopping in at church and could easily relate to the Christian culture.

    Outwardly, all seemed well. But it wasn’t.

    Now, what we have in many parts of the country, is an obvious divide as people more and more outwardly object religious values (and are open and proud of it). So that’s a much more obvious mission field. It is very black and white and I think that’s an advantage. But it’s no more a mission field than in communities (whether in the actual “Bible Belt” or pockets that exist elsewhere) in which an outward church ‘culture’ prevails.

    All that said, I agree with Kim that there remains a prevailing prejudice against the south, especially in more liberal parts of the country.

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  53. I don’t think I ever had that view of the South. Maybe because we have our share of hillbillies here as I have seen in many other States as well. But most people are not that so I understand it is just a minor group.

    The South to me was more about kind considerate people going about their own business while being more social than the northerners, and just as helpful to their neighbor. Dukes of Hazard? No, just a little group. Christy? Not so much. Beverly Hillbillies? I am sure, as here, there are home brewers and pipe smokers, and chewers, school dropouts, pregnant teens….

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  54. For those of you who like “live cams,” my husband sent me a link to one showing brown bears (grizzlies) at a waterfall watching for salmon. I’ve looked at it a couple of times and there has only been one bear. It’s supposed to show more activity in July and August–but that’s right around the corner. It has links to other such cams on other continents.

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  55. I apologize Kizzie. As I said, I am just a little tired of my home being the butt of jokes. I work in Florida, so I get it at the office too. My husband watches The Daily Show, The Late Show, United Shades of America, Bill Mahr, then tops it off with CNN all day, every day. I am just a little weary of it. He also tells me I am racist. I took the Harvard Racism test earlier this week. I moderately prefer white people. Well of course I do. I am WHITE (with probably a whole host of other things I don’t know). My comments weren’t aimed so much at you as they were at the minister who says that.
    Just today in Sunday School a woman was telling of a mission trip she took with her daughters to Montana, and why we can’t/don’t do the same things right here in our own backyard. I am sure there are “Country Club Christians” to be found in any area. I’m just tired of my area being singled out. Yes, I know people who go to the “right” church because it is the place to be to make the right connections. Then I know people who go to the “right” church because it is the right church for them. I choose to think we are all more alike than we aren’t.

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  56. Kim – I understand that there is a prejudice against the south, and I cringe when I see it or hear it.

    The background to what that pastor (who is southern himself) wrote is that he felt guilty that he was going to be ministering in such an easy place (the south). Another pastor, who I guess had ministered in both the north and the south, told him that the Bible Belt can actually be harder to minister in because many of the people think they are saved, but they are not. They are “cultural Christians”. and it is as if they have inoculated themselves against the gospel. Similarly, in the north, we have more Catholics who are in a similar position (although many Catholics do indeed know the Lord).

    For a while, we had a pastor from Texas, and he made the same point.

    My mention of things that are sometimes said against us northerners (Ricky was quite guilty of this) was referring to comments about us being a bunch of liberal perverts and such, or that we are rude or hard-hearted because we don’t have the same social customs as southerners. Although we may not seem as friendly on the surface, underneath that we are as giving and soft-hearted as our southern neighbors. (I’d say that is particularly true in smaller towns, but maybe that’s because that’s what I am used to.)

    Like in your town, whenever a need is mentioned on one of our town’s Facebook pages, people jump in to meet that need, often more than is needed. For example, my friend and a friend of hers started a once-a-month ministry to the homeless in Hartford, and it has become something that many people in town donate to each month, and others have joined to go with them. Even a business or two have joined in in donating “blessing bags”. But there have also been folks who have helped others in town with various needs as they come to our attention. Some little things, some big things.

    I’m reminded of a line in a song from The Music Man. The song is about how supposedly unfriendly the folks in Iowa are. One funny line, inviting the newcomer to the town picnic says, “You can eat your fill of all the food you bring yourself.” But another says, “But we’ll give you our shirt, and the back to go with it, if your crop should happen to die.”

    Since tone does not come over in text, let me add that I am merely explaining what I wrote. I am not annoyed or anything. I feel bad that what I wrote hurt or annoyed you.

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  57. I’d say it’s also easier to be a cultural Christian in areas where Christianity is the norm. People who aren’t Christians here probably don’t go to a church to make contacts. Being a non-Christian is the more popular, default position.

    Interesting, though, our guest minister today, a seminary professor who teaches at a school in South Carolina, grew up on the beaches in Southern California and has pastored a church in Silicon Valley.

    He mentioned at the outset that he sometimes feels like a missionary in a ‘foreign’ land in South Carolina where, while sitting at the Starbucks, at any time, or all the time, you’ll hear people on one side of you talking about last week’s sermon and on the other side of you engaged in a Bible study.

    That simply doesn’t happen here, as he noted. And I think he was making those comments in a positive light, though I didn’t stay for SS to quiz him more about that (I should have).

    In Silicon Valley, he said everyone is from somewhere else because they’ve come there for the tech jobs — he said he would often be the only ‘white American guy’ in their fellowship gatherings.

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  58. He’ll be in the pulpit again next Sunday, though, so maybe I’ll get a second chance to quiz him on his take regarding ‘cultural Christianity’ in the south.

    We have another family recently move to a suburb just north of Atlanta. The wife’s husband joked that they were “moving to America.”

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  59. The city never ceases to provide something of interest. In order to get the bus home from church, I have to walk through a large mall and then past the bus terminal for all the buses running north south to get to the west to east bus stops in front of the courthouse and city hall. When I was about to cross the street to the bus stop, I began to wonder if I had stumbled across an accident, crime scene, or arrest (all of which I have seen before) as the street was swarming with both cop cars and cop bikes – it also could have been a protest, as we have been having a series of them from disgruntled right wingers (and by that I mean faaaaar right).

    Then I realized that a parade was forming from in front of city hall. My first thought was it is June, but the Pride events were last weekend. Then I recognized the writing and the dress of the male attendees – it was the annual Sikh parade. I could see my bus stopped with the other traffic down a couple of blocks, so I knew I just had to wait. The parade consisted of a jeep and an pickup with a trailer carrying signage written in Sanskrit characters (probably in Punjabi, since that is the prevalent Sikh language) and English about the parade, which is for a Sikh martyr. Then some baton whirlers, consisting of some bemused and distracted Sikh lads half heartedly twirling (one arrived late, running up as the parade started) and their very dedicated instructor, who was giving an impressive display. Then a row of flag bearers, and a row of swordsman, sabers drawn. Then a covered platform, where first a group of musicians sat cross legged, playing the tradition Punjabi drums and an instrument like a stationary accordion and sing a chant that sounded like a cross between a Hindu prayer and a Muslim qawwali, which seemed appropriate, since Sikhism is neither Hindu nor Islam but has been influenced by both. After the musician, a raised dias had a covered article that people kept running up to do obesiance to (thereby delaying the parade), while a Sikh priest presided over it. Then a circle of Sikh elders sat on the end opposite the musicians. Sikh devotees, of which there might have been 75 to 100, followed on foot, making a colorful spectacle in their traditional clothing and turbans. The police circled in the parade on pedal bikes (the police use both horses and bicycles a lot in the city) while motobikes and cars went before and after to block traffic.

    Security was so high partly because of the history of Sikhs in Canada. The year of my birth holds great significance to the Sikh independence movement in India, being the year that the military under Indian President Indira Ghandi attacked Sikh militants in the Golden Temple in Punjab, killing them and destroying the temple. Ghandi was then assassinated by two of her Sikh bodyguards, provoking sectarian violence in which Hindus killed 3,000 Sikhs in riots. The violence spilled over into Canada. A plot was actually hatched here to assassinate an Indian minister (Bollywood even made a film about the plot, called Dus) by Sikh extremists, who also perpetrated the worst terrorist attack in Canadian history in 1985, blowing up Air India flight 182 as it flew out of Vancouver, B.C., killing 329 people, making it the worst aviation terrorist attack until 9/11.

    For all that, the nearly half million Sikhs who now live in Canada are peaceful. In fact, at the time a Sikh Canadian, who later became briefly the premier of British Columbia, publicly spoke against the extremists, for which he was brutally attacked. The traditional occupations of Sikhs in the Punjab are farming and fighting (as portrayed in their highly entertaining films – yes, there is a Sikh film industry in Punjabi), and they have transferred those skills to their new homeland. I have seen their traditional turbans on labourers in market gardens north of Toronto, and our current federal minister of defense is a Sikh who served in the Canadian army (the leader of the federal New Democratic Party, the third most popular party in Canada, is also Sikh). They even have Sikh announcers broadcast hockey games in Punjabi (Sikhs in India are champions of field hockey, so ice hockey transferred well). I encounter them all the time on the campus, on the bus, in the mall. Like the rest of humanity, most of them just want of a peaceful life.

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  60. I remember asking my grandfather — he was out here from Iowa visiting and we were walking to the grocery store together — about a man who was dressed in white and walking in front of us. I’d seen him before, he must have lived nearby. I realized later he was a Sikh by the dress, I don’t believe my grandfather knew but he probably told me he was maybe from India.

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  61. Like other monotheistic religions, Sikhism has some elements that are oddly reminiscent* of portions of the Bible. A devout Sikh man does not cut his hair, which resembles the Nazarite vow, and always covers his head, which resembles the dress code of the high priest in the law of Moses, hence the reason for the turbans and long beards.

    *My small group has been reading through (or rather, listening through) the Bible and we were on Numbers 5:11-31 about the law of jealousy. I have read it often enough before, but this verse jumped out at me this time: “The priest is to write these curses on a scroll and then wash them off into the bitter water. He shall make the woman drink the bitter water that brings a curse…” The reason it jumped out at me is what I was told by our mutual friend in West Africa, that Muslim marabouts make their most powerful charms by writing out verses of the Quran in charcoal on parchment and then washing the writing off into water, which is then drunk.

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  62. After that description, I think some music in a popular Sikh Punjabi style, known as Bhangra, would be appropriate. This song is from a scene of a popular Hindi language film – the song may sound like a war cry, but it is actually a cheekily romantic song:

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  63. Roscuro – I enjoyed watching that, and enjoy the Bollywood videos you sometimes share. I am curious: How is it that you are so familiar with Bollywood, and know what these songs are about?

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  64. Kizzie, I was introduced to Bollywood (which is the Hindi language division of India’s enormous cinema industry) by a Punjabi, but not a Punjabi from India, a Punjabi from Pakistan. He studied violin with me for a few months the first time I was in the city. I had met his wife in an outreach ministry by the city church and she had been asking if anyone knew of a violin teacher. I happened to over hear the question. He wanted to learn how to play a particular Bollywood song, and from there I began to take an interest. The films are available in subtitles, and there are many on Netflix, including this film ‘Jab We Met’ (which is delightful, despite the somewhat wild ending song).

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  65. I am always a student of music, so expanding my knowledge beyond the West seemed natural. I also find unusual insights from watching films and listening to music from other cultures. Seeing how Westerners are portrayed in Bollywood, as well as other film industries (I have recently begun sampling Nollywood, as Nigeria’s growing film industry has been nicknamed) has been an interesting experience. I know how to laugh at myself, so I do not find the portrayals offensive, but rather hilarious and thought provoking.

    The film I mentioned about the attempted assassination of an Indian minister is set in Canada, but all the major roles are played by Indian actors as both the good and bad guys. Canadians only appear briefly as background extras, and the few lines they speak are dubbed over, not in Hindi, but in English (after the U.S., the largest English speaking population in the world is in India) by Indian voice actors doing an impression of North American accents. The Canadians are also clueless to the dangerous plot, and it is the brave Indian secret servicemen who save the day. Seeing how Indians relegate our culture to the background of their stories, use stereotypes of us, and imitate our accents stimulates some interesting reflections of how other cultures see the West’s filmed portrayals of their cultures.

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  66. I should note that Indian films are like Western films, some are good, some need to be turned off partway in due to objectionable content, some are annoying, some are frightening, some are funny, some try to be funny, some are silly, some are serious, some are flops, some are masterpieces. The best are well worth seeing. The worst are not worth wasting your time watching. But as my former violin student warned me when his wife fed me their traditional Punjabi food, “After eating (watching) this, you will find Western food (films) boring.” That has been true for me. There is so much colour and so much life in Indian films that modern Western films seem drained of colour and subdued by comparison. They may sometimes seem over the top to our jaded Western eyes, but the best are magnificent works of art. I would recommend the following to begin with:
    Lagaan (on Netflix) – Can a three hour film about cricket and the British Raj be interesting? Yes, it can – and you will understand cricket afterward.

    Bajrangi Bhaijaan (on Amazon Prime) – Written, produced, and directed by a family of Indian actors originally from Pakistan, this is a beautiful film that mourns over the divisions between the two countries and optimistically hopes for a better future.

    Ek Toilet Prem Katha (on Netflix) – A film about the barriers to progress due to tradition in rural India, this takes on some serious topics with dignity and humour.

    Barfi! (on Netlix) – A loving tribute to the work of Charlie Chaplin, the romantic couple in this film are a hearing impaired boy and an autistic girl – the acting is incomparable.

    One note, most of you probably think nothing of the portrayals of religious ceremonies in Western films, which are almost always some denomination of Christian, whether Catholic, Anglican, or Baptist, etc. Indian culture also portrays religious ceremonies as part of the portrayal of everyday life, and since there are many different religions in India, all at some point are portrayed. I am not bothered by it, but I understand that some may be uncomfortable with seeing Hindu ceremonies, etc.

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  67. Oh, I almost forgot this one, which is unfortunately neither on Netflix nor on Prime but is available from iTunes:
    Mission Kashmir – This film was released in 1999, about two Kashmiri Muslim families who are torn apart by the extremists in Kashmir, one a policeman’s family, the other a simple peasant family – it is a difficult watch, but well worth it, and the shadowy figure who funds the terrorists’ activities in Kashmir bears a striking resemblance to the silhouette of someone whom every Westerner would hear about in September 2001 – it is a fact that Osama bin Laden was involved with the Kashmiri extremists who tore that beautiful land apart in the 1990s.

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  68. Thanks, Roscuro! I added the ones available on Netflix to my list. Although it may take me a while to get to them, I will eventually.

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  69. It was a beautiful afternoon here, sunny with a very cool breeze, temps in the 70s — perfect. I spent about an hour having coffee with my neighbor in her backyard, throwing the ball for her 2 huge labs.

    Then I came home and started sanding down a little wooden stool/bench my mom always had in her garden. It had been painted white but the paint was peeling and it wound up in my garage — I decided it would look cute in a turquoise color (I decided on SW’s Gulfstream shade) in front of my house to hold the hose ‘bowl’ so that wasn’t sitting on the ground.

    Think I’ll also paint the wooden seat bench on the patio the same shade, I should have enough paint.

    But first I’n having to get all the paint off, which is a chore, Wound up buying a wire brush along with the sanding pad.

    My neighbor gave me some garden cuttings also … now I’m sitting on the patio reading Scripture, listening to music on the portable speaker and just enjoying the end of the day. Days are longer and longer. 🙂 But yesterday was the longest?

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  71. Roscuro- Wasn’t “Slumdog Millionaire” a Bollywood film? It won the Best Picture Oscar about 10 years ago. I enjoyed it, even though it got an R rating in the US, mostly because of the topics covered.

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  72. We just made an emergency visit to the vet to have Duke sewn up. Poor guy ripped open the skin on his shoulder somehow (chasing squirrels). A huge gash but thankfully not into the muscle. He’s now stitched up and recovering with a drain in and wearing a blue inflatable collar.

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  73. Poor Duke!! Wonder if he will think twice about chasing squirrels again?!
    We just returned from rescuing a kitty who had been 30 ft up in a ponderosa pine since yesterday! A neighbor posted on Nextdoor a plea to help get the cat down…her 6 kids were so sad that the cat seemed frozen to the tree limb and could not get down. Her husband is deployed and she felt helpless! Kitty was still there this evening so we drove over in the truck with ladders and ropes. Husband suited up in his climbing gear and made it to the top of that skinny tree. The cat patted husband on the head when he reached him and just melted into husband’s arms. It was a tricky descent having only one arm free to repel down…but he did it…my husband the hero!! There are some very happy kiddo’s tonight, not to mention a very relieved kitty!!

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