they blowed it up real good

it's dead. as it should be. RIP(ieces) the bartman ball (2003-2004). next year has begun. if this doesn't work, a goat is next.

more on the mayhem here (you'll have to register to read)

or here (video of the blessed event from msnbc)

much more on the story as it develops (or unravels)
j

from the lighter side

all of these headlines appeared in australian newspapers over the past year. enjoy

Something Went Wrong in Jet Crash, Expert Says

Police Begin Campaign to Run Down Jaywalkers

Iraqi Head Seeks Arms

Prostitutes Appeal to Pope

Panda Mating Fails; Veterinarian Takes Over

Teacher Strikes Idle Kids

Miners Refuse to Work after Death

Juvenile Court to Try Shooting Defendant

War Dims Hope for Peace

If Strike Isn't Settled Quickly, It May Last Awhile

Cold Wave Linked to Temperatures

Enfield (London) Couple Slain; Police Suspect Homicide

Red Tape Holds Up New Bridges

Man Struck By Lightning Faces Battery Charge

Astronaut Takes Blame for Gas in Spacecraft

Kids Make Nutritious Snacks

Chef Throws His Heart into Helping Feed Needy

Local High School Dropouts Cut in Half

Hospitals are Sued by 7 Foot Doctors

And the winner is....

Typhoon Rips Through Cemetery; Hundreds Dead

beautiful
j

daily dose of irony

from an online article about the passion of the christ

Controversy continued Wednesday when Lovingway United Pentecostal Church in Denver put up a marquee sign outside the church saying, "Jews killed the Lord Jesus." The Anti-Defamation League issued a statement of outrage after asking the pastor to remove the sign. He refused.

insert sigh here
j

still more marquees

seen in Kansas City last week.
exposure to the son will prevent burning
ACK!
j

kansas city is cool

i had no idea. K and i just got back from KC for the weekend and it was a blast. we stayed in a decent hotel in the westport district, but we didn't find ourselves there much because there was so much stuff worth doing.

some highlights
amazing food at places like stroud's (do the oak ridge manor location -- it's wortht the drive and the wait and canyon cafe (quick tip -- if you go on valentine's day, have a reservation it will save you a couple of hours) and amazing burgers at the flea market in westport (no really).
a couple of quality hours at the american jazz museum -- they have a spot where you can sit and listen to their collection of hundreds of jazz CDs, i could have been there a looooonnnnnggggggg time. K ran out of louis armstrong CDs pretty quickly, so we left.
coffee (well hot chocolate for me) at hi hat coffee -- totally worth the time you'll spend finding it.
the mother of all used book stores - spivey's in the westport district. this place has thousands of books, maps, prints, etc. it is floor to ceiling, 2 stories plus a basement, of stuff from last week and over 200 years ago. we walked out with 5 books the newest of which was published in 1976 and three children's books that were published in 1916, 1914, and 1905 respectively. we could have done a lot more.
the nelson - atkins art museum was incredible too. i stood nose to nose (?) with originals from van gogh, monet, warhol, pollack, manet, gauguin and more. and it's free! a lot of the collection is under wraps right now while renovation goes on, but what they have out is very nice.
shopping at the plaza. yes i shopped. well, mostly i followed K around while she shopped. but the area is incredibly cool. it is a massive shooping / entertainment / food district.

there was more, but you're bored. i would go back in a heartbeat and do a lot of the same things again. if you're looking to get away, it's only five hours from okc (5 very boring hours by the way).

this message brought to you by the KC department of tourism and the letter W
j

i'm so torn

i can't wait to see the passion of the christ, but at the same time i am afraid i am going to have to wait three weeks to go so that all of the churches can get it out of their systems. i don't want to go experience this movie in a theater full of church people. is that wrong? i'm bothered on a lot of levels by this whole thing of the church coopting this movie as an evangelism tool. it feels really cheap and WWJDish to me. i saw a pastor on the news the other night talking about how his church has bought up blocks of 500 (yes, 500) tickets so that they can go and take their lost friends to this movie so that their lost friends can hear the truth and be saved. sigh. is that really going to happen? maybe some. my guess is that it will be mostly good church folk (some of whom probably need to be saved -- did i say that?) who were invited by other good church folk because the first group of church folk couldn't get tickets because the other church folk's church bought them all up. sigh again. it also bugs me that most of these folks won't walk across the street to befriend thier neighbors, but they are going to give them a movie ticket and a door hanger and consider their work for the kingdom accomplished until the next "christian" thing comes out. i know i'm generalizing, but some stereotypes exist for a reason.

why does this bug me so much? i don't know. i think my fear is that mel and company have made what looks to be a beautiful and brutally honest and real portrayal of the death of Jesus and in response the "christian" marketing machine has cranked up for the next round. how long will it be before we have TPOTC key chains? sigh x3. i wonder how many people who do not know Christ are going to stay away from the movie because of the people who will be there? after seeing pastor ticketmaster on the news the other night, i wouldn't go anywhere near a theater for several weeks. who wants to experience the movie and then be assaulted on the way out with the 4 happy hops to heaven? i don't know if i could control myself if i walked out and a stranger came up and asked me the "diagnostic questions".

pardon my joy in irony. but i also think it is hilarious that pastors and churches who have been railing against "r" rated movies since time began are now buying block tickets and encouraging everyone to go. it's gonna be awful hard to preach that sermon about the evils of culture now. actually probably not. i do think there will be some good church folk who leave the theater mighty ticked at brother so and so though. if this thing is as violent as it has to be, the deacons will not be pleased.

so i'm stuck with my dilemma. when to go? i may wait and see it on a sunday around noon. the church folk will be too busy eating lunch to join me. unless they go to the early service. sigh.

man i'm bitter tonight.
j

truth

does it even exist anymore?

i'm not talking about "absolute" truth that is such the war between moderns and postmoderns. i'm just talking about accurate reporting of facts as they actually happened. i have been listening up and down the dail to different versions of talk radio in an attempt to remove myself from the "sports(book) animal" and i keep hearing the same stories told 15 different ways by 10 different "reporters". it's no better on TV or on the internet. everything is spun and respun so much that there is no way to know what really happened short of being there. we are told that we should vote and care and be involved in the events of our country and world, but then the same people tell us who to listen to to get the facts to make us "informed". if we listen to moby or michael moore or MTV, bush is the antichrist. if we listen to fox news or rush or hannity, he is the leader we must have for the days ahead.

we can't even get the straight news on atkins. they report that he was obese and had heart problems when he died and then his side comes out to explain why. what's true?

i know my philosopher friends cringe at all of this truth talk and i understand where they are coming from. i guess i'm looking for "just the facts" so i can be intelligent and decide things for myself.

does joe friday have a radio show?
j

by the way

happy birthday president reagan.

93. wow.
j

quick public service announcement

in response to an emailer who will remain anonymous. blogger puts posts on the blog with the most recent post first. that means if a blogger (like me) posts more than once on something, the response will be above the original post. that means some posts won't make sense if you read from top to bottom because they will refer to something you haven't read yet.

when reading a blog, it is the best idea to find where that day starts and read up from there. it makes a lot more sense that way.

and knowing is half the battle.
j

unfortunately God also made humans

TV Viewer Sues Over Janet Bra-Ha-Ha

this tops suing mcd's over hot coffee or oreos because they made kids fat. this woman says she was

INJURED

by the half-time show and is suing every collection of letters she can think of (MTV, NFL, CBS, AOL, JANET)

injured? by that? hmmmmmmmmm. from what i have seen (and for the record i am not one of the millions of TiVo subscribers who simultaneously backed up to see it again) the only one injured was janet (miss jackson if you're nasty). that thing looks like it hurts. (if you don't know what i'm talking about, again just move on)

maybe i could sue my local christian retailer (still nameless) for injuring me emotionally. all i want is the george w. cutout.

i have to call my lawyer.
j

God makes amazing stuff

nerd alert!

check out the picture of this galaxy recently photographed by the hubble telescope.

wow
j

my trip to the christian bookstore

yep. i had to go. it is one of those things that occasionally happens in my life. i had to stop in to my friendly (not really) neighborhood (well, its about 15 miles away) "christian" retail outlet.
some highlights from my adventure.

i was almost run over twice in the parking lot. once by a guy in a GIANT truck. when he realized he almost smashed me, he gave me the sheepish little "my bad" wave. thankfully he had a God bless America sticker on his truck, so i knew he was "one of us" and he would never intentionally be neglegent enough to try and kill me. the other was by a maroon MINI van with a church name (name withheld to protect the sad) and a coat of arms on it. seriously. a shield with a cross on it and then a sword over the cross. hmmm. no sheepish wave from this guy. i should never have been in his way, he obviously has battles to fight and victory to obtain.

upon walking in i was immediately confronted by a life size cardboard standup of george w. advertising the new book about his faith. i immediately shifted back to college days and thought about how cool it would be to "borrow" that and have it ride around in the passenger seat of my car.
i was also confronted by three scowling employees standing behind cash registers furiously working on something. none of them even looked up. certainly no smiles or "welcome to _________". geez. these people wouldn't last 10 minutes working at GAP. thankfully they can work in a "christian" environment that obiously lifts their spirits and... nevermind.

on my way to pick up my items i had to pass a stand of new worship CDs. ever curious, i stopped to browse. what i found is that there have only been 10 worship songs written in the last 4 years and so everyone has to keep redoing them over and over again. someday i will find the version of "in the secret" that is just right for me. alas, not today.

so i picked up what i came for and headed to checkout. now i'm nervous beacues they are all still scowling and all working hard at whatever. i'm dodging stacks christian candy and purpose driven corn flakes. i made my choice and smiled as i tried to find a place among all of the testamints (clever) and F.R.O.G. and D.O.G. bookmarks, fridge magnets and car air fresheners (seriously). if you don't know what those are (the acronyms, not airfresheners) thank God and move on with your blissful life, i'm not going to ruin it for you.
my choice of helpers may have been the best of the options available to me, but not good. she was unhappy that i had so many items that were different and didn't have bar codes so she had to TYPE IN NUMBERS on her register. then i had the audacity to use a credit card. everyone knows that credit is evil. the funny moment for me was when she looked at the back of my card to see my signature. i hadn't signed it. whoops. she had to ask me for my ID. clearly this place has had problems in the past with people stealing credit cards and then coming in and buying things. when all was said and done i told her to have a good day (she grunted in response) and away i went. thankfully mini van and giant truck had moved on.

this is why amazon is the happiest place on earth. none of those people work there.

thanks for letting me share
does anyone care about any of this?
you probably shouldn't
j

still more fun with irony

the school down the street from my house has a bible verse on their marquee. the church down the street from my house has a web address on theirs.

interesting
j

new toys for all of us

i have added a feature allowing everyone (or anyone) to comment on the things you read here. just click on comment and then ummmm comment.
just so you know, the link to comment on a post appears below that post even though it seem closer to the top of the previous post.

enjoy and play nice.
j

more on living v. breathing

read this today in mitch albom's book tuesdays with morrie

"Because", Morrie continued, "most of us all walk around as if we're sleepwalking. We really don't experience the world fully, because we're half-asleep, doing things we automatically think we have to do."

exactly
j