November Linkdump

Thursday ended before I got done with it.

Here's everything I've had open in a tab for the last month thinking I was going to get around to doing something with it.


Stem cell controversy: effectively over.
Now let's get on with the business of growing larger penises for insecure men.

Covering the Mouse.
A blog of covers of Disney songs. I like the idea, but this is like, a mini-series blog, right? Are there really that many cover tunes of Disney songs?

Update! Kurtis assures me that he has enough Disney cover tunes to last until the heat death of the universe. Go have a listen, whydoncha.

Heavy Ink.
This might be my new comic book store. I can't tell yet.

Photos and video of real-life Shaolin monks.

Tricksy military camouflage.
Rubber tanks! Neat!

How to make your own tact-tiles.
The manufacturer of this RPG aid apparently decided they were tired of making money or something. I emailed them six months ago asking when they might be selling their wares again, and they said they wouldn't make any more at least through the end of the year, and now their Web site is down. So screw it, I'll make my own.

What's a Bushel?

Ruminating on yesterday's post, I think it's pretty interesting that I barely mentioned Jesus in any of that.

I've spent a lot of my adult life attempting to modulate my Jesus vibe so as to not scare the heathens and pagans around me.

I used to think it might be because I was ashamed of Christ, but that's just self-flagellatory Bible-talk people use to try to make you feel bad. It's not true. I don't even know what that means. I've never been ashamed of Christ. I've never had any reason to be. I just didn't want to scare anybody off.

So I would talk about love, sacrifice, and forgiveness but almost never in a way that acknowledged Christ as the source or goal of that goodness.

The people close to me knew the standard Christian line, I think. They didn't need me to wave the Jesus flag to know what I was talking about. Besides, I hated seeing the uncertain, trapped-animal looks in their eyes when I brought up Christ explicitly.

But now I think I need to wave it more. Not acknowledging Jesus sort of... leads to fuzzy thinking.

And, I'm more at peace now with the discomfort brought by talking about Jesus in public. People might get the trapped-animal look when I bring up Jesus, but the best solution to that is to talk about him, and then continue being a normal person. In fact, that's probably the best rule of thumb for American Evangelicals I can think of: Mention Jesus, and then don't be loony afterward.

I doubt this new inclination will affect my demeanor. It'll probably take a few years to settle in. I'll likely forget about it as a discrete concept within a few weeks. But as part of Advent, I hope to try to interact with Jesus like he's active instead of a figurehead.

The Waiting Game

Although I grew up thoroughly religious, and occasionally Christian, Advent was a non-issue. I remember people lighting funny-colored candles during Sunday morning worship service, but so often some song-and-dance routine was going on down front: baby dedications, handbell choirs, lay people solemnly trudging up to read the Bible. The rituals around Advent seemed part of the showbiz, keeping things interesting. Is what I would have thought if I had any conscious thoughts about it.

I'm more curious and skeptical about my religion now. Once I started poking around, I discovered an entire year-long calendar of stuff in the official Church orthodoxy, of which Easter and Christmas are just the standouts. But there's more.

Like Advent. Advent formally starts the fourth Sunday before Christmas. Some years that can be as early as November 24, but this year it's December 2. Advent is meant to be a time of anticipatory waiting, not just for Christ's first coming, but also for his next coming.

I've become increasingly aware of Advent in the last few years, and this year I'm making a point to... care, I guess. I have a book of Advent readings, and with startlingly little thought, I volunteered myself into leading Advent reflections in my weekly small group (which starts tomorrow, which is why I'm ruminating on this four days before go time).

As with many of my religious dabblings, I don't go in with a lot of expectation. I don't know what I'm doing, and I don't have a goal other than to fiddle with the knobs and see what happens. Sometimes that turns out to be meaningful, and sometimes I get done and feel no less bewildered than when I started.

Is that a dumb way to do religion? I can't tell. It might be. But I like experimenting, and I like simple hope, free from disappointment.

Which I suppose is a very Advent-y thing to be doing.

Doubletalk

Here's a word game I made up. I found words with doubled letters, and put them with clues. It reminded me of the good old days when I worked for the newspaper and made up puzzles to put on the comics page to fill space. It was fun and weird to make up puzzles for work--it was so fun, sometimes I felt like I was slacking on the job.

This one isn't especially hard, but there's a couple of obscure ones. Have fun!

a a _ _ _ _ _ _ : Earth pig
_ _ b b _ : A hare shy
_ _ c c _ _ _ _ : Short work
_ d d _ _ : Snake totaler
_ _ e e : A sworded affair
_ f f _ _ _ : No effect
_ g g : It's no spring chicken
_ _ _ _ h h _ _ _ _ : He's all thumbs
_ _ i i _ _ : Half a biathlon
_ _ j j _ : A pillar in his community
_ _ _ k k _ _ : One who goes boldly
_ _ l l : Don't get bent on it
_ _ m m _ _ : Comes before down, time
_ n n _ _ : Bored in French class
_ o o _ : Old-timey GPS
_ p p _ _ : Computer, records
_ _ q q _ _ _ : Pharaoh dead zone
_ r r : It's human
_ s s _ _ : Things I Think
_ _ t t _ : Bruce Wayne's alter-ego
_ _ _ u u _ : Suck-up
_ _ v v _ _ : Fired up
_ _ w w _ _ : National dance party
x x _ : Blackjack!
_ _ z z _ _ : What are you doing?


I couldn't find any yy words that aren't nowhere places in Scandinavia or Turkey, and that's not fun. Really, I was pushing it with qq.

Essential, but Superficial

I finished The Essential 55: An Award-Winning Educator's Rules for Discovering the Successful Student in Every Child this weekend, after long trysts with non-printed media.

The Short Version: Famous educator, Ron Clark lays out his 55 rules for how to teach children to, essentially, be successful humans. Some of his rules cover homework and listening in class, but many more are about table manners and common courtesy.

My Take: The book contains a lot of truth, although the writing contains sleep-inducing cliches and is so relentlessly positive, it borders on pollyanna. If one were reading this as a how-to manual, one would have to read between the lines. Although Clark is a success at his chosen profession, that's because he has devoted his whole self to teaching, not because of 55 rules.

You know how, when you're a kid, and you see your teacher in the grocery store, and your little mind is blown because you see this person out of context? After reading this book, one wonders if Clark is ever out of context. He talks about baking brownies for his students every night, and taking them on week-long field trips, planning surprises for them... the logistics alone would take all my time, without any of that pesky pedagogy.

What he never directly says is, "You must give all of yourself to the children you teach, by means of convictions so deep and personal that I cannot convey why this is done. Only that it must be so."

This is not a complaint, but rather a caveat. The book contains excellent lessons about motivating people, especially the young form of people. But the rub is not the lessons themselves, as much as in applying them, and following through on them.

Like many supposed how-to books, I read this and wanted the how-to behind the book: How to WANT to do _______. Armed with that elusive giveadamn, I suspect many lessons would seem uselessly self-evident. Without it, they're an interesting, but baffling set of laws that you'll apply haphazardly.

It's good for teachers, and useful for students of leadership and motivation.

Water Shots

Today was a big photo shoot for Unda Water.

Unda Water is a non-profit bottled water organization, affiliated with our church, that I am basically in charge of. We sell bottled water in fair trade coffee shops here in Philadelphia and send the proceeds to provide clean water for people who don't have it. Our current batch of water, for instance, will fund well-digging efforts in North Africa.

One bottle of Unda Water provides a month of clean drinking water for someone in a developing country. For reals, everybody. It's a great deal.

So that's a good gig. But then earlier in the week, my friend, Dave (the photographer from the pirate party), volunteered to do a photo shoot for us if I would art direct.

I am sick and feeble this weekend. I would very much like to have slept through the sun today, and then shuffled around the house in my socks and pajamas playing with my Nintendo DS. But when a professional photographer enthusiastically offers to do a pro bono shoot for your charity's product, you don't get a sick day. You put your misery in a special place and go be an art director.

I would post a couple shots here, but it's late and every photo is like 3 megs because they're such ridiculous quality. I believe you can zoom into the atomic level with these shots.

If you bothered to follow the link in the first sentence, you will probably see an ugly placeholder site. Now that we have an amazing set of photos, I have all-new impetus to finish editing down my too-wordy copy and get the REAL site going.

Woo + Hoo = Me underneath it all.

Black Friday

Thanksgiving Day is good, but I'm really thankful for the day after T'give, when people go back to their lairs and lie around quietly.

As is my yearly tradition, I almost-but-not-quite participated in Buy Nothing Day on the day after Thanksgiving. For the unacquainted, here's the Wikipedia entry, and here's the Adbusters page on it.

Back in the day, I used to print BND posters, hang them in my cube, and talk it up among my friends. Theseadays, I just try to quietly observe it myself.

Regardless, in most years I wind up going out to eat on BND, and spend at least a little money. I tap on the anti-consumerism drum all year long, so I'm comfortable with a little blackness on this Friday.

Thanks

Gratitude is hard to cultivate. I'm glad we have a holiday devoted to it. It would be nice to have more of these:

January 30, Calmwaits.
With a month of winter left, you take the day to express your patience with cold, dead spots in life.

Second Friday in July , Kindmakings Day (observed).
Forget "random acts of kindness" crap. This is a day when you put up decorations, plan surprises, give gifts, and work intentionally on being kind to people around you, especially people who you conventionally disregard like waiters, postal workers, and grocery store checkout people.

August 22, Gentlewords.
A day where you resolve to make gentleness more important than your expectations, particularly toward yourself.


And hey, thanks for reading.

Yo Ho

As promised, pictures from Saturday night's pirate birthday party. Photos by the always-energetic, highly skilled, available for weddings and bar-mitzvahs, -- and dare I say, good friend? -- Dave Difuntorum. The guy's one of them camera whatdyacallems... virtuosos.


It was a joint party, for Meredith and Jon, sister and brother duo whose birthdays are close, turning 30 and 34 respectively.




Meredith (right) officiates the parrot-naming contest. As you can see, we assembled a papercraft parrot to sit on her shoulder for the evening. The finalist names on the authentic high-seas markerboard behind her:

• Vivian
• Humperdink
• Brian the Bird
• Eye Patchless
• Legless Lenny

Legless Lenny was the overwhelming favARRRite. Here, you can see why:



Cap'n Jon is probably not as drunk as he appears.



To the right is busty wench, Alison, Jon's lovely wife, and plotter extraordinaire. The entire evening would have been four people drinking Tab in our living room without her piratical wiles.

The smile, I believe, indicates some manner of skulduggery.

In a room full of captains and stylish swashbucklers, I dressed as a mere swabbie. Nearly every picture Dave took of me involves my mouth perilously wide open, as though I am so scurvy-ridden, I am preparing to eat an orange whole.

That's me on the left, with my friend, John, who did not dress up. As punishment, he does not get his name bolded.


We would have made him walk the plank if it had not been 40 degrees outside. I mean, we're pirates, but that's just cruel.









I would also like to point out that I am shedding my tradition of "Internet paranoia" here. I have had a long-standing rule not to post pictures of myself or family, and not to mention my last name on this site. So as to avoid complications.

Today, I'm chucking that rule because 1) BlogaDay is ravenous for content, and I don't have enough considered, cooly detached opinions on things to fill space without talking about myself; and 2) anybody who means me harm probably already has enough ammo to do it from context clues in this blog. Really, being oblique here only prevents me from making new friends and reconnecting with old ones. I'm not so booked I don't need friends.

Arr, matey.

A Moment for Reflection

Daily original content is hard.

I used to work for a small daily newspaper, and the editor-in-chief, whose managerial skills were only faintly detectable through induction, wrote the editorial personally every day. I doubt he would have trusted anyone else's judgment.

Sometimes he wrote them at the last minute, and one day he was sitting around trying to figure out what to write about and he mused to the office, "What am I mad about today?"

That's actually a fine way to generate content. However, bitching for a living damages your soul. It's self-induced, professional waterboarding.

So I resist the urge to troll news sites for outrage choruses to join, or fish up a further-refined opinion on the economic problems we done got ourselfs into in the U.S., or to engage in protracted curmudgeonliness. It would fill column inches, but it would not fill me, or dear reader, you.

Besides, lately it comes down to this: Greed is bad. Wean yourself from it.

I know, I'm robbing myself of valuable content distilling truths so pure. But perhaps removing anger and admonitions from the menu will allow me to experiment with subtler drafts.

It might also lead to more skipped days during BlogaDay, but my resolve is firm! Forward!