To buy a skirt=torture: “My mental state slams into disaster mode. My eyes cross, my vision blurs. I feel unworthy, angry, and giddy all at once, at the same time as trying to get a grip. This is only the first store, and I can’t go home yet! I think of how annoyed at myself I will be if the day of the special occasion comes, and I have to assemble an outfit out of the stained, pilled rags and bags I already have at home. So I begin to try things on.”
This post at Conversion Diary details my opinion on shopping exactly. It’s not therapy; it’s torture.
Archives
Links and Thinks
On paying for college, courtesy of Mental Multi-Vitamin.
What do Stephen King and Jerry Jenkins have in common? Well, they are both writers who’ve both sold a lot of books. Other than that, I’m not sure I would ever have thought of them in the same room, but Writer’s Digest did a joint interview with the two best-selling authors, and it’s a good read.
What happens when the doctor becomes the patient? It’s a brief trailer for the new season of House. I was actually afraid after the last episode of last season that the Powers That Be would just end it there. But it looks as if Greg House is not to be written off so easily.
Dutch researchers find that fetuses have memories. “A call to NARAL Pro-Choice America for comment on the implications of the research were [sic] not returned.”
And finally, little did I know that my Top 100 Hymns Project may have revolutionary implications. In Fiji, it’s looking as if the police and the government are afraid an annual hymn-singing contest and Methodist conference may spark a revolution or a change in government or something. If the Methodist choirs can’t sing in Fiji, what’s next?
Gospel Challenge
Becky’s hosting a mini-challenge for the summer:
Operation Actually: Summer Studies Mini-Challenge
Host: Operation Actually Read Bible
Duration of the Challenge: June 1, 2009 – September 7, 2009
Description of the Challenge: Participants will choose one gospel (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John) to study for the summer. Study could mean reading it multiple times (once a month for June, July, August). Or it could mean reading the gospel and reading books about that gospel (commentaries, study helps, etc.). Or it could mean reading the gospel, listening to the gospel, watching a video drama of the gospel, listening to sermon series preached from that gospel, or participating in a Bible Study or Sunday School class discussion of that gospel. It might mean memorization of passages.
You do not have to have a blog to participate. You can keep track of your progress on the mini-challenge by commenting on this site. (If you want. No one is going to make you share what you learn or anything! But sharing does build community among participants, so it is encouraged!
If you have a blog and would like to ‘journal’ your studies, feel free to do so. But it’s not required.
Go to Becky’s place to sign up. I’m tempted, but what with the hymns and the urchins and the summer field trips and the projects over in the sidebar, I’m already on Project Overload.
Pseudogamy
Anthony Esolen at Mere Comments is writing a series of essays that he calls “Pseudogamy,” reflecting the sham and pretense that we as a society have made of the sacred institution of marriage. It’s worth reading in its entirety, but here are some selected quotes to whet your appetite.
Marriage — marriage such as Jesus defined it — is the foundation of society not simply because it is the best environment for raising children, though it is. It is the foundation because in it man and woman commit themselves one to another, as if they were, so to speak, gods freely bestowing freedom upon what they create.
I return to the notion of cosmos: order. Man and woman unite in marriage to bring into being a new generation; and even when they cannot do so, because of age or some physical defect, they may well wish to do so, or they stand for others as exemplars of the act that naturally brings forth children. All of which is to say that marriage that is open to children is part of the order created by God. Then marriage that is not open to children violates that order, and introduces into our understanding of marriage a destructive chaos.
In these two posts, Mr. Esolen says eloquently and intelligently some of the things I tried to start talking about in this post on marriage: that we have already lost the meaning of marriage before the activists and anti-Christians came along to try to put into statute and law what was already broken. I’m not saying that it’s a losing battle but rather that we will have to re-examine the fundamental Biblical meaning of marriage itself before we will be able to speak truth to our culture and, perhaps, change the course we are travelling toward the destruction of both marriage and family.
7 Links to Waste Your Time or Educate
These may be timewasters or educators; you decide.
The Eyeballing Game. I did spend some time trying to get these right, but my accuracy remained abysmal. How did you do?
Lunch Bag Art I want to show this blog to Engineer Husband. He’s really a talented artist, and I wish he’d make some of these. Or do a mural on my wall. Or something artistic. Don’t you think that art, for those who are somewhat talented, is both therapeutic and a way of praising God? Why couldn’t one praise the Lord on a lunch bag? Or a wall?
The Cheerios New Author Contest encourages aspiring authors to write and submit an original story for a book for children ages 3 to 8. You have to be over 18 to enter, and the deadline is July 15, 2009. I tell my children Maria stories, and I may send one in.
From The Common Room: Could you pass this test? This exam is one that a late nineteenth century teacher had to pass in order to keep his teaching certification. Even in the literature section, what I would think was my forte, I couldn’t answer half the questions. The rest was hopeless.
Most Interesting Bookstores of the World. Eldest Daughter used to hang out at Shakespeare and Company when she was in Paris. She found it fascinating in a 60’s, hippie sort of way.
Pun for the Ages: “Dryden called it the ‘lowest and most groveling kind of wit.’ To Ambrose Bierce it was a ‘form of wit to which wise men stoop and fools aspire.'” If you like puns, you might enjoy this NY TImes article on the uses and abuses of the lowly pun.
Children’s reading skill correlates with orderliness in the home? Whoaaaa, this is NOT good. However, I’ve managed to produce four adult readers so far with a minimal amount of order in the home, so maybe the study cited is flawed. Or else we’re the exception.
Friday 7 Quick Takes
So, does this mean that you all are likely to pay careful attention to my blog posts, but you won’t get many creative ideas from stopping by? But if you’re reading from China or South Africa, all bets are off?
There are so many things going on in our nation that make me upset and concerned, and I’m feeling helpless. I can’t stop the stimulus boondoggle, even though I’m going to have to pay for it. I can’t save the books. However I am going to do this simple thing, to try to change minds about abortion. It may not have any effect, but it’s something. And I’m feeling a need to do something about all this madness.
Speaking of abortion, Screwtape Writes Again. And he does have an interesting, dare I say diabolical, perspective on the matter.
Over at Mugglenet, in cooperation with Random House, they’re sponsoring an essay writing contest. Write 500 to 1,000 words on the topic, ” “How can magical stories help young people grow spiritually or build character?” Author N.D. Wilson and a couple of other people will judge the submissions, and the prizes for the top three essays are copies of Dandelion Fire and 100 Cupboards by N.D. Wilson.
March 2 is Read Across America Day and Dr. Seuss’s birthday. Read here for ideas on how to celebrate in your own homeschool.
Back to CPSIA, even people in other countries are noticing the stupidity and harmfulness of this law: Warning! Eating books could seriously damage your health from Daniel Kalder at the Guardian Books Blog. Maybe some of our politicians who are so enamored of European ideas and mores will pay attention to a Brit making fun of such “legal lunacy.”
Lunacy is not confined to government. The New York Times on Tuesday February 17th printed an unsigned editorial that totally misrepresented and confused the issues with CPSIA, talking about “needless fears” and “enlightened leadership.” Walter Olson of Overlawyered calls the NYT editorial “clueless” and “cruelly hard-hearted toward families and businesses.” Back at ya, Grey Lady.
Dickensian Birthday Celebration
Happy Birthday, Mr. Dickens!
Born on this date in 1812, Mr. Dickens has been delighting readers for over 150 years.
Dickens Novels I’ve Read: David Copperfield, Oliver Twist, Nicholas Nickleby, A Tale of Two Cities, A Christmas Carol, Pickwick Papers, Great Expectations, Our Mutual Friend
DIckens Novels I Have Yet to Enjoy: Hard Times, Dombey and Son, Bleak House, The Old Curiosity Shop, Barnaby Rudge, Martin Chuzzlewit, Little Dorrit, The Mystery of Edwin Drood.
Favorite Dickens Hero: Pip, Great Expectations
Favorite Dickens Villain(ess): Madame Defarge, Tale of Two Cities
Favorite Tragic Scene: Mr. Peggotty searching for Littel Em’ly (Is that a scene or an episode?)
Favorite Comic Character: Mr. Micawber, David Copperfield
Favorite Comic Scene: Miss Betsy Trotter chasing the donkeys out of her yard, David Copperfield
Strangest Dickens Christmas Story We’ve Read: “The Poor Relation’s Storyâ€
Best Dickens Novel I’ve Read: A Tale of Two Cities, David Copperfield is a close second.
Dickens-related posts at Semicolon:
LOST Reading Project: Our Mutual Friend by Charles DIckens.
Dickens Pro and Con on his Birthday.
Charles Dickens by Jane Smiley
Other DIckens-related links:
Mere Comments on Dickens’ Christianity.
A DIckens Filmography at Internet Film Database.
George Orwell: Essay on Charles DIckens.
Edgar Allan Poe Meets Charles Dickens.
An entire blog devoted to Mr. DIckens and his work: DIckensblog by Gina Dalfonzo.
And finally, here’s a re-post of my own Dickens Quiz. Can you match the quotation with the Dickens novel that it comes from?
1. “Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen nineteen and six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery.â€
2. “It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to, than I have ever known.â€
3. “I would rather, I declare, have been a pig-faced lady, than be exposed to such a life as this!â€
4. “It’s over and can’t be helped, and that’s one consolation as they always says in Turkey, ven they cuts the wrong man’s head off.â€
5. “If the law supposes that,’ said Mr. Bumble, squeezing his hat emphatically in both hands, “the law is a ass–a idiot. If that’s the eye of the law, the law is a bachelor; and the worst I wish the law is, that his eye may be opened by experience–by experience.â€
6. “I am as light as a feather, I am as happy as an angel, I am as merry as a school-boy. I am as giddy as a drunken man. A merry Christmas to every-body! A happy New Year to all the world! Hallo here! Whoop! Hallo!â€
7. “We spent as much money as we could, and got as little for it as people could make up their minds to give us. We were always more or less miserable, and most of our acquaintance were in the same condition. There was a gay fiction among us that we were constantly enjoying ourselves, and a skeleton truth that we never did. To the best of my belief, our case was in the last aspect a rather common one.â€
8. “It is a sensation not experienced by many mortals,” said he, “to be looking into a churchyard on a wild windy night, and to feel that I no more hold a place among the living than these dead do, and even to know that I lie buried somewhere else, as they lie buried here. Nothing uses me to it. A spirit that was once a man could hardly feel stranger or lonelier, going unrecognized among mankind, than I feel.”
(HINT: these come from the eight DIckens novels that I have read. Which is from which?)
KidLitosphere Central
This thing that Melissa Wiley dubbed the “KidLitosphere†has become a valuable resource that celebrates fiction and nonfiction, poetry and prose, authors and illustrators, writing and reading. Bloggers cover everything from picture books to young adult titles, writing process to publishing success, personal news to national events.
KidLitosphere Central strives to provide an avenue to good books and useful literary resources; to support authors and publishers by connecting them with readers and book reviewers; and to continue the growth of the society of bloggers in children’s and young adult literature.
Bookmark it now.
7 Quick Takes Friday
Here’s an article in WSJ by Allen Barra about G.K. Chesterton and The Man Who Was Thursday. I found the WSJ article via Neil Gaiman’s blog, which I was browsing because this is the year I’m going to “discover” Neil Gaiman. I’ve been planning to do so for several years now, but haven’t managed to actually read a single book by the much-acclaimed author. I have read The Man Who Was Thursday and named it one of my twelve favorites from last year’s reading.
I Wish I could Read LIke a GIrl by Michelle Slatalla. Mental Multivitamin sent me to this nostalgic look at the “the childhood gift of being able to suspend disbelief.” I think I can still do it, but it is easier for the younger set.
Another reason to let (make) your children play outside. My children don’t spend nearly as much time outdoors as I did when I was a kid of a girl growing up in West Texas. And I didn’t much care for playing outside; I only wanted to sit around and read. But my mom sent me outdoors and said for me to stay there “until I tell you to come in for supper,” or some such deadline. Sometimes she let me take my book with me, and I climbed the mulberry tree outside my window, perched on a branch and read. At least I was outside.
It shouldn’t be a surprise considering Mr. Obama’s strong pro-abortion statements and actions in the past, but I am nevertheless appalled that this man has been nominated for the post of U.S. Associate Attorney General. As columnist Jeffery Kuhner says, “If ‘Piranha Perrelli’ (as he is known in pro-life circles) can’t protect a defenseless, incapacitated woman from a ruthless, amoral husband – in fact, goes out of his way to help finish her off – then he certainly cannot oversee the enforcement of America’s laws.”
Octamom: Is Eight Enough? “It’s all about trust. It’s all about listening. I don’t know how many children people should have. I do know we should pray a whole lot more about it. I don’t think that big families are somehow more ‘spiritual’. I do know that the process of family building is holy ground, whether by biological or adoptive or foster or mentoring means.”
Isn’t that wonderful? I don’t know how many children any family should have. But God does. And He will lead if we let HIm.
Gene Veith asks: What works should be in our collection of the Christian Great Books?
He’s already got 50+ comments with lots of suggestions, but have a look both to get suggestions for your own reading and to give suggestions for others.
Finally, I got this quote from Julie at Happy Catholic:
Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.
Howard Thurman
Go here to read her further thoughts on the idea of service and calling and vocation.
Happy Friday, everyone! More Quick Takes at Conversion Diary.
Free Book Giveaway: Heaven
Carrie of Mommy Brain sent me a link to this book giveaway of Randy Alcorn’s Heaven at his blog. I’ve also read some interesting posts at his blog in the past, so you may want check out both the giveaway and the blog.