Meme of the Day

Inspired by the effusive posting of Christianne and my own literary hubris, here's a meme for you to chew on and spit into the open mouths of the hungry little chickies in your midst. Name and make the case for five books you frequently foist on your friends. Here's mine:

1. Orthodoxy by G. K. Chesterton. If I could have, I would have, but I'm so glad he did. So playful, so insightful.

2. Life Together by Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Worthy of an endless conversation, so all the more reason to recruit more conversation partners.

3. Forgetting Ourselves on Purpose by Brian Mahan. Nature's most nearly perfect book; Brian approaches Chesterton in his apt mixing of wit and self-effacement with profound insight. It hasn't had nearly the effect on the people I've loaned it to, however, that it's had on me. Fair warning.

4. The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell. Jesuits in space. How can you lose?

5. Daredevil: Born Again by Frank Miller. Yeah, it's a comic book. Deal with it. Brilliant story telling, great revision of an aging character, remarkable secular appropriation of Christian imagery and language.

There are others, of course, but these five came to mind most quickly. How about you? Post a comment here or an entry on your blog--I tag everybody.

Idolatry of the Cell

I'm feeling a little conflicted about my cell phone. It's a camera-phone, which is great. It allows me to store photographic memories of my travels, which is great. It allows me to set a screen poster of my own creation, which is great. So far, so great.

I visited Warehouse 2:42 while I was in Charlotte this past winter, in the hopes of conscripting two of their members to write books for me and my employer. (One down, one to go. :) While I was there I used my cell phone to take a picture of the cross outside their church. So far, so great. Then comes Holy Week, so I set the photograph to be my screen poster. Pretty clever--pretty pious, no? But here's where my inner conflict enters the picture.

In the center of the crossbeam on my screen poster, where Jesus' head might be found on a crucifix, sits the term Cingular. I tried to change the layout of the script, but Cingular stays locked in place.

Now, I have nothing against Cingular. I've gotten good service and nigh-on-miraculously few dropped calls. But I can't seem to shake the passing thought that this photograph set as this phone's screen poster conveys the message that Cingular died for my sins. That seems idolatrous.

But it gets worse: thinking about the notion of a cross branded by Cingular like some Nascar helmet makes me chuckle. That seems sacrilegious.

But perhaps it's time for one more confession: I don't like talking on the phone. And I hate the pressure of being constantly available by phone. So it's actually a good discipline for me to be reminded just before I use a phone that God so loved the world that he gave his only Son. That seems like a good safeguard against the sin crouching at my door, so to speak.

So on the one hand, I want to leave the cross where it is. On the other hand, I want to drop it like it's hot. What to do, what to do . . .

Unsafe at Any Speed

Well, it happened again. For the third time in seven months I've been cited for a moving violation. You may recall from my earlier post that (a) none of my tickets has been for speeding or driving under the influence or shooting at other drivers, and (b) I disputed and defeated the charge the most recent charge. Ever since then I've been hypervigilant as I drive, dropping well beneath the speed limit and virtually shifting into park at every stop sign or stop light. But the man keeps trying to bring me down. I found out this week that my passenger-side headlight is out; that little insight from a Village of Roselle police officer is costing me thirty-five bucks.

The officer had one hand on his holster and one hand on the extra-bright flashlight as he approached my car. I told him good evening and handed him my license and insurance card; he asked me if there was anything he should know about my license. I still don't know what he meant by that (feel free to speculate), because based on my reply and his reaction he wasn't asking if I'm still at the same address or if I've recently gained some weight. My best guess is that, in the minds of the village leadership in Roselle, there's some terrorist message encoded when someone willfully acts to, in the words of the Wallflowers, "drive it home with one headlight."

I really am getting tired of getting pulled over, and as I mentioned in my earlier post, my attempt to defend my driving honor and voice my prophetic diatribe against traffic justice in the United States was interrupted by a forgetful bureaucracy, so once again this time I sat in my car waiting for my ticket and grumbling internally about the unfairness of my situation. I made myself a bet that a third to a half of all the cars that passed by as the Roselle officer wrote my ticket would have at least one headlight out of service, then I started counting. To my shock, only one driver along this busy thoroughfare was a scofflaw like me; apparently Roselle's zero-tolerance policy has effectively rooted out pediddle-driving banditry from its village limits.

After a while, the officer returned to me my license, proof of insurance and ticket. He told me that the ticket won't go on my driving record--that it's a village ordinance I've violated, not a rule of the road. This was free money for Roselle; I know that much for certain, as much because I have such a sophsticated sense of logic and such open eyes about the injustice of the traffic-law system as because of the address to which I was to send my ticket:

Village of Roselle
Finance Department

Wholle Llotta Llamas

Is there any word quite so endearing as llama? It evokes such warm feelings for me; when I was a kid my uncle the Father sent us from Bolivia a llama-fur wall hanging, which held a place of honor in my bedroom for years. It was soft and fuzzy, warm and cute, the closest thing to a pet I had--if you don't count Cinnamon the impish hamster and the fish-with-the-short-lifespan. So now, llamas--which to my knowledge are not indigenous to the North American midwest, are popping up all over the place. Web has one on his site right now; and mad props to the queen of llama llovers, Llama Momma. And of course how can I keep typing llama without thinking of Jenn with two nns? It's true: llamas bring people together.

To Scribble or to Gnosh?

I have much to write to you, but I do not want to use paper and ink. Instead, I hope to visit you and talk with you face to face, so that our joy may be complete. (2 John 12)

I found myself caught off guard by this little comment, tacked on to the end of both 2 John and 3 John. I originally posted this at Accountable Devotions, but I keep thinking about it, so I wanted to expand the pool of inquiry. What are the limitations of something written (even something written under the guidance of the Holy Spirit) in personal relationship? How do we know when it's time to set aside the paper and ink, and instead go face to face? What are the relative merits and weaknesses of written versus verbal conversation?

Quote of the Day

From G. K. Chesterton's essay on "William Blake":

I have often been haunted with a fancy that the creeds of men might be
paralleled and represented in their beverages. Wine might stand for genuine
Catholicism, and ale for genuine Protestantism; for these at least are real
religions with comfort and strength in them. Clean cold Agnosticism would be
clean cold water -- an excellent thing if you can get it. Most modern ethical
and idealistic movements might be well represented by soda-water -- which is a
fuss about nothing.

So, are you a mocker or a brawler? Or perhaps you're much a Mountain Dew about nothing. (Tee hee.) I'll also welcome nominations for alternate beverages for these and/or other worldviews.

Link of the Day

My friend Craver VII, impish fellow that he is, recently received the Thinking Blogger Award from Jenn of the multitudinous n's--only to turn around and grant himself the "Stinking Blogger Award." Pretty funny. You can spend a lifetime following the trail of "Thinking Bloggers" that links away from Craver, so for God's sake, show some self-discipline. But have fun while you're doing it.

Red Rover, Red Rover

I've been memed by two people, Jenn (with one J) and Pete (with two ees). Jenn wants to know what tunes people are digging lately; Pete wants to see your office space. So here, without further ado, are my responses.

1. Office.
Here's a picture of our home office. Note the superhero stuff on the wall, painted and otherwise crafted by friends along the way. Also note the open container of dark-chocolate-covered espresso beans and the unopened box of Turbo Tax. Believe it or not, I cleaned up a bit before taking this picture.

2. Music.

Most of the new music I've been digging lately isn't all that new. I bought the new Switchfoot (Oh! Gravity!) and actually like it more than I expected; it's pretty rockin, and I'm apparently in a pretty rockin mood. Best tunes are "Amateur Lovers" and "4:12."

Another recent purchase was John Mayer's Grammy-winning Continuum. I'm willing to forgive his fascination with Jessica Simpson because he's so good at writing songs and playing guitar. He takes a great turn on Jimi Hendrix's "Bold as Love" and crafts a wonderfully melancholy consolation song with "The Heart of Life." I wrote at Strangely Dim about the cultural significance of his song "Waiting on the World to Change"; all told, it's easy to see why this record has gotten such high praise.

I've become a big fan of Arcade Fire, though thus far I've only borrowed, never bought. They have unbelievable texture to their music, though they're definitely an acquired taste--as are the Decemberists, who made my last list of good music with their Picaresque album. Their single "Valencia" is OK, but "Crane Wife" is a very moving song.

Finally for now, I've been taking every chance I can to listen to Madeleine Peyroux, who revisions other people's songs like nobody's business. The one on the new album, Half the Perfect World, that really gets me is "Everybody's Talkin'." Listening to her is like knowing then what we know now--a savvy innocence, wounded but healing.

3. Tag!

OK. Red rover, red rover, send Carolyn, Web and Rebecca's current favorite songs and photos of their offices right over.

Drama-rama

In case you're in the Chicago area and are looking for something to do around Eastertime, consider coming to one of the performances of Living Waters, my church's Easter play. We're a little neighborhood church in Lombard, on Madison Road just east of Westmore/Meyers (becomes Fairview in Downers Grove). See a map here.

Show Times
April 5 (tonight) at 7:30
April 6 (Friday) at 3:00 or 7:30
April 13 (next Friday) at 7:30
April 14 (next Saturday) at 7:30

Childcare is available. No tickets needed. Watch the trailer (featuring my wife!) here.

Hope you can join us! I sing a solo--so low you can't hear me.

Paul Grant (author of Blessed Are the Uncool) sent me this nice little pick-me-up yesterday.

guess what showed up when I typed "discipline of celebration" in a google
search? An InterVarsity (StudentSoul) article called "Loud Times".

I wrote that article years ago in preparation for a writers workshop staffed by Jeff Yourison, editor at Student Soul. I tried to get it published as a booklet, to no avail, but Jeff very kindly ran it, and I've hung on to the concept ever since.

http://www.intervarsity.org/studentsoul/item/loud-time

Check out Student Soul; as the French say, it's tout sweet.

Yes, yes, I know the French mean something different . . .

Spam of the Earth

Today's spam of the day is technically not spam; I'm proud to say that it comes from Sojourners, an organization dedicated to a biblical vision for social justice and responsibility. That being said, this blanket e-mail had a subject line too tasty to resist:

Subject: Kick off Earth Day

Earth Day isn't till April 22, so that can't be what this e-mail was about. No, I'm pretty sure it's promoting a day for kicking people, places and things off Earth. Sounds fun: I'm taking nominations here at Loud Time. I'll start:

I vote that we kick the following off Earth:

1. Hummers
2. Private property leaflets
3. Spam

How about you? What would you like to see kicked off earth?