The Tattered Thread

On Veterans Day

2011-11-13T19:53:00.004-06:00

This past Friday was Veterans day, a holiday in which we celebrate the sacrifices of those who have served in America’s military. Watching Facebook I saw a lot of tributes to this group of people and let me start by saying that I share the sentiment. Every day there are thousands of Americans who put their very lives on the line to service the needs of our country. These people go to work every day with the knowledge that they may very well get their faces blown off by an IED or be killed or horribly maimed. That’s a claim that very few of us can make. Those who serve in the military are truly selfless individuals who deserve to be praised and honored every day of the year, not just one single day in November.

All that said, the idea that any of that is necessary at all is complete bullshit. On one hand I respect immensely that people are willing to do that. It takes a hell of a lot of guts to put everything you have in jeopardy every time you put your boots on in the morning. On the other hand, it makes me utterly sick that in this day and age our government is still so backwards and unsophisticated that it requires that people fight and die to support its strategy on the world stage. Every American soldier who comes home without a hand (or a face) represents the failure of the U.S. government to do its job. Surely in this day and age diplomacy must rule first and foremost. Only when the statesmen fail to do their jobs properly must we resort to the abomination of war, physical intervention in some remote area.

So on this Sunday after Veterans day, I say simply, thank you. Thank you for all that you do. Thank you for what you put on the line every day. But it’s a complete fucking shame that you have to do it. If our politicians weren’t such utter fucking failures, you would all be safe at home, every single one of you, warm and comfortable by the sides of the ones you love. Your deaths lay heavily on the failures and the egos of the American political system. The sooner that the United States can take its right and proper position in the world, the sooner you will come home safely. I honor the veterans of America’s wars, but I hope for a day when they will be an extinct species, a relic of a bygone and obsolete age.

On the Stock Market

2011-10-31T20:31:00.002-05:00

So, a while back I invested some money in the stock market. Not in a mutual fund mind you but in pick a single stock and hang on type schenario. I was alive in the ninties so I have this pervasive mental image that money invested in stocks is like planting a money tree in the back yard. You put $5 in and before you know it, $57.67 has grown in its place. I still remember in my college days thinking, “Boy, if I only had some money I’d really invest in that eBay place!” I remember watching the stock tick gradually up and up and up and up and split and split and split until I was woozy with the math of how much my $10 then would be worth today. OK, it’s only $166, but still. That’s 4.5% interest! I’m sure I would have sold in 2004 when it peaked. Not…

As I sit here today looking at the returns, on one hand I’m happy. I bought in a fairly severe dip in the markets. My Walmart stock is up 11.02% in a month! Microsoft, up 6.5%. Starbucks, up 6.4% in three weeks! Great returns, right? Fuck no. The whole market, on average, was up 12%! Even my absolute best pick, Walmart, suffered worse than the Dow Jones and NASDAQ, both mindless conglomerations of companies that managed 12% gains in the period of a 30 days. God damn. That’s a lot of wasted effort to do WORSE than the average of just a bunch of companies thrown into a bucket.

Every single day I watch the markets hour by hour. One day they’re up and one day they’re down. Today my portfolio was down 1.91%. The Dow was down 2.26%, a miniscule gain. Tomorrow, I’m willing to bet that my portfolio, in obedience to the oscillating markets at large, will be up by about the same margin. This blind zombie obedience makes me regularly consider selling off my entire list of stocks just to buy some index fund. On many levels, I wonder what in the WORLD the point is. Unless I’m smart… impossibly smart and ahead of those MILLIONS of investors trying to do the same thing, I’m just gambling. If I drop $1,000 into Akorn, I might make more than the Dow or I might lose it all in a day. Who knows? I’m not sure any of it is worth the risk. Tomorrow I will sit and hit the refresh button every hour or so and watch my money go up….. (hopefully) and inevitably go down…. All based on the whims and speculations of millions of other investors who are influenced by random stories on the radio or a single internet speculation. Who can compete with that? Not me. I’m just gambling. It’s like slot machines with one-share minimum.

Random Thoughts for Halloween 2011

2011-10-31T19:20:00.004-05:00

As I sit here alone in my third-floor apartment on Halloween night in 2011, I realize that lately I’ve been on a renewed search for a sense of purpose. Of course that search has been blunted by as much rum as I can cram into the refrigerator but even the thick blanket of Sailor Jerry cannot completely suffocate the part of my brain that calls out for something meaningful to do with my life. As I look around the apartment (which, it should be noted, is 77 degrees today even with the windows open because of the ambient heat leaking up from my poorly-insulated neighbors) I see the evidence of many of my previous attempts to have some meaning to the world. They’re like little tombstones to the hopes of a person who only really wanted to be someone…

Between my elbows rests “The New Middle Eastern Cookbook” and yesterday saw the first-time preparation of three new recipes. Fish with Chermoula sauce was divine (p187) with the aptly named “Rice to Accompany Fish” (p 342) and Kousa Mabshoura (p 287). They were all tasty and well worth having again. They gave me a peek into the foods of other cultures and made me a more knowledgeable and efficient customer when next I venture to order food at an Iranian restaurant. The experience added to the sum total of what it is to be “Rob” but ultimately, they’re meaningless in the grand scheme.

Looking left, I see the Jared Diamond book I’ve almost finished. It goes on in much detail about the intimate practices of various species and describes how those practices relate to human practices in the bedroom. For the most part, it’s all fairly cliché and material that I’ve either concluded on my own or read in other literature. It’s all very edifying in its way and adds to the sum total of what it is to be “Rob” but ultimately, it too is meaningless.

Peering further across the room I see the book on Islam. It was very edifying and I still swear that I’ll finish its summary at some point. It will, I’m sure, be an interesting period in my life to look back on. It too adds, but ultimately it’s meaningless.

Today I worked another day at work. I slogged through the same relatively inane garbage that really does fail to challenge me in any way. My job is far too easy and despite the fact that we really do a wonderful service to our customers, that too is meaningless in the grand scheme of things.

If you add up all the pieces of a person’s life, one by one and end to end, how can you determine their actual worth? How many pieces and parts add up to a meaningful whole? On measure, no individual item that I have ever undertaken seems to add up to a hill of beans in the world. No one picture I’ve ever taken has ever inspired anyone. Nothing I’ve written has ever made a difference in anyone’s life. No line of code or documentation that I wrote in my professional life ever really mattered one damn bit in the grand scheme of the universe. Taken in this light, my life is a waste. Time ticked ploddingly past one grain of sand at a time with no one to notice or to care.

But I like to think that taken as a whole, my life has great meaning. Perhaps that funny turn of phrase that I shared in the hallway rolls around in a co-worker’s mind long after I’m gone. Maybe that smile I shared with a stranger in a crowded store turned around some part of their day. Perhaps my whole body of work, everything I’ve done over the past four decades of my life has inspired SOMEONE or made someone think or smile or love or laugh.

This is the battle that rages in my head. As I sit here by myself I think back upon all the things that I have most definitely NOT done in my life. I am no great man. I am flawed and lazy and in error and utterly a mess in many small ways and in many big ones. But at the same time I am devoted and passionate and caring and above all I really do give a damn. I hardly ever say the right thing but I am dogged and determined enough that I will try, again and again, until I find it. What I lack in skill I make up for in raw and unadulterated tenacity. I am a small and ferocious dog with almost impossibly dull teeth. It is with the balm of these words that I sooth myself from the ache of the “am nots” that roll so fluidly and effortlessly from my mind. I am not great. I am not wise. I am not powerful. But I will be there after everyone else is gone. I’m not the most fun or giddy guest at the party, but I am the one who will help you with the dishes after everyone else is gone.

Unpopular Opinions - Dan Wheldon

2011-10-23T19:11:00.000-05:00

Generally speaking, my fits of writing tend to begin with writing about something that is exceptionally unpopular. This particular topic is likely to earn me more heat than most but I can’t help but feel that I don’t really care very much…

Driving back from Lafayette today I heard a protracted WIBC story about Dan Weldon. They went on at length about what a shame it was that he was killed and I don’t disagree. When people die, it sucks. From everything the news reporter had to say, he was a nice guy: involved in his community, great father, great husband, all the usual stuff. That’s wonderful. More people should aspire to such a position in life. I was right on board with them until they suggested that listeners should contribute to the trust fund for his family. Excuse me? Perhaps I didn’t hear properly?

During his racing career, Dan Wheldon has earned $14,612,570. The median annual household income in Indiana is $45,424. When I think that the local radio station is suggesting that households that make 1/300th as much as Dan Wheldon send his family money it quite frankly turns my stomach. Seriously? Was Wheldon’s death a tragedy? Yes, by all means. I hate to see anyone lose their life in pursuit of their job. But for the love of all that’s good, do not send this millionaire’s family any money. If you feel the need to help someone, why not give to the many millions of families who don’t have enough money to even fulfill their basic needs.

All too often I think that in this country we confuse grief with actual need. Wheldon’s family is hurting emotionally. They lost a loving father and husband. I feel for them. However, that doesn’t mean that they need the financial outpourings of people across the country. If you feel the need to help people who are REALLY hurting, how about donating time or money to the local homeless shelter? How about helping people who really need it? There are families all around us who can’t buy food or the basic necessities of life. Wheldon’s death is a tragedy, but there are so many better ways that your money could be spent.

Personal: Echoes of Solitude

2011-09-21T20:07:00.003-05:00

I have, as of late, avoided posts of a personal nature. In part, I think that’s because I’ve tended to have a less public venue for my personal outpourings and in part it’s just damn embarrassing. Both for me and for my readers because honestly, who wants to read someone’s innermost struggles online? I know I do, but then I’m all about figuring out how people work.

At any rate, as I sit here looking about this apartment on a Wednesday night I’m struck by the need to be doing something. I don’t mean walking about by myself in Zionsville in the dark taking night photos. I don’t mean sitting reading a book. I’ve found as time goes on that I need people. People are really important to me and yet in some bizarre way I have the damnedest time relating to them. I am, if we must be utterly honest, terrified of people. Well, amend that slightly. I’m terrified of people that I don’t have some sort of handle on. People at work are a snap because I have an “in” with them. I can talk about work! What could be more natural than that? Unfortunately, that seems to be just about ALL I can talk about at work.

For example, one of my coworkers is leaving our company soon and it was announced today. I sent him a short missive that said, in a nutshell, how much I appreciated the work he had done and that one of the things that I really admired about him was the fact that he managed to really get things done but also forged personal bonds with people. He’s just an amazingly nice guy and people can sense that and appreciate it. Meanwhile, I’m off in the corner just sort of working away and I suspect that people think of me as “Rob, that guy that does the work” but it ends at that. My coworker is real. He’s human. People like him and relate to him. I feel most days like I’m just a drone. I come in, I’m good at what I do and then after the work day ends I vanish (unless there’s an emergency support call). For the most part people don’t know how to really relate to me. It’s clearly not their fault, but I can’t help but feel that there’s some part of me that’s missing. That they try to connect and all there is in response is empty air.

Anyway, my personality dysfunctions aside, I was reflecting tonight on my situation and realized that my feelings of isolation, as they always are, are self-induced or at the least a function of my anthropophobic tendencies. It is not that life does not throw ample opportunity at me for social interaction but much more that I simply fail to grasp it. For example, let’s just look at the calendar for the next several days. Tomorrow the Center for Inquiry has an event going on that sounds pretty interesting: “The Dark side of the Sacred.” If that doesn’t scream, “Rob Slaven come see this!!” I don’t know what the hell does. Friday through Sunday morning I have my girls over so that’s certainly accounted for. Sunday afternoon I have an Ultimate Frisby (whatever the hell THAT means) invite that I should not ignore. Monday I have photography class where I will sit quietly in the corner and fearfully not really participate. (Yes, I realize that anyone reading this from my workplace will be totally agog at the idea of me sitting quietly anywhere.) Tuesday I can go to a classic movies discussion. (assuming I can find and see the subject movie by that time). Wednesday I can…. Well. Hrm. Not much going on Wednesday. Perhaps I’ll relax that day… anyway, point is that there’s SO much crap going on. There is absolutely NO excuse to be sitting here on my own. The whole world teems with ideas and activity for those willing to partake of them…

It really is funny, in an odd sort of way, that someone who seeks so vehemently the company and friendship of others is so incapable (scratch that, not incapable, but inherently unskilled in) of taking advantage of all that the vast society around him has to offer. In times of more assiduous reflection, it seems clear that society would welcome my contributions if only I were more readily capable of producing them and making them clear to those around me. Sadly, this tiny and ill-heard forum is insufficient to bridge that gap. One voice crying out in the forest is far from sufficient. The voice will have to take to its legs and go forth unto the people. And once there, proclaim itself to be appreciated…

Book Notes: St. Thomas Aquinas on Politics and Ethics

2011-09-19T09:14:00.001-05:00

Below, find my observations as I read Norton's selection of St. Thomas Aquinas on Politics and Ethics. The topics discussed are entirely outside the realm of my current expertise and so I reserve the right to falter, fail and downright err in my attempts to assimilate and summarize the text. You'll also no doubt note that my writing style is faulty and at times illegible due to the complete lack of familiarity with the topic. Parties wishing to correct my interpretation, grammar or content are welcome to do so. Parties wishing to argue about the nuances of Thomist theology should find a more worthy opponent with whom to test their expertise.

St. Thomas Aquinas on Politics and Ethics

Norton Critical Editions

Life of St. Thomas - Timeline

1225 - Born near Naples

1244 - Joins to Dominican order but is imprisoned for a year by his family as they are disappointed in his choice. They preferred he become a Benedictine.

1259 - 1264 - Writes 'Summa Contra Gentiles'; an aid to help missionaries in their work to convert Muslims and Jews in Spain and North Africa.

1265 - Writes 'On Kingship' for the youthful new king of Cyprus

1266 - 1272 - Writes 'Summa Theologiae', an introduction to the Dominican theology for novice members

1274 - Died after striking his head on an overhanging tree branch

1323 - Canonized

Introduction

Saint Thomas' primary contribution to history was to integrate the newly discovered and seemingly contradictory teachings of Aristotle into the theological teachings of his day. Because Aristotle's teachings ran contrary to long-standing church teachings they were banned in 1215. The ban was re-affirmed in 1231 but a few short years later the logic of Aristotle's arguments was irresistible and by 1255 he had become required reading.

Thomas' use of the scholastic approach allowed complex philosophical problems to be broken down via rational debate. Where previously issues of governance and morals were resolved by attempts to extract answers directly from interpretation of Biblical texts, with Thomas we see the evolution of the use of natural law or reason as an extension of Biblical teachings. The belief that man's natural reason is all part of God's plan for the world is key to Thomas' work. "Grace does not destroy nature, but completes it." he writes. The grace of God and the knowledge of Jesus' sacrifice does not contradict our observations of the world around us but instead caps it nicely by wrapping up the lose ends that human reason is too feeble to resolve. Man can know some part of God's divine plan by use of his intellect but can never know God completely. Where knowledge ends faith must begin. For Thomas, reason was simply another path to God, not one of self-deception as St. Augustine argued.

Summa Contra Gentiles

In Summa Contra Gentiles Thomas argues about the fundamental properties of God and the universe. God, he argues, cannot be entirely understood by application of human reason. Using the human senses to know God is like knowing an object merely by the shape of it's shadow. One can demonstrate logically that God exists, that God is one and eternal but the deeper mysteries of God, such as the fact that he is simultaneously 1 and yet also 3, are impenetrable to logic. Though it is possible to know something of God by argument alone, few men do so. Most are distracted by earthly concerns, not mentally capable of the pursuit or merely too lazy. But the knowledge is there for anyone who seeks it; reasoning and logic, derived as they are from God himself, will never contradict faith and truth. It cannot be emphasized enough, however, that no matter how diligently we may seek or reason, the final step to knowing God must be an act of faith. Reason alone will not give us all the answers.

Thomas goes on to compare humans' relationship with the divine to an oyster's relationship to a plant. The oyster represents the very lowest of the animal forms and as such is only slightly separated from a plant. In the same way, humans, supreme among the animals, are only slightly separated from the angels above them in the great 'Chain of Being.' Man, as ruler of the animals has only his soul to separate him from his baser counterparts. While all animals outstrip man in some manner (some are faster, stronger, better hunters) man dominates them all in that he has a soul and can partake of the ultimate happiness, the contemplation of God. While communion with God is the greatest joy possible to mankind this is never without an accompaniment of sorrow or distraction. No man is without suffering until he reaches his ultimate reward. The soul needs the human flesh to help it derive knowledge from the substance of the world around it but this flesh comes with a price, constant suffering while man lives on Earth. Only the divine light of God can teach the soul directly without the need for a human form.

All the acts of man, no matter how base-seeming, come about as the fulfillment of natural appetite. Since nature tends always towards the good and optimal all acts are good though that good may be of a strictly local nature. If a man should kill another man, it would be for the benefit of himself. Whether this should benefit society in general is another argument altogether but in the context of murderer alone the act is a good one. Similarly, all intellectual acts bring us closer to God. No matter what we seek the only truth in the universe is God himself and when we approach truth by any path we approach God. If we should derive pleasure from any act we commit it should be noted that this is merely a byproduct and not the goal to be achieved. Pleasure is never an end in and of itself but instead merely a sensation that signals that we have completed some more important goal.

On Kingship

On Kingship illuminates Thomas' views on the best manner of government. This text was started for the King of Cyprus in 1265 but Thomas did not, in fact, ever finish this work as the young King was killed not long after it was started. Another writer completed the text afterwards. Thomas argues emphatically that the best form of government is a Monarchy. A single ruler, he says, is not burdened with differing viewpoints. A benevolent monarch can move quickly to serve the needs of his people without the need to consult anyone else. While private concerns of the citizens work to divide the community the king's role is to guide the people to focus on the public goals that bind them together. It is this act of uniting his people in peace that is the ruler's first and most important responsibility. Because this is the first goal, it can obviously be done most efficiently by only one man. No appearance of dissent is possible if all the decisions stem from a single individual. Nature also demonstrates to the superiority of a single leader. Thomas points out that the body is ruled by a single organ, the brain. The universe is ruled by a single God and even bees are guided by a single 'king' bee as he refers to it. Lastly, a government ruled by many, no matter how seemingly benevolent, is more likely to devolve into tyranny. If a group rules then it becomes increasingly likely that at least one of them is corrupt and thirsts for more power and may overthrow the others.

While a king is the best form of government a tyrant is the worst. As the king works for the benefit of the ruled the tyrant works only for the benefit of himself. A tyrannical monarch is worse than any form of government in which many rule since he works in the interest of only himself while a oligarchy at least works for the benefit of a select handful of people. A tyrant also drives the virtuous from his kingdom. Any who excel in a society ruled by tyranny represent a threat to the status quo and are quickly forced to either leave or act against the king. Men will still labor to support a just king but a tyrant brings out the best in no one around him.

A relatively benign tyrant can be better than a particularly oppressive oligarchy, Thomas concludes. A tyrant only steals for his own benefit but an oligarchy may go so far as to spur a war or in the best case steal for the needs of many more individuals. Once established, a tyrant should not be removed except by the united rebellion of those he rules. It is thought by many that simply assassinating the despot will resolve the government's problems but often is it found that another even worse tyrant simply replaces the first. Since this new ruler is keenly aware of the delicate position he holds his reign will be even more oppressive. If the ruled cannot unite strongly enough to depose their ruler then their only valid course is to appeal to God himself. It is better to suffer an unjust ruler than to act unjustly in deposing him as God sometimes uses such rulers to punish the sinful.

A king who wishes to be just should model his rule after that of God over the universe. Rulers should consider their subjects like parts of their own body and treat them with the same respect. The ultimate goal of the government is to support the people in their own goals: to live virtuous lives and enjoy the divine knowledge of God. The government should recognize the supremacy of the church in all matters since it is the Church which is the best guide of virtue and Godliness.

Summa Theologiae Part 1

In the Summa Theologiae, Thomas takes on some of the stickier theological questions of his day. The format for these answers takes the form of a debate in which the question is posed, objections are raised and then Thomas puts forth his proof. I will boil down these proofs to their key points below.

Does God Exist?

Objections: God cannot exist because a true God would not allow evil to exist in the world. Besides, everything that takes place in nature can as easily be explained without God.

God's existence can be proven in 5 days:

Objects on the Earth and outside it move from the stars to the wind. In order for these things to move there must be someone to move them. This is most assuredly the work of God.
The universe operates on the principle of cause and effect. Everything we see around us has some cause but there is no effect without a cause. This first cause which is required for anything to exist is God.
Objects in the world either exist or they do not. Objects come into being because of other preexisting objects therefore there must be some initial object to have created all others. Again, this first object is God.
To all properties in the universe there is a greatest superlative example. God exist to represent the greatest possible example of 'goodness' and benevolence in the universe.
Nature operates in the optimal way possible for the survival of animals and plants. Just as for the arrow in flight there must be an archer to guide it, so also in order for nature to behave in a rational manner there must be some God to dictate this behavior.

Responds to Objections: God is so utterly powerful that he allows evil to exist so that he may turn it to good. Further, all the acts of God seem rational and explained by other means exactly because God dictates that they behave in a reasonable fashion.

Can we know God in this lifetime by use of reason alone and is it better to know God by reason or by Grace?

Man can learn to know God by the use of his reason but the results will be hollow when compared with that gained by God's grace. The pursuit of God by logic is prone to error since man's reason is subject to the frailty of his senses while God's grace instructs the soul directly.

Does God love all things?

God does love all things and everything is good in God's eyes. God's very love for things makes them good while man's love is contingent on the belief that they are good.

Is the soul a material object? Is the human soul corruptible?

The soul is incorporeal and as such is not corruptible

Should woman have been made in the Original Creation?

Objections: A woman is basically just a defective man so she shouldn't have been made in the first place. This is obvious because she is subject to the rule of the man and this is an indication that she has sinned and is being punished for it.

Woman was made as a "helpmate" to man. Not for helping in the fields but as an aid to procreation. Animals in nature reproduce in the same way and while the woman is concentrating on bringing new life into the world the man can be focused on the first goal of mankind: communion with God.

Responses to Objections: Woman is somewhat defective in her nature but that's what God made her to be. Her duty is to create children and this was as God intended therefore it is good. Also, woman is subject to the rule of man but that's only because man is more endowed with intelligence than woman so it's for her own good that this is so.

If the 'Fall' had never happened, would we still need Kings to lord over us? Would we still have sex?

Man is a social animal so regardless of the circumstances he will require the company of others. Whenever men congregate there will be some who are more intelligent or stronger than others so even if man had never fallen from grace, we would still need leaders to direct the actions of the community. As to sex, male and female were made before the fall so sexual intercourse would still exist. It would be different however in that it would not be tainted by lust. This is not to say that it would be less pleasant however. A moderate man who eats only what he needs enjoys his meal no less than a glutton.

Are there different orders within the hierarchy of angels?

Yes, angels are broken into orders by their function and into three levels: highest, middle, and lowest.

Summa Theologiae Part 2a

In part 2 of the Summa St Thomas pursues a few more questions but for brevity I will reduce the findings to a more comopact form and dispense with the Question and Answer format.

The only happiness that can be found in this life is merely transitory. Man is never truly happy as long as there is more to do and more to find out about and in this life we cannot possibly hope to exclude all suffering and evil. It is only by achieving his primary goal, to know God, that man can achieve happiness. God in his wisdom and mercy gives us tools added to our natural intellect to help us attain this final happiness, they are the theological virtues: faith, hope and charity. It is by exercising these virtues that man can eventually become truly happy.

Just as you would not blame the hand alone for a murder it carried out, so too can one man alone not be blamed for his sins. The body of mankind as a whole is tainted and this is the nature of original sin.

Law is the rule or measure of action or restraint in a man and the first law of all is that of human reason. A law is said to be good if it is oriented towards the common good. To be effective a law requires consensus among the ruled and must be widely known. Effective law also requires that the ruler has the power of compulsion in cases where the law is disobeyed. Unjust law is contrary to divine goodness and should be considered no law at all. There are four types of law:

Eternal law is the law by which God governs the universe, the divine wisdom by which all things are ultimately ruled. Eternal law is a constituent in all other laws.

Natural Law represents the manner in which man behaves according to the Eternal Law. These laws are the same for all men but are unknown or unfollowed by some. They are also prone to exceptions since they can be changed or exceptions made depending on the situation or the will of God. Natural Laws fall into three basic categories: those laws which preserve life (prohibitions on murder, suicide), that knowledge shared in common with the animals (sex, education of children), knowledge of how we can become closer to God.

Divine Law is the word of God given to us in the form of Scripture. Divine law serves four purposes. First, to aid man to reach beyond the Natural law towards his own salvation. Secondly, to correct human laws where they may err. Third, to judge those things which cannot be judged by man's sense of the world around him. Lastly, to tie up any loose ends that are unenforceable in the course of a normal human lifetime (such as punishing suicides who would otherwise be beyond the reach of civil authority).

Finally, Human law is constructed by man and derived from Natural Laws as an aid to the young and the weak who might not otherwise observe those laws. The purpose of human laws is not to suppress all human vice, this would be impossible to enforce. Rather, those infractions which would diminish the social order are focused on. Even those who are outside the enforceable realm of human law are subject to it as God will sit in judgment of even Kings who violate it. Over time, Human Law evolves and exceptions are made but changes should only happen with the support of the ruled and in cases when the risk of changing a long-held belief is small compared to the benefit derived from the change. In many cases, local custom has the force of law even when it is not formally codified. The best way to administer Human Law is through a single ruler and a council of elders much like Moses and the council of 72 elders. Human Laws fall into two basic categories. Firstly, those laws which are common to all nations and from which there is no dispensation. These laws are derived directly from the Natural Laws.

Secondly, laws which are derived less directly from the Natural Laws merely for the convenience of the of the community.

Most importantly, it should be noted that no system of laws, no matter how constructed or how closely adhered to can make a man truly good. Only the Grace of God can bring man to the level of true goodness.

Summa Theologiae Part 2b

Those who never believed in the salvation offered by Jesus Christ (primarily the Jews and the Muslims) should should not be physically compelled to believe since this would not actually do any good anyway. Heretics, apostates, and any others who stand in the way of the faith can be removed by any means necessary as these threaten the viability of the faith. The faithful should also not associate with unbelievers, especially those weak in faith. Others may associate with them only if there is hope of conversion and the rituals of unbelievers are not to be tolerated unless that tolerance directly serves to advance the cause of conversion. Further, the children of unbelievers are not to be baptized against the will of the parents until such time as they reach the age of reason. In extreme cases, heretics may be killed but only after being given the chance to renounce their heretical views.

War is not in and of itself a sin. If waged for a just cause and in a just manner war is an acceptable means of advancing the cause of the faith or removing an tyrannical ruler. In all cases of violence, however, the benefit must be weighed against the costs of the disruption to the common peace. Similarly, it is just to murder a criminal if that murder benefits the public good but this must be undertaken by the ruler of a community and not by its private citizens. Killing in self defense is not considered murder as long as it is proportionate to the risk of doing nothing. In such cases, the intent of the killer is paramount. If the intent was to murder then so should the action be adjudged. In the same way accidental killing is not considered murder except in the case where gross negligence caused the death. In that case, regardless of intent, the ruling shall be that of murder. Finally, in the case of the death of an infant before it's birth, it shall be considered murder if the pregnancy is more than 40 days old (in the case of a male) or 80 days old (in the case of a female).

Suicide is a mortal sin for three reasons. Firstly, the act of suicide is contrary to the natural law of self preservation. Secondly, the destruction of a member of a community is harmful to that community so the act is also one against the common good. Lastly, suicide is an infringement on the sole jurisdiction of life and death that belongs to God.

It is within man's natural rights to own objects as his own private property. In this way he is best able to care for those objects as he has a sense of ownership and pride. However, with that ownership comes the responsibility to share that objects in a time of need. A man may rightly steal if he is in dire need so the right of ownership is secondary to that of necessity. A man may also sell his objects for a profit without fear of committing a sin but it is a sin against nature to charge interest on the use of money itself since nothing is bought or sold in the transaction.

It is natural that inferiors obey their superiors in life but a slave may never be commanded in contradiction to orders given by a greater superior (ie, God). A superior can also not command outside the realm of his dominion. Specifically, a master may command the body but the mind is beyond his reach. It should also be noted that faith in Christ does not release us from our duty to secular authority.

In no case is lying acceptable even in cases where a another sin may be averted by use of a falsehood. Instead, it is recommend that one simply avoid giving a direct response.

The act of drinking is not a mortal sin unless the intention is to actually become drunk. Drinking to drunkenness deprives man of his natural reason which directs him to act virtuously.

Virginity, although contrary to the natural law of procreation, is not a sin if it is done so as to free one for more time to contemplate the divine. The opposite extreme, that of promiscuity, however, is a mortal sin as it works against the proper rearing of children. The mere act of kissing and embracing is merely a venial sin but those of masturbation, bestiality, sodomy and 'sex using the wrong organs' is against nature and constitute mortal sins.

Summa Theologiae Part 3

Christ is the head of all mankind though in differing degrees:

1. Christ is head of those united to him in heaven

2. Christ is head of those united to him in love (those not currently in a state of mortal sin)

3. Christ is head of those united to him in faith

4. Christ is head of those who have not yet united with him but who are predestined to before their deaths.

5. Christ is head of those who will never be united with him and who will separate from him utterly upon their deaths.

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Books: How to Work a Room

2011-09-18T23:01:00.000-05:00

Extracted from a 2007 post that had some other garbage in it that had nothing to do with the book.

I started reading a book in the vicinity of this day. It's completely out of character as it's called, "How to work a Room." Yeah, yeah. Get back on your chair. After 50 pages I'd gleaned a couple of useful facts. By 100 pages I was just about ready to tear the book in half just to guarantee that one copy of this bullshit out of the millions available would not poison another impressionable mind. Anyway, let's start with the good and useful things I was told. Yes, I know, they're obvious but I'm not sure anyone had told me these things specifically:

* If you go to a party and you're uncomfortable, then other people are too. When I mentioned this to my wife she reminded me of the July 4th party I 'ruined' about 13 months ago. It went something like this. We went to some distant friend's house where we were in company of several other people who were good friends with the hostess. They all sat about drinking heavily, talking about nothing and I sat quietly and waited for the party to end. This, apparently, was enough to ruin the party and it certainly ruined my attitude for the rest of the day. The lesson learned here is a simple one I think. If you're not enjoying yourself then just leave so you don't screw it up for everyone else. Fair enough.

* 93% of people in the world consider themselves shy. I think most of the time that I consider myself shy but really I'm not. If you wander into a topic that I know something about, I will talk incessantly and I'm always blabbering on about my innermost thoughts on here so I'm certainly not shy about talking when I have something to say. The important bit here though is that the hard part for most people is approaching others. So, if you approach them then you've done 90% of the work and you can go about the conversation. Amusingly, evidence for this was right at hand. I often talk to people at random in stores or whatever and people almost always react positively to what I have to say so people want to talk to you. People are, in general, ready to have a conversation. The key is getting over that initial hurdle and breaking down the initial barrier between people. Now that, I think I can try to do more effectively. At this point, I can't imagine people will think me any MORE of an ass no matter what I say so I have that going for me. The down side here is that I typically just DON'T have anything to say on most of the common topics of conversation. You want to talk about the science or mathematics or literature or computing or religion then I'm your man. Let's set a date. You want to talk about what diet Cher's on or what happened on American Idol last night.... um, no, not so much.

* People can sense what your real intentions are so you can't schmooze just to get something. Now this, I thought, was a damn interesting little tidbit and hopefully true. The author tells bits about how she's gotten all sorts of random perquisites from her smoozing. Tickets to shows, free crap, discounts, etc because of some incident she had in an elevator. That's all well and good and a nice thing to look forward to I suppose but really just random gravy. What I guess pisses me off most is that there are people out there who have to be told, "just don't do this to take advantage of people" while I sit here on my own with absolutely nothing going on. It's damn frustrating to try to put yourself out there for people and get blank stares in return. I take cookies across the street to the old couple at Christmas but I'm not even sure they eat them. I'd be happy to help the neighbors get their yard in order so maybe they could sell their house but they won't even acknowledge my greetings. We're just such isolationists in this country. Either that or I'm just too damn scary. Whatever the case it's annoying. It's not that I WANT to get a call at 4 a.m. from some friend who has a major problem but it would at least be nice if that were a possibility.

So the first 50 pages went about like that. I was relatively upbeat on the whole process but it was clear that the book was geared for sales types which I most definitely am NOT a sales type. Then we start getting into the 'how' phase. How to make contacts and break the ice and get the free flow of information going. Sounds good doesn't it?

* The book recommends practicing a self-introduction. OK. Here's the best one I could think of:

**** Hi! I'm Rob! Now, I'm only here as part of a court-order. 'Socialization re-adjustment phase' of my parole they call it. Anyway, when we gone done talking there are some forms the judge would like you to fill out if you could.... Ma'am? Where are you...

* Practice your smalltalk. Look through the news and find 2 or 3 interesting stories and read them so you'll be prepared. Read People magazine so you can be aware of all the latest goings on.

It was at this point, that I measured the book to see if it could fit down the toilet. So basically, the key to successful smalltalk is to go read something you wouldn't ordinarily so that perhaps you'll have something to say that people might find interesting. Well I'm sorry but that's just a bunch of horse shit. If the idea of socializing with other people requires me to read fvcking People magazine then I'll just sit quietly and leave when I think it's no longer rude to do so. What the hell kind of lasting relationship is based on that sort of? Am I going to have to read People magazine every week/month/whatever for the rest of my life to sustain such a relationship? I'm looking for people to be friends with, to have interesting conversations with. Not sell them stool softener and rubber cane tips.

The first person to express a desire for this book gets it. Assuming, of course, that they can catch it as I hurl it at them.

* Books: Lost Languages: The Enigma of the World's Undeciphered Scripts

2011-09-18T21:33:00.002-05:00

Introduction
Writing evolved about 4000 B.C. due to the need to store accounting information. Farmer A had to know how many things Farmer B had given him so he wrote some symbols that looked like cows and some lines representing numbers and from there writing evolved into what we have today. Even thousands of years later, most of the texts found boil down to basic accounting.

As writing systems evolved, they became less pictographic and more symbolic. Rather than draw a picture of a cow a farmer might draw a rebus that represents the sounds in the verbal word for cow. Then even the rebus symbols became abstracted until a proper alphabet was developed.

Ferdinand de Saussure - "Thought is one side of the sheet and sound the reverse side. Just as it is impossible to take a pair of scissors and cut out one side of the paper without at the same time cutting the other, so it is impossible to isolate sound from thought or thought from sound."

Egyptian Hieroglyphics
Deciphered in 1823 by Jean-Francois Champollion. For centuries even the Greeks had been mistranslating Egyptian Hieroglyphics (Greek for "Sacred Writings") assuming they were pictographs as did more modern translators. Champollion finally cracked the real meaning using the Rosetta stone, a 3/4 ton slab of rock found in 1799 by Napolean's army. The stone which describes an agreement between priests and Ptolemy V Epiphanes, a thirteen-yeary-old newly-crowned Pharaoh in which they'll offer their support for the new ruler for certain unspecified privileges. Good to know some things never change. The stone was written in Greek, Egyptian Hieroglyphics and Demotic (the language of common Egyptians.) As it turns out, Hieroglyphics are both pictographic and phonetic (each symbol can represent an idea or perhaps a sound.)

Linear B
The first examples of Linear B were discovered in Crete in 1900 by Arthur Evans. It was written around 1450 B.C. in clay tablets and comprised mostly of inventory lists. Evans kept the finds to himself for the most part in hopes that he could decipher them. It was not until after his death that they were published and translated by Michael Ventris. Evans believed the tablets to encode a lost Minoan language but as it turns out they represented ancient Greek.

Mayan Glyphs
Only four books (bark paper with jaguar skin covers) survived the Spanish conquistadors who burned Mayan artifacts as works of Satan. The longest is the Dresden Codex which folds out to 12 feet in length. Until the 1970s, Mayan Glyphs weren’t even considered writing. When they eventually were decoded they bespoke of a warlike people who were overly obsessed with hallucinogenic enemas and astronomy. Their calendar was complex sporting 18 named months of 20 days plus a single month of only 5 days. The workings of their calendar are well understood and allow the exact dating of several Mayan artifacts. The Mayan calendar begins on August 13th 3114 B.C. and ends on December 23rd 2012 leading some to believe this date represents the end of the world. The script would have been indecipherable except that in 1547 Fray Diego de Landa wrote down a partial rendering of their alphabet with pronunciations. That in combination with existing Mayan spoken languages has allowed interpretation of existing manuscripts.

Meroitic Script
The Meroitic civilization thrived along the Nile where Sudan is today. In 712 B.C. they conquered Egypt to become the 25th Dynasty. The Egyptians later repelled the invaders and subsequent Pharaohs carefully removed evidence of the outside rulers. By the first century A.D. the Meroitic civilization had evaporated leaving behind its undecipherable writings. Only 26 written words have been translated despite the discovery of some loosely translated documents written both in Egyptian and Meroitic.

The Etruscan Alphabet
Located in what is now Tuscany, the Etruscans are credited with bringing the Greek alphabet to the attention of Rome. The spoken Etruscan language is extinct and apparently bore no resemblance to any modern tongue. The Etruscans were highly literate and borrowed their alphabet from 8th century B.C. Greece. About 13,000 examples of Etruscan are known with 4,000 of those being graffiti or fragments of inscriptions. Of those, only about 250 words have been deciphered, mostly numbers and terms used later by Latin authors.

Most abundant among the artifacts are about 3,000 bronze mirrors bearing engraved pictures and brief Etruscan inscriptions. The Zagreb Mummy was wrapped in an older Etruscan linen religious text of about 1,200 words. The Tabula Cartonensis was found in 1992 and bears 200 Etruscan words. The artifact appears to be a contract for the sale or lease of land.

Linear A

Linear A was used in Crete between 1750 and 1450 B.C. and was believed for some years to be the ancestor of Linear B. As it turns out, it was used before Linear B and in many of the same areas but is not related. Only about 1,500 examples exist totaling about 7,500 characters. Linear A has been found throughout Greece and as far away as Israel. Emmett Bennett Jr. worked out the numerical system of Linear A in 1950 but the bulk of the written language is still undeciphered.

The Proto-Elamite Script
Used between 3050 and 2900 B.C. in what is now Western Iran, Proto-Elamite is the oldest known undeciphered writing system. Despite the fact that 1,500 examples have been found containing over 100,000 characters, only the numeric system has been translated. The primary difficulty in decoding the writings stems from the relative lack of variety. The vast majority of items are simple accounting records. Like other languages, the numbering system has been worked out along with a few simple words and it seems that counting was done in base 10 when counting people or workers but base 6 was used for counting grain products.

Rongo-Rongo
Rongo-Rongo is the only written language of Polynesia and was used solely by the inhabitants of the isolated Easter Island. Rongo-Rongo is written in reverse-boustrophedon, meaning the writing proceeds from left to write on the object, and then the object is turned 180 degrees and writing proceeds again from left to right on the opposite end. Writing continues until the two lines of text converge in the middle of the piece. Only 25 wood carvings survive from the island carrying a total of 14,000-17,000 characters.

The island was discovered in 1722 and later claimed by the Spanish in 1770. At that time, the local chiefs were asked to sign a treaty with the Spanish and they did so using pictograms but did NOT use the Rongo-Rongo language. When Captain Cook arrived in 1774 he reported no signs of a written language whatsoever; for this reason and others some speculate that the language developed only after contact with the west. In 1864 when Peru raided the island for slaves the written language seemed to be dying. By the time missionaries arrived in 1869, their attempts to save the language by asking the islanders to read the markings aloud were unsuccessful. Subsequent attempts similarly failed but it is believed by some that the language may not be in fact a complete writing system but instead a system of mnemonics to aid local leaders in remembering oral histories and genealogies.

The Zapotec & Isthmian Scripts
Zapotec is the oldest known script of the new world, used from 600 B.C. to 800 A.D. About 1200 inscribed objects survive but only 570 are indisputably writing. No apparent relationship with Mayan scripts from the same area but it is clear that the Zapotec originated the calendar system used by the Mayans though the Mayans improved upon it significantly.

Isthmian script is scarcer with only about 600 total characters discovered so far. The artifacts themselves are unusual:

* In 1902 a jade statuette was discovered in a field in Olmec. It depicts a man dressed as a duck and includes about 70 written characters. Included is a date of 162 A.D.
* In 1986 a 4-ton basalt stone was found a La Mojarra. The stone was 8x5 ft and contained a stunning carving of a prince and 400-500 written characters. This item was dated 143 and 156 A.D. Several decipherments of this item have been published but all are highly suspect.

The Indus Script
At it’s height between 2500 and 1900 B.C. the Indus Valley Civilization covered much of Pakistan and N.W. India. It had maritime trading as far away as the Persian Gulf and Mesopotamia and was larger than either it’s Egyptian or Mesopotamian rivals. Over 1500 sites have been found, 5 of them major cities. Yet when Alexander the Great traveled in the area in 326 B.C. all he found were abandoned villages.

3,700 inscribed items have been found with 60% being seal stones containing very brief inscriptions. The longest inscription found is 26 characters with most less than 4. Since so little is known about the people or culture of the area at the time, all that can be said with certainty is that the reading order is right to left and the language seems to be made up of 400-450 distinct signs.

The Phaistos Disc
The enigmatic Phaistos Disc is unique. No other written example of this language exists and therefore it’s thought by many to be a fake. Discovered in Crete in 1908 in the Palace Ruins at Phaistos, this 6.5 inch diameter disc dates from 1850 to 1600 B.C. It contains 242 characters demarcated into 61 groups. The text is written along the outside edge and spirals inward and rather than being marked in the clay with a stylus the signs are actually stamped into the clay making it the first ‘printed’ document. The disc includes several scribal ‘corrections’ which many believe lends credence to its authenticity. Its uniqueness seems to lend credence to the theory that it is not of Cretan origin but has also acted to bring out all manner of crackpots who believe it to be an extraterrestrial artifact of some sort.

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Islam: The Straight Path – John L. Esposito [1998] – Chapter 3: Religious Life – Belief and Practice (Pt 3)

2011-09-16T23:35:00.001-05:00

A single pronouncement of the phrase, “I divorce you” was sufficient to divorce a wife though there was a requisite three month waiting period before the act was final. The delay was intended to assure that the wife wasn’t with child before the dissolution.
Similarly, three pronouncements of the phrase in three consecutive months would actuate a legal separation. Once the final month had passed the act was final and the couple could not remarry unless the wife married someone else first and consummated that relationship.
Lastly, and most problematically, the husband can merely declare three times in immediate succession and the divorce is final and immediate. This is seen as antithetical to the Quran which admonishes husbands to wait three months for the reasons stated in method one above.

The other Muslim tradition most familiar to Westerners is the hijub, or chader, the wearing of burqa and veils to hide all but the eyes and hands of women. While not strictly prescribed by Islam, this tradition acquired from conquered Persian and Byzantine lands does fulfill the Quranic requirement to “speak from behind a screen and be modest.” Unfortunately, this tradition combined with the purdah, or seclusion of women, has had a vast and deleterious impact on women themselves. This separation from the outside world has in some cases left them ignorant even of their duties to God.

Popular Religion

Islam has in its history also enjoyed a wide variety of variation in practice. As we’ve seen in earlier sections, Muslim adherence ranges extremely literal to much more relaxed. At the end of Chapter 3 our author introduces us to the Sufi. The Sufi are Muslim mystics much like traditional western monks. They lived isolated ascetic lifestyles in an attempt to connect directly with God. By blocking out all worldly distractions they hope to be directly and personally inspired. In 1058, Abu Hamid al-Ghazuli was born and he was to become to great unifier of the Sufi religion with mainstream Islam. Al-Ghazuli was a successful lecturer until one day he was mysteriously struck mute. In personal anguish at his loss, he retreated into the wilderness and there became a Sufi and thereafter their greatest spokesperson (at least in writing.)

After al-Ghazuli, Sufi practices started to see widespread acceptance. In pursuit of a connection with God, the Sufi practiced four basic methods of self-purification:

Self-denial – poverty, fasting, silence. It was believed that only by stripping away earthly desires and distractions could one come to truly know God.
Repetition of a Mantra – often the Sufi would repeat the names of God hundreds of thousands of times in a sitting
Song and Dance – it was believed that through music one could become intoxicated by the presence of God. The most famous of the Sufi dances is that of the Whirling Dervishes which reenacts the motion of the celestial bodies around the sun(? Would they have had a Heliocentric view of the universe at this time? We’re talking about 1100 AD.)
Veneration of Muhammad and the Sufi saints – it was believed that the saints provided a link between God and mankind

Unfortunately for the Sufi, their methods of worship gradually came to be their undoing. Much of their practices came to be considered heretical and by the 17th century they had become a repressed minority.

Similarly, the Shii also venerate special humans as god-like in the person of the Imams. While the Sunni reject any such notion vehemently, the Shii recognize 14 pure or perfect ones: The prophet and his immediate family along with the 9 Imams. The Imams have their birthdays and death anniversaries celebrated yearly by the Shii faithful.

Another central figure of Shii faith is Prince Husayn who was martyred in the year 680. The town of Kafa called to the Prince to save them from a tyrant. The Prince left Mecca with a procession of only 77 followers but upon his arrival he is greeted by an army of Syrians in the tens of thousands. His small band is quickly overwhelmed but not before the Prince’s brother Hasan killed 3,000 Syrian soldiers single-handedly. As the Prince is making one final charge to the attack he is suddenly called back to his camp where his women await him. While on his way he is attacked by a group of cowardly archers who riddle him with hundreds of arrows. Husayn along with his mother Fatima are held up as elite examples of proper Muslim behavior.

Textual Note: Items in this post are noted in the order they appear in the book. Oddly, this is resulted in a somewhat fragmented presentation of the material. At a later date this will be revised into one longer volume with arranges the information presented in a more topically logical manner.

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Islam: The Straight Path – John L. Esposito [1998] – Chapter 3: Religious Life – Belief and Practice (Pt 2)

2011-09-16T06:20:00.005-05:00

Judges act only to interpret the law, not set precedent for future cases
Two male witnesses are required for any crime. If this is not available then the crime must be sworn to “in front of God”(?) Note: The text is not terribly clear on this point and I’m further unsure how much this applies to modern courts versus traditional ones.
No circumstantial evidence is allowed
No witness cross examination is allowed
Decisions are final with no appeal, though all decisions are reviewed by the Caliph. Note: Again, I’m not sure how much this applies to the modern day, though these courts only deal with matters of religious law rather than smaller civil matters which we’ll get into a bit further along.

The courts enforced the laws with the help of the muhtasib, a religious police force which still exists in some countries (Saudia Arabia, Kuwait and presumably others) and has recently seen a resurgence in others (Pakistan and Iran).

In addition to the Muslim courts, the Grievance Courts were set up to deal with matters of a more civil nature. The only real restriction on the laws for the Grievance Courts is that they must not directly conflict with Sharia. Generally, these courts deal with such matters as taxation, criminal law and business regulation.

The underlying premise of the law in general is that God is the leader and sole legislator of all human action. Islamic law is intended to be absolutely egalitarian without regard to race, creed or social stature. The actions which the law governs fall into two basic categories:

Duties to God – prayer, almsgiving, fasting, etc
Duties to Others – penal, commercial and family law

The Duties to God are represented by what is referred to as the Five Pillars of Islam:

Profession of faith – simply speaking, one must acknowledge that there is one God and that Muhammad is his prophet. The only unforgiveable sin is that of associating God with some other entity (such as Jesus) as this is viewed as polytheistic.
Prayer – Five times a day (dawn, noon, mid-afternoon, dusk and evening), the muezzin, or call to prayer sounds from a mosque and Muslims must face Mecca and pray. Each time of day has a set ritual that includes 2-4 positions and specific prayers which must be recited. On Fridays, all gather for prayers in a central Mosque. Men are required to attend but women are optional. If women do attend they stand at the back (often behind a curtain) to preserve their modesty during the proceedings. Friday is not traditionally a day of rest but in some countries has begun to replace the Christian Sunday tradition.
Almsgiving – Every Muslim is required to give 2.5% of his accumulated wealth to the poor each year. Note that this differs from income but is instead a percentage of whatever you have on hand. It’s unclear to me if the assessment of wealth includes only ready cash or also personal property. Traditionally this was collected in an official manner but lately it has been left to the individual to manage on their own though Pakistan, the Sudan and Libya have recently formalized this in the form of a tax.
Fast of Ramadan – In the month of Ramadan, Muslims fast from sunrise to sunset if their health permits. Neither food, nor drink nor sexual activity is permitted. The intent is to spend time during the month reflecting not only on the mercy of God but to contemplate the plight of those who are poor and hungry. At dusk a light meal is prepared (referred to as breakfast) and in the evening families visit and congregate for what is no doubt a larger than usual dinner. The mood seems exceptionally festive with special foods served only at Ramadan and prayers at Mosque. The month ends with a feast that is somewhat reminiscent of western Christmas.
Pilgrimage: The Hajj – After the month of Ramadan the month of Dhu al-Hijja signals the start of pilgrimage season. Once in their lifetimes Muslims must travel to Mecca to see the Kaba. The Kaba is a square house built around a sacred black stone. The Kaba is said to have been built by Ibrahim (Abraham) and Ismail around the stone given to them by the angel Gabriel representing God’s covenant with the Muslim people. The traditions of the Hajj are many:

circle the Kaba seven times (It’s not clear to me what this is symbolic of, if anything)
running between Safa and Marwa, two neighboring mounts, seven times symbolizing Hagar’s frantic search for water for her son Ismail. Most fascinatingly, if you do a quick image search for Safa and Marwa, you will find that an enclosed walkway has been built between them so pilgrims can walk without fear of the weather.
"stoning the devil" with the devil represented by three stone pillars
a visit to the plain of Arafat in which pilgrims stand from noon to dusk seeking forgiveness not only for themselves but for all Muslims
visiting the “Mount of Mercy” where the prophet made his last speech
the month of pilgrimage ends with a Feast of Sacrifice in which hundreds of animals are sacrificed and their meat given up to the poor
Lastly, the pilgrimage is a source of great pride among Muslims and some go so far as to prefix their names with ‘Hajji’ upon their return

The Struggle (jihad) – Unofficially, the sixth pillar of Islam is the jihad, or the struggle to realize God’s will on Earth. Most typically this takes the form of extending the Muslim community by education and preaching and leading by example by living a virtuous life. In the case of extremist groups, this has been taken to the extent of actual warfare against non-believers but that is not officially sanctioned by the Muslim community at large.

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Islam: The Straight Path – John L. Esposito [1998] – Chapter 3: Religious Life – Belief and Practice (Pt 1)

2011-09-13T22:13:00.003-05:00

Islam: The Straight Path – John L. Esposito [1998] – Chapter 2

2011-09-11T20:31:00.004-05:00

Convert to Islam
Accept Muslim rule but pay a special tax to the ruling establishment
Fight it out and get decimated

In this way Christianity in conquered territories was disestablished officially but not specifically persecuted.

This tolerance left the Muslim world with four distinct social classes:

Arab Muslims – natively born Arabs of the Muslim faith
Non-Arab converts – those who converted to Islam after conquest of some sort. Quranically speaking, these converts were in fact equal to those who came to the faith by birth, but practices varied. Some divisions of Islam required these converts to pay the special taxes levied on non-Muslims. This proved to be one of the many sources of conflict within the religion.
Non-Muslim “People of the Book” – Christians, Jews, and their religious counterparts
Slaves – Generally, no Christian or Jew was allowed to be enslaved.

I’ve mentioned that the Muslims of the time were factional and the chapter goes on at some length on a few of the major players in Islamic politics. The Kharijites were strict Quranic literalists. They viewed any act of sin as a traitorous act against Islam. By this definition, every previous leader of Islam was viewed as a traitor on the grounds that they had not properly followed the rules of succession of leadership put forth in the Quran. The Shii, as have been previously described, believed in familial succession to leadership which is their primary point of difference with the Sunni. The Shii are lead by an Imam, a divinely inspired, sinless and infallible embodiment of Allah on Earth. They await the “Hidden Imam” or Mahdi as their savior. In addition, the Shii are also split off into the Ismailis whose primary distinguishing characteristic seems to be that they believe as the Shii do, but they believe themselves to be somehow special and elite from other Muslims. One cannot imagine why this would cause them to come into conflict with their brethren. Most uniquely, we have the Druze, a separatist faction that forbids intermarriage or conversion. Because of this their practices remained localized and untainted by any outside influences. They also differ in that they believe in a form of reincarnation. So with this diverse cast of characters, it is unsurprising that the next millennium of Islamic history was as unsettled as it turned out to be.

Muslim history is tangled and far beyond your blog-writer’s abilities, but I will attempt to summarize in brief. After the death of the prophet , the “Rightly Guided Caliphs” established themselves (632). Caliphs were established by vote among tribal elders. This met perfectly with Sunni expectations, but the Shii factions were unsatisfied that the original bloodline of the prophet was not honored. As a result of this and other internal disagreements, the reigns of the Caliphs tended to be brief and ended at unexpected times in unpleasant ways. In 661, the Umayyad Empire was formed at the end of an unusually bloody period. The ruled until 750 as a military aristocracy and were eventually replaced by the Abbasid Caliphate.

The Abbasid are sometimes referred to as the true Flowering of Islam. Under Abbasid rule and patronage, Islam truly came into its own and for once owed much of its success to conquest by trade and cultural domination rather than the sword. It is at this time that we find the formation of the Ulama, or religious professional elite who lead the final formalization of Muslim practice and the translation of the great works of the time into Arabic. It is particularly interesting that centuries later when Europe sought to regain its own lost cultural heritage, it was Arabic source material they found rather than their own relics. Unfortunately, due to the sheer scope of geography being ruled, the Abbasid Caliphate began to undergo significant political decline by 950.

Our author also goes on at length about the Muslim response to the Crusades, specifically in Jerusalem. The Arabs originally took the city in 638 and in so doing left the Christian and Jewish populaces largely unmolested. However, when Constantinople fell to the Arabs in 1071, it became widely feared that the event was only the vanguard of a larger effort that might end in the conquest of the entire Western World by the Arabs. So in response, a Crusade was undertaken in 1095 to retake Jerusalem. When the Crusaders arrived in 1099, they murdered every Muslim in evidence despite promises to the contrary and Muslim buildings were desecrated and converted to serve Christian purposes. In contrast, when Arab forces once again retook Jerusalem in 1187, typical Muslim mercy is displayed and Christian buildings and families are again left untouched. At the close of the Crusades, our author points out, the wars that were intended to unite the Christian faith under a common flag was now more fractured than ever by infighting and theological disagreements. When the Crusades officially ended in 1453 with the final fall of Constantinople, the Muslims, not the Christians, were the ones who stood united.

The rule of the Abbasid Caliphate ended officially with the sack of Baghdad by the Monguls in 1258. The remnants of the once great empire lingered in Egypt and Syria until 1517. By the 16th century, the Muslim world was split into three great Sultanates:

The Ottoman Turkish Empire centered in Istanbul covered much of North Africa, the Arabian Peninsula and Eastern Europe. This Sultanate remained in one form or another until it was finally dissolved in the fallout from World War I.
The Persian Safavid Empire existed until 1736 in what is now Iran. It distinguished itself as having established Shii as its state religion
The Mughal Empire had its seat of power in Delhi, India and covered Pakistan, parts of India and Bangladesh. It was finally ousted officially from power by the British in 1857 when India was declared a British Commonwealth though the real transfer of power in the region had started long before.

Thus ends Chapter 2. It should be further noted that it is likely that I’ve just plain gotten something totally wrong in the summation above. Readers who note such inaccuracies should point them out so I can correct them or at the least feel bad about them and then quickly forget.

Back to Class

2011-09-10T07:03:00.000-05:00

On Monday (two short days) I’m going to do something that I haven’t done in 17 years. (When I put it that way, and when I realize that’s almost half my life, I’m suddenly sad.) OK, so what’s the thing, you might ask? Well, to put it unexcitingly and finally just spill it, I’m going to go to a place of learning and take a class in something that’s not related to my work. In fact, it’s a class on a topic totally unrelated to my vocation. It’s a class just because I want to learn something that will probably never actually be profitable to me economically in any way. That’s not the interesting part. The interesting part is the way in which people have reacted so far when I tell them this.

Universally, the first thing people say when I tell them I’m headed back to class is to express their envy that I actually have time to do this at all. Since I started getting this feedback, the realization has crept into my conscious just how much time I do have to myself to do… whatever… and to utilize this time at least a bit more productively. Even before people expressed this envy I had a lot of productivity guilt. I’d regularly look back on a day and say, “I had 6 hours of time that I wasn’t engaged in work or sleeping. What did I get out of it exactly?” I have a lot of difficulty “relaxing” or whatever it is the average person likes to do with their free time. Now that other people have expressed to me the perceived value of my underutilized hours, I find myself guarding it much more jealously and in many ways I put it to better use. My previous retrospective guilt over the waste of this precious commodity has become proactive and now I feel much more satisfied with the use of it. The unintended impacts of people’s random comments is endlessly fascinating.

Now all this does bring up a couple of related concepts. Firstly, I’ve written several times that the average person actually has much more free time than they want to admit and that they choose intentionally to put themselves in situations in which they lose this commodity. For example, if you have a yard that rivals the size of some golf courses, you shouldn’t be surprised if you have to spend a lot of time mowing it. Those with twelve kids need not be shocked that they spend much of their time shuttling people to ballet class. I can’t help but point out, however, that the majority of topics which consume our free time are mentally passive ones. In today’s media-saturated world, that’s no excuse. You can easily find a podcast about medieval French ballet to listen to on the mower. Those twelve kids might enjoy learning Russian with you in the car on the way to their activity. It can be done, and, I would argue, it should be done. It sets a good example for those around you and, I’d further insist, an intellectually growing parent is a good parent. I see far too often parents who forget to take care of themselves both physically and intellectually in the name of raising their children. This does them a great disservice and denies their children a fulfilled and happy and growing parent in their lives. That, however, is a topic better left explored in another post.

The second subtopic is to wonder exactly what actually constitutes a “productive” activity. Is productivity anything that’s not just sitting and watching television? If I come home, cook dinner, exercise, finish the book I was reading, write a review of it, edit a batch of pictures, upload them and put together a narrative blog post for them all before 11pm, is that *REALLY* productive or is it just busy? What’s the standard here? Does a productive activity have to be financially profitable or does fiscally neutral suffice? Does it have to be intellectually broadening and if so, what exactly does that even mean? I could probably learn something from watching a reality show in MTV. Does THAT count as productive if I now know more about waterproof mascara than I did before? Clearly this is all a personal judgment but it’s still one that I struggle with. Somewhat scarily, my opinion on this topic does seem to change from one day to the next. I sincerely wonder how I will look back on myself a decade from now and judge my use of time.

At any rate, photography class starts Monday. I will not fail to document the process. It will be interesting to see if this is the first of many or simply the first.

Online Identity Crisis

2011-09-05T21:01:00.000-05:00

In the past month I’ve taken advantage of Facebook’s generosity three times. The first time I created a page for The Tattered Thread, my blog of almost a decade. The second time I created a page for At the Bijou, my short-lived desire to see and write about every new movie in the theatres. The third time I created Rob Slaven Photography, a pseudonym for my tendency to take photographs of everything in the universe… at least that small subset of things in the universe that I can set a camera lens to.

In the end and with the help of an absurd book written by a comedian, I’ve come to realize that all of this is simply a search for validation: an attempt to find some group of people who will say by way of word or deed, “you’re doin’ good, Mr. Slaven!” Part of me realizes quite plainly that I don’t care what I do. If the masses want me to write, I shall write. If they want me to go take pictures, I shall do that. The validation I seek is not internal so much as it is external. Perhaps in no small way this goes back to my mother who failed to appreciate me no matter WHAT I did. So now I flail somewhat hopelessly in an attempt to fill that blank and yawning void with the approval of others. Apparently the nascent approval of the maternal is more important than we care to admit.

Somewhat recently though, Laura brought up with me a good point. She said simply that what I really needed was internal approval. I needed to be proud of myself and that would trump any vacuous leftovers I might have from my own upbringing. Nobody could fill the void I felt except me, she said simply. And I will not deny that she is right. But the problem is that I am such a relentless taskmaster. To feel even an iota of self-validation I need to create something momentous. I hold myself to an epic standard rather than a modern one. Every non-productive moment that creeps by is a pain, a sin, a terrible affront to the legacy of humankind that brought me to where I am now.

So where does this leave me? I am not, honestly, all that sure. Clearly, there are some fads which need to be allowed to die. I have puttered about with The Tattered Thread for 10 years but the hallmark of that small and unheard-of publication is that you never quite know what you are going to get on any given day. It is as fluid and as unpredictable I am. One day you might be reading about copper-age warfare and the next you might be assailed by a prolix description of the latest vampire movie. While I can’t claim to have, in fact, any following at all, I do have several years of history to live up to. And while the majority of people who wander on to my blog couldn’t give two rats shits about what I’ve done over the past decade I can say with sincerity that I *DO* care. Deeply. Passionately. This is my history. More history, frankly, than I can personally remember. The devoted reader of this open missive to the universe will probably know more about ME than *I* actually know about ME. Having been in your position as reader, however, I don’t honestly expect you to take that much interest. It’s too much. One cannot live one’s own life and consume that of another. It cannot be done. I get that. I’m flattered that whoever you are, dear reader, you have taken even this much time.

As for the photography, as I look back on my history, I realize that I’ve been at that for a solid three years. I look back at those first pictures and I can’t help but feel a pain in my gut. I look back at those pictures from a week ago and I still can’t help but feel a pain in my gut. Some days I look at my output and think, “Damn. I fucking suck at this” and other times I look at my pics and think, “Damn. I fucking rock.” Perhaps this is the nature of any endeavor. I can say without a doubt that I’ve gotten better over the years. Compared to my early attempts at photography, I’m a photographic genius. Trial and error have left their mark, though I’m sure many would rightly argue that the mark hasn’t been deep enough.

The point is though that I have no standard. By the standard of history, I would vanish utterly. I would have tried my utmost in writing, in photography and if I died today there would be none to remember me at all. None. Silence. Yet part of me thinks that if I don’t accomplish more then I will be a failure. I hold myself to some idiotic standard that if I don’t paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel then I should not have even bothered to have lived at all. In my own mind, no matter what reasonable thing I do, I am too small to have mattered. In the end, I am still a small child who looks expectantly up to his mother but is still too small and too inconsequential and too much of a bother to have mattered.

So after all this I can only say that I think the correct thing is to continue on in the two paths I have chosen even if nobody ever bothers to notice. When I am at my best, I can write, and write well. I’ve been told at work that I need to “tone it down,” that my writing is too elevated to actually be understood widely. I’ll choose to take that as a compliment. On the note of photography, I receive precious little feedback. This is either because my output is so terrible as to not justify a response or that people have come to expect excellence and therefore they say nothing. To feed my own ego, I will assume the latter. If the former is the case then more practice is the only relevant remedy. Either way, I will continue to assiduously and continuously photograph everything that comes into my view.

Returning back to practicalities, those of you are interested in my verbal outputs, should pay your homage to The Tattered Thread page on Facebook. There I will continue to push my observations in whatever form they present themselves. Those who wish for more visual media have Rob Slaven Photography to sate their needs. I will not be offended in the least by any who choose to pursue one in deference to the other. Each of us has a muse who speaks to us with most primal force and I will not think less of anyone who listens most keenly to one but neglects the other. As I sit here pondering the darkness of the night on September the 5th, like countless men before me, I can’t help but wonder about the meaning of it all. What will history, a thousand years from now, think of any of us? Are we vapid, squalid mewling infants in the view of history? It’s idiotically broad and rhetorical thoughts like this that make me realize that I have been out of society far too long. Thank the powers that be, whether they be, God or the random machinations of the universe that I start a new class on the 12th. It has been far too long that I have been out of the normal circulation of society.

Movies – The Help – 2011

2011-09-03T19:50:00.002-05:00

Today Laura and I wandered out to an early afternoon movie and for a chance, we chose one intentionally. Also of note is that for the first time in a while the theatre wasn’t empty except for your faithful reviewer. By the time the movie had started the theatre was at least half full and it was interesting to note the difference that this made in the whole movie-going experience. Crowds are like sentient beings all on their own so in a way this crowd took on a life of its own and we all seemed to react together in the same way at the same time. It is part of the movie-going experience that one misses when at home or in an out-of-the-way location.

“The Help” is a merciless and poignant view of the life of black servant-class people in Jim Crow era Jackson, Mississippi. I am not a person generally prone to displays of great emotion but it was all the willpower I could muster at several points in the movie to not openly weep. It is a merciful circumstance that movie theatres are dark and private places. This movie moves in a way that very few ever have before and as I walked from the place I wanted sincerely to shake the hand of every person of black descent I met on the way out. The portrayal of the unjust and heartless treatment of southern servants of color during this era was just about all I could bear to watch.

Aside from the sheer emotions evoked, the movie also raised some interesting psychological questions. In these circumstances, white children of privilege were practically raised by black servants and came to view many of them as more parental than their own parents. Given this, how was it that they somehow managed to uphold the horrible injustice of the situation for so many generations? Similarly, it seems that on some level many of the characters were against the treatment received by blacks in the area yet they sat quietly and did nothing while secretly objecting. How can such implication by non-action by tolerated? Sadly this sort of thing is endemic in human history and this movie’s depiction of the circumstance should be applauded.

Overall, I feel confident in saying that this movie is among the best of the year. It’s heart-wrenching portrayals (though mixed with a bit of seemingly inappropriate comedic breaks) of life in the era were flowing and organic and natural and evoked real regret for their accuracy in the audience. As the credits rolled, the audience in the theatre I was in just sat stunned in contemplation of what they’d seen. This is truly a movie to be seen and shared and applauded. I can’t rank it highly enough.

Movies: Another Earth – 2011

2011-09-01T21:00:00.002-05:00

As a general rule, it can be assumed that any movie with the word ‘Earth’ in the title is either an environmental allegory or a science fiction fantasy. “Another Earth” is anything but. While having a slight sci-fi bent with the discovery of a nearly identical copy of the Earth in the solar system, tonight’s movie was more an anthropological investigation than space exploration.

On the day that a new Earth is discovered in the heavens as a tiny, taunting blue spec, our protagonist’s life takes a fateful twist. In the space of a few seconds her dreams of going to MIT are traded for a prison jumpsuit as she is involved in a fatal collision with another vehicle due to her own intoxication. As the movie develops the twin Earth grows closer and our heroine struggles to cope with the repercussions of that pivotal event in her life.

Symbolically the movie gives us the approaching planet as a symbol of redemption and opportunity for rebirth after failure. We also get a chance to see the impact of the realization that we are not, as a species, alone in the universe. Society stands enraptured at the possibility of getting to know the “other” Earthlings. This is a movie that lives on after the viewing in the form of the conversations that result.

At a technical level the execution of the film was amazing. The music, photography and storyline worked in perfect harmony to advance the narrative in the film in a way I’ve very seldom seen in any modern movie. Unfortunately, due to the mistaken belief that this is a science fiction film and its very non-Hollywood ending, I’m expecting the film to fare poorly at the box office. Despite that, this movie earns a very satisfied 9 stars out of 10 from this reviewer.

Movies: Conan the Barbarian – 2011

2011-08-30T20:23:00.000-05:00

This evening wins a very small and very silly prize for drama. I realized at 5:03 that the $5 movie theatre down the street started a round of movies at around 5:00 so I jetted from my place of work at 5:04 and dashed into the theatre at 5:19 just in time to enjoy five minutes of silence before Conan the Barbarian started. Well, to say it with a more hearty and satisfying grain of truth, five minutes of silence before the 20 minutes of previews started.

The Previews

This particular venue is not only desperately quiet before the movie but also pounds down the previews like an addict at a Methadone clinic. Tonight’s total was six and started with “Red Tails” which seems to be following on the coattails of other war movies featuring under-appreciated units made up entirely of minorities. This time it’s WWII African-American fighter pilots. I can’t resist a war movie of any type so it’ll probably have my $5 when the time comes. Next we had “Ghost Rider” a movie with such a twisted and confusing preview that I’m not sure if the self-immolating skull-faced dude is a hero or a villain. We have established, however, based on the preview alone that if you take a whizz while you’re on fire it does hurt. (No, I’m not just making that up to be funny.) “Immortals” seems to be a standard epic adventure mythology flick. The new hero of the week seems to be Theseus and he’s going to save the world or destroy it or something similarly stimulating. Next up was “Drive” which seems to be one of your typical plotless thug movies. Somebody beats up somebody else to get something. Yadda, yadda, yadda. There’s also a new Sherlock Holmes movie coming out it seems making ready to make me spout profanity as I leave the theatre about how completely they’ve destroyed the spirit of the original Conan Doyle genre. And lastly, “Warrior” is apparently one of those stories about a war vet who comes home, doesn’t have any money and decides to become a UFC fight champion to make money to save the house or farm or pay for grandma’s operation. Whichever it is the preview, was nice enough to give away the climax in which the guy has to fight his own brother in the finals. What a devious twist! Pity they told me that BEFORE I gave them the $5.

The Movie

So now after 20 minutes we get down to the movie which, as you will no doubt be unsurprised to learn, is your standard adventure slash-em up western-but-with swords bit. People with impossibly white teeth (and some with no eyebrows) fight each other, heal impossibly fast and fall from impossible heights without any harm whatsoever. Easy enough.

Excessively high level summaries aside, just take the Lord of the Rings and replace it with a weird squiggly, tentacle mask and you’ve about got it. In the beginning (ages and ages ago), evil necromancers (what’s any movie without necromancers, after all) created a terrible mask that they wished to use to enslave the whole world. Well, the barbarian tribes got wind of this and so they united and had a huge and terrible war. As a result they destroyed the mask and broke it into a dozen pieces that they scattered through the world under the protection of the tribes. That takes you up through about the opening credits.

Ages go by and people are still fighting about things but not always about the latest in fashion headgear. In one of these petty squabbles, Conan’s mother, herself a great warrior, is grievously wounded. With her last dying words, the pregnant woman gasps, “I want to see my baby before I die!” so in what I can only describe as the clumsiest C-section ever, Conan’s father plunges his sword into his wife’s abdomen without even looking down and within seconds has produced the instantly wailing infant. Conan’s mother quickly expires from the botched surgery while his father wails his grief that he didn’t pay more attention in nursing school.

More years go by and Conan (that’s pronounced COnan like Conan O’Brien, btw, not coNAN like that OTHER barbarian) grows into a boy. He wants to be a warrior so he and the other children his age are set a challenge. They must take an egg in their mouths and run around some mountain and the first one back without breaking the egg gets to be a warrior. So the boys run out some distance, then stop to beat the shit out of one another and break everyone else’s eggs when suddenly they’re attacked by a band of 7 or 8 large brutal-looking men twice their size. The other boys, of course, wisely run away but Conan wades in and decapitates the whole lot of bandits. In dramatic fashion, Conan arrives back at the village carrying the warrior’s heads and casually spits his unbroken egg on the ground. It’s at about this point that we’re supposed to believe he’s quite a bad-ass.

Well, as you might expect, not long after, some new evil dude decides he’s going to do the Blues Brothers thing and “put the mask back together.” He arrives at Conan’s village having gotten all but the last piece. Evil dude’s armies descend on Conan’s village (which has managed to field quite a sizeable fighting force considering it’s just a tiny village) and bloodshed ensues. It is at about this point that the movie engages in one of my personal movie pet peeves. Either through some complete failure in logic or a flaw in the editing process, evil dude sends in his horsemen, then he sends in his footmen and THEN he lets the town have it with the archers. It is just this sort of disregard for basic military protocol that makes the infantry cut all the archer’s bowstrings the night before a big fight. Evil dude’s footmen don’t want arrows in their backs either. Anyway, long story short, evil dude gets the last piece of the mask, Conan’s dad gets melted to death by a small vat of molten steel that seems to just stay hot FOREVER and evil dude escapes. Conan, however does too but not before he manages to cut the nose off of one of evil dude’s cohorts.

So flash forward several more years and Conan has buffed up into quite the justice-dealing hunk of man meat. We find him first fighting to free a colony of slaves by rolling boulders down from the mountains onto the camp. Doubtless he’d forgotten that groups of slaves chained together or in cages tend to suffer more from falling rocks than guards who can move about more freely, but his heart is in the right place. Conan and his merry band go on to free the slaves including several dozen topless women who remain topless for several minutes as they carouse in celebration. It’s not exactly clear WHY any of them are topless but it’ll certainly make the television edit of the movie shorter.

Conan now starts to pick up clues about the man who killed his father all those years ago. He tracks down one after another without any really notable results except when he finds the man whose nose he cut off as a boy. By now the guy’s wearing a leather face-bra to protect the hole in his face and when Conan finds him he takes the opportunity to shove his finger into the hole until an unpleasantness ensues. Apparently it’s not fatal unpleasantness, however, since Conan has a more brutal method of execution in mind for him. Mr. no-nose runs a slave community so Conan forces him to swallow the key to the front gates and then pushes him out amongst his slaves to be thoroughly “searched” for the key.

Alright, my patience with this movie nearly exhausted, we move into really fast-forward mode. Conan finally finds evil dude and his daughter (a witch). They have the standard cliché fights: fight in an impossible physical situation (this time on a large rotating wheel), fights involving two swords each, a fight between Conan and some sand djinns summoned by the witchy daughter, fight with a monster in a dungeon with a bunch of tentacles. Between fights, Conan manages to schtoop the pretty girl and say those magical words: “I live, I love, and I slay. I am content.”

All in all, it was exactly what you would expect. Excessive gore and insufficient plot but I will say that it had my attention. It was, of course, entirely and utterly predictable but it did have moments of amusement. The eye candy factor was fairly high and on that account I give it a five out of ten. It’s a movie that I will very soon forget, but it’s one that I paid five dollars for and you can’t take that away from it.

Movies: Alfred Hitchcock’s : “Easy Virtue” – 1928 [silent]

2011-08-26T22:02:00.000-05:00

It’s been an entire day since I resolved to watch and review all the Hitchcock films and I’ll admit that his 1928 silent film was an initial challenge to my resolve. In this day and age of HD video and theatre-quality sound, watching a film with no real audio takes a surprising amount of concentration. As if that isn’t enough, it’s even clearer how far we’ve come in the intervening century when you can’t help but notice that even the edges of the screen fade in and out of view because the illumination is inconsistent. Quite a bit is left to the imagination and in some ways, that’s a good thing. In other ways, watching a movie at 11pm that requires this much concentration is just asking for trouble.

The plot synopsis is fairly standard, though it reveals a sensibility that we would today find boggling. Larita Filton is in the midst of a divorce from her drunkard husband and at the same time ensnarled in a bit of impropriety with a painter (Claude) who has been commissioned to do her portrait. Larita does finally escape her marriage but her honor and reputation is sullied forever when she’s “found guilty of misconduct” with Claude. Her reputation in tatters, she escapes to the French Riviera. There she meets John who falls desperately and almost immediately in love with her. Larita keeps mum about her past and only John’s mother suspects that something might not be on the up-and-up. The couple are quickly married but not shortly after, the meddling mom finds a picture of Larita in the paper and the connection with her scandalous past is made. Remaining married is, of course, unthinkable and Larita steps aside so that John can divorce with his honor intact.

Despite the lack of actual audible dialog, the movie doesn’t suffer from a vacuum of memorable quotes. Early on, the love interest, Claude, writes Larita a love note and it’s as sappy and as generic as could be possibly imagined:

Darling,
Why suffer that foul brute when you know I’d give anything I have in the world to make you happy?
--Claude

Near the end, the Larita spars with John’s mother in a manner so standard between generations that it’s almost cliché:

Mother: In our world we do not understand this code of Easy Virtue
Larita: In your world you understand very little of anything

Larita’s position is summed up quite nicely by her closing line: “Shoot, there’s nothing left to kill!” Her virtue lost, her prospects dim, there is nothing else for her to live for. Sensibilities have certainly changed, haven’t they?

Visually, there are a few interesting moments as well. During some of Larita’s time in the Riviera she takes in a few sporting events and it occurred to me as I watched (somewhat bored, honestly) that audiences of the time might very well have been fascinated by the prospect of watching filmed sport. With the cinema still a relatively new and novel art, things we find mundane today would doubtless have been viewed with breathless wonder. Also, earlier on, John anticipates the response to his proposal from Larita by phone and we’re treated to an extended segment of the telephone operator connecting their call and then reacting as she listens in on their conversation. These are images of a day long, long past.

To close, while I’ll admit that I didn’t find much Hitchcock in “Easy Virtue” I did find plenty of 1928 which is almost as good. While these bygone relics don’t entertain in the way that modern movies do, they do act to make us think and help us to know where society has gone before. Whether these changes are progress or regress is left as an exercise to the viewer.

Movies - Fright Night - 2011

2011-08-25T18:19:00.000-05:00

Today’s ‘next available movie’ was Fright Night. I will admit that going in I was expecting an utterly mindless slasher flick. When it was over, I’d watched a nearly mindless slasher flick but it had its up sides. This trip was my first to the newly restyled theatre at Michigan road and 86th redubbed “The Movie Buff Theater.” I’m not sure I see any real elements of movie buffness in evidence but it was at least semi-clean and utterly quiet. When I questioned the cashier about the utter desolation she acted as if she had no idea what I was talking about. Apparently such things are typical. I should also say that I went into this movie with absolutely no foreknowledge. I’d heard of it from movie listings but hadn’t seen a preview or in fact heard any word that I remembered so I was utterly clueless at the onset.

The Previews

The Movie Buff theatre is certainly no frills in that before the movie starts there is… silence, utter and complete. Awaiting a movie which ones assumes to be suspenseful it does create a certain amount of tension. It’s unclear whether the movie will fade in gradually or crash into presence on the screen like a semi-truck full of cymbals getting into a wreck on the interstate. When finally the previews did begin, they certainly didn’t skimp. For the third time I saw a preview for the “50/50” movie. Long story short, guy is diagnosed with cancer lives out the last days of his life… maybe? I’d say it qualifies for the list of movies not to avoid like the plague but it would be one to take a date to. (A date who doesn’t mind occasional scribbling in a notebook.) Next up was “The Woman in Black” a very gothic-looking horror movie about a gent trapped in an isolated and apparently haunted house. I’d say that one deserves an intentional look though it’s not for the easily creeped out. The sci-fi movie “In Time” has a title that doesn’t really do it justice and I think it’ll eventually suffer for that defect. This futuristic yarn is at heart a crime drama but with the twist that in the future the only real currency of exchange is time itself. When your “bank clock” runs down…. Well, you drop dead. Interesting concept I’d say. Next up we have one of those previews that leaves one wondering what the movie’s actually about. “Killer Elite” has something to do with shooting people. More than that I couldn’t really tell you. Lastly and mercifully we had “Real Steel,” the movie about an old down-and-out robotic boxer who finds new inspiration at the hands of a child-hero. This movie is guaranteed to annoy me if it comes up in a “next available movie” review. Kid heroes piss me off.

The Movie

The first five minutes of this movie are so sudden and so gory that I honestly expected the director to pop up and yell, “Cut!” With no pre-amble or setup whatsoever a family of three is devoured by some monstrous beast. After the devouring, we pan out typical Hollywood style to show the whole neighborhood full of cookie-cutter houses… that are… well… JUST LIKE THE NEIGHBORHOOD YOU LIVE IN! OH SPOOKY! Well, not really, but it’s a pretty typical movie device.

So to set the scene we have Charley, a recently rehabilitated geek who has abandoned his old posse to hang out with the cool kids. That is, until Ed, one of his recently abandoned buddies, contacts him to say that one of their mutual friends has been killed by a vampire. As it turns out, this vampire just happens to be Charley’s hulky new neighbor who is putting the moves on Charley’s mom. After some amount of negotiation and blackmail, the duo find themselves vampire hunting.

Unfortunately, before they can really make much headway, Ed runs into “Jerry the Vampire” (as the movie points out repeatedly, what the hell kind of name is Jerry for a vampire?) and is taken in typical vampire style to the dark side. It’s not long, however, before Jerry learns that Charley too knows the truth and quickly Charley and his family become targets. A lot of gratuitous violence ensues which everyone survives just fine (conveniently).

After this wake-up call that he just might not be able to destroy the undead all on his own, Charley decides to enlist the help of Peter Vincent, famous Las Vegas act specializing in on-stage fake vampire killing. This relationship goes through the standard stages of any such movie relationship:

Stage 1: Oh, it’s all an act kid.
Stage 2: It’s all an act kid, but my family WAS killed by vampires.
Stage 3: It’s not just an act kid, but I’m too chickenshit to help.
And finally, Stage 4: Oh hell, let’s go kill some vampires!

So now having a reluctant ally to assist, Charley and Peter head off armed with Peter’s collection of vampire killing goodies (wooden stake guns, holy water and a wooden stake blessed by St. Michael that will revert all the vampires victims back to non-vampire form). In typical movie fashion, some drama happens, things look hopeless for a brief period and then all the vampires end up dead. Happy ending ensues. Nothing very surprising about any of that.

At its heart this is a typical suburban vampire tale to help inspire you to keep a little closer eye on what the neighbors are doing out in their back yards late at night. It has all the standard plot devices and processes from holy water to the standard vampire speech: “I’m doing you a favor making you undead. You can live forever!” So in that respect it was as cookie cutter as the houses depicted in the opening scene.

I will say though that it touched a bit on some interesting and newish points. Our vampire antagonist thought ahead and actually had small rooms built into his house to act as ‘meat lockers’ so he could keep his victims in captivity as he periodically fed on them. This is a practical matter not often touched on. Further, rather than being a single individual of an undead form, this vampire is one of a species. It is infrequent (ok, less than 50% of the time at least that the vampire is looked upon as a biological entity rather than a mere result of satanic influence. So while the standard vampire lore was still in place, the story did go in somewhat non-standard directions.

The best thing about the movie, however, was the casting. While the story itself was somewhat lame, Colin Farrell made a wonderfully menacing member of the undead empire and David Tennant of Dr. Who fame did a spot on portrayal of a Las Vegas showman who was at once less than he appeared and more than we expected. To me Tennant saved this movie from utter oblivion. So it earns five stars out of a possible ten. It loses stars for its lack of originality and needless use of violence but as usual the actors save the day.

Movies: 30 Minutes or Less [3/10]

2011-08-24T15:25:00.001-05:00

To me the idea is simple and intuitive: You decide on no notice to traipse off to the movies and when you get there you watch the next available movie no matter what that happens to be. What could be easier? There are three possible outcomes.

Outcome the first: You end up seeing a movie that you would have seen anyway. Delay of gratification fail but nothing really lost or gained otherwise.

Outcome the second: You see a movie that you would have ignored otherwise and it turns out to have been the most awe-inspiring and amazing cinematic experience of your entire life. Or... some shade of gray between that and “eh, should have stayed home and watched Jerry Springer.”

Outcome the third: You see a movie so bad that you can have endless fun regaling all of your friends/readers/countrymen about just how utterly and absolutely moronic it was and invoke mirth if you tell the story right or at least pity if you don't. With these three possibilities at hand, I fail to see how any such scantily-planned scheme can fail. (As long as you ignore the $7-$12 you paid to get in, anyway.)

So today's winner of $7 was the movie “30 Minutes or Less.” Instinct and reputation said immediately that this movie was an utter loser but one must stay true to one's beliefs so I boldly went forward unto the ticket stand and placed my order. I was immediately accosted by a rather glacial woman next to the cashier who was hanging all over a notebook filled with movie reviews like too much icing on too small a cupcake. “Why'd you pick that one?” she said. Ever-ready and well-rehearsed I went into my standard spiel on movie selection criteria which left her with exactly as much information as she had before. She went on to explain that she lives in Frankfort and “they don't get no fancy movies like this in Frankfort.” Having been born in that town, I can well believe her statement. I turned my attention back to the cashier (a teenage girl) who handed me my ticket and conspiratorially whispered “You'll like it, it's really funny.” Now my doom was assured.

The Previews

Whenever I'm in movies I always think to myself that I should actually make note of the previews and review THOSE so that I can make an informed decision about actually picking a movie later (gasp, I know, sacrilege, right?). In this case, a couple of movies actually struck me as having some weird non-zero potential. The faithful-servant turned crook movie of the fall seems to be “Tower Heist” (due out November 4^th) and it intrigued me not only because of its cast of actors I've actually seen before and can name but also it's sort of sweet timeliness. Like any movie-going schmuck I love justice and especially when it's at the expense of rich, powerful corporate types. I'll definitely put this on my “don't offhandedly ignore” list. The other movie that made me actually bother to write down its name in the movie theatre was “Moneyball,” (September 23) a baseball movie about the Oakland A's and their success at using analytical methods to win baseball games rather than relying on the conventional wisdom of 150 years of baseball history. When you put baseball and analytical analysis together you've got me hooked already. So I'll put that down solidly in the “think about going to see on purpose” category.

The Movie

Yes, hard to believe that after ALL that blather there is actually still a movie to be reviewed. Well, before I go on, I should say a bit about spoilers. In this case, there's nothing to be spoiled so no worries. Long story short, Nick's a pizza delivery guy who seems to have only one actual friend, Chet. Chet is the highlight of this pair and he has some wonderful one-liners. Early on he sets the stage for Nick's character with the line: “Dude, you had a Lunchables for dinner last night. You are a total manchild.” That about sums up those two.

Dwayne is the maniacal idiot son of an ex-Marine. He and his sidekick Travis plot to kill Dwayne's dad for the inheritance but in order to do this they need $100,000 to hire a hit-man to whom he is referred by a stripper with the moniker of Juicy. So their plan to get this money, is to call for a pizza delivery and when the delivery guy arrives, they'll strap a bomb to him and make him rob a bank. It's utterly fool-proof. Dwayne and Travis too have a few amusing exchanges but this one made even me blink with a bit of aghast surprise (paraphrasing a bit):

Dwayne: I have an idea for a cash business that's just crawling with hot bitches!

Travis: Taco stand?

Dwayne: No

Travis: Abortion Clinic?

So after much kerfuffle the plan comes to pass. Dwayne and Travis wire Nick with a bomb and he finds himself forced to rob a bank in the company of a surprisingly faithful Chet. The duo makes the standard preparations for the robbery and manage to pull it off in a friendly fashion that gives one faith in the kind, honest hearts of criminals everywhere. After even more unnecessary and gratuitous violence they thwart the bad-guys and even end up with the $100,000 for their trouble which they don't even consider actually returning to the bank. There seems to be little justice in this movie that can't make up its mind whether it wants to be a comedy or an action movie and even takes a short side-trip into the maudlin. This movie gets a solid 3 out of 10 stars due only to the fact that you could get some enjoyment about of the first 30 minutes... assuming you had had enough to drink beforehand.

Islam: The Straight Path – John L. Esposito [1998] – Chapter 1

2011-08-16T20:03:00.004-05:00

Below you will find my notes and random observations from the book indicated by the title of this post. It is hoped that it will be effortless to differentiate between those locations in which I provide information from the book proper and those in which I offer personal observation, illumination or pose further lines of inquiry. Whenever any doubt is evident it should be assumed that anything even remotely factual should be attributed to the author of the book and anything that would be construed as otherwise can be attributed to me personally.

Links to related posts: (Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3 [Part 1][Part 2][Part 3])

It is evident early on that “Islam: The Straight Path” is authored by one who is himself a believer in the Muslim faith. Similarly, it will become quickly evident that your commentator is not a believer in the Muslim faith or, in fact, a believer in any faith at all. As such, the book’s author and the blog’s author will be quickly distinguishable. While the author of the blog will do everything in his power to maintain respectful of all possible beliefs, it is of fundamental importance that we all deal with this important area of study as frankly and openly as possible.

The book opens with a few simple numerical facts and some historical background. The adherents of the Muslim faith number 900 million strong with 85% belonging to the Sunni division and 15% to the Shii. Before Muhammad, Arabian society was tribal in nature. Nomadic herders wandered the desert tending their flocks moving from one oasis to the next. Rule of law was primarily enforced by the threat of retaliation. Social structure was familial in nature with many families combining to form a clan and several clans forming a tribe. Leadership of the tribe was determined by a vote of senior members of each family. Warfare was common but generally focused on assimilation rather than annihilation. Religious practices were polytheistic with Allah at the center but different tribes adopted different members of the pantheon as their patron or preferred objects of worship.

Muhammad was called to be the prophet of Allah in 610 C.E. at the age of 40. He was orphaned at a young age but married at the age of 25 and had 3 sons (all of whom died as infants) and 4 daughters by the time of his calling. He often retreated into the mountains to contemplate life and its injustices and it was on one of the retreats during the month of Ramadan that he received his first prophetic message from the Angel Gabriel. Over the next 22 years Muhammad continued to receive prophecy from Allah and these prophecies and teachings were compiled into the Quran or, “The Recitation”.

At first, as with most prophets, Muhammad thought himself crazy. Luckily, his wife and her Christian friend (ironic) were able to convince him that he was in fact not crazy but instead the chosen one of God. As time went on and his following grew, Muhammad and his teachings also came under the scrutiny of government representatives who resented his insistence on justice in public affairs that ran afoul of the typically corrupt practices of the time. After 10 years of preaching in Mecca, Muhammad was invited to migrate to Medina to solve a dispute(?) for a public official there. It is this migration to Medina in 622 that is viewed as the true beginning of the Muslim faith. Muhammad quickly gained influence in Medina and wages periodic war with his previous home, Mecca. In 630 Mecca finally capitulates but Muhammad doesn’t have long to celebrate as he dies not long thereafter in 632.

Culturally, Muhammad is held up as the example in all things good and pure in Muslim culture from hygiene to politics and prayer. Contrary to popular Western opinion, Muhammad is not the founder of Islam so much as the one who brought the previously polytheistic Islamic culture back into line with the classic monotheistic beliefs of Abraham from which all Arabs draw their lineage. The Muslim faith existed before Muhammad but needed correction in the same way that Muslims believe that Judaism and Christianity need correction to bring them into line with the will of Allah. Muslims share many common aspects of their faith with their Christian and Jewish neighbors and even go so far as to compare themselves to the oppressed followers of Moses in the Old Testament.

The schism between Islam and the other religions of the region are, unsurprisingly, blamed on Jewish influence. Muhammad attempted to approach his Jewish neighbors in an attempt to “correct” their belief systems and even went so far as to suggest that Muslims should direct their daily prayers toward Jerusalem. Unfortunately, the Jewish populace refused these “corrections” and prayers were then redirected to Mecca as they remain today. Since this rejection of sharia (“The Straight Path”) by Jewish leaders, the Muslim mujahidin (holy warriors) wage jihad against their Jewish oppressors. The martyrs in this war, or shahid (literally: witnesses), are viewed as heroes since they gave all defending the truth of Allah.

The Quran, dictated to Muhammad over the period of 22 years is seen as absolute and incorruptible. Its 114 chapters are arranged in ascending order of length and were collected after Muhammad’s death. Like the Bible, the Quran considers itself self-evident. Anyone seeking validation of the Quran need merely look around at nature and the world around us or the history of the world in which the unjust are repeatedly smote by Allah. Of the Jewish faith, the Quran claims that the Torah was indeed originally the word of God but was unfortunately corrupted by the desire of mankind. Christians seem to be viewed as idolaters who have placed Jesus, who is acknowledged as a prophet of God, above God himself. The Quran, by contrast, is the centerpiece of not only Muslim faith but the Arabic language. The Quran is viewed as the very epitome of perfect and unsurpassable literature not only for its content but because it is written in Arabic, the one true language of God.

As a text, the Quran bears many similarities to the Bible but also bears some striking differences. For example, the Quran repeats the famous episode in which Abraham is called upon to sacrifice Isaac but in the Quran’s version it is Ismail who is to be sacrificed instead. Where the Bible and the Quran are the same, it is claimed, they are the divinely inspired word of God. Where they differ, it is a corruption. Most pointedly, the Quran specifically points out the uniqueness and oneness of Allah. Allah has no sons. No partners. This seems to invalidate the entire Christian religion in one small sentence. One can see why there’s conflict.

The Quranic universe is composed of three principle parts: heaven, earth and hell. Heaven is represented as a mansion surrounded by peaceful bliss and flowing rivers. It’s inhabited by nubile young women and they’re apparently not shy yet still perpetually virginal. In typical fashion hell is a rain of torment and fire. Earth is the domain of man and the jinn. Jinn are intelligent spirits that roam the Earth and, like man, will be judged on the day of reckoning as they can be either of good or evil varieties. Joining these we have the typical angels and of course Satan. Satan, or Iblis, seems to have a different story than the Biblical one. When Allah created man, he commanded all the angels to bow down but Satan refused (presumably as an act of jealousy). For this refusal Allah cast Satan out but Satan managed to negotiate his punishment so that he was allowed roam the earth until the judgment day. Presumably for the purpose of tempting mankind into hell.

Finally, the difference that I suspect causes the most trouble (aside from the blatant denial of Jesus’ position as son of God) is the concept of the fundamental nature of mankind. From Biblical tradition we have an inherited evil or sin for each man or woman on the planet. The missteps of Eve haunt us all even to this day. The Quranic tradition seems much more forgiving and frankly, much more just. In the Quran there is no original sin. Each man is good or sinful based on his own actions. Man is an agent of Allah’s will and will be judged based on his own ability to carry out that will, not based on some inherited debt of virtue over which is has no control. Even more galling perhaps, in the Quran’s telling of man’s expulsion from the Garden, it’s not Eve who gives in to temptation first but Adam.

In conclusion (at least for this chapter) I find a lot of this fairly typical. The Quran is deemed perfect in the same way that the Bible is deemed perfect since God will watch over his word for Christians. Islam claims the flag of “absolutely and completely right” while the Bible does the same. Clearly one or the other must be flawed but the decision for that seems to have much more to do with what you were raised believing than any real qualitative differences. They are two very similar documents cut from very similar cloth with just enough niggling differences to make the adherents of each really, really dislike each other. I will say that the Quran seems much more fair than the Bible, at least based on this small overview. The abolishment of original sin and introduction of personal responsibility ring very true with me. The sociopolitical revolution of Islam that brought order to a tribal society is deeply important and should be recognized. The historical importance of Islam should not be diminished by any perceptions of its negative influence on current events.

Storyboard - Misc 6/28/2011

2011-08-15T19:36:00.000-05:00

Like any human I've found myself up and down on the energy required to go out and take photos. To the best of my recollection, the photoset from 6/28 is an amalgamation of a couple of days of random photography.

So this fly, as I recall, was buzzing around in Laura's backyard. For some reason I cannot fathom it stood still long enough for me to get its picture with the macro and even preened itself with that cool "I'm going to rub my eyes with my feet" move that flies like to do so much.

From 2011-06-28

Yeah, this next picture is a bit questionable but I trust you all to be adults about it. Birds do it and beetles do it.

From 2011-06-28

These two are always a hoot.

From 2011-06-28

This shot is from the Wabash river beach. For once it's not flooding.

From 2011-06-28

To continue the craziness of this random time period, there was also a horse show in this. I like the way the horse holds itself so stiffly like it's posing to be a chess piece.

From 2011-06-28

And in an accidental recreation of Muybridge we prove that when horses run they DO get all four feet off the ground at once. (Quite a difference 139 years can make)

From 2011-06-28

Laura has a way with the savage beast...

From 2011-06-28

Such deep and soulful eyes. It honestly breaks my heart that we take these creatures... though this one does have sort of an eyebooger thing going.

From 2011-06-28

And the stereotypical shot of Indy downtown from near the state museum.

From 2011-06-28

I love this shot. Laura's beautiful (nothing new there) but the gondolier in the background on the cellphone is a priceless anachronism.

From 2011-06-28

Storyboard - West Park, Carmel, Indiana - 8/13/2011

2011-08-14T09:01:00.000-05:00

In a happy twist of August Indiana weather it was a blissful 73 degrees outside yesterday so my first inclination turned towards taking the kids to the State Fair. The youngest was easily tempted over to my side with the phrase, "they have food..." but the eldest was unconvinced as revealed by her response of "I hate the state fair. I always have hated the state fair and I always will. *sigh* Fine. Given that attitude and with the debacle of the previous year in mind (in which we spent $37 for a 20-minute visit) a compromise was in order.

The eldest's counter-suggestion was that we go to the Children's Museum on the principle that it was "too hot to be outside." Commentary on the decadent American lifestyle that leads to such beliefs aside, we instead headed out to West Park.

Izzy, who upon arriving at the park observed that there was clearly no food, was indignant and charged off as quickly and as obviously annoyed as it is possible to do at her age. I suppose she should have growled at us but she made her disgruntlement clear enough without such guttural utterances.

From West Park - 8-13-2011

We quickly managed to bring the indignant Izzy around by pointing out the abundance of testudine (turtle) wildlife. Only moments before in the car she'd been discussing strategies by which she might wrangle herself into having a turtle as a pet.

From West Park - 8-13-2011

Amanda, however, was still unconvinced. The temperature had skyrocketed to the header figure of 74 degrees.

From West Park - 8-13-2011

A walnut or two found under a pine tree never hurts one's attitude either, it seems.

From West Park - 8-13-2011

I'm a bit embarrassed to admit that I stood in this area for a couple of minutes before noticing this heron fishing for its breakfast. Generally when you see them they seem to be just placidly walking along as if they have nothing much better to do but this one was actively taking advantage of the large number of small fish in the pond.

From West Park - 8-13-2011

I also have to give the park a lot of credit. They appear to be cultivating several native species that you don't find in most public areas. I believe this is Prairie Dock if I recall correctly.

From West Park - 8-13-2011

And no summer trip would be complete without a dragonfly.

From West Park - 8-13-2011

Storyboard - Eagle Creek - 7/9/2011

2011-08-07T21:28:00.000-05:00

It is not lost on me that as the days go by, I'm forced to reach further and further back into my recollections to post my thoughts on each of my photo albums. I'm not sure if this is significant because I'm posting far too frequently on the topic in question or because I'm taking photos too infrequently. Either way, I find myself posting about photos taken almost a month ago so forgive me if my recollections are weak ones.

As I cast my mind backwards, I recall a Saturday when I had little else to do so I wandered out to Eagle Creek. This somewhat private park on the North West side of Indianapolis has always been somewhat of an enigma to me since it exists as a large and important park but is somehow not part of the Start Park system. It's likely that I notice this mostly because my annual pass to Indiana State Parks does not gain me admittance to this urban nirvana but instead costs me the heady sum of $5 per visit. Whatever the cost, however, there is much to be seen.

This first photo is evidence merely of my appreciation for the boundaries between land and water. I have an excessive appreciation for the plants that somehow span the gulf between the aquatic and the terrestrial.

From 2011-07-09

Similarly, there's a certain symbolism in the manner in which trees procreate. I believe that this tiny messenger is from the cottonwood tree. Whatever its origin, the seed is a symbol of hope and optimism as the parent sends out millions of its progeny and can only raise up a prayer to whatever divinity represents the hardwoods that its seed will find purchase in some hospitable soil far away.

From 2011-07-09

Now we get to the dragonflies. I spent the better part of my sunburned day in an Indiana July chasing these things all over their marshy abodes. They really are quaint miracles of nature. It boggles the mind how they can fly at all, let alone do so efficiently and with such precision. There are more things in heaven and Earth...

From 2011-07-09

Those delicate wings...

From 2011-07-09

Yeah, ok, so here's where I admit that I chased this ONE dragonfly around for 20 minutes.

From 2011-07-09

Probably my favorite. Note the posture and also the delicate lacework on the wings.

From 2011-07-09

Alright, so here's where I also admit that somehow I've lived a charmed life. If you read my auto-bio you'll see that this wasn't always the case but over the past few years I can't help but feel that when I just let the winds of randomness blow me whence they will, they tend to blow me into exceptionally interesting spots. In this case, I just happened to get blown into a bicycle race.

From 2011-07-09

In fact, the race was so ... well, circular in nature, that I was able to get a bit artsy. This photo makes me think more strongly of an oil paining than a photo.

From 2011-07-09

After the bikes, it was time to find our way to the pond, aka "the next random place I wandered to". The butterflies were in evidence.

From 2011-07-09

And more of these, of course.

From 2011-07-09

And one very cooperative... moth?

From 2011-07-09

Reptiles.... well, reptiles have always fascinated me. They seem at the same time utterly independent and at the same time at the mercy of the weather. No matter how stubborn a tortoise might be, give him a cold morning and he is at your mercy. Luckily, these turtles sunning themselves had no such worries.

From 2011-07-09

And thus ends, apparently, the trip around the park on the ninth. To extend the visual elements, I recall that the park was very, very warm and that I was more than a bit lonely. Someone for whom I have great affection was off doing her own thing so I was compensating with a bit of natural beauty. Either way though, a fine time was had. And thus we close.

Arts: Cirque du Soleil: Dralion – 8/6/2011

2011-08-07T19:53:00.002-05:00

On Saturday night we wandered out to see Cirque du Soleil and it must be admitted that when we heard that it was in town… and tickets were available… all four of our eyes got as big as saucers. There are some things in life that are greeted with a “phffttt… they’ll be back” or a “eh, whatever” but Cirque was not one of them. We hastened to obtain tickets (at the last minute) and betook ourselves unto the show.

So, to start, I will admit that I wasn’t nearly as awe-inspiringly impressed as I would have liked to have been. Yes, the acrobatics were beyond any criticism. Yes, the show was immaculately prepared and with only a few exceptions, flawless. Yes, I enjoyed it immensely but I’ll admit that I fell victim to the curse of expectations. In our over-indulged American lives we see so much and we have so much placed in front of us on television that when the real thing presents itself… well, we’re desensitized. Like a magician who has many of his tricks telegraphed to the audience ahead of time, Cirque made me internally say, “cool” but at no time did my mind say, “wow!” Well, ok, with one exception. I still don’t understand completely how those trampoliners managed to defy physics in quite the specific and indescribable way in which they did. If you want the details on that you’ll have to actually go.

So during this interesting but not awe-inspiring show, I felt my mind wandering, as I often do. I couldn’t help but ponder to myself… why is it…? What is it about these shows that enthralls us so? Why do we care so much about the men who can run and jump flawlessly through two hoops? Why is it important to us when a person can grab a long ribbon of silk and dance with it into the air suspended above the stage as if they were born there? Why on Earth do we give a damn about any of this impractical crap that they do? The answer, I think, comes down to the simple matter of control.

When we look at these people, so obviously and completely in control of themselves and their movements, we have a certain and undeniable sense of envy. It is this “envy of control” that keeps us coming back for more. This group has dedicated their lives, their diets, their everything, to the simple fact that they have utter and complete control of their bodies. When they tell their bodies to walk gracefully on top of a large ball, their bodies do it. By counterpoint, our bodies can’t keep us from eating that last bite of hamburger at Applebees. The people at Cirque have something that we struggle with daily. They have dominion over themselves. They have control. And we… we do not. For this they are adulated, admired and revered.

And I would posit that this extends not only to circus performers. In general, I think that we can’t help but respect those that do things that are beyond our own capabilities, those who demonstrate a control and mastery of themselves that we can’t begin to fathom. Whether they are actors on the stage taking on a role or comedians fighting back the butterflies that we would doubtless feel under such pressure, we elevate those who control that which is beyond our control. Each of us looks up to the not-us. It is the not-us to which we aspire and to which we hope to some day ascend. The secret to life may very well be finding the not-us and figuring out how to bring that most vividly and completely into our own ourselves.

Books: “Julie and Julia” - Julie Powell [2005]

2011-08-06T13:51:00.002-05:00

To me there are three basic types of reception that a book can receive from a reader. The first is the kind that grabs your soul and shakes it and when it’s done you find yourself sad and disappointed that the shaking has stopped. The second stretches your head like an elephant in a bikini and you find yourself almost exhausted by the mere act of reading. The third leaves you wondering why you bothered reading at all and hungry for something of substance. “Julie and Julia” falls solidly in the lattermost category. To use a seasonally appropriate analogy, the book is like an extra large cotton candy had for the very first time. The first bite leaves one thinking “what an absolutely novel idea for a food!” but after the third all you really want is a trashcan.

The concept of the book is probably by now familiar: a New York secretary decides to work her way through the Julie Child cookbook and make every recipe in it over the course of a year. Now I can certainly relate to the obsessive and completionist concept here. It’s just the sort of thing I might undertake and then get bored with. So we’re starting out at a point of relative commonality but much like our sunbathing pachyderm’s distended swimming gear, the idea that was intriguing in paragraph form becomes trite and redundant by the time one’s reading has progressed much at all.

Despite the unnecessary prolixity of the novel, there were some reasonable cultural and psychological points that bear discussion. I’m not convinced that any of these were really among the items the author intended to invoke in her readers, but they did come unbidden to mind for me at least. Let’s enumerate in no particular order.

At one point she tells the story of a call she received at work from a “black woman who runs an S&M dungeon.” This in itself isn’t unusual but she goes on to say that her dear husband is the only one with whom she could ever share such a story and have hopes that it would be appreciated properly. This I found a bit perplexing. It’s been my experience that just about EVERYONE appreciates a story of this ilk. The odd and unusual are the meat and drink of many, many people so the value of a story like this one is not to be diminished. What is it that makes her think her husband unique in his appreciation? Is she simply trying to find reasons to heap adulation on him or trying stealthily to criticize the rest of humanity for its narrowness of mind? It does seem that much of the book is intended as a vehicle for placing her husband on a pedestal.

In a similar vein, the protagonist is keenly aware of political divisions in those around her to the point of bigotry. She refers to “the Republicans” as if they were a troupe of scabrous lepers banging their tin cups on her cubical wall. Her attitude is very much one of of good-guy Democrats versus those ignorant Republicans and if one has the audacity to disagree with her then, as she might say, “fuck them.” Those who disagree with her might as well not even exist. This attitude becomes decidedly apropos at the climax of the novel when it’s found that her beloved Julia Child does not, in fact, like her or what she’s done. This leaves her between her previous state of admiration and an obligatory, “you don’t agree with me so fuck off.”

Moving on, I was reminded of one of my larger pet peeves when the protagonist put a ‘Donate’ widget on her blog page. Why is it that society thinks everything of value must be paid for? At what point in this country did we become so wrapped up in materialism and amassing wealth that doing something simply for the public good and entertainment was relegated solely to low-grade criminals doing “community service” and those too addled to know any better? Did the author entertain some people? Yes. Did the author inspire some people to cook? Yes. Does that make it appropriate for her to rattle her tin cup in front of the masses asking for donations? No. Call me communist if you want, but sometimes the best things are free. If you’re constantly looking to make a buck then it’s likely that’s all you’ll make.

OK, now for some palate cleansing before we close. Now that I’ve romped incessantly to the negative, weren’t there some positive aspects here? Most certainly the author’s dedication to a project, and a non-trivial one at that, are to be admired. The body of work required to actually cook that much and that consistently is nothing to be sneezed at. This is especially telling considering the apparently far-too-carnivorous nature of the French diet at the time. The amount of animal flesh and butter products used during the course of a single year must have rivaled that of some healthier restaurants during the same time period. Personally I would have found Eastern cooking for more palatable (and survivable).

Lastly, if the author’s characterization is to be believed, the book does serve to underscore the importance of Child’s seminal works on cooking. Making European cooking accessible (and entertaining) to hoards of US housewives probably contributed at least somewhat to the explosion of dietary diversity we see in America today. To be clear, I’m not claiming familiarity with the history of cuisine in this country over the past 50 years but it would not be surprising if the popularity of French, Thai, Greek, Chinese and a hundred other ethnic food genres owes at least some debt of gratitude to Child’s work in making those exotic French foods seem much less exotic.

Storyboard - Logansport, Indiana - 7/10/2011

2011-08-04T23:41:00.000-05:00

A couple of weeks ago now I had the better part of a day to myself, so where better to head than some random Indiana town that was not previously of my acquaintance. In this case, it was Logansport and while it was far from Paris (France or Texas) it was nonetheless a refreshing trip for all its randomness.

The town has done a really good job of keeping itself properly decorated. I found a great little patch of garden in the downtown area. The cone-flowers are fairly typical but I was struck by the bedewed spiderwebs.

From Logansport IN, 7-10-2011

And this would have been better by yards and yards without the used car lot in the background.

From Logansport IN, 7-10-2011

Along with the garden there was also a carousel horse that had become disembodied from the herd, as it were. The eyelashes on this particular subject frankly terrified me.

From Logansport IN, 7-10-2011

I think timing is everything when it comes to capturing the morning dew. (duh)

From Logansport IN, 7-10-2011

This scene is typical of SO many Indiana towns. Their aging building-fronts offer impossibly anachronistic products. It's hard to know what to think, exactly. They have one foot in the past and one foot in the future without fully committing to either.

From Logansport IN, 7-10-2011

Like a lot of Indiana towns, Logansport straddles the Wabash and is at the junction of the Eel and the Wabash rivers.

From Logansport IN, 7-10-2011

I'm still a bit mystified by this one. Is it the bail bonds "shop" or the youth center? Perhaps the youth get in trouble so frequently that there's no need to distinguish between the two? Either way, the signage is in need of some clarification. PS: That bear looks terribly sad. Don't you just feel a NEED to bail him out?

From Logansport IN, 7-10-2011

Logansport has done a lot with its available shore space. I was never at a loss for features to take photos of...

From Logansport IN, 7-10-2011

I'm always a sucker for the 'decay' of human-made objects. This trip was no exception.

From Logansport IN, 7-10-2011

Even after thinking about it for a month, it's not clear to me what exactly this place is. Is it in the process of being built or in the process of being forgotten about? Either way, it's in some limbo state of usefulness. Note the primitive brickwork spelling out "Golden Palace" above the arch.

From Logansport IN, 7-10-2011

Moving on, it seems as if I've seen this particular grammatical oddity before. Why would the Baptist Church use the English "An House" in their permanently-affixed motto. Clearly something I'm missing here....

From Logansport IN, 7-10-2011

Yes, for those of you playing at home, Dr. Brewer has indeed set up shop in an old church. I guess this makes sense for those receiving the worst news as they can simply go across the hall to the chapel for any "second opinions".

From Logansport IN, 7-10-2011

Lots of lawyers in Logansport, though apparently they decided to all share the same office space. Miller Tolbert Muelhausen Muelhausen Groff and Damm stand ready to serve you...

From Logansport IN, 7-10-2011

The local cemetery in town is utterly uneventful except for this incredibly gaudy display. Gold leaf Jesus.... wow.

From Logansport IN, 7-10-2011

Alright, so here's where I confess that I had a better picture that I was afraid to take. These gents shown here actually were bow-fishing from the top of the bridge. When I walked past on the way back, they'd managed to catch a 2-foot carp(?) by the use of their skills. Considering the distance to the water from the bridge where they're standing, I considered this fairly impressive but when I broached the topic with them they stated simply that it was "easy" and that my admiration was utterly unnecessary.

From Logansport IN, 7-10-2011

These two were also interesting to observe. The boy was determined that he too would become a fisherman. His father (or grandfather?) made no promises except that they would NOT be bow-fishing any time soon. The younger's ebullient happiness at being on the bridge was a strange contrast to the worn and uneager attitude of the elder.

From Logansport IN, 7-10-2011

Storyboard - Indiana Dunes - 7/25/2011

2011-08-03T16:35:00.000-05:00

Having hit the Indiana Dunes area twice during our most recent trip, we actually have some small story to both on the way and on the way back. Unfortunately, the former was primarily in the dark of night so while I would have delighted in capturing some of the Gary-area blight, I was denied that pleasure by lack of ambient lighting.

Sunset on the first day wasn't QUITE what I would have hoped for. A pendulous ruddy sphere backing up the distant skyline would have been optimal but it was not to be. Luckily, there are always more sunsets. At least until there aren't.

From Indiana Dunes 7-22-2011

Humans are such clean and responsible creatures.

From Indiana Dunes 7-22-2011

This, above all else, is the ultimate in evidence that Laura drives MUCH, MUCH too fast.

From Indiana Dunes 7-22-2011

And this cooling tower is not at ALL ominous at night. Actually, considering the area this is in, the entire neighborhood is a bit on the ominous side, but I digress.

From Indiana Dunes 7-22-2011

And now we move on from the lowlands to the highlands. Mt. Baldy is the highest dune in the park. It used to be second highest but they mined the first one until... well, until it was literally wiped from the face of the Earth.

I love all manner of contrasts, especially those between the steely cold of mankind and the delicate touch of nature.

From Indiana Dunes, Mt. Baldy - 7-25-2011

Quite a desert though the high tension lines give it that lived-in look.

From Indiana Dunes, Mt. Baldy - 7-25-2011

This is the delightful landscape that awaits you from the top of the dune. Who wouldn't want to climb up here to see THIS!!!?

From Indiana Dunes, Mt. Baldy - 7-25-2011

Such a lonely-feeling view in this direction. Based on recent history, this tree isn't going to make it long.

From Indiana Dunes, Mt. Baldy - 7-25-2011

Boy. All I can say is looking at this picture.... why is that woman hanging out with me. Jeeze. I'm afright. And what happened to my face.... ?

From Indiana Dunes, Mt. Baldy - 7-25-2011

I love the beach. Everybody's so interested and excited to be there.

From Indiana Dunes, Mt. Baldy - 7-25-2011

Anyway, so ends the Indiana Dunes and so ends the Michigan trip. I must say that looking back, we Humans sure are filthy. Find a spot on a lake and what do we do? We tromp it all down until they have to put up fences and build huge industrial complexes to belch out soot. On the other hand, I sure do love electricity!

Books: “Lost in Translation” – Eva Hoffman [1990]

2011-08-02T21:51:00.000-05:00

The back of the book describes it as ‘graceful and profound’ and I will say simply that that is far too succinct a summation to be absolutely accurate. While the book does have a lot of interesting things to say about society and language and the complexities of moving between them it lacks a strong thread to bind the whole together. The narrative is a mind-bogglingly featureless one that fails to ever really grasp the reader’s attention. I found my mind wandering every few paragraphs and it was a force of will to actually affix my attention to it long enough to finish. No doubt my failure to find the core of the novel was at least in part due to my inability to read it for more than a few minutes at a time.

Putting aside the book’s merits as a whole, it did still manage to inspire new ideas though these appeared in very small increments primarily in accordance with the maximum attention span of the reader. The author moves from Poland as a young child and has only a tiny introduction to the English language. All of her internal dialog is in Polish and it is interesting to see how this colors the new world she’s living in. It emphasizes strongly the impact that the language in which we’re immersed has on our way of thinking and our way of interacting with others. As time goes on and she acquires more of a North American attitude her words too change both internal and external until her Polish language roots are no longer sufficient to sum up the whole that she has become as a person.

The other small hook in this novel lies in the cultural contrasts. She sums up well the “lostness” of American identify in which everyone seems to be pushing for more and more and more yet still feels they never have enough. While her more European background seems to be more placid, more content with the world as it is without having to constantly put such herculean effort into competing with everyone around you. These two combating viewpoints are a source of constant debate among her Polish friends until she too finally accedes to the American need to push.

So in summation, the book is a lot to digest and defied my expectations upon beginning it. It is a work to be studied and pondered upon rather than enjoyed. There is some small possibility of both, but the reader will be hard pressed to find an appropriate stopping point along the prosy primrose path to ponder the author’s intent since the book boasts three long chapters of 100 pages each and no real breaks anywhere in between where one can take a breath and internalize what has been presented.

Storyboard - Muskegon, Michigan / USS SIlversides - 7/24/2011

2011-08-02T19:22:00.000-05:00

Ahhhh, yes, wonderful Muskegon, Michigan, the furthest northern destination during our recent trip to the north. Like many of its larger coastal neighbors, Muskegeon is a city ruled mostly by water and the pictures from that day reflect a bit of aquatic ennui with the whole wave-tossed shoreline concept. The primary photographic survivors from that day are from the USS Silversides, struck from the Naval register in 1969 and serving as a tourist attraction in Chicago in the 80s and currently residing in Muskegeon.

Anyway, enough random background and on with the photos.

The "bloody sea birds" as Monty Python might say are almost too accustomed to the presence of humans. They sit quietly and wait for you to take their pictures despite the quite real possibility that their souls are being stolen in the process.

The Tattered Thread

On Veterans Day

On the Stock Market

Random Thoughts for Halloween 2011

Unpopular Opinions - Dan Wheldon

Personal: Echoes of Solitude

Book Notes: St. Thomas Aquinas on Politics and Ethics

Books: How to Work a Room

* Books: Lost Languages: The Enigma of the World's Undeciphered Scripts

Islam: The Straight Path – John L. Esposito [1998] – Chapter 3: Religious Life – Belief and Practice (Pt 3)

Islam: The Straight Path – John L. Esposito [1998] – Chapter 3: Religious Life – Belief and Practice (Pt 2)

Islam: The Straight Path – John L. Esposito [1998] – Chapter 3: Religious Life – Belief and Practice (Pt 1)

Islam: The Straight Path – John L. Esposito [1998] – Chapter 2

Back to Class

Online Identity Crisis

Movies – The Help – 2011

Movies: Another Earth – 2011

Movies: Conan the Barbarian – 2011

Movies: Alfred Hitchcock’s : “Easy Virtue” – 1928 [silent]

Movies - Fright Night - 2011

Movies: 30 Minutes or Less [3/10]

Islam: The Straight Path – John L. Esposito [1998] – Chapter 1

Storyboard - Misc 6/28/2011

Storyboard - West Park, Carmel, Indiana - 8/13/2011

Storyboard - Eagle Creek - 7/9/2011

Arts: Cirque du Soleil: Dralion – 8/6/2011

Books: “Julie and Julia” - Julie Powell [2005]

Storyboard - Logansport, Indiana - 7/10/2011

Storyboard - Indiana Dunes - 7/25/2011

Books: “Lost in Translation” – Eva Hoffman [1990]

Storyboard - Muskegon, Michigan / USS SIlversides - 7/24/2011

On Life

Storyboard - Douglas, Michigan - 7/23/2011

Storyboard - Benton Harbor, Michigan - 7/23/2011

Random Bits and Pieces for 7/31/2011

What I Learned on one of my Summer Vacations

Random Bits and Pieces for 7/18/2011

Storyboard - The Celery Bog 7/14/11

Random Bits and Pieces for 7/17/11

On Personal Martyrdom and Pretending to be Something that you are Not

The Eye that Sees Itself – 2010 Version

Storyboard - Wabash River (Flooded), West Lafayette, IN - April 29 2011

Books: Faces of Poverty – Portraits of Women and Children on Welfare [1995]

Storyboard - Ross Hills Park, West Lafayette, IN - April 3, 2011

Movies: “Source Code”

Storyboard - Indianapolis Museum of Art (grounds) - April 8, 2011

More Wondrous Feedback

Storyboard - Indianapolis Zoo - April 23, 2011

A Spring Holiday by any other Name… (or: The Easter Post)

Antisocial Society

Never Too Young

The Real “Job One”