Thanks to Toby Sumpter.
A man is walking down a bridge and sees another man standing on the railing. Naturally, he yells over "What are you doing?"
"I just can't take it anymore. I'm going to jump."
"Don't you believe in God?"
"Yes, but it's just not enough anymore."
"Are you Catholic?"
"Protestant."
"Me too! Reformed or Arminian?"
"Reformed."
"Me too! Presbyterian? Reformed Baptist?"
"Presbyterian."
"Me too! Amillenial, Postmillenial, or Premillenial?"
"Post."
"I am too! Weekly communion?"
"Yeah."
"This is amazing! Robes or no robes?"
"No robes."
"Jump already, you stupid heretic!"
You can only be so unified.
Showing posts with label Bemused. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bemused. Show all posts
Saturday, July 10, 2010
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Theodore Dalrymple
I have just begun reading a collection of essays by Dr. Theodore Dalrymple, a British psychiatrist that works in a slum hospital and a prison in England.
First, the caution: he occasionally quotes his patients verbatim, which leads to... well... colorful, if mono-adjectival, conversations.
I don't think I would be able to praise this book highly enough. It is simply magnificent. I just finished reading Rodney Stark, so the prose seems to simply float by (I've been reading for two or three hours and I'm on page 162), and is, in tone, magnificent intelligence interspersed with wry drolleries. He seems to be one of those British chappies who's immaculately dressed, extremely intelligent, and I keep expecting him to say at any moment "Bless me, what do they teach them in these schools?" So it's been loads of fun so far.
A few quotes from the first half; forgive me for not giving pages and what not (I'm taking a break from job-hunting, and it needs to be a short one):
"It just didn't work out," they say, the "it" in question being the relationship that they conceive of having an existence independent of the two people who form it, and that exerts an influence on their lives rather like an astral conjunction.
Another burglar demanded to know from me why he repeatedly broke into houses and stole VCRs. He asked the question aggressively, as if "the system" had so far let him down in not supplying him with the answer; as if it were my duty as a doctor to provide him with the buried psychological secret that, once revealed, would in and of itself lead him unfailingly on the path of virtue. Until then he would continue to break into houses and steal VCRs (when at liberty to do so), and the blame would be mine.
When I refused to examine his past, he exclaimed, "But something must make me do it!"
"How about greed, laziness, and a thirst for excitement?" I suggested. "What about my childhood?" he asked.
My patient was intelligent but badly educated, as only products of the British educational system can be after eleven years of compulsory school attendance.
A surprisingly large number of auto-tattooists choose for the exercise of their dermatological art the chief motto of British service industries, namely F*** OFF. Why anyone should want these words indelibly printed in his skin is a mystery whose meaning I have not yet penetrated, though my researches continue, but I recall a patient who had the two words tattooed in mirror writing upon his forehead, no doubt that he might read them in the bathroom mirror every morning and be reminded of the vanity of earthly concerns.
It is a regrettable fact that psychological distress expands to meet the supply of publicly funded services available to reduce it.
(On someone turning the TV back on in the rooms of incapacitated patients): There is someone in the ward, however (a postmodernist, perhaps), who believes otherwise, who believes that a moment unentertained is a moment wasted, and that a mind unfilled by someone else's drivel is a vacuum of the kind Nature abhors.
The young men--especially those with ironmongery in their noses and eyebrows...
(In a club): Two young girls, one fat and one so drunk that she must surely throw up soon, gyrate to the music, but without reference to its rhythm.
Not a single one of my young patients has known the dates of the Second World War, let alone of the First; some have never heard of these wars, though recently one young patient who had heard of the Second World War thought it took place in the eighteenth century. In the prevailing circumstances of total ignorance, I was impressed that he had heard of the eighteenth century.
...parents whose philosophy of child rearing is laissez-faire tempered by insensate rage.
...a murderer who once said to me that he had had to kill his victim, otherwise he didn't know what he might have done.
(After relating truly horrific stories of Africa): Yet nothing I saw--neither the poverty nor the overt oppression--ever had the same devastating effect on the human personality as the undiscriminating welfare state. I never saw the loss of dignity, the self-centeredness, the spiritual and emotional vacuity, or the sheer ignorance of how to live that I see daily in England...I and the doctors from India and the Philippines have come to the same terrible conclusion: that the worst poverty is in England--and it is not material poverty but poverty of the soul.
Medical correctness hasn't reached the bingo hall yet. It is with a certain pleasure--no, joy--that I watch women with the physiques and mobility of beached whales refresh themselves constantly (as they mark their cards) with large piles of cholesterol-raising fried foods and large volumes of tepid, watery English beer. Tomorrow, of course, they'll go to their doctors and tell them that, however hard they try, they just can't seem to lose weight: they only have to look at food, and the pounds go on.
Blessings from the (currently) sunny land of ice and snow.
Jesse Broussard
First, the caution: he occasionally quotes his patients verbatim, which leads to... well... colorful, if mono-adjectival, conversations.
I don't think I would be able to praise this book highly enough. It is simply magnificent. I just finished reading Rodney Stark, so the prose seems to simply float by (I've been reading for two or three hours and I'm on page 162), and is, in tone, magnificent intelligence interspersed with wry drolleries. He seems to be one of those British chappies who's immaculately dressed, extremely intelligent, and I keep expecting him to say at any moment "Bless me, what do they teach them in these schools?" So it's been loads of fun so far.
A few quotes from the first half; forgive me for not giving pages and what not (I'm taking a break from job-hunting, and it needs to be a short one):
"It just didn't work out," they say, the "it" in question being the relationship that they conceive of having an existence independent of the two people who form it, and that exerts an influence on their lives rather like an astral conjunction.
Another burglar demanded to know from me why he repeatedly broke into houses and stole VCRs. He asked the question aggressively, as if "the system" had so far let him down in not supplying him with the answer; as if it were my duty as a doctor to provide him with the buried psychological secret that, once revealed, would in and of itself lead him unfailingly on the path of virtue. Until then he would continue to break into houses and steal VCRs (when at liberty to do so), and the blame would be mine.
When I refused to examine his past, he exclaimed, "But something must make me do it!"
"How about greed, laziness, and a thirst for excitement?" I suggested. "What about my childhood?" he asked.
My patient was intelligent but badly educated, as only products of the British educational system can be after eleven years of compulsory school attendance.
A surprisingly large number of auto-tattooists choose for the exercise of their dermatological art the chief motto of British service industries, namely F*** OFF. Why anyone should want these words indelibly printed in his skin is a mystery whose meaning I have not yet penetrated, though my researches continue, but I recall a patient who had the two words tattooed in mirror writing upon his forehead, no doubt that he might read them in the bathroom mirror every morning and be reminded of the vanity of earthly concerns.
It is a regrettable fact that psychological distress expands to meet the supply of publicly funded services available to reduce it.
(On someone turning the TV back on in the rooms of incapacitated patients): There is someone in the ward, however (a postmodernist, perhaps), who believes otherwise, who believes that a moment unentertained is a moment wasted, and that a mind unfilled by someone else's drivel is a vacuum of the kind Nature abhors.
The young men--especially those with ironmongery in their noses and eyebrows...
(In a club): Two young girls, one fat and one so drunk that she must surely throw up soon, gyrate to the music, but without reference to its rhythm.
Not a single one of my young patients has known the dates of the Second World War, let alone of the First; some have never heard of these wars, though recently one young patient who had heard of the Second World War thought it took place in the eighteenth century. In the prevailing circumstances of total ignorance, I was impressed that he had heard of the eighteenth century.
...parents whose philosophy of child rearing is laissez-faire tempered by insensate rage.
...a murderer who once said to me that he had had to kill his victim, otherwise he didn't know what he might have done.
(After relating truly horrific stories of Africa): Yet nothing I saw--neither the poverty nor the overt oppression--ever had the same devastating effect on the human personality as the undiscriminating welfare state. I never saw the loss of dignity, the self-centeredness, the spiritual and emotional vacuity, or the sheer ignorance of how to live that I see daily in England...I and the doctors from India and the Philippines have come to the same terrible conclusion: that the worst poverty is in England--and it is not material poverty but poverty of the soul.
Medical correctness hasn't reached the bingo hall yet. It is with a certain pleasure--no, joy--that I watch women with the physiques and mobility of beached whales refresh themselves constantly (as they mark their cards) with large piles of cholesterol-raising fried foods and large volumes of tepid, watery English beer. Tomorrow, of course, they'll go to their doctors and tell them that, however hard they try, they just can't seem to lose weight: they only have to look at food, and the pounds go on.
Blessings from the (currently) sunny land of ice and snow.
Jesse Broussard
Thursday, April 22, 2010
And Yet More Wodehouse
For, like so many substantial citizens of his native country (America), he had married young and kept on marrying, springing from blonde to blonde like the chamois of the Alps leaping from crag to crag.
from Summer Moonshine
Blessings,
JB
from Summer Moonshine
Blessings,
JB
Monday, May 18, 2009
And You Thought Facebook Was Worthless...
"I Appreciate Christian Pick-up Lines." Wow.
a collection of the best:
1. "nice bible."
2. "is this pew taken?"
3. "i just don't feel called to celibacy."
4. "for you i would slay two Goliaths"
5. "i would go through more than Job for you"
6. "you are perfect, except with all the sin."
8. "you are so unblemished that i would sacrifice you."
9. "what, this here? oh.. thats my study bible - it's a little bigger but i can handle the extra spiritual and physical weight."
10. "shall we tithe?"
11. "at points in my life i have been referred to as Samson"
12. "the word says 'Give drink to those who are thirsty, and feed the hungry'; how about dinner?"
13. "i didnt believe in predestination until tonight."
14. "im not like those other Christ Church guys."
15. "i believe one of my ribs belongs to you."
16. "i know Lachlan Payne."
17. (if no.16 gains no response) "Lachlan Payne knows me"
19. "i can be your Boaz."
20. "my spiritual gift is my good looks... it lifts peoples spirits"
21. "i sacrifice my sunday mornings to look after the creche group. its tough... but i love children."
24. "mark driscoll takes up 35% of my ipod memory."
25. "hey.. i would work 7 years for your sister.. but i would work 7 more years for you."
26. "im kind of a big deal at Koorong"
29. "bible-gateway happens to be my homepage."
47. "how many times do I have to walk around you to make you fall for me?"
49. "if you say no, i will rip out my hair and my beard"
54. "let me remove my sandals before I come any closer.."
55. "lets say, hypothetically, you were married. I would send your husband to the front line against the Amorites"
56. "its obvious to me that you sprouted from the good kinda soil..."
57. "feel free to meet me at the threshing floor."
70. "i arrange the substantial christian section of my bookshelf into alphabetical order. coffee?"
71. "i sit with my mum at church"
72. "let me sell you an indulgence because it's a sin to look as good as you do."
73. "not a big fan of your last name, but thats cool, i can change that."
92. "have you died before? because that looks like a resurrection body to me.."
93. 'all im looking for is a Godly woman. i don't care that you're not attractive.'
98. "i will never give you reason to hammer a tent peg through my skull."
99. "i predicted David over Goliath... now I'm betting on you and me."
100. "if you were staying for the tribulation, i would consider staying too.. but then i would probably leave."
101. "if you were a leper, i would still hold your hand.. even if it wasnt attached."
102. "i would have asked you out to dinner, but i just put all my money in the offetory basket."
103. "Hi, I'm Calvin. You were meant to choose me."
104. "Unlike the Israelites, who forgot the Lord, I will remember your name most of the time."
109. "the perseverance of the saints is well illustrated by the amount of time I spend talking to you."
******************* NEW ********************
111. "If you were my wife, I would never make you pretend to be my sister. That would be too damaging to my reputation."
112. "I would bring your father twelve-hundred Philistine foreskins for just one date with you."
a collection of the best:
1. "nice bible."
2. "is this pew taken?"
3. "i just don't feel called to celibacy."
4. "for you i would slay two Goliaths"
5. "i would go through more than Job for you"
6. "you are perfect, except with all the sin."
8. "you are so unblemished that i would sacrifice you."
9. "what, this here? oh.. thats my study bible - it's a little bigger but i can handle the extra spiritual and physical weight."
10. "shall we tithe?"
11. "at points in my life i have been referred to as Samson"
12. "the word says 'Give drink to those who are thirsty, and feed the hungry'; how about dinner?"
13. "i didnt believe in predestination until tonight."
14. "im not like those other Christ Church guys."
15. "i believe one of my ribs belongs to you."
16. "i know Lachlan Payne."
17. (if no.16 gains no response) "Lachlan Payne knows me"
19. "i can be your Boaz."
20. "my spiritual gift is my good looks... it lifts peoples spirits"
21. "i sacrifice my sunday mornings to look after the creche group. its tough... but i love children."
24. "mark driscoll takes up 35% of my ipod memory."
25. "hey.. i would work 7 years for your sister.. but i would work 7 more years for you."
26. "im kind of a big deal at Koorong"
29. "bible-gateway happens to be my homepage."
47. "how many times do I have to walk around you to make you fall for me?"
49. "if you say no, i will rip out my hair and my beard"
54. "let me remove my sandals before I come any closer.."
55. "lets say, hypothetically, you were married. I would send your husband to the front line against the Amorites"
56. "its obvious to me that you sprouted from the good kinda soil..."
57. "feel free to meet me at the threshing floor."
70. "i arrange the substantial christian section of my bookshelf into alphabetical order. coffee?"
71. "i sit with my mum at church"
72. "let me sell you an indulgence because it's a sin to look as good as you do."
73. "not a big fan of your last name, but thats cool, i can change that."
92. "have you died before? because that looks like a resurrection body to me.."
93. 'all im looking for is a Godly woman. i don't care that you're not attractive.'
98. "i will never give you reason to hammer a tent peg through my skull."
99. "i predicted David over Goliath... now I'm betting on you and me."
100. "if you were staying for the tribulation, i would consider staying too.. but then i would probably leave."
101. "if you were a leper, i would still hold your hand.. even if it wasnt attached."
102. "i would have asked you out to dinner, but i just put all my money in the offetory basket."
103. "Hi, I'm Calvin. You were meant to choose me."
104. "Unlike the Israelites, who forgot the Lord, I will remember your name most of the time."
109. "the perseverance of the saints is well illustrated by the amount of time I spend talking to you."
******************* NEW ********************
111. "If you were my wife, I would never make you pretend to be my sister. That would be too damaging to my reputation."
112. "I would bring your father twelve-hundred Philistine foreskins for just one date with you."
Monday, March 16, 2009
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
One for Brooke
The sea cucumber, when harassed, will turn away from its inimicus, blast its intestines out of it's nether regions to entangle or distract aforementioned unfriendly, and will then proceed to grow them back at its leisure.
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Sawyer Speaks
5 Prescient Animals Less Well Known than Groundhog Punxsutawney Phil
January 29, 2009 by sawyerspeaks
Prescient – adjective. Prophetic, predictive, visionary; psychic, clairvoyant.
5. Common Goldfish. By floating on its side, predicts whether you know how to care for a common goldfish.
4. Wiley E. Coyote. Able to predict precisely when Road Runner will pass by on highway. Unable to do anything about it.
3. Blue Whale. Accurately predicts winning Powerball numbers. Known to beach itself trying to get to 7-11 in pursuit of ticket.
2. Whack-a-Moyle. Habitat: kosher carnival arcades. Appearance in text predicts that SawyerSpeaks is about to receive e-mails about insensitivity.
1. Hippo Craticoaf. This is simply a hippo that has disguised itself in a physician’s lab coat in order to graze free salad bars at medical conventions. Able to predict when next tray of shrimp will arrive from hotel kitchen.
January 29, 2009 by sawyerspeaks
Prescient – adjective. Prophetic, predictive, visionary; psychic, clairvoyant.
5. Common Goldfish. By floating on its side, predicts whether you know how to care for a common goldfish.
4. Wiley E. Coyote. Able to predict precisely when Road Runner will pass by on highway. Unable to do anything about it.
3. Blue Whale. Accurately predicts winning Powerball numbers. Known to beach itself trying to get to 7-11 in pursuit of ticket.
2. Whack-a-Moyle. Habitat: kosher carnival arcades. Appearance in text predicts that SawyerSpeaks is about to receive e-mails about insensitivity.
1. Hippo Craticoaf. This is simply a hippo that has disguised itself in a physician’s lab coat in order to graze free salad bars at medical conventions. Able to predict when next tray of shrimp will arrive from hotel kitchen.
Friday, February 13, 2009
The Whimsy of Wodehouse
http://www.credenda.org/issues/11-4verbatim.php
Volume 11, Issue 4: Verbatim
Quotations on Plum
Plum and Clever Chappies
But anyone who considers a Wodehouse inferior and thinks that he may never read anything other than Marlowe, Goethe, or Vestdijk does not know how to distinguish. The distinction between good and bad does not lie between what is heavier and more serious and what is lighter, but runs right through the genres. There are good and bad books which must be regarded as high literature, and there are also good and bad books which are devoted to the lighter muse.
H.R. Rookmaker
Stilton, who was now a pretty vermilion, came partially out of the ether, uttering odd, strangled noises like a man with no roof to his mouth trying to recite ‘Gunga Din’.
Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit
She gave a sort of despairing gesture, like a vicar’s daughter who has discovered Erastianism in the village.
Laughing Gas
The Modern Library asked its board of advisors to pick the hundred greatest English-language novels of the twentieth century. We define the assignment differently. P. G. Wodehouse wrote 96 novels; what are the other 4?
National Review
“In the inspired words of Pliny the Younger—”
Bill held up a hand. “Right ho, Jeeves.”
“Very good, m’lord.”
“I’m not interested in Pliny the Younger.”
“No m’lord.”
“As far as I’m concerned, you may take Pliny the Younger and put him where the monkey put the nuts.”
The Return of Jeeves
...giving it her opinion that against a woman with a brain like that, Ginger hadn’t the meager chance of a toupee in a high wind.
Jeeves and the Tie that Binds
To inhabit the same world as Mr. Wodehouse is a high privilege; to inhabit the same volume, even as a doorkeeper, is perilous.
Ogden Nash
“Well there it is,” I said, and went into the silence. And as he, too, seemed disinclined for chit-chat, we stood for some moments like a couple of Trappist monks who have run into each other by chance at the dog races.
Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit
In repose, it has a sort of meditative expression, as if she were a pure white soul thinking beautiful thoughts, and, when animated, so dashed animated that it boosts the morale to just look at her. Her eyes are a kind of browny-hazel and her hair rather along the same lines. The general effect is of an angel who eats a lot of yeast.
The Mating Season
The lunches of fifty-seven years had caused his chest to slip down into the mezzanine floor.
Chester Forgets Himself
He trusted neither of them as far as he could spit, and he was a poor spitter, lacking both distance and control.
Money in the Bank
Golf . . . is the infallible test. The man who can go into a patch of rough alone, with the knowledge that only God is watching him, and play the ball where it lies, is the man who will serve you faithfully and well.
The Clicking of Cuthbert
The Right Hon. was a tubby little chap who looked as if he had been poured into his clothes and forgotten to say ‘when!’
Very Good, Jeeves
I don’t think I have ever seen a Silver Band so nonplussed. It was as though a bevy of expectant wolves had overtaken a sleigh and found no Russian peasant on board.
Uncle Dynamite
For only Og king of Bashan remained of the remnant of giants; behold, his bedstead was a bedstead of iron; is it not in Rabbath of the children of Ammon? Nine cubits was the length thereof, and four cubits the breadth of it, after the cubit of a man.
Deuteronomy 3:11
Back to top
Back to Table of Contents
Copyright © 2007 Credenda/Agenda. All rights reserved.
Volume 11, Issue 4: Verbatim
Quotations on Plum
Plum and Clever Chappies
But anyone who considers a Wodehouse inferior and thinks that he may never read anything other than Marlowe, Goethe, or Vestdijk does not know how to distinguish. The distinction between good and bad does not lie between what is heavier and more serious and what is lighter, but runs right through the genres. There are good and bad books which must be regarded as high literature, and there are also good and bad books which are devoted to the lighter muse.
H.R. Rookmaker
Stilton, who was now a pretty vermilion, came partially out of the ether, uttering odd, strangled noises like a man with no roof to his mouth trying to recite ‘Gunga Din’.
Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit
She gave a sort of despairing gesture, like a vicar’s daughter who has discovered Erastianism in the village.
Laughing Gas
The Modern Library asked its board of advisors to pick the hundred greatest English-language novels of the twentieth century. We define the assignment differently. P. G. Wodehouse wrote 96 novels; what are the other 4?
National Review
“In the inspired words of Pliny the Younger—”
Bill held up a hand. “Right ho, Jeeves.”
“Very good, m’lord.”
“I’m not interested in Pliny the Younger.”
“No m’lord.”
“As far as I’m concerned, you may take Pliny the Younger and put him where the monkey put the nuts.”
The Return of Jeeves
...giving it her opinion that against a woman with a brain like that, Ginger hadn’t the meager chance of a toupee in a high wind.
Jeeves and the Tie that Binds
To inhabit the same world as Mr. Wodehouse is a high privilege; to inhabit the same volume, even as a doorkeeper, is perilous.
Ogden Nash
“Well there it is,” I said, and went into the silence. And as he, too, seemed disinclined for chit-chat, we stood for some moments like a couple of Trappist monks who have run into each other by chance at the dog races.
Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit
In repose, it has a sort of meditative expression, as if she were a pure white soul thinking beautiful thoughts, and, when animated, so dashed animated that it boosts the morale to just look at her. Her eyes are a kind of browny-hazel and her hair rather along the same lines. The general effect is of an angel who eats a lot of yeast.
The Mating Season
The lunches of fifty-seven years had caused his chest to slip down into the mezzanine floor.
Chester Forgets Himself
He trusted neither of them as far as he could spit, and he was a poor spitter, lacking both distance and control.
Money in the Bank
Golf . . . is the infallible test. The man who can go into a patch of rough alone, with the knowledge that only God is watching him, and play the ball where it lies, is the man who will serve you faithfully and well.
The Clicking of Cuthbert
The Right Hon. was a tubby little chap who looked as if he had been poured into his clothes and forgotten to say ‘when!’
Very Good, Jeeves
I don’t think I have ever seen a Silver Band so nonplussed. It was as though a bevy of expectant wolves had overtaken a sleigh and found no Russian peasant on board.
Uncle Dynamite
For only Og king of Bashan remained of the remnant of giants; behold, his bedstead was a bedstead of iron; is it not in Rabbath of the children of Ammon? Nine cubits was the length thereof, and four cubits the breadth of it, after the cubit of a man.
Deuteronomy 3:11
Back to top
Back to Table of Contents
Copyright © 2007 Credenda/Agenda. All rights reserved.
Thursday, February 12, 2009
So Many Types of People...
There are only 3 types of people in the world: those who can count, and those who can't.
There are only 10 types of people in the world: those who know binary, and those who don't.
There are only 2 types of people in the world: those who put people in little categories, and those who don't.
There are only 10 types of people in the world: those who know binary, and those who don't.
There are only 2 types of people in the world: those who put people in little categories, and those who don't.
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Sunday, February 8, 2009
Not My Fault
I have a roommate, see? And he has a family, see? And every once in a while, they tell him something odd which he relates to me and I am ethically obligated to pass it on to you, see? So the following is not my fault: as Michael Scott says, "I'm just the middleman. You wouldn't arrest a guy who's just selling the drugs, would you?"
What is the difference between a Jew and a pizza? (No, it's not that vile answer that you've all heard.)
Pizzas don't hate Jesus.
Thank you Rob Linn, we are all inspired and deeply moved.
What is the difference between a Jew and a pizza? (No, it's not that vile answer that you've all heard.)
Pizzas don't hate Jesus.
Thank you Rob Linn, we are all inspired and deeply moved.
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Declamation: Letter to Grandma
Dear Grandma, how’s the weather down there in California? I hope it’s better than it is up here, because it’s really cold and rainy. I guess for you guys cold and rainy means sixty degrees and partly cloudy. But we actually have to wear coats now. Dad really hates the cold. He says he gets really cold because he has bad circulation. He says he has bad circulation because his pipes are clogged. I’m not sure he knows exactly what that means, but it sounds pretty unhealthy. He wants to come down and spend the winters with you guys but he says that’ll only happen when his ship comes in. He also says he thinks his ship sunk. But he still keeps his eyes peeled.
School’s good. I really like my teachers and my classes and my teachers and my classmates and my teachers. Right now I’m taking a history class and a Bible class, and a music class, and a sort of kinda of speech class, and a kind of like a Spanish class but a little different. My grades are fine…I think…well, I actually don’t really know. You know how back in elementary it was fun to joke about getting a Z or a Z minus. Well, my school actually does that here, but only down to M. At the end of the week the whole student body and faculty gets together and we pray and then sing and then everybody takes naps. Usually one or two people come up and tell I guess you’d call them bedtime stories so everybody can go to sleep easier. Once, I had slept through my early morning class that day so I wasn’t very tired and the story was kinda interesting so I stayed awake the whole time. Life’s pretty good though, I was able to buy a new pencil and some paper. Christmas is coming up though so that’ll help. By the time my birthday rolls around I’ll probably be broke again. Oh how quickly that day will be here, that oh so ominous
February 28th . Big day, mkay, gotta run to class. Love, Ben.
School’s good. I really like my teachers and my classes and my teachers and my classmates and my teachers. Right now I’m taking a history class and a Bible class, and a music class, and a sort of kinda of speech class, and a kind of like a Spanish class but a little different. My grades are fine…I think…well, I actually don’t really know. You know how back in elementary it was fun to joke about getting a Z or a Z minus. Well, my school actually does that here, but only down to M. At the end of the week the whole student body and faculty gets together and we pray and then sing and then everybody takes naps. Usually one or two people come up and tell I guess you’d call them bedtime stories so everybody can go to sleep easier. Once, I had slept through my early morning class that day so I wasn’t very tired and the story was kinda interesting so I stayed awake the whole time. Life’s pretty good though, I was able to buy a new pencil and some paper. Christmas is coming up though so that’ll help. By the time my birthday rolls around I’ll probably be broke again. Oh how quickly that day will be here, that oh so ominous
February 28th . Big day, mkay, gotta run to class. Love, Ben.
Thursday, October 30, 2008
The Gauntlet is Accepted
Each year, the house that won the pumpkin rugby game challenges the house that lost the pumpkin rugby game to a game of, not surprisingly, pumpkin rugby. This is done, I am afraid to confess, in a public setting, and this was this years response to the challenge, read by Ryan Handermann and Nate Douglas.
Ryan: Woe! Woe! Woe! Weeping and wailing arises from Blaine Street and all Israel can hear her lamentations. How Anna Street stomped upon our faces and beat our precious pumpkins into the ground! How they have sneered at our rucks and pranced about in our Trizone! They have strewn our mutilated bodies over the whole earth, vultures have come and eaten our flesh. They buried the remains deep in the earth, where no light could penetrate. And there was nothing to mark our death-graves only seven small pieces of broken pumpkin. Death be not proud! Oh Israel! The night is darkest, just before the dawn.
Nate: Dawn. She shone with her rose-red fingers, slowly creeping across the sky, like blood spilt over the floor. The sky was red. Today, blood would be spilt at the hands of Blaine St.
But then, the earth began to shake, lightning ripped through the sky, as the headstones of the graves split like the temple veil. Hades rejected the men of Blaine, who then arose from the coffins, battered, bruised, and muddied. The sun sprang up, leaving the brilliant waters in its wake, climbing the bronze sky to shower light on the on the men now clad in white. The men approached, clad in white, and the names that set on them were death, and hell followed with them.
Ryan: Then hell broke loose upon a third of the field which views the mountain. Horses flew forward urged on by their shining riders. And then, just before the clash of battle sounded, all looked up and upon the cliff overseeing the battle stood a man. Frozen in time, they waited. Then the prophet of old who had been lying on his side, right hand lifted up before the sunrise, spoke these words: “Behold, I have looked with my eyes, and I have seen a vision from the pumpkin colored-heavens.
Nate: A man, like Hector, burst through in glory, his face dark as the sudden rushing night, but he blazed on in white and terrible fire broke from the bright garments that wrapped his body, two pumpkins clutched in his fists. No one could fight him, no one could stop him, none but the gods as the man rushed through their masses and his eyes flashed fire. And whirling around he cried to his brave men of white, shouting through the ruck, “The line! Storm the line!”
Look, Breath, Both: We, on behalf of blaine st and all men it doth represent, do accept this challenge.
N: For redemption.
R: McCain.
N: For freedom.
R: For a random faculty or student.
N: For Plato
R: And Aristotle
N: For women’s suffrage
R: For the Gourd Goddess
Both: Don’t ruck until you see the whites of their thighs.
Ryan: Woe! Woe! Woe! Weeping and wailing arises from Blaine Street and all Israel can hear her lamentations. How Anna Street stomped upon our faces and beat our precious pumpkins into the ground! How they have sneered at our rucks and pranced about in our Trizone! They have strewn our mutilated bodies over the whole earth, vultures have come and eaten our flesh. They buried the remains deep in the earth, where no light could penetrate. And there was nothing to mark our death-graves only seven small pieces of broken pumpkin. Death be not proud! Oh Israel! The night is darkest, just before the dawn.
Nate: Dawn. She shone with her rose-red fingers, slowly creeping across the sky, like blood spilt over the floor. The sky was red. Today, blood would be spilt at the hands of Blaine St.
But then, the earth began to shake, lightning ripped through the sky, as the headstones of the graves split like the temple veil. Hades rejected the men of Blaine, who then arose from the coffins, battered, bruised, and muddied. The sun sprang up, leaving the brilliant waters in its wake, climbing the bronze sky to shower light on the on the men now clad in white. The men approached, clad in white, and the names that set on them were death, and hell followed with them.
Ryan: Then hell broke loose upon a third of the field which views the mountain. Horses flew forward urged on by their shining riders. And then, just before the clash of battle sounded, all looked up and upon the cliff overseeing the battle stood a man. Frozen in time, they waited. Then the prophet of old who had been lying on his side, right hand lifted up before the sunrise, spoke these words: “Behold, I have looked with my eyes, and I have seen a vision from the pumpkin colored-heavens.
Nate: A man, like Hector, burst through in glory, his face dark as the sudden rushing night, but he blazed on in white and terrible fire broke from the bright garments that wrapped his body, two pumpkins clutched in his fists. No one could fight him, no one could stop him, none but the gods as the man rushed through their masses and his eyes flashed fire. And whirling around he cried to his brave men of white, shouting through the ruck, “The line! Storm the line!”
Look, Breath, Both: We, on behalf of blaine st and all men it doth represent, do accept this challenge.
N: For redemption.
R: McCain.
N: For freedom.
R: For a random faculty or student.
N: For Plato
R: And Aristotle
N: For women’s suffrage
R: For the Gourd Goddess
Both: Don’t ruck until you see the whites of their thighs.
Sunday, October 26, 2008
Trovato: Aquinas on Zombies
Whether there are such thing as zombies?
Objection 1: That’s weird and dumb.
Objection 2: You’re an idiot.
Objection 3: To assert that zombies are nomologically possible would be to assert that in some world that shares all of its laws with the actual world there is a being identical to some actual or genuinely possible human being who is utterly lacking in consciousness. Of course, the existence of a real zombie would entail that zombies are nomologically as well as logically possible, but the reverse entailments do not hold. The idea of qualia and related phenomenal notions of the mind are not coherent concepts, and the zombie scenario is therefore incoherent.
On the contrary: The Bible.
2 Kings 19:35: And it came to pass that night, that the angel of the LORD went out, and smote in the camp of the Assyrians an hundred fourscore and five thousand: and when they arose early in the morning, behold, they [were] all dead corpses.
I answer that: Um…well, nomologically speaking the related phenomenal notions inherent in the generic state of consciousness in the human mind and to certain qualia related platitudes…um, the Bible?
Reply to objections 1 & 2: Don’t you feel stupid now?
Reply to objection 3: Psh. Science. They don’t even know.
Objection 1: That’s weird and dumb.
Objection 2: You’re an idiot.
Objection 3: To assert that zombies are nomologically possible would be to assert that in some world that shares all of its laws with the actual world there is a being identical to some actual or genuinely possible human being who is utterly lacking in consciousness. Of course, the existence of a real zombie would entail that zombies are nomologically as well as logically possible, but the reverse entailments do not hold. The idea of qualia and related phenomenal notions of the mind are not coherent concepts, and the zombie scenario is therefore incoherent.
On the contrary: The Bible.
2 Kings 19:35: And it came to pass that night, that the angel of the LORD went out, and smote in the camp of the Assyrians an hundred fourscore and five thousand: and when they arose early in the morning, behold, they [were] all dead corpses.
I answer that: Um…well, nomologically speaking the related phenomenal notions inherent in the generic state of consciousness in the human mind and to certain qualia related platitudes…um, the Bible?
Reply to objections 1 & 2: Don’t you feel stupid now?
Reply to objection 3: Psh. Science. They don’t even know.
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Declamation: Aquinas on Beards
The assignment was to write in a structure imitative of Thomas Aquinas Summa Theologiae, so here is mine; others are forthcoming.
Blessings.
J. Broussard
Declamation:
Aquinas Summa imitation (in form)
10/22/08
1. Whether it can be demonstrated that facial hair is good?
Objection 1. It seems that the benefit of facial hair cannot be demonstrated, as it would be a matter of preference—a benefit to some, but a detriment to others.
Objection 2. Further, facial hair is not available to all manner of men, so if it is beneficial, it is a benefit that slanders the justice of God: that He would give it to some and not to others.
On the contrary: It is written that God made all things that are, and that He declared everything that He had made to be “all very good.”
I answer that: Demonstration can be made in two ways: through the state of man at creation, and through the state of man following the resurrection. Hence the benefit of facial hair, which cannot be easily ascertained from our current fallen state, can be made plain through the eternal counsel of God.
Reply to Objection 1: The Gospel clearly states that the beard of Christ was plucked out, and that this was done to shame Him. How is it then merely a matter of preference for us to daily imitate the vile heathen that crucified our Lord by severing with dull razors the beard from the Imago Dei in us (be you a man with one blade or a coward with five)? This is indeed our shame.
Reply to Objection 2: It is true that all men cannot grow facial hair; indeed, it is also true that most women cannot either. But this does not appear to have always been the case, for it is written in Leviticus, the thirteenth chapter and the twenty ninth verse, that “if a man or woman have a plague upon the head or the beard…”
Now it may be easily assumed, that if women used to be able to grow beards, so too could all manner of men, and if we are asked why this is not the case today, we may easily respond, “why do men not live past their hundredth year today?” God has changed things for His own pleasure, and it is our delight that some men, and (indeed, our great delight) that most women cannot grow beards, and this does not impute partiality to God.
However, we may all look forward to the day when there shall be neither slave nor free, male nor female, Jew nor Greek, American nor Dutch, bearded nor side-burned.
Blessings.
J. Broussard
Declamation:
Aquinas Summa imitation (in form)
10/22/08
1. Whether it can be demonstrated that facial hair is good?
Objection 1. It seems that the benefit of facial hair cannot be demonstrated, as it would be a matter of preference—a benefit to some, but a detriment to others.
Objection 2. Further, facial hair is not available to all manner of men, so if it is beneficial, it is a benefit that slanders the justice of God: that He would give it to some and not to others.
On the contrary: It is written that God made all things that are, and that He declared everything that He had made to be “all very good.”
I answer that: Demonstration can be made in two ways: through the state of man at creation, and through the state of man following the resurrection. Hence the benefit of facial hair, which cannot be easily ascertained from our current fallen state, can be made plain through the eternal counsel of God.
Reply to Objection 1: The Gospel clearly states that the beard of Christ was plucked out, and that this was done to shame Him. How is it then merely a matter of preference for us to daily imitate the vile heathen that crucified our Lord by severing with dull razors the beard from the Imago Dei in us (be you a man with one blade or a coward with five)? This is indeed our shame.
Reply to Objection 2: It is true that all men cannot grow facial hair; indeed, it is also true that most women cannot either. But this does not appear to have always been the case, for it is written in Leviticus, the thirteenth chapter and the twenty ninth verse, that “if a man or woman have a plague upon the head or the beard…”
Now it may be easily assumed, that if women used to be able to grow beards, so too could all manner of men, and if we are asked why this is not the case today, we may easily respond, “why do men not live past their hundredth year today?” God has changed things for His own pleasure, and it is our delight that some men, and (indeed, our great delight) that most women cannot grow beards, and this does not impute partiality to God.
However, we may all look forward to the day when there shall be neither slave nor free, male nor female, Jew nor Greek, American nor Dutch, bearded nor side-burned.
Monday, September 29, 2008
Commonplaces on Play vs. Work
"Play is anything you enjoy and aren't held accountable for." --Jordan (Juhr-duhn) Leithart
"Play starts when the umpire says 'Play ball' and ends when the last out is made. Everything else, like lifting weights and taking steroids, is just work." --Ben Saunders
"Dr. Stokes learned me all about letters last year. “They simply refer us,” he said, “to real world stuff.” Problem solved! What childhood activity could be more “real world” than packaging 10 dead flies into envelopes, sorted according to their kinds, and selling them to my other brothers?" --Timothy van den Broek
"Play starts when the umpire says 'Play ball' and ends when the last out is made. Everything else, like lifting weights and taking steroids, is just work." --Ben Saunders
"Dr. Stokes learned me all about letters last year. “They simply refer us,” he said, “to real world stuff.” Problem solved! What childhood activity could be more “real world” than packaging 10 dead flies into envelopes, sorted according to their kinds, and selling them to my other brothers?" --Timothy van den Broek
Friday, September 5, 2008
Nice Latin phrase
"Vir qui surget in latrino, altus est in caccabo."
A man standing on a toilet is high on pot.
A man standing on a toilet is high on pot.
Thursday, August 28, 2008
कोम्मोंप्लासस
"Cocaine is God's way of saying you have too much money."
"Happiness is like wetting your pants: everyone can see it, but you're the only one who can feel it."
"What do you call a musician without a girlfriend? Homeless."
--Mark Driscoll
On the excessive use of makeup:
"If the house needs painting, bring out the brushes."
"If it needs that much paint, remodel."
"Love conquers all, so tace et osculate."
To Mr. Collins: "The only time you open your mouth is to switch feet: I thought men like you shot themselves. Your mother should have thrown you out and kept the stork."
"I could become one with Nature to figure out where the heck Nature is and then kill it."
--Craig Lynn
"Mothers, persistent as Rambo sequels..."
Most of these aren't cited; about half are mine and the rest are either unnamed classmates or were anonymously cited by unnamed classmates. Enjoy.
"Happiness is like wetting your pants: everyone can see it, but you're the only one who can feel it."
"What do you call a musician without a girlfriend? Homeless."
--Mark Driscoll
On the excessive use of makeup:
"If the house needs painting, bring out the brushes."
"If it needs that much paint, remodel."
"Love conquers all, so tace et osculate."
To Mr. Collins: "The only time you open your mouth is to switch feet: I thought men like you shot themselves. Your mother should have thrown you out and kept the stork."
"I could become one with Nature to figure out where the heck Nature is and then kill it."
--Craig Lynn
"Mothers, persistent as Rambo sequels..."
Most of these aren't cited; about half are mine and the rest are either unnamed classmates or were anonymously cited by unnamed classmates. Enjoy.
Monday, July 21, 2008
Evangellyfish
Pastor Doug Wilson of Christ Church in Moscow, Idaho has written a novel called Evangellyfish. So far, he has posted the first two chapters (click on my title), and they are brutally well worth reading.
Enjoy.
Enjoy.
Thursday, May 8, 2008
Last and Greatest (or at least most awkward) Declamation
Oh Sweet Smell
The first week of NSA was awkward. There was a barrier within our class, and this barrier was the sexes. No one knew how to act or what to say.
The first time I met Sean, it smelled right. In my nose every nostril hair was swaying back and forth singing the Hallelujah Chorus. If Capon wrote a book on smells, Sean would be Capon’s onion, only it would take more than ten pages to unpeel all the mysteries of Sean’s smelliness. Sean smells so good, and I told him this. “Sean, you smell soooooo good.”
I do not think that this was necessarily the greatest thing to tell a guy, especially one that you just met, but I don’t regret it. Anyone so odiferous deserves a prize: a plastic cookie, a statue of a naked Greek god, coupons…anything.
Needles to say this made Sean extremely uncomfortable, which was only a small part of the joy it gave me. He stepped back, and in his eyes I could see a picture of the Antichrist. He shifted his little mouse eyes, and anxiously moved his little mouse hands in distress. Trying to help him understand, I said: “Sean, really, you are the best smelling person I know. You smell like home.” This just made things worse…
Now when I see Sean it is like the story of Abelard and Eloise. Anytime I came within a three-foot radius I say, “Abelard, I don’t want to use Herbal Essence anymore, I just want to smell like you.” And Abelard says back, “Eloise, Eloise, Eloise, live for God.”
The first week of NSA was awkward. There was a barrier within our class, and this barrier was the sexes. No one knew how to act or what to say.
The first time I met Sean, it smelled right. In my nose every nostril hair was swaying back and forth singing the Hallelujah Chorus. If Capon wrote a book on smells, Sean would be Capon’s onion, only it would take more than ten pages to unpeel all the mysteries of Sean’s smelliness. Sean smells so good, and I told him this. “Sean, you smell soooooo good.”
I do not think that this was necessarily the greatest thing to tell a guy, especially one that you just met, but I don’t regret it. Anyone so odiferous deserves a prize: a plastic cookie, a statue of a naked Greek god, coupons…anything.
Needles to say this made Sean extremely uncomfortable, which was only a small part of the joy it gave me. He stepped back, and in his eyes I could see a picture of the Antichrist. He shifted his little mouse eyes, and anxiously moved his little mouse hands in distress. Trying to help him understand, I said: “Sean, really, you are the best smelling person I know. You smell like home.” This just made things worse…
Now when I see Sean it is like the story of Abelard and Eloise. Anytime I came within a three-foot radius I say, “Abelard, I don’t want to use Herbal Essence anymore, I just want to smell like you.” And Abelard says back, “Eloise, Eloise, Eloise, live for God.”
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