List of the Week

Possible Titles for an As-Yet-Unnamed Romantic-Comedy Project Starring Matthew McConaughey and Kate Hudson

1. I Love Love
2. Love is Pretty
3. Love is Nicer Than Kittens
4. Just Like Love in Real Life, Only the Opposite
5. It Took 8 Committees, 5 Writers and 3 Rewrites To Produce This Waste
6. Of Course They'll Find Love, They're Far More Attractive Than You
7. L'amour Rend Mon Pantalon Brouille
8. Love is Super, Way Better Than Hot Chocolate
9. If You Can Read This, You're Too Intelligent For This Film
10. Also Starring Greg Kinnear; He Won't Get the Girl
11. Orgy of Blood
12. I Ate A Bowl Of Alphabet Soup and Crapped Out This Script
13. Are Sun-Drenched Rainbow Puppy Kisses Better Than Love? Doubtful
14. Gone Forever: $20 and Two Hours of Your Life

There's Something Wrong Here...

Here's a disturbing story about one Abdul Rahman. He is an Afghan man, who, after working as a medical relief worker, converted from Islam to Christianity. For this he was arrested, imprisoned, and faces the death penalty. At the moment most other nations are pressuring the Afghan government to release him, while Abdul himself facing psychological testing to make sure he's fit to stand trail. In this article , from CNN, a leading Muslim cleric has these encouraging words:

"Rejecting Islam is insulting God. We will not allow God to be humiliated. This man must die. Cut off his head! We will call upon the people to pull him to pieces until there is nothing left."

So the man's crime was converting to Christianity. Also, scandalously, when he was arrested he was in possession of a Bible. This is in a country that we recently "liberated", where we have a huge military presence, and whose government and people our soldiers are being killed to protect. Isn't there something wrong with this picture?

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Saturday update: The Afghan government is trying to find a way around a possible death sentence, perhaps by declaring Rahman unfit to stand trial (crazy for Christ?). Any trial might be as long as two months off. Most Muslim clerics are still calling for his death. And this past week a United States soldier was killed in a firefight with Taliban fighters in the southern part of the country. That would be a total of 283 Americans killed in that country since the operation began.

Randomosity Returns

The Little Willies = Norah Jones' new country band = Happiness and Joy

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It has been a little over a week since the Academy Awards, in which Crash upset Brokeback Mountain for best picture. I was fine with the upset, since I never jumped on the Brokeback Bandwagon. Besides the moral issues, the gay cowboy film (actually they were sheepherders, but I guess that's a tougher pitch) was just a bit overpraised. However, I didn't think Crash deserved best picture either. That film was a bit over the top and melodramatic. The characters in that movie weren't bigots, they were Bigots, and every Stereotype imaginable made its appearance at one point or another. A little subtlety would have served that film well.
Being a bit of a movie geek, I try to see all the best picture nominees so I can have my own little awards ceremony. Given the five best picture nominees, I would have ranked them this way, from best film to worst: Munich, Capote, Brokeback, Crash, Good Night Good Luck.

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I took this picture to commemorate winter 2006, which started one weekend in February and lasted about 48 hours. It is a picture of the snow on my balcony. There was about an inch and a half that fell. As usual you would have thought it was fire and brimstone falling from the sky the way this city freaks out over a little snow. Nothing to worry about, however, since a couple of days later it was back to the 60s, and winter became a distant memory. Go global warming!!!

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One recent post-call-day-hike was to this lovely spot, Ozone Falls. It is off of interstate 40. I thought that it was just past Cookeville, but it is actually just past Crossville, about thirty miles further up the Cumberland Plateau. It really isn't much of a hike, since the top of the falls is only a couple of hundred feet from the parking lot. Also, the trail to the bottom of the gorge is only about a half mile. However, that trail is horribly maintained and requires some climbing down boulders. It is a pretty little waterfall, though, falling about 110 feet into the gorge. You can also walk behind the falls.

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Last Sunday after church we went to Cracker Barrel to eat breakfast. We all took a turn playing the classic Cracker Barrel peg game, where you jump pegs in the hope of ending up with just one. I left two, making me "pretty durn smart". All of my dining companions left 4 or more, making them all "eg-no-ra-mooses". I basked in my superior intellect. It has been the high point of my week.
It has been a slow week.