Live and Learn

I was walking past the mental hospital the other day,and all the patients were shouting ,'13....13....13'

The fence was too high to see over, but I saw a little gap in the planks and looked through to see what was going on.

Some idiot poked me in the eye with a stick.

Then -- they all started shouting '14....14....14'...

Where's Waldo?

I've already sent out the email, so this would be the follow-up blog post to my fifteen minutes of Traditional-Catholic fame. My use of the word 'fame' is something of a stretch of course. Nowhere is my name to be found, and even my face remains hidden.

But I was nothing shy of ecstatic to stumble across a photo of Yours Truly on Fr. Z's popular blog, What Does The Prayer Really Say? I'm joined in the picture by a few hundred fellow Catholics who share an appreciation for the Mass of 1962, and my torso from behind is about all you can make out. But there I am just as sure as you're sitting here now.






Among other things, you may be wondering what an obscure Catholic from Seattle is doing at a Latin Mass in Knoxville. I'm glad you asked. My work had sent me for five weeks of training to Oak Ridge, TN, a town just outside of Knoxville. When Saturday rolled around I naturally began the hunt for an orthodox parish in the area. That Saturday happened to be Holy Saturday, and I knew my first choice was a bad one when kneeling in silent prayer moments before Sunday morning Mass the pastor came bustling down the aisle shouting "He is risen!! Be glad! He is risen!"

Needless to say I was back on the prowl for a good parish come Divine Mercy Sunday.

And I found it.

St. John Neumann was still celebrating Mass in their 1970-something excuse for a church. But what they lacked in architecture they made up for in liturgy and worship. I was impressed. All the more so when I learned they were in the process of selling the building to the Presbyterians and building a real church at another location.

Anyhow, it seems St. John Neumann was supportive and encouraging celebration of the Traditional Latin Mass on a regular basis (in another chapel some few miles away), and was going to do so with their own parish to mark completion of the new church which happened to coincide with the five-week stint I had in Tennessee. Sort of.

As you can read in Father's post, there were some delays in the construction. But the scheduling of the Latin Mass had been done months in advance and could not be postponed. So another church had to be used -- the beautiful Holy Ghost Catholic Church.

To get an feel for what it was like, you really should read the post at WDTPRS.

Oh, and if you haven't yet found me...I'm on the left, about five rows from the back wearing a white, long sleeve dress shirt.

Three kinds of people

There are really only three kinds of people in this world. The haves. The have-nots. And the haven't-paid-for-what-we-haves.

I'm a fellow Dave Ramsey-ite. You gotta find this guy on your radio; he's great.

Shunned

Do you ever feel like an outsider?

The best ads are always the funny ones

Things that make me smile...

Washington State Ferries

From the Official Site of Washington State Tourism

Washington is home to the largest ferry fleet in the U.S. and the third largest in the world. Each year millions of passengers travel throughout the Puget Sound and into British Columbia aboard vessels with names like Kaleetan, Elwha and Hyak. Always comfortable, always friendly, and always offering the best views of the city, sound and islands.

All true...except, I don't know that "comfortable" would be your word of choice had you boarded the ferries on October 18th.

Last Thursday we had a wind storm with gusts exceeding 50 MPH. Someone managed to snap these shots:

This 'n That

Have you got a minute?

Cows, the Constitution, and the Ten Commandments

I only wish I had come up with this:

1. Cows
2. The Constitution
3. The Ten Commandments

COWS: Is it just me, or does anyone else find it amazing that our government can track a single cow born in Canada almost three years ago, right to the stall where she sleeps in the state of Washington? And, they tracked her calves right to their stalls. But they are unable to locate 11 million illegal aliens wandering around our country. Maybe we should give each of them a cow.

THE CONSTITUTION: They keep talking about drafting a Constitution for Iraq. Why don't we just give them ours? It was written by a lot of really smart guys, it has worked for over 200 years, and we're not using it anymore.

THE TEN COMMANDMENTS: The real reason that we can't have the Ten Commandments posted in a courthouse is this: You cannot post "Thou Shalt Not Steal," "Thou Shalt Not Commit Adultery", and "Thou Shall Not Lie" in a building full of lawyers, judges and politicians. It creates a hostile work environment.

Sense

Sorry, I had to put this up. :)

H/T: Jonathan Smith

Want to smile?

Swimming lessons for infants

I had no idea this was possible.



Amazing Swimming Babies - video powered by Metacafe

Bad day

I've had some pretty embarassing moments in my life.

I don't think I've had one as bad as this:

A Catholic priest faces an indecent exposure charge after police said he went jogging in the nude about an hour before sunrise.
The Rev. Robert Whipkey told officers he had been running naked at a high school track and didn't think anyone would be around at that time of day, a police report said.

He told officers he sweats profusely if he wears clothing while jogging. "I know what I did was wrong," he said in the report.

Whipkey did not return phone messages. His attorney, Doug Tisdale, told the Longmont Times-Call that Whipkey had no comment.

Whipkey, 53, was arrested June 22 in this Weld County town about 20 miles north of Denver.

An officer said he saw a naked man walking down the street at 4:35 a.m. The U.S. Naval Observatory Web site said sunrise that day in Frederick was 5:31 a.m.

The officer said when he shined his flashlight at the man, he covered himself with a piece of clothing he was carrying.

Source.

H/T to Gerald.

German Coast Guard

Why?

...because it's only the best commercial ever made.

Bobby McFerrin does the Ave Maria

Not too shabby.

Bach

For all the faithful followers of Ab Opposito, my apologies for pulling a Houdini.

Here's a piece by Bach that I think fits well with my totally random reappearance on May 27.

Enjoy.

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Pensees

Seventeenth Century prodigy Blaise Pascal, like Isaac Newton, is most often remembered for his astounding contributions to math and physics. Seldom, however, are either recalled for their contributions to philosophy and theology. But it was his Catholic faith, once abandonded, which consumed Pascal in his later years. This burning love for God and for souls compelled him to put to paper his Pensees -- his thoughts:

"Man is obviously made to think. It is his whole dignity and his whole merit; and his whole duty is to think as he ought. Now, the order of thought is to begin with self, and with its Author and its end."

"Now, of what does the world think? Never of this, but of dancing, playing the lute, singing, making verses, running at the ring, etc., fighting, making oneself king, without thinking what it is to be a king and what to be a man."

......

"Atheism shows strength of mind, but only to a certain degree."

......

"When I consider the short duration of my life, swallowed up in the eternity before and after, the little space which I fill and even can see, engulfed in the infinite immensity of spaces of which I am ignorant and which know me not, I am frightened and am astonished at being here rather than there; for there is no reason why here rather than there, why now rather than then. Who has put me here? By whose order and direction have this place and time been allotted to me?"

What is man, O Lord, that you are mindful of him?

Random post, but interesting.

How easy it is to forget how small we are. And yet, it is good to be reminded of our finite existence -- as Chesterton said, to be reminded of "our coming from darkness; the very fact that we are created." For if we lose sight of our creation, we lose sight of our Creator. And if we lose sight of God, we become our own gods.

I have always found it puzzling that so many are deaf to creation, which unceasingly cries out: "God!"