I stumbled across this biography of my friend Andy, and I had to laugh because, amazingly, all of it is true.
Also, just reading this has sort of inspired me to do something great.
Also, I hope Andy never reads this, because his whim is rumored to have led to the death of many men, and I do not wish to make his list.
Monday, February 28, 2005
RSS FEED
I have posted the RSS feed for this blog under the links, on the right side of the page. I'm not really sure how one would use it, if one so desired, but I know that people have asked me to post it.
I now fully expect, in all seriousness, for this blog to become the most popular in the world.
I now fully expect, in all seriousness, for this blog to become the most popular in the world.
SOUL-SHATTERING
This Yahoo news story about the congregants who attended the same small Wichita church as the BTK killer reads, if you were to strip it of the cold objectivism of the AP-style writing, almost as a short story:
Inside Christ Lutheran Church, neighbors and friends crammed into the pews Sunday, staring at Clark as the pastor made his way to a lectern. Latecomers, finding nowhere to sit, mingled outside in a hallway, peering through glass doors and straining to hear what was said.
Gerald Mansholt, bishop of the Central States Synod in Kansas City, Mo., spoke at the service and pleaded with the crowd for patience — to wait for the evidence. "We grieve with you," Mansholt said. "Words fail us at times like this. The very foundation of our faith is shaken."
Several women cried. One buried her face in her hands, bent over her knees and silently sobbed.
"The events that have unfolded over the past 48 hours have the power to destroy, to devastate us," Clark told the congregation. "These events have the power and energy to be a wedge that drives us apart, or they can be a force that will hold us together in these trying times. 'It makes no sense!' 'What has just happened?'"
I'll spare you my usual, painful attempts at humor - twice the effort for the half the laughs - and just say that this is damn interesting, damn dramatic stuff.
Inside Christ Lutheran Church, neighbors and friends crammed into the pews Sunday, staring at Clark as the pastor made his way to a lectern. Latecomers, finding nowhere to sit, mingled outside in a hallway, peering through glass doors and straining to hear what was said.
Gerald Mansholt, bishop of the Central States Synod in Kansas City, Mo., spoke at the service and pleaded with the crowd for patience — to wait for the evidence. "We grieve with you," Mansholt said. "Words fail us at times like this. The very foundation of our faith is shaken."
Several women cried. One buried her face in her hands, bent over her knees and silently sobbed.
"The events that have unfolded over the past 48 hours have the power to destroy, to devastate us," Clark told the congregation. "These events have the power and energy to be a wedge that drives us apart, or they can be a force that will hold us together in these trying times. 'It makes no sense!' 'What has just happened?'"
I'll spare you my usual, painful attempts at humor - twice the effort for the half the laughs - and just say that this is damn interesting, damn dramatic stuff.
Friday, February 25, 2005
THE AGE OF GOOD MEN HAS PASSED
News of the death of Robert Kearns, the 77-year old inventor of intermittent windshield wipers, has left me feeling hollow and defeated. Kearns was a part of that group of great American men that lived through the Depression, rose from its ashes, and fought the face of evil in the Great War. Overseas they did their duty and lost friends who, like them, had seen hell and vowed to restore peace and goodness to the world of men. They knew evil and desparation; had looked it in the eye and battled it, had conquered it. When they returned they hoisted this country on their sturdy backs and got down to the business of working hard. Because of men whose character was forged in the fire of battle, whose earliest memories were the hunger and cold of the Great Depression, we pluck the fruit that is fast food restaurants, endless subdivisions, and intermittent windshield wipers from the tree that is America. I take my hat off to you, Mr. Kearns, for you remind us why we forge ahead - it is not for glory or for fame, but for the betterment of our fellow man and the improvement of the human condition. You taught us to live, and you taught us to see - to see more clearly through the windshield of life.
Unfortunately, the editors of Yahoo news were not as respectful of your legacy as it deserved, for though you died on February 9th and were buried on the 14th, they have decided that only today, the 25th, shall you be remembered. For shame to them, they are imbeciles and they do not understand that the curtain is closing on the age of decent people. To you, Mr. Kearns - today I will wipe my eyes in sorrow at your passing, probably once every ten minutes, though maybe once every twenty minutes, or maybe every five mintues, but assuredly at a distinct and timely manner, intermittently and until the tempest in my soul has quieted and the rain in my heart has extinguished.
Unfortunately, the editors of Yahoo news were not as respectful of your legacy as it deserved, for though you died on February 9th and were buried on the 14th, they have decided that only today, the 25th, shall you be remembered. For shame to them, they are imbeciles and they do not understand that the curtain is closing on the age of decent people. To you, Mr. Kearns - today I will wipe my eyes in sorrow at your passing, probably once every ten minutes, though maybe once every twenty minutes, or maybe every five mintues, but assuredly at a distinct and timely manner, intermittently and until the tempest in my soul has quieted and the rain in my heart has extinguished.
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