Diana: WORST. BEGINNING. OF. A. (SUPPOSEDLY). ROMANTIC. SONG. EVER!

Lyrics - Diana Paul Anka

I'm so young and you're so old
This, my darling, I've been told

Smooth move there, Mr. Anka: remind her that she's old.  Oh, wait, that's only what you've been told.   What you're actually telling her is that she's not really old, people just think she is.  Like that's really going to make her feel better.  Then again, he probably made more in a year than I'll make in ten, so what do I know?

It's already 4:47* AM and I haven't wished y'all a happy Christmas!

Just where are my manners?  I must rectify this immediately, if not sooner.

HAPPY

HAPPY

JOYFUL
JOYFUL

CHRISTMAS!

Wishing you and yours the Happiest of Christmases... Christmasi... Christmice....  Oh, well, y'all know what I mean (I hope)!

*Official posting time was recorded as 4:49, but what do they know?

A Social Network Christmas

The Christmas Story Retold | The Prodigal Thought

Usually these kinds of things are quite cheesy. But I thought this re-telling of the Christmas story, via Facebook, was quite well done.

Not much to add, except watch for the spoiler alert after my response and see if you can spot the minor edit below (just pretend it's Waldo):

While I would admit that something like "The Digital Story of the Nativity" is a little cheesy (e.g., the three wise men discussing what gifts to bring), I don’t think it’s entirely bad, either (then again, I also happen to like "Bethlehemian Rhapsody" and "Hotel Can’t Afford Ya", so some might find my tastes a bit skewed). However, I clearly prefer "A Social Network Christmas", as it seems a bit more reverent and somber both in music and tone, thereby probably capturing the emotions of those who were involved better. Also, there seems to be a better synchronization between the music and what’s being typed.
Um, did I just review a couple of youtube videos? (Which might help explain why I prefer to write under an pseudonym).

SPOILER ALERT!!!!
SPOILER ALERT!!!!
SPOILER ALERT!!!!

SPOILER ALERT!!!!

(I don't want to hear anyone claiming they weren't warned!)

My favorite parts of the video:

1. 1:24 Joseph typing that he's hurting/confused at hearing about Mary's pregnancy
2. 1:57 + 1:59 "Oh, that's convenient..." and Joseph unfriended
3. 2:42 "IT'S A BOY!" typed in at same time song starts with "Rejoice...."
4. "His name shal be <close up> Jesus </video>
5.  

 BTW, there is no # 5, I just wanted to see how many people are paying attention.

A song fit for The King* written** by Queen

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Children of all ages,

We proudly present....

The Bethlehemian Rhapsody***

And, if you act now, you'll also get

(free of charge)
The Hotel Can't Afford Ya

*No, I don't mean Elvis, I mean THE King.
** Well, the music was written by them, at least.
*** Thanks to NT Blog for drawing my attention to the Bethlemian Rhapsody

The mad lovechild of Dr. Seuss and H.P. Lovecraft

The Call of Cthulhu Page 01 by *DrFaustusAU on deviantART

The Call of Cthulhu by H.P. Lovecraft

For beginning readers.

So far, the book is up to pp. 44-45.
Page 1:

The most merciful thing in the world is, I think,
that the mind is unable to connect and link
all the disparate pieces of things that we know
and thus learn of the horrors that lurk down below.

Deof Movestofca's Grand Web Tour #1: 20 links in 56 days

Note: the following first appeared on the "¤ Deof Movestofca's Web Tour ¤" static page, but were moved here to keep it from getting overloaded with links.

Proud Fundamentalist makes observations similar to my posts in my "Myths about Fundamentalists" series, but from a different angle

Bumper Sticker Christianity A fairly good assessment of "minimalistic" Christianity.

Deeper Issues Behind the Same-Sex Marriage Discussion The main issue, as I write in response to the article, is whether marriage is a God-made or man-made institution.

John Piper: I Was Racist | Christianity Today | A Magazine of Evangelical Conviction I find myself agreeing with some of what Piper says and disagreeing with other statements of his.  In this case (an excerpt of an article by [about?] him that appears to have been printed in Christianity Today), I find his writing to be too muddled to know whether I agree with him or not.  Perhaps he becomes clearer as the article progresses, in which case I might be doing his writing a bit of a disservice here.  From the excerpt itself, however, I couldn't find any indication of what specific point he was trying to make in the article.

Argument Poor, Make Fun of the Opposition add a side of appeal to ridicule with that bacon.

The Problem of Evil: Lesson 03 While the lessons over all are good, I disagree with many of the author's objections to the free will defense.

The Problem of Evil: Lesson 04 So does the author agree with free will or not?

Oh no! My wife’s coming home Well, not my wife, rather that of the author (who makes a very good analogy between cleaning house physically and cleaning house spiritually) of the post

Recall Notice A bit of humor over at TWeb

Why Won't God Heal Amputees No, not the website, but a post trying to "help" it by positing the "argument" that if God existed, He would have created 25-hour days. Since a day only has 24 hours, He doesn't exist.  (An example of Poe's Law, atheist style?)


Is There Really a non-Fundamentalist Christian? I don't see how one can deny the fundamentals of the Christian faith and still claim to be a Christian

Is Inerrancy Idolatry? A Few Simple Thoughts If an inerrantist believes that God is the source of all scripture, and that an effect (in this case, scripture) cannot be greater than its cause (in this case, God), how could they possibly place scripture above God?  An argument only a few intelligence points above the "God would have created a 25-hour day if He existed" one.

The Sad Lack of Rational Argument...  In which an argument by Dr. James F. McGrath against inerrancy on the basis that it relies on circular reasoning is shown to rely on circular reasoning.  Oh, the irony!

exclusivism If living in a pluralistic society didn't stop Peter, John, and Paul from proclaiming an exclusivist message, why should it stop us today?  (I found Johnathon Shelley's satire of the post-modern rationale behind inclusivism especially funny)

voting on heresy Who's next, Arius or perhaps Marcion?

intergenerational warfare Anyone who has heard The Who's "We Won't Be Fooled Again" or Genesis' "Land Of Confusion" should recognize this as being "same song, different verse"
.
Rob Bell takes his message to the churches Nothing really to add here

Does Hebrews Tell Us to Move On from the Gospel? "A text without a context is a pretext for a proof text."

pluralism Not all pluralisms were created equal

NB: I give up on making this page looking like I want it to.  Some of the spacing between lines is off, but I've already copied and pasted the entire post to notepad, copied and pasted it back to Blogger, and then re-did the links.  Anyone who thinks I'm going to do it again needs a psychological examination even worse than I do.

More fun deconstructing children's literature

SAET » Tom Wright Reads Humpty Dumpty » The Society for the Advancement of Ecclesial Theology

Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall
Clearly the writer is telling an Israel story, and here alludes to the Temple.  This echoes other lines in early 2^nd Nursery Literature, such as Mother Hubbard’s cupboard (the "storehouse" of the Temple) and the bone (resurrection life) which she sought for her dog ("Gentiles"). "But when she got there, the cupboard was bare and the poor little doggie had none."  The temple had nothing to offer the Gentiles, and they thus remained in their state of Adamic sin and decay.

Somehow, Wright (and everyone who responded to the post) missed the significance of the name "Humpty Dumpty", an error I sought to correct in my response (awaiting moderation; I've added here the "during the clearing of the temple":that I meant to original comment and changed the word "invasion" in the original to "intrusion".)

"Clearly the writer is telling an Israel story, and here alludes to the Temple."
I’m surprised that no one has of yet deconstructed the name "Humpty Dumpty" itself. Remove the nonsensical last syllable from both words and you get "Hump" and "Dump".
The former, especially with the mention of the "wall" as noted by Wright, is a clear reference to the Temple Mount. But note that instead of the Temple {"wall") being on the Mount {"Hump"), the order is reversed in the rhyme so that the "Hump" is on the "wall". IOW, everything has been turned upside down and is in chaos (It may also be a subtle allusion to Jesus’ "city on a hill" in Matthew 5:14, but once again, with the order upside-down). This is further strengthened by the "Hump" being combined with the "Dump", as the name of Jerusalem’s dump is the well-known... Gehenna (or "Hell"), indicating an intrusion of the unholy into the place of the sacred that echoes Jesus’ quote of Jeremiah 7:11*: "My house shall be called a house of prayer: but ye make it a den of robbers" during the clearing of the temple.
Need Mother Goose paint a clearer picture than this of what is going on here?

*I’m tempted to make a Slurpee joke here, but will attempt to resist it.

In a similar vein (the link to the following was provided in the "SAET » Tom Wright Reads Humpty Dumpty » The Society for the Advancement of Ecclesial Theology" post).

Initial Explorations: Bultmann Reads Mother Goose

Internal evidence rejects the view that wehave here an original composition by Mary (Mother) Goose of Boston(1686-1743).[1] The phrasing of I-A is definitely late eighteenthcentury, since the Goose Period would have rendered it "diddley-diddley" (and thus "fiddley" in I-B). Furthermore, the sequence "cat-cow-dog-dish" represents an obvious redaction and is a compilation ofat least four different accounts.[2] Thus, the author of the piece isunknown,[3] and its date set between 1780 and 1820.[4] The Sitz imLeben of the Depression of 1815 may be reflected in III.2.

 See also "Of Bears (and others) of 'very little brain'"

Of bears (and others) of "very little brain"

Reconstructing the Pooh Community - Justin Taylor

But few know of [Richard Bauckham's] years spent in the Winnie-the-Pooh books, reconstructing the community behind the texts [by using methods similar to those used to reconstruct the "Johannine community"]. In this unpublished paper he summarizes the "major methodological breakthrough which virtually all Pooh scholarship now takes for granted." Here is a snippet:

I couldn't do justice to the humor of what follows, you'll just have to read it yourself.  Instead, I'll just skip to my response

So what he's saying is that both Winnie the Pooh and the Gospel of John must have been the works of redactors working with multiple sources?  Because we all know there's no way that the Gospel of John could have been the work of a single author.

For a parody of the "documentary hypothesis" (a.k.a., JEDP), there's New Directions in Pooh Studies: Überlieferungs- und religionsgeschichtliche Studien zum Pu-Buch, for which I've provided the following excerpt:

There is little need, at the present stage of scholarship, to attempt a justiÞcation of the principle that the dogma of unitary authorship for works of literature must be totally abandoned. In all conÞdence we may say that a priori we may expect the Pooh corpus (viz. Winnie-the-Pooh, hereafter abbreviated W, containing traditions of higher antiquity than the Deutero-Pooh book, The House at Pooh Corner, hereafter abbreviated H) to be of composite origin; even if there were such a person as A.A. Milne, traditionally the 'author', we may be sure that he did not write the Pooh books. His name does not occur once within the narratives themselves, and we can hardly be expected to take a title-page, manifestly a later addition, seriously.

 See also "More fun deconstructing children's literature"

Bad gifts for cold babies

Christmas Songs That Don’t Make Sense « A Brick in the Valley

Christmas Songs That Don’t Make Sense

It's a video (the title of this post is my diabolical, um, fiendish um, I mean, clever[?] way to try to get you to view the video because othewise it would be hard to make sense of it [i.e., the title of the post] without doing so) so there isn't anything written I could quote, so let's just move on to my reply (with a minor edit because I forgot that the plural of "reindeer" is "reindeer"):

Actually, it should be "A Christmas Song That Doesn't Make Sense", unless there's more in the series.  Like "Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer".  Here's Santa with the biggest5 spy network in the world to keep track of all the kids in the world and one is supposed to believe he doesn't know what's going on in with his reindeer?  And he seems to care whether children are "good or bad", so why not his reindeer as well?  Finally, one would also think if he can get the adult reindeer to listen to him, he should be powerful to do the same with the younger reindeer as well.  But there's poor Rudolph, being laughed at, being called names, not being allowed to play reindeer games.  Why?  Why?  Why does Santa hate ampu-  I mean, red-nosed reindeer?  This song is what made me become an a-Santa-ist.
But flash-forward.  Now here's Santa needing Rudolph's help- you know, the same reindeer that when he was younger Santa apparently wouldn't lift a finger to help.  And Rudolph must have the word "CHUMP" stamped on his forehead, because here he has Santa in a prime bargaining position and what does he do?  He throws it away with a "Why sure, Santa, I'll be glad to help" when he should have been saying, "Yo, Santa, show me the Benjamins"- all for the fawning adulation of a bunch of reindeer that earlier wouldn't have given him the time of day (I realize that reindeer not wearing watches would make this nigh impossible, but you know what I mean).

Exhibit one on the importance of keeping one's website updated

 Submitted for your approval: an image gleaned off Telemundo's website that covers one of their telenovelas, El Clon (WARNING: Read the Wikipedia entry for El Clon at your own risk, as it appears to have been poorly translated from another language and therefore contains many headache-inducing errors.such as a badly mangled writing [for example, "However, cultural differences either do not allow to be together."] and the use of masculine pronouns for Jade [who, as far as I can tell, is female- she's{?} the one on the viewer's left in the photo below])   On the extreme right- no, not the John Birch Society- a poll which asks "What do you think?" and below that "Who will Jade [the female lead] end up with?" and lists as possible responses the names of four of the male characters, Lucas, Daniel, Said, and Zein.

Eeny, Meeny, Miny, Moe...

So what's the problem, besides that the final episode ran on Telemundo just over a year ago?  On the left is "Final Decision" and below that "Jade tells us which were her reasons for remaining with Lucas"..

GLOSSARY

Telemundo = Spanish-language network broadcasting in U.S. and Puerto Rico
telenovela = "televised novel", a type of program similar to a soap opera, except telenovelas run for a predetermined duration (usually about 120 episodes) whereas the lifespans of soap operas tend to be limited only by the ability to get good ratings.  Another difference is that soap operas tend to be targeted towards women, while telenovelas  tend generally have a more diverse audience.  For example, it is more culturally acceptable in Spanish-speaking cultures for men watch telenovleas; as well  and there are some, like Carita de Ángel, that are made primarily for kids.
extreme right/John Birch Society = Humor by way of the Smothers Brothers

WARNING: Christmas music watch is now in effect

To avoid any misunderstandings, let me state for the record that I (at least tend to) like Christmas music... just not for hours on end practically every day, especially before December 1.  So, please, someone, STOP THE INSANITY!

You may now return to your regularly scheduled blog.  Oh, except for one more thing: "These Are a Few Of My Favorite Things" is NOT a Christmas song.  It's from "The Sound of Music" and was meant to soothe some of the Von Trapp children who had been scared by some lightening (or something like that).  As much as I like that movie, the truth must be told.

Apparel to avoid when teaching children about colors:

A Public Service Announcement brought to you by your friends at:

Grooving With A Pict

Baldfader™ is not...

1. Darth Vader's REALLY evil step-brother  (*shushuk, shushuk* "Luke, I am your uncle.")
2. An Austrian punk rock band ("Ve are Baldfader and Ve are here to rock you.")
3. The Norwegian word for gusund... gessundhite... gezundheit... that word you say after someone sneezes.
4. A new James Bond villain (Baldfader, He's the man, the man with the bad combover....)
5. A mafia don who will offer you a deal you can't refuse on hair restoration products.
6. A top-secret WWII weapons project ("Whatever you do, don't let the Baldfader plans fall into enemy hands.  Your country is counting on you.")

The truth is... well, I'm not going to tell you what it is, you'll just have to google it to find out.  I just thought it was an odd name, especially since I don't see how it would help anyone to make his or her baldness fade.

An open letter to any rich Nigerians who may happen to read this blog

Dear Mr Mrs Ms Miss Dr Herr Monsieur Hr Frau A V M Admiraal Admiral Air Cdre Air Commodore Air Marshal Air Vice Marshal Alderman Alhaji Ambassador Baron Barones Brig Brig Gen Brig General Brigadier Brigadier General Brother Canon Capt Captain Cardinal Cdr Chief Cik Cmdr Col Col Dr Colonel Commandant Commander Commissioner Commodore Comte Comtessa Congressman Conseiller Consul Conte Contessa Corporal Councillor Count Countess Crown Prince Crown Princess Dame Datin Dato Datuk Datuk Seri Deacon Deaconess Dean Dhr Dipl Ing Doctor Dott Dott sa Dr Dr Ing Dra Drs Embajador Embajadora En Encik Eng Eur Ing Exma Sra Exmo Sr F O Father First Lieutient First Officer Flt Lieut Flying Officer Fr Frau Fraulein Fru Gen Generaal General Governor Graaf Gravin Group Captain Grp Capt H E Dr H H H M H R H Hajah Haji Hajim Her Highness Her Majesty Herr High Chief His Highness His Holiness His Majesty Hon Hr Hra Ing Ir Jonkheer Judge Justice Khun Ying Kolonel Lady Lcda Lic Lieut Lieut Cdr Lieut Col Lieut Gen Lord M M L M R Madame Mademoiselle Maj Gen Major Master Mevrouw Miss Mlle Mme Monsieur Monsignor Mr Mrs Ms Mstr Nti Pastor President Prince Princess Princesse Prinses Prof Prof Dr Prof Sir Professor Puan Puan Sri Rabbi Rear Admiral Rev Rev Canon Rev Dr Rev Mother Reverend Rva Senator Sergeant Sheikh Sheikha Sig Sig na Sig ra Sir Sister Sqn Ldr Sr Sr D Sra Srta Sultan Tan Sri Tan Sri Dato Tengku Teuku Than Puying The Hon Dr The Hon Justice The Hon Miss The Hon Mr The Hon Mrs The Hon Ms The Hon Sir The Very Rev Toh Puan Tun Vice Admiral Viscount Viscountess and/or Wg Cdr (along with any and all other titles that may be applicable to you):

I wish to warn you of an epidemic that seems to be sweeping your country.  If the scads of e-mails that I have received (and I have received not just one scad, but several) accurately reflect the extent of the problem, then a large number of your wealthy compatriots have gone to their demise intestate, leaving their assets bona vacantia and the executors of their estates scrabbling to find someone to smuggle transfer any monies left unbequeathed out of the country and into their private bank account.  Alas, even widows have been affected as well, as one such poor soul has been stricken with an ailment that allows her to contact complete strangers and ask them to disburse money her deceased husband left her to charities, yet leaves her unable to contact those same charities herself.  This epidemic seems to now be spreading to other countries, as a Laotian executor has recently e-mailed me claiming to be in a similar predicament.  I thereby urge you to do your part to stem the tide of funds being bled from your country due to unfortunate administrators being taken advantage of by individuals who would not scruple to charge them exorbitant fees so that they may discharge their duties.  Please make sure you have a valid will drawn up as soon as possible, especially if you think you may be susceptible to sudden, unforeseen death.  If, perchance, you cannot think of any suitable inheritors, at least contract with an agent to settle the details beforehand so that the administrator of your will is most likely to get the best deal possible.

Wishing you a very long and prosperous life,



Deof Movestofca