Blankshield

Last night our church (St. Michael-Resurrection) hosted a Good Friday prayer around the cross in the Taizé tradition.

Taizé is a small community in France that is made up of a number of different christian denominations from around the globe, and you can read more of it at their website. As it was explained to me, one of the challenges facing the community in it's early days, was how to worship. There were Catholic brothers there, and Jews fleeing from Germany (it was founded in 1940), protestants from all over Europe and many others. In the face of all these traditions and differences of belief, they found common ground in silence and song. Three times a day, the community at Taizé gathers and sings, and is silent.

For an hour last night, a little bit of that world was at our church. We sang together, mostly simple chants repeated, with sometimes breaking into parts or other instruments added (there's some horns and a flute and a few varied string instruments among the Taizé community), but for the most part, people just sang the melody. Often in several languages. Most of the tunes had the words scored out in 3 or 4 (or 8 or 10!) languages. It was one of the most moving and beautiful experiences I've ever known. I would describe it if I could.

The single reading they had, John 19:16-19 (the crucifiction) was read out in many many languages, which was also quite moving. English, French and German, I recognized, and one that was either Ukranian or Russian. Yiddish, I think, was one of them, and several more languages that I didn't recognize. It was also done very simply, with the readers speaking from where ever they were sitting in the crowd, without standing or any other ceremony; one would finish, there would be a short silence, and another would start somewhere else.

I'll be going again.

James

Is there anyone out there who is

a) Bored enough to be reading my weblog on a Thursday night,
b) Not doing the usual thursday night thing, and
c) Willing and able to come out to my end of the world to alleviate bored-daddy-at-home syndrome?

[...]

Didn't think so.

Decided to duck out of work early for a change and swung by a Best Buy to (finally!) use my X-mas gift certificate from work. They've got a decent selection of DVD's, about comparable to the other big box stores. Prices are on about par, although I may come back to pick up the Highlanders, as they're about 30 bucks cheaper there than I've seen anywhere else. Still over-priced, mind, but I've got a soft spot for modern fantasy with swords AND a soft spot for Adrian Paul. If I swung that way, I'd totally stalk him. Except that he'd kick my ass.

Speaking of ass-kicking, I'm totally impressed with myself for, well over a year after I started, still going to kung fu pretty darn routinely. I am now back about where I would have been 10-ish years ago if I hadn't stopped going. Except for the whole "having the energy/physique/strength/etc of a 23 year old" part. I am working on my spare tire, though. It's down to a bicycle tire, and there's muscle behind it, neither of which was true a year ago. I'm also trying to eat better, but that's a less decided struggle. I'm currently losing on the Tim Horton's front, although later tonight I hope to fire off a volley of home-made(ish) muffins to keep off the advancing horde of morning Timbits.

I think it's been something on the order of 20 years since I routinely ate a proper breakfast. Scary.

Where was this going again? Oh yeah - Best Buy, DVD's, gift certificate. The GC paid for about half of Season 1 of Dead Like Me, which I *totally* snapped up as soon as I saw it. I haven't seen it in a store since I hemmed and hawwed over it in a Walmart and ultimately decided "not today. I'll pick it up some other time. After all, if Walmart has it, every where will have it." Nuh unh. So I saw it, and I grabbed it, and I saw that It Was Good.

James

When the Lord said 'be charitable to the least among you' did he mean stupid people?

A pair of real lightbulbs on the road this morning.

For the first, a bright yellow sports car went zipping by, way too fast, at around Cloverbar, where I merge onto 16 in the morning. Around 17th street, said sports car was about 1/2 into the ditch on the left hand side. As traffic slowed down and applied caution, this brilliant example of the human race gunned his engine repeatedly, making inches of progress at a time and backed out of the ditch into the driving lane! Just on the other side of the N. Saskatchewan river he passed me again, going too fast for the roads. Again.

The second of the pair is the little gold Honda that rode right up on my bumper this morning coming down that slope on 16 towards the river. I could not see the headlights on this sucker. Admittedly it's a Honda and I'm in an Astrovan, but that's still way too freakin' close. So I tapped the brake a couple times, just enough to blink-blink the lights at this impatient soul. No noticable impact on behavior - at least not immediately. However, about 30 seconds later when the car to my right was far enough back that Crazy Honda Driver could slip through the gap (without signaling, of course), she passed me with gusto - glaring out the window mouthing something noxious at me and gesticulating with her left hand. The hand holding the cell phone.

Lord, some days your yolk ain't easy.

James

Tasteful eye for the working guy.

My wardrobe is again reaching the end of it's "business casual" lifespan, and I'm dreading the inevitable trip to Sears and digging through racks of clothing to find something that is appropriate for work, does not cost the earth and that I will actually wear.

I think I need the experts. I know I have friends out there with taste. Want to spend my money? Left to my own devices, I will pick clothes that look Ok, but are pretty much indistinguishable from the rest of my clothes and are, frankly, boring. If there is someone there to make me try on other things, my wardrobe might actually approach not boring.

Caveats:
I'm sticking with the Dockers, unless you can recommend something equally verastile (cheap, durable, business casual and doesn't need ironing or the like).

Nothing that needs ironing.

Nothing prone to staining/dirt damage: I do spend a notable amount of my time under desks and in dirty environments like welding shops and so forth.

Beyond that, I'm yours, if you're interested.

Philisophical soundbite of the day:
The lack of a clearly defined conclusion does not in any way lessen the value of the question.

James

Well, here I am again, blogging from the passenger lounge of the lovely Regina airport. Just me, the coke machine and the two old biddies across the way who've been complaining and cackling to each other for all three days of the hour I've been here.

I really hope this doesn't become a habit.

James