Collateral Bloggage

I’m disappointed by John Grisham. Don’t get me wrong; he’s a very talented, sometimes brilliant writer. At least one of his books would make my Top Ten Favorites list. But, his latest work displays at least one occurrence of shocking ignorance.

His latest book, The Appeal, deals with the messy topic of tort reform. Sort of. I’m pretty sure I know where he stands on the issue, but I’m disappointed by it (but maybe he’ll prove me wrong). More than that issue, though, is his apparently shallow view of pro-life issues.
(more…)

So, this week, the singers got chose songs as old as them. They’re not old.

I feel old.

This week, I’m going to review the performances and possibly suggest a song that might’ve worked better for the singer.
(more…)

There’s one more thing from Men’s Retreat I wanted to mention. I was going to just send a note to Pastor Ron (and perhaps Doug Burleigh), but I decided I might as well let others in on the conversation.

It’s about the Communion service we had at Wildhorse. For those who weren’t there (or haven’t heard), we formed lines and received the elements from Pastor Ron and Doug (at least on my side; there were other ministers on the other side). Pastor Ron had a basket with the “Jesus Crackers” (as my son might call them) in it. We took a cracker and dipped it in the “wine” Doug was holding (the dipping is known as “intinction”, in case anybody wondered).

Now it gets personal. Doug looked at me, read my name tag, and said, “Seth, the blood of Christ, poured out for you.”

I can’t tell you how touching it was. And how personal. I think Communion always implies a certain community aspect; something we all do as a show of unity. But receiving it this way made it much more meaningful to me. Particularly having my name attached to it. I don’t think often enough about Christ’s sacrifice for me. This brought it home.

After I returned to my seat, I continued watching the other men receiving the elements. I was captivated by Pastor Ron’s face, and the joy he had in serving all those men. I could really see the love he has for his flock. It was written all over his face. He practically glowed.

I hope I wasn’t the only one affected by this. I hope I remember what it meant next time I take Communion in the usual way. The Blood of Christ. Poured out for me.

So, I was patronizing my own bathroom yesterday and some thoughts occurred to me. I was thinking of a list of things that a homeowner should absolutely provide for a guest restroom.

Now, as I mentioned, I wasn’t actually visiting anyone. I was at home. But, here is the list:

1. A plunger.
2. Air freshener.

I know. That list is HUUUUGE!!!

It goes without saying that TP is also a necessary thing. But the other two are particularly important to prevent the all too common Chick Flick/Raunchy Comedy (so often one devolves into the other, and I won’t mention which one is the less-evolved) situation, in which Hapless Male puts a serious Nuking on a restroom, then finds the toilet is broken/plugged/not connected to anything at all. See “Dumb and Dumber” and “Along Came Polly” for examples. Actually, scratch that. I’m really not recommending either of those films. But probably just picturing Ben Stiller or Jim Carrey does the trick, right?

Maybe I just think about bathrooms too much. Probably true.

Any additional things I should add to the list? A door is probably a good one, and I’d even say it needs to be a real door, not a pocket-door.

Any others?

First off, I totally agreed with Simon that it was a bad idea to mine the Beatles for an additional week. I’m very glad David A. was able to redeem himself, and there were several other solid performances, but it was like some of the contestants couldn’t come up with another pick they really *liked*.

In fact, I found myself agreeing with Simon all night. Except when he was wrong.
Click for the beating!

So, I got back from Sunset’s Men’s Retreat last night. Once again, it was at Wildhorse Canyon. Last year, I discovered you can get in a surprising amount of prayer on a 25 second zip line ride. I was sort of looking forward to riding that line again. Alas, it was too cold (you end up in a pond), and they shut ‘er down. Instead of doing the same old thing, this year I discovered abject terror.

Yup, my pal Brent browbeat me into doing the Pamper Pole. “Pamper” doesn’t refer to being treated nicely…it signifies what might end up in your pants.
(more…)

For those of you who don’t know, I spend too much time thinking about the restroom. I notice things. I give names to characters I encounter there. I make up Rules that I think everybody should follow. I break these Rules just to mess with people.

And I’m writing a book about it. So, basically, every trip to the restroom is research for me.
Click for the straight, er, scoop

I just realized I completely spaced my “Doing the Math” segment for my AI recaps. So, here was the result this week (factoring in my rankings through the Semis):

Cut for space economy

All I can say is, it’s about time they broke out some Beatles! I guess there must have been logistics that kept it from happening earlier. But there are so many good songs in the Lennon/McCartney book!

Anyhoo, onto the recap.
(more…)

I have to say, I was pleasantly surprised this week with the gals. Yes, there were occurrences of Whitlash (whereby an AI contestant somehow doesn’t know that it’s a form of mania to pick a Whitney song, then catches flak for it). But, on the whole, I enjoyed the performances. I can actually pick six of them to move on!!! Last week I would have bet on only two or three making a good impression. With that, let’s get to it…
(more…)