PeaceBang

Polls Show

His ratings have even gone down among the canines…

(thanks to Fran for the hilarious photo)

Swellegant

roman_holiday04
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

I just saw “Roman Holiday” on the Turner Classics channel. Sigh. Air kisses to William Wyler for directing this gem, and for the blacklisted Dalton Trumbo for penning the screenplay.

What is there to say about this perfect film?
Audrey Hepburn is just the most luminous creature ever. Let me be Will Ferrell as James Lipton for a moment, leaning forward in my chair with my greasy comb-over and making up a new word to describe her:

“SCRUMPTRULESCENT!”

She really is. She’s an elegant, glowing, absolutely enchanting girl with an impossibly tiny waist and the most beautiful posture any movie actress has ever had. I can’t imagine any screen siren today who could make me believe she is a princess. I believed Audrey Hepburn was a princess. She’s swellegant and then some.

That tiny crooked tooth she has just makes her more perfect. Has there ever been a more beaming smile in all cinematic history? I would pay to watch this woman stand in a doorway. She is beyond the reach of any of my usual feminist critique.

And then there’s Gregory Peck. I’m glad I was alone when this flick came on so that others would be spared my “oh my Gods” every time he appeared in a close-up. I’m thinking, “Lord help me… am I actually older now than he was when he made this film?” Because when I watch Gregory, I’m squirmy-stomached little girl dreaming of my first kiss.
Speaking of which, I love that Peck and Hepburn — about 15 years apart — manage a passionate embrace without wolfing each other’s faces. A lost art in today’s Hollywood.

William Wyler’s direction is totally crisp, charming, well-paced, carefully choreographed yet endearingly clutzy, and sweet, sweet, sweet.

And — quelle surprise! — Eddie Arnold is just plain hot as the comic banana-best friend-boho photographer.

Now I’m going to call Sister of PeaceBang and talk like Audrey Hepburn all night, ’cause we can both do a mad accurate impression.

Calgon, Take Me Away

CalgonTakeMeAway
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

I don’t have one official meeting tomorrow afternoon or evening. I can’t remember the last time this happened.

Now, will I withstand the temptation to fill that space with 1,000 things?

Daily Kos On George Lakoff

Like every other blue state liberal, I began reading George Lakoff’s works about a year ago. His idea is that all social policy boils down to a sort of family model, and that conservatives and liberals have very different ideas of what a healthy family looks like, with conservatives embracing the “tough daddy in charge” model while liberals dig the “nurturant co-parenting” model.

Unlike most liberals, I think Lakoff is important but not persuasive. I find his assumptions to be arrogant in that way that conservatives often accuse liberals of being arrogant, and this time I agree with them.

So anyway, I keep reading other liberal critique of Lakoff, and I found this today:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/8/22/175119/489

I read it quickly but I find it interesting, and recommend it to those of you who may feel that “Don’t Think of An Elephant” provides the ultimate blueprint for liberal political success in the next elections.

Training for Faith

Training for Faith
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

Last week in my doctoral seminar I was trying to explain to the room of mostly very conservative Christians about Unitarian Universalists, and presenting my plan to write a dissertation on the relevance of covenant to our contemporary congregations.

People tried to be respectful but when I initially described our theological pluralism, their faces were studies in bewilderment. A religion where everyone is free to search for truth and meaning? A religious tradition that welcomes atheists and makes no effort to convert them? Whaaaat? (When someone asked the inevitable question, “But why would an atheist want to go to CHURCH?” I replied, “I don’t have time to try to answer that,” earning chuckles from the few liberal Christians in the room who are acquainted with UUism.)

I tried to steer the conversation away from feeling I should offer apology for Unitarian Universalism’s mere existence and into a place where I could get feedback from the group, who are a lovely and earnest people (and who represent six different nations).

At the end of my presentation, a Baptist peer offered this: “I get the image of training wheels. Is Unitarian Universalism a sort of training ground for faith? After they begin with your church, do they then leave you?”

I was so furious I could not answer beyond a “No, they don’t leave.” His question was specifically asked in the context of covenant process, as in “After you all develop a non-Theist covenant together, do they take off in droves, hungry for the Living Word?”

I mean, of course some of our people leave. I’ve been hollering about that for years and years — especially about how our children leave in droves because we give them nothing substantive within the great wilderness of FREEDOM.

His inquiry deserves a fuller answer, though, and I’m finally getting calm enough to give it.

No, L., they don’t leave our congregations. In fact, quite the opposite. They have left YOUR congregations to come to Unitarian Universalism. They are not riding the training wheels of faith. They have taken OFF the training wheels of the creedal, doctrinal faith traditions that would seek to fill their heads with proscriptions, superstitions and unproven certainties, and now they’re riding free and upright.

I Thought I Had It

I’ve been making apple crisps unsuccessfully for years, and tonight I thought I finally had it! I thought the trick was to pour vanilla sauce over the whole works before the final 20 minutes of baking. It finally LOOKED like apple crisp should look.

I don’t know if it’s because I had to resort to using soy milk for one cup of the two cups of milk called for (I only had one cup of cow milk in the fridge) or if Macintosh apples are a bit too mushy, but I have before me a plate of the CLOSEST I have ever come to a really excellent apple crisp. I think the oats were a bit stale, too. We are SO CLOSE, though.

Back to the test kitchens, I guess. But not tonight. I feel so crummy I’m surprised I had the energy to even peel 8 apples.

This will make a great breakfast for the next, oh, 18 or so days.

From the PeaceBang Situation Room

First of all, he should have been indicted just for having the name “Scooter Libby.”

I’m not naive. I know that the kids in the Big Sandbox play nasty, and that such shenanigans are not limited to one party or another. However, this is so much more sinister. This one has the blood of 2,000 American soldiers on it, and the blood of tens of thousands of innocent Iraqis. This isn’t just, “Nya nya, you wouldn’t play our game, so we told everyone you kissed Suzy!” This is “We will not countenance another version of the truth than ours getting out into the public, and we will punish you for putting yours out there.”

I have no comment about the ninnies from the New York Times.

Serious Questions

turkey
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

It’s time to get out the Thanksgiving Binder, a serious compilation of gravy-spattered recipes from my first years hosting Thanksgiving in the parsonage. I make it sound like it was eons ago when this is actually only my 4th time playing Pearl Mesta of the South Shore.

I’m thrilled to know that I’ll have a full house of out-of-towners, who can keep each other entertained while I go into that Zen state of massive cooking and baking. And no, I don’t need any help in the kitchen, thank you. You can help with the cleaning up, though, with my gratitude.

I do turkey, dressing, a gorgeous cranberry sauce donated by a devoted congregant, Mom’s cole slaw, mashed taters, bread and butter, and some vegetable like turnips or brussel sprouts. To be honest, I’ve not been happy with the veggie dish yet. Any suggestions? Just not the yams with marshmallows thing. Maybe just a simple roasted root vegetables dish?

Also, what do you do when you have a few more people than can fit around your dining room table? Do you do a “baby table” and just let the chips fall where they may as far as who winds up at it? Do you put out name cards at place settings? Set up an extra table in the parlor and eat buffet style?

You all were such deep, real help with the sermon I thought you’d like to tackle the Thanksgiving situation.

Broken Wing

A few years ago I was walking down JFK Street in Harvard Square when I saw a fairly large bird struggling along with a broken wing. The poor thing was in obvious agony and also very frightened, as its avenue of escape from meddling humans was totally debilitated. I stopped traffic for it as it fluttered and staggered across the street to a little park.

As I stood wringing my hands and watching the bird, others gathered around, similarly distraught and useless. Should we scoop it up and try to bring it somewhere to be treated? But scoop it with what, and put it into what container and where could we find treatment for a wild bird?

As we stood with our stricken faces and our helpless strategizing, a young man approached the circle. He assessed the situation in ten or so seconds: suffering bird, pathetic human beings. He walked over a few steps to a big municipal garbage can, picked it up, and with a pained expression on his face, smashed the bird under the garbage can.

The others in the circle were flabbergasted. And yet no one had any words of condemnation for the young man, who was obviously quite miserable about his choice, and who walked away in the most depressed imaginable posture with hands in pockets. How could we argue with his unilaterial act of annhilation? Would it have been better to meander endlessly around our limited options while the bird suffered? Was smashing the bird dead the most merciful course of action?

I have considered that scenario many times since it happened. I still don’t have clear answers for questions like, “when does the democratic process do more harm than good?” and “was that kid exerting violent power or tender mercy?” and “should we have berated him for not even saying what he planned to do?” among others. But now I know, because I read Wally Nut’s blog,

http://grandfathertree.blogspot.com/

that this young man may just have been a Boy Scout at one point in his life.

I don’t have one of those sidebars listing all my …

I don’t have one of those sidebars listing all my favorite blogs — it’s just because I’m too technically impaired to know how to do it — but I do want to tell you about a new favorite:

http://lareinacobre.blogspot.com/

Never Say No To Your Traveling Self. All hail, La Reina Cobre!