Look, it’s Friday!

And we’ve had a busy week and next week promises to be even busier, what with picking out the clothes we’ll wear to the Inaugural Ball, the Ball, itself, then recovery from said Ball.

So let’s take a breather. I’ve posted this addictive little game elsewhere, and there’s no reason Dating Jesus-ers (there has to be a better name for our little congregation, but I can’t think of one because I’ve already started my breather) can’t enjoy it, too.  Be sure your computer monitor — should you play this at work — is turned toward the wall, and have at it. For all the time I’ve wasted at this site, I remain shockingly bad at it.

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Secular hymns

Talented banjo player and boy-preacher Tod sent me to “She Left Me for Jesus” (go to YouTube and load it yourself as I can’t seem to create a workable link here) and that got me to thinking about all the popular (or not-so-popular) songs that sound theological to me.

Depeche Mode’s (and Johnny Cash’s) “Personal Jesus” is one, but that’s kind of obvious. I always liked Elvis’s “In the Ghetto” (surely you didn’t think a Jesus blog written by a hillbilly would go too long before mentioning The King, did you?) because even as a little kid, I heard context in that tune. There might be a reason a kid in the ghetto would grow up and do bad things. Elvis said so. The Fixx’s “How Much Is Enough” is a nice little sermon about the dangers of acquisitiveness. Johnny Nash’s “I Can See Clearly Now” is pure joy without getting all  Jesus-y.

That’s off the top of my head. Tod? You’re the musician. What am I missing?

Understand I love the old hymns, especially the scary get-your-ass-to-church songs with lyrics like “Jesus is co-oming soon, morning or night or noon, many will meet their doom, [happy thought, that]  trumpets will sound…” Give it a good strong bass and a soaring tenor and I’m there, but it always thrilled me to hear songs that could cross-over. Or maybe I’m just weird like that.

So I come home from vacation…

…tanned, rested and ready, and I find a letter from my insurance company that says my new dental plan covers all of $40 of a nearly $400 bill for replacing a crown I broke just before Christmas.

Oh, and I owe on the vacation, too. And we heat our home — as do many people in New England — with an oil-fired furnace, and we just got a delivery. Oh, yes, and my car needed repairs. Why does this suddenly sound like a bad country song?

Have no fear, though. From here, I see that applying for TARP (Troubled Assets Relief Program) funds takes less than a half-hour — and that’s including the time it takes a financial person to explain it to me. Now I could just figure out how to incorporate my sad financial empire…

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If you haven’t already…

…go rent “The Visitor.” I meant to see this when it was in the theaters, but it was in Hartford for about a minute and I missed it. None of my friends saw it, either, and I want someone to watch it so we can talk about it.

It’s been a while since I saw such an effective, moving film. The relationships that form between the most unlikely people are stunning. Did the scene in the airport kill you? The subway scene there at the end, too? Will these people ever meet again? I’m ready for “Visitor II,” or “They Visit Again.”

Go get it. Do it now. Then get back to me, please.

Millard Fillmore didn’t give one

Neither did Chester A. Arthur, among others. Gerald Ford spoke to the nation via broadcast after taking over from Richard Nixon, who resigned, but Ford called his speech simply a “little straight talk among friends.”

Still, the inaugual address is as American as, well, the presidential election. And you can help Pre.-elect Obama write his speech, here.

If you fancy yourself a wordsmith, a speechwriter, or just someone with something to say, this is your site.

Or, if you want to help choose which speech gets published Inauguration Day, then this is still your site.

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The gospel according to the Drive-By Truckers

 You ever hear a song and you just can’t get enough of it? This one’s my latest best song, ever. Or nearly so. I’ve posted it elsewhere and if I was younger and less enthralled with a regular paycheck, I’d be on the road following these people around — to what end I haven’t a clue, but still.

More on the band here.

The rules of married sex

No, they aren’t what Dennis Prager writes here and here.  Prager, a conservative radio talk show host and newspaper columnist, recently said that a married woman should have sex with her husband any time he initiates the marital act – no ifs, ands, or buts — because, boiled down, members of the Baby Boomer generation worry too much about their own feelings, and if a woman refuses to have sex because she isn’t in the mood, what’s to stop a man from using that excuse for skipping work?

That’s a paraphrase, but it’s accurate. Prager bolsters his argument with the fluffiest of logic, including that old canard that if a woman waited for her own mood to initiate, she might wait a month or longer before she made the beast with two backs with her spouse.

The “beast with two backs” is mine, not Prager’s.

And in that, Prager reveals more about his own sex life than I care to know. He also shows a marked lack of understanding about the psychology/physiology of the sex act, particularly as it applies to women. It isn’t about “mood,” Dennis. It’s about “communication,” more than anything, and finding common ground — not a terribly challenging notion because between two people who love each other, what’s not to like about sex? Keep your hearts and flowers. Married or not, sex isn’t a conquest, much as we sometimes like to reduce it to such. Nor is it about giving and taking or (shudder) submitting to your spouse. It’s about mutual need and want and if you don’t have that, mood is entirely beside the point.

So. My wish for ol’ Dennis is that he one day meet a woman who initiates sex more than 12 times a year, a real woman who doesn’t let kids, work, family, home, gardening club, and tea towels get in the way of this free and fun entertainment. And I say that with all due respect.

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Some people you should know

I stumbled across the website, Ex-Church of Christ Support Group, a few months ago, and mostly restricted my activity there trolling through the comments — and crying, just a bit. It was a little bit like coming home, though online.

But recently, a discussion started about “Dating Jesus,” and a nice man named Barry was kind enough to alert me. Don’t feel obligated to go to that thread, but you’re welcome there, if you want. Understand that this site is for ex-members of the church, and people thinking about leaving the church. I am not encouraging you to leave the church of Christ if you’re happy there, but if you’re sitting in the pews with your hands balled into fists, or if you’re not finding your answers in the “literal” intepretation of the scriptures that’s been handed to you, or if you don’t fit into the church as you see it, you will find a welcome here.

Registration is required, but it’s worth it. Remember: There is life outside of fear, and there is a healthy and happy spiritual life awaiting you. No, the posters at the site don’t have your answers, but they may help point you toward your questions.

“Dating Jesus” is in Mother Jones magazine

And I think it’s an awesome fit. I believe Jesus’ politics dovetail perfectly with Mother’s — or perhaps that should be the other way around. Though Mother cops to no particular religion, both entities approach the world with a view that is iconoclastic and infuriating, the kind of thing that flips mainstream thinking on its ear.

But what do I know?

What’re YOU looking at?

This is the most patient bird in the world. S/he waited by my towel for hours one recent day on Sanibel Island, because s/he saw me reach into my backpack for a snack. I finally had to snap a photo because it felt like we’d kind of spent the day together, as friends would do.

I say “s/he” because I have no idea how to sex a seagull. That sounds dirtier than it is. Sexing a chicken is an art in and of itself. As a graduate student, a former husband (well, I’ve only had one former husband, but saying it that way makes me sound more interesting, I think) was tasked with sexing chickens at University of Delaware. He was also tasked with doing some things that he, a big softie, thought was hurtful — even though it was for serious research –  and so he eventually left that program.

Back to the bird. It’s interesting that many species don’t wear their genders on their sleeves, and telling them apart when they don’t display their gender by size or coloring (as does, say, a cardinal) is something else again. From a beach towel, I’m not sure how one would go about it, and I couldn’t be bothered, anyway. But I was impressed with this bird’s tenacity.