Notepad

Some Other Place

I'm not going to make it to NYC for tonight's Whisperado CD-release party, but if you're within reach of the West Village, you may want to check this out.

Whisperado is Patrick Nielsen Hayden's band. I got to see them play a few months back and let me say — since modesty prevents Patrick from saying this himself — that they rock. Good, thoughtful, playful American music.

But don't take my word for it — you can check out a couple of tracks for free at Alison Scott's Potted Music page.

(Also via Patrick, "I saw something nasty in the woodshed!")

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teh etmyology

I've skipped a lot of the plenary sessions on Internet culture and language, so some things just seem baffling to me. Thank you, Wikipedia, for explaining this. (This was also helpful.)

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"Why aren't we having meetings about polar bears and guns?"

I missed this when he first posted it, but John Rogers of Kung Fu Monkey hilariously captures the affectionate frustration I have for the TV series "Lost" in "LOST: You Uncurious Motherf*ckers.

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A LAWTDB* story with an unhappy ending.

* (Large Animals Where They Don't Belong)

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Prism magazine

I no longer work there, but I retain a kind of parental affection for it. "America's Alternative Evangelical Voice" is beginning it's 13th year — soon it will start dating other magazines and we won't talk like we used to when it was little. Sigh. They grow up so fast. (Maybe one day Prism will even have a viable Web site.)

This is from their latest issue, in Michael Bailey's "So Help Us God: The Hazards of Evangelizing the Framers":

… The Constitution itself is strikingly free of religious sentiment. God doesn't make an appearance (except in stating the date "the Year of our Lord") and religion is treated directly only in the prohibition against religious tests and in the First Amendment. The Constitution expresses no gratitude to a benevolent God, does not link the nation's health with obedience to an angry God, and acknowledges only that authority comes from "We the People." In content and style, the Constitution is about as religious as the instructions for setting the clock on the VCR — and read just as frequently. …

Believing that America is the chosen nation is but a step away from saying that God is exclusively on our side. It is one step away from idolatry itself, making the United States an object of the deepest veneration. Indeed, for many Americans, their true object of worship is not Jehovah but rather America itself, or at least the mythologized America of their self-congratulatory dreams. This is the inevitable price of seeing one's nation as both chosen and the world's last, best hope. It is also why, I think, it is so important for the religious right to see that George Bush — that candid and vocal born-again Christian and defender of the West from the rest of the world — succeeds. George Bush, the most recent and forceful proponent of American exceptionalism, lets us know that the United States is unique, set apart in ordinary and extraordinary ways from other nations, and not subject to the limitations, moral or physical, that subject other nations. He reminds us that we are chosen.

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Genius is as genius does

Despite my advice to the contrary, my buddy Big Daddy spent Saturday morning taking Mensa's membership tests. So in honor of Papa Grande, U.S. Election 2004: Results listed by average IQ.

(C-minus points out ni comments that this is an urban legend, not that it'd be any more meaningful if it weren't …)

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22 Days

Pitchers and catchers report to spring training in less than a month. Carlos Delgado, Paul Lo Duca and Billy Wagner will be playing in Queens and Anna Benson will be standing for "God Bless America" in Baltimore. Things are looking up. I am, as always in January, incautiously optimistic.

Say it with me Phillies, Nationals and Marlins fans: "This could be the year that Bobby Cox's luck runs out."

I am, once again, a non-roster non-invitee to spring training, but I haven't given up yet. After all, I'm still 10 years younger than Julio Franco, and he'll be playing in Queens this year too.