Old coffee ads are awesome. Especially when they are so riddled with violent chauvinism disguised as humour. Yes. That’s right. Buy me good coffee or get spanked. That’s the ticket. I found this floating around the interwebs – and tracked it down to this collection of ads featuring spankings – there’s a bigger copy of the image here.
The Christian blogosphere is drowning in a sea of Calvin posts. It’s his 500th birthday around now – depending on where you are on the planet. We’re taking things back to Geneva tomorrow at church as we “celebrate” the milestone.
I don’t have much to add – except to say that I’m putting the finishing touches on my “novella” on Calvin’s life for our conference tomorrow. My topic deals with Calvin and Servetus – a heretic killed on his watch (but not, as some would suggest, by him).
Heretics were killed back then. There was a very blurry separation of church and state, and heresy was a destabilising political force. It’s hard to reconcile the actions with our current system of government and our religious freedoms – but there wasn’t really much choice in those days.
Calvin had a hand in significant political reform too – helping move a number of theologically reformed countries towards more “democratic” systems of government.
Challies.com has a great article on the episode and I commend it to you – if you can’t be bothered reading all that, and you’re in Townsville, come along to the conference tomorrow afternoon at Willows.
I’m going to use the word antidisestablishmentarianism in my talk too – that should be a real highlight. I’m all about brevity and concise communication…
I’ll share a bunch of Calvin links for you all to enjoy in tomorrow’s link post. Huzzah.
Ever wondered just how close to midnight your town’s personal doomsday clock should be? Start the calculations rolling with this little tool that lets you know just how much nuclear danger you’re in.
Please note the disclaimer:
“Please, please, please do not make any important decisions based on this information.”
The humble pencil is a triumph of cooperation – the epitome of human achievement, a telling example of the benefits of industrialisation etc, etc… you’ve probably never considered it this way – and neither had I until I read this essay (via Kottke).
A lot of seemingly simple things involve complex processes.
I, Pencil, simple though I appear to be, merit your wonder and awe, a claim I shall attempt to prove. In fact, if you can understand me—no, that’s too much to ask of anyone—if you can become aware of the miraculousness which I symbolize, you can help save the freedom mankind is so unhappily losing. I have a profound lesson to teach. And I can teach this lesson better than can an automobile or an airplane or a mechanical dishwasher because—well, because I am seemingly so simple.
Simple? Yet, not a single person on the face of this earth knows how to make me. This sounds fantastic, doesn’t it? Especially when it is realized that there are about one and one-half billion of my kind produced in the U.S.A. each year.
I get some decidedly odd spam these days. I’m sure you do too. Any piece of art based on spam emails is likely to be a little risqué – so click through to this page at your own risk… this has been around for a while. I’m doing some spring cleaning of my queue of blog fodder…
Elliot Burford is producing a series of literal spam. Or something. You can get them as T-Shirts.
Simone has brought up the old copyright chestnut again – head on over for the fun. I’ve commented a couple of times already – no doubt I’ll comment many more…
“This argument didn’t sit right then and still doesn’t now. I’m convinced that there is something different about a song. Last night I gave away a kids club that I spent weeks and weeks writing. I’m happy for people to use it however they want. Change bits. Whatever. I don’t care. (Though my fonting and layout is nice). In terms of work hours, this kids club probably cost me about $4000. No single song has cost me that much. It’s not a time thing. I don’t think it’s a selfishness thing either. But there is an all-or-nothingness about songs that there’s not about other things.”
Godfather Vito Corleone taught son Michael one important lesson – keep your friends close, and your enemies closer. Without wanting to give anything dramatic away – for those who haven’t seen the Godfather II – Michael was betrayed by a family member. Which must really hurt.
Some public figures are learning a similar lesson about the importance of treating your family – and extended family – well.
Cricketer Mitchell Johnson has copped a public shellacking from his mother – for consorting with his fiancé – and rarely calling home to mum. The apron strings were clearly not as severed as Johnson believed…
"I get a text on Mother’s Day and a text on my birthday.
The last time I actually spoke to him was when the beach cricket was here (and) Dennis Lillee told him he had to ring his mother, so Mitchell rang me that day.
It has been like this since Jess came on the scene.
Up until he met Jessica we were very close . . . but he hasn’t spent a night under my roof since he met Jessica."
Johnson moved from Queensland to Western Australia to get away from his mother be with his lady friend – and it seems his mum wasn’t anticipating the consequences of the move…
"For the wives and the children I think it is great that they support them and send the over there, but who are these girlfriends? They are just girlfriends, Mitch met Jess and since then she has flown off to South Africa, to England and the Bahamas.
She gets all these trips, she gets flown there, accommodation, food and all of that."
It couldn’t possibly be a case of missing the perks could it?
My perennial political whipping woman – Sarah Palin – has also learned a lesson about not biting the hand that feeds your grandchild. Her disenfranchised ex-potential son-in-law – no doubt annoyed that he was thrust in the campaign spotlight for naught – has held a press conference. Yes, that’s right. A press conference. The high school jock who a year ago was heading towards a career hunting bears or something – called a press conference to spill the beans on his jilted almost-mother-in-law’s decision to resign.
Nineteen-year-old Levi Johnston, whose wedding to Bristol Palin was called off earlier this year, says he thinks the governor is resigning over personal finances.
Johnston says he lived with the Palin family from early December to the second week in January. He claims he heard the governor several times say how nice it would be to take advantage of the lucrative deals that were being offered, deals that included a reality show and a book.
Johnston made his comments at a news conference Thursday at his lawyer’s office.
After the McCain campaign paraded this guy around the country he wants a few more minutes of fame. So he’s becoming a Palin pundit.
What possesses people to settle family disputes through the media? It must surely put a permanent strain on the relationship – I can’t imagine Mitchell Johnson waking up feeling positively about his mum and inviting her to join him in England now – can you?
Robyn bought me a present yesterday. Bodum coffee cups. They’re awesome because they’ve got a little cup within a cup – they’re double walled. They’re not cheap. But I really like them…
Gary is a bad landlord. Apparently. One of his tenants has a blog documenting the badness of his landlordness – called Landlord of the Flies. If I was a Landlord I can imagine perpetuating this sort of thing as a joke – but it seems genuine.
“June 30: Oil Leak
My car has been leaking oil for a little while, and I have been trying to get it fixed.
Email from Gary concerning this:
GD:
YOUR CAR IS STILL LEAKING OIL LIKE A SIEVE….
GET IT FIXED NOW…..
STRONG LETTER TO FOLLOW,
Gary
Strong letter that followed:
get your oil leak fixed NOW……MORON
“
June 17: The Arrest
Upon returning from work on Wednesday, I find 2 cop cars parked in the driveway. The police inform me that when James returned from the hospital, he discovered his TV, laptop, and iPhone were all missing. When asked about this, Gary claimed he had no idea where they were. The police then found the TV in Gary’s garage. He admitted to having stole the TV, but said he had no idea where the laptop or phone was. They found the laptop under his bed. “Alright, I also stole the laptop, but I have no idea where the iPhone is.” The iPhone was then found in his desk drawer.
This is the first, and a prime example, of Gary’s inability to plan for future events. One could assume that after finding the TV, they would likely continue to search. Unless you have thought of a really unique hiding place, just fess up, because they’re probably going to check your desk and under your bed.
Gary was handcuffed and I was asked if I would be posting bail for Gary. Having lived in the house for just about 2 weeks, I didn’t feel that me and Gary were at that “posting bail” level of our relationship. Gary then spent the night in Kane County lock-up on charges of felony theft.
And we thought our landlord was crazy… there’s a bit of strong language if you want to read the whole account.
Coffee makes the world go round. And if there’s been one gap in the coffee spectrum it’s in the field of wearable coffee. Harnessing the awesome and incredible powers of coffee waste – not even the good bits – this company is able to make fabric – and then shirts.
This is an interesting follow up to the last post on death and the decline of religion. There’s a saying that infuriates atheists – well, at least the ones I read on the Internet – “there are no atheists in the fox holes” – it’s the idea that when confronted with our mortality we turn to God.
A quick flick through this oddly compelling gallery of the last words of executed criminals suggests there aren’t many atheists at the gallows…
Luigi is the forgotten Italian Plumber. Less cool because he wears green and was pretty much a lackey, or a bit player – an 8-bit player no less – in the Mario Bros saga – it’s not the Mario and Luigi bros is it… and Mario gets the girl…
Luckily someone out there is still holding a torch/flame/candle (whatever the expression is) for the green guy – because they produced this awesome Lego statue.
An ABC blogger reckons religion is in decline because nobody is as scared of death any more… his post attracted a bunch of rabid atheists – like any such post on the interwebs does. There aren’t enough rational Christians commenting on these kinds of posts with gospel intent…
“The appeal of the big three monotheistic religions – Judaism, Christianity and Islam – has always been that they offer us a mechanism to deal with death, an accommodation with our inevitable personal extinction.”
The study of religious structures is pretty fascinating. But the idea that religions came about to control people rather than in a search for truth and meaning is pretty insulting to any believer.
Christianity, is not, as the author of this piece suggests, about “moral living’ that’s an outcome of Christianity not the process of Christianity. And it’s not the end goal of Christian life.
“In exchange for living according to a moral code, life can be infinitely prolonged after the death of the body. But for Westerners, death is now further away than ever before. Western science has not yet conquered death, but it has now banished death to a comfortable distance.”
One of the angry atheists in the comments suggested that the God of the Bible is immoral – kind of defeats the purpose of being God if you’re not the arbiter of morality doesn’t it? That statement is not logical.
“This article made no mention of the wealth of evidence and arguments against religion. The immorality of the god of the bible, mohammed, and just the illogical nature of the whole thing.”