Category Archives: Goofing

The Sixth Weirdness

A few days ago, the Maverick Philosopher linked to us in connection with an Andrew Klavan post he wrote, primarily pointing out this article from The Weekly Standard.

So, now I have to confess what’s wrong with me, eh? Well, one man’s weird is another man’s social obligation. I should ask my sister what is truly weird about me. Take for example:

1. I always carry a pocket handkerchief. I’m sure some people think that’s weird.

2. I can’t break the habit of falling asleep while praying, bent double on the floor with the circulation in my legs (and sometimes my arms) cut off.

3. For all the joking I do about beer, the closest I’ve come to drinking one is a sip of someone else’s O’Doul’s.

4. Despite #3, I confess I have consumed almost an entire bottle of Cognac on my own. Over several months, but still without any help from the sweet wife, who avoids alcoholic and caffeinated beverages like stagnant pond water.

5. From memory, I can sing a few songs from the American War of Independence.

Tags: I’d like to see Blestwithsons and Lintefiniel take this up, if they haven’t already.

Nothing tough about this one

Andrew Klavan has this essay up over at City Journal today.

That high-pitched noise you hear in the distance is me, screaming, “I wish I’d written that!”

Michael at The Euphemist has come out of hibernation long enough to tag Phil and me with a “Six Weird Things About Me” meme.

Now there’s a challenge.

If he’d asked for six normal things about me, I might have had some trouble.

OK, where do we start?

I have heterochromia iridis. This is not a rare, debilitating genetic disease. It’s the condition where a person has bi-colored eyes. A famous instance is the rocker David Bowie, who has one blue eye and one brown. My H. I. comes in a different form, where the two colors are mixed in the eyes, in a pinto pony combination of brown and gray (or blue, depending on the light and who’s looking).

I like folk music.

I don’t like cheese of any kind, except in pizza.

I actually much preferred the second Conan movie to the first one.

I have no good memories associated with any sport (except for live steel combat).

I can read Norwegian in the old, Gothic Fraktur typeface.

I shall now take my hat and cane and go.

Walker’s Theory

OK, this is getting ridiculous.

I’m supposed to believe in Global Warming, according to the Great and the Wise.

It’s April 10.

We got about three inches of snow last night and today.

The cognitive dissonance has become too great. I need a new paradigm.

And I have one. I’ve done serious thinking today (I work in a library, and the psychic emanations from all the wisdom that surrounds me marinate my highly sensitive soul). I’ve considered the situation, and I know what’s going on.

What are my credentials, you ask? Ha! I know as much about it as Rosie O’Donnell! And I’m almost as fat!

I offer Walker’s Theory of Global Cooling.

When you’re introducing a new paradigm (or theory, or hobbyhorse) of course, there’s one thing you absolutely need in order to enjoy real credibility. I’ve studied the discussion closely, as it has gone on to date, and it’s clear that a theorist really needs one thing to be taken seriously in our day.

You need a conspiracy theory.

So I’ll start with the C.T.

Every conspiracy theory needs a Hidden Hand, a secret cabal manipulating events for its own benefit. I have selected one.

The Jews are already taken. All the crackpots are ranting about the hidden hand of the Jews. I’ve got to be more creative than that.

I’ll go to the Number Two most popular Hidden Hand, the one they use in Hollywood all the time.

Neo-Nazis.

Yes, Global Cooling is the work of an international cabal of neo-Nazis.

If you’re old, like me, you remember the 1970’s, and how all the scientists back then were warning us about the new Ice Age that was right around the corner. Any day glaciers would advance to cover most of Canada, and snow would fall in Mexico.

Why did the alarmists change their boogeyman?

I believe it happened because scientists realized, to their horror and surprise, that global cooling was actually happening. What they’d intended as a fictional lever with which to pry research money out of the government turned out to be an actual danger.

Enter the neo-Nazis.

The neo-Nazis are still angry about how World War II ended. Ever since 1945, the Nazis and their heirs have been furious at Europe and America. “We offered you greatness, and you refused it!” they mutter. “If you want to decline, we’ll help you decline.”

Global Cooling is their method. Through massive bribery of the world’s scientists (with money provided by their anti-Semitic allies, the Arab oil states) they suborned the scientific community into promoting the entirely imaginary theory of Global Warming.

Meanwhile, the weather gets colder and colder, so we have snowstorms in April. The demand for oil increases, enriching the Arab allies, making more money available for bribes.

Soon it will be too late. Soon most of Europe and the United States will experience arctic conditions. Equatorial areas (where the Arabs live) will become temperate. Everyone will want to move there. There will be massive social upheaval, wars caused by food and fuel shortages, and the neo-Nazis and their allies will have the market cornered on those resources.

It’s almost too late, friends! You must demonstrate! You must riot in the streets! You must call scoffers bad names and throw ice cubes at them! Only through unrestrained international chaos and upheaval will we be able to make our voices heard!

(By the way, that part is up to you. I came up with the theory. My work is done.)

Does the Poe Figure Come with a Knife?

Stefanie of So Many Books has photos of her latest purchases, including a Jane Austen action figure. This is crazy. Action figures? I wonder how many there are or if an author can commission his own figure. I can think of possibilities:

  • Hawthorne would come dressed in black with a scarlet “A.”
  • Meville would have a spyglass and seaman attire.
  • Samuel Johnson would come with Boswell.
  • G.K. Chesterton would be heavier, though not larger, than any other figure and never remain where you leave him overnight.
  • Lewis might come with a wardrobe.
  • Tolkien would have an ornamental waistcoat, a pipe, and short sword.
  • Walt Whitman would be the most interactive of the figures with his growing hair.

No one would buy them, of course.

Go Fish Meme II

OK, I’ll bite.

Yes, I certainly have Andrew Klavan books. In fact I think I have everything in his oeuvre, (including the Keith Peterson books) except for Hunting Down Amanda, which I’ve got to find one of these days.

Roy, do you have any books by Walter Wangerin?

Go Fish Meme

Here’s a new meme. The path, should you choose to follow it, goes like this.

1. Answer the question given when you were tagged.

2. Tag someone else with a new question.

The questions allowed for this meme are of the Go Fish variety. For example: “Hey, Phil, got any books by Rudyard Kipling?” “Yes, I do. I have a couple cheap paperbacks of The Jungle Book and Captains Courageous, and a 1940 edition of his collected verses published by Sun Dial Press.”

Having answered a question, I will ask a question, and I’ll start with what I hope to be an easy-sort-of-easy one.

Hey, Lars, got any books by Andrew Klavan?

If I Were a Church Father

You’re Origen!

You do nothing by half-measures. If you’re going to read the Bible, you want to read it in the original languages. If you’re going to teach, you’re going to reach as many souls as possible, through a proliferation of lectures and books. If you’re a guy and you’re going to fight for purity … well, you’d better hide the kitchen shears.

Find out which Church Father you are at The Way of the Fathers!

I can’t say I’m too familiar with Origen, but I know I don’t have what it takes to be a church father anyway. Like they said of Luther, he didn’t just roll out of bed to lead the Reformation; he studied and taught constantly. The closest I’ve gotten to “original languages” is Middle English.

Philadelphia Has Gone Crazy

Philadelphia has gone crazy, and city officials are considering padding the sidewalks. They say it’s an environmentally friendly idea, but I know it’s really because the people in that city are wacko. I mean, Frank Wilson lives there, and he’s questioning global warming. Insanity! Right now it’s 32F outside and it was about 20F this morning–proof!! the world is warming up.

This Ain't Minnesota

But it’s still snowing. Chattanooga has it’s first good snow in a few years. In the past few years, if it has snowed at all in my area of the world, it has laid on the ground only in the mountains. Today, we have a nice thin snow blanket everywhere.

Snowfall in my backyard