Me on my Segway. Artist’s conception.
So I had a birthday recently, and my family gathered on Saturday to make a big deal of it. In their own, uniquely Walker way, of course.
The perfect Walker celebration involves finding an activity that’s a) something the subject’s interested in, b) fun, and c) slightly humiliating.
They found the perfect thing. First of all, it was a tour of St. Paul, the more colorful of our Twin Cities (there are two of them, reading from left to right, in case you’re wondering). Secondly, it was a history tour—right down my alley. Thirdly (and this was the clincher) it was a Segway tour, giving me (and, to be fair, all of us) the opportunity to look like dorks on the hallowed avenues of our state’s capitol.
It was a huge success. Honestly, my conservative, hidebound reservations about the Segway remain firmly in place. But it would be vain to deny that the things are easy to learn and a whole lot more fun than you think they’ll be.
The wonderful thing about a Segway is that it’s intuitive. You lean forward and it goes forward. You straighten up and it stops. Lean back (just a little) and it goes into reverse. You lean on the handlebar to go right or left. Because the machine senses your movements, and there’s no intermediate stage of controls and levers, it soon starts feeling like a part of you. When you have to yield it up at the end of your allotted time, you miss it, like an amputated (if numb) limb.
I hasten to add that this has not turned me into a “small is beautiful” greenie. The trouble with the Segway is that fun is about all it’s good for. When I ask myself, “What’s this marvelous device in service of?” the only answer I can come up with is, a showy toy for people with a lot of surplus money. It’s a cheap way (cheap in mileage, not in initial cost) to get around town, but most of us carry things when we travel, often bulky things. You can hang a backpack on a Segway, but that’s about the limit of its carrying capacity (I wonder if they sell a trailer).
My hope for the Segway is that American ingenuity can find a way to translate this cool technology into something actually useful—a new generation of wheelchairs, for instance. This is too good to languish as a rich man’s toy.
To my family, in any case, thanks for a very enjoyable day.
All posts by Lars Walker
The wreck of the Narcissist
For reasons I’ll keep to myself (for a change), I’ve been thinking about growing old lately. That leads me to consider my whole generation, that fabled company known in the West as the Baby Boomers. I’m confident that future historians (I trust there will be some) will certainly rank us as one of the greatest disasters in western history.
The generation of Americans that survived the Depression and won the Second World War faced the post-war years with two firm goals—to have families, and to give their children everything they never had. The children they bore were (by and large) the most cherished, the most cossetted, and the most privileged in human history. Many (not all, but enough) were taught that they were the center of the universe, the most important people in the world. As they grew older, they were confidently informed that they were the smartest, best-educated, wisest generation the world had ever seen. They would, they were assured, change the world forever.
And change it they did. Continue reading The wreck of the Narcissist
Unconverted Rice
The big news in Christian popular culture today is that Anne Rice, the bestselling vampire author who announced her conversion to Christianity a couple years back, has unconverted.
The 68-year-old author wrote Wednesday on her Facebook page that she refuses to be “anti-gay … anti-feminist,” and “anti-artificial birth control.”
She adds that “In the name of … Christ, I quit Christianity and being Christian. Amen.”
There was a surge of debate about this on a Christian SF/Fantasy e-mail discussion list I subscribe to. Part of the scuttlebutt (who knows how reliable?) was that she had a bad business experience with a Christian company that planned to film her novels about Christ, and that that may have contributed to her disenchantment. If that’s the case, it wouldn’t be the first time. The history of celebrity converts in my lifetime hasn’t been a happy one. And it’s not just a matter of the celebrities’ immaturity. Christian enterprises are rather notorious for their shoddy business practices and promise-breaking. Sad but true.
But if the Facebook posting really reveals her heart, it would seem she simply found the gate too narrow and the way too straight. She appears to be one of those many who want a Jesus who’ll accommodate their preferences. Being in the church involves a certain amount of doctrinal teaching and accountability, which they find offensive and intrusive.
I think of the rich young ruler from Luke 18—“When he heard this, he became very sad, because he was a man of great wealth.”
Discipleship has a cost. The cares of the world often choke out the seed that has been sown.
Let’s pray for Anne Rice.
(Photo credit: Getty Images)
You don't have to be a meteorologist to know which way the wind is blowing
Novelist Andrew Klavan, about whose work you may have read from time to time in this space, reports at City Journal that his French publisher has backed out of a deal to publish a translation of his novel Empire of Lies.
The book’s French cancellation is, I realize, a rather small cultural event. Yet it gives specific color to the recent revelations on the Daily Caller website that left-wing journalists conspired to suppress scandals that might harm Barack Obama and to the brouhaha over Breitbart’s online release of a video that resulted in a government worker’s momentarily losing her job. In both stories, one thing leaps out at me: everywhere, the Left favors fewer voices and less information, and conservatives favor more. Everywhere, the Left seeks to disappear its opposition, whereas the Right is willing to meet them head-on.
Meanwhile a federal judge has ruled that Eastern Michigan University did not violate a student’s freedom of religion when they required her to abandon her religious beliefs or be booted out of a graduate counseling program.
U.S. District Judge George Caram Steeh dismissed Ward’s lawsuit against Eastern Michigan University. She was removed from the school’s counseling program last year because she refused to counsel homosexual clients.
Anybody else sense a trend?
"If any form of pleasure is exhibited, report to me and it will be prohibited…"
“Floyd R. Turbo” at Threedonia blog reviews West Oversea, in flattering terms.
A side order of pictures
Photobucket works for me tonight, so I can share some photos from Nordic Fest in Decorah, Iowa.
Here’s an eager crowd learning all about Vikings from the Skjaldborg guys.
Here’s the Vikings extracting much-needed sustenance from pork chops, the national cuisine of Iowa.
And here’s my friend, under my own awning, showing off the mail shirt he’s making.
The big thing that kept occupying my mind all weekend (and my friend got pretty sick of hearing about it too) was the fact that when I attended Luther College, which is also in Decorah, it was forty blankety-blank years ago. Forty years.
When I consider that fact, I’m not surprised by how much has changed. I’m amazed anything remains the same. The fact that some of the same buildings yet stand in Decorah, and that a few of them even serve the functions they did back in my time, seems somehow against nature. When I think that forty years have passed, I imagine that the very hills should have been brought low, and the river should have o’erflowed its banks and found a fresh course. Everybody should have flying cars, and we should all be taking our sustenance in tablet form.
Well, that last part did sort of come true. I do not lack for pills in my diet in this strange old world.
A weekend in exotic Iowa
I meant to share some pictures of my weekend in Decorah, Iowa, but I can’t seem to upload anything to Photobucket today. Not sure if it’s their fault or mine. I’ll try again tomorrow.
I rode down with one of the other Vikings, who has relatives in the area with whom we bunked. The festival actually starts on Thursday, but we only took Friday off, and arrived a little after noon. Viking Sam was there with his Viking boat, and a small contingent from the Skjaldborg group from Omaha.
Friday was an amazing day for me. It was stinking hot—tropical hot, southeast Asian hot and humid, as it so often is in Decorah at the end of July, most especially in the little hollow behind the Norwegian immigration museum where the Viking camp has been located for the last few years.
First of all a couple ladies, sisters as it turned out, came into the camp and talked about a Viking festival they’d attended in Norway. Turned out it was Vikingfestivalen Karmøy, which I’ve been trying to get to for the last decade or so. It further developed that they were descendents of Karmøy, home of my great-grandfather, and their family had come from a neighboring farm.
Later, when I went up to Main Street to scrounge up some lunch, a total stranger stopped me and asked, “Are you Lars Walker, the author?”
I expect that’s the only time that’ll ever happen to me in my life, so thanks, whoever you are, for making me feel like a big shot.
Finally, a couple from Illinois wandered into the camp. She was, as it turned out, the president of the organization devoted to saving and preserving The Viking, the replica Viking ship that was sailed from Norway to America for the Columbian Exposition in 1893. It’s been gradually allowed to deteriorate ever since.
As an added bonus, they’re Christians. He’s a retired employee of Moody Broadcasting.
Saturday was OK, the weather actually pleasant (following thunderstorms which soaked my stuff) but my normal insecurities returned, and—oddly—although traffic was heavier, I sold fewer books.
But you can’t have everything.
Thanks to Sam and Skjaldborg for making it possible for me to be there.
I am neither a prophet, nor the son of a prophet
It was one of those rare, perfect moments in preaching.
While living in Florida some years back, due to limited choices I was attending a church of a different denomination than my own. It was a large, growing, dynamic congregation. The pastor announced a series of sermons on Revelation. But when he started preaching, it quickly became clear he was not teaching the Dispensational Premillenial (i.e., Left Behind) interpretation that’s so popular in our day. He was an amillennialist.
Many congregation members were not happy about this, and made their opinion known.
After a few weeks of controversy, the pastor got into the pulpit one Sunday morning and announced that, for the sake of peace, he was discontinuing the sermon series on the End Times. Instead, he would take up a topic that would trouble people less.
“I’m going to preach on Hell,” he said. Continue reading I am neither a prophet, nor the son of a prophet
Of butterflies and kerfuffles
Last night I confessed on my Facebook page that I love butterflies and dragonflies. I think my love for butterflies is easily understood. If there are any butterfly haters out there, I’ve never encountered one. Dragonflies, for their part, are cool because they’re beautiful in a sleek, deadly, Viking ship kind of way. As an extra bonus, they devour mosquitoes in large quantities. Every time I see a dragonfly, I want to show my support in some way; buy him a drink and say, “Thank you for your service.” Haven’t worked out a way to do that yet.
Did you ever ponder the word “butterfly?” Where does the butter come in? I did some web searches and discovered (to my delight) that nobody really knows. There are, thank goodness, a few mysteries left in our world. Some say that it’s a confusion of the original name, “flutterby.” That seems to me a little precious, and there seems to be no actual evidence for such a word in history. Some think the word originally only designated the yellow ones, and then expanded to embrace the entire genus. Others say that it’s because butterfly droppings are yellow. Take your pick, or make up one of your own.
By the way, the Norwegian word for butterfly is sommerfugl, which means “summer bird.” What a lovely, poetic name. Illogical, as they have lots of birds in Norway in the summer, but apt.
Much summer heat is being generated by Andrew Breitbart’s story on Shirley Sherrod and her speech to an NAACP meeting. I defended Breitbart in a discussion over at Threedonia earlier today, but on consideration I’ve come to the conclusion that he had a fair point, but bungled the story badly. He was trying to make the reasonable argument that the NAACP shouldn’t call other people racist when its own members laugh and cheer at a story of reverse racism. But he went ahead without having the full story, and should have been aware that Ms. Sherrod, who seems to be a decent person, would be caught in his line of fire.
Talleyrand is supposed to have once said of a political assassination, “It was worse than a crime. It was a blunder.” This was worse than a blunder. It was a sin.
I confess I can imagine myself committing the same sin. Doesn’t make it right, though.
Triple Crown, by Dick Francis
A while back I reviewed Dick Francis’ mystery, Decider, and said I’d be reading more. So I picked up the collection Triple Crown (comprising Dead Cert, Nerve, and For Kicks) and read it last week. It was an intriguing reading experience for me.
I have a hard time pinning down what’s so compelling in a Dick Francis mystery. Most of the stories revolve around the sport of racing (with the corruption that racetrack betting invites), and that’s a field of endeavor in which I’ve never had much interest (though I’ll admit that if I have to watch a horse race, I’d prefer a steeplechase, which is the kind of racing Francis concentrates on, at least in the novels I’ve read). I can’t say that he’s a brilliant stylist—in fact I’d characterize him as the kind of author who disappears totally, which isn’t a bad way to get your reader invested in your characters. I can’t say he’s especially skilled at crafting vivid characters. And yet I found myself horizontal on the couch for hours, turning page after page, absolutely under the spell of the stories.
Dead Cert, I understand, was Francis’ first published novel. It’s good, but I think he was still feeling his way. Nerve was his second book, and by then he’d already found his pace. This was possibly the most satisfying tale of revenge I’ve ever read. And For Kicks amazed me. It was the compelling adventure of a man who takes a dangerous job for money, endures great suffering and violence, and in the end learns something about himself that changes his life.
I think what I particularly like is that Francis writes about manly men. Men blessed, and burdened, with strength, integrity, and courage, Churchillian in their resolve never to give up.
What a joy to discover an author you didn’t know before, who has a long list of published works you can look forward to!