Michael W. Smith has prepared a third Christmas album, and an article on this ends this way:

But despite his success in gospel, Smith worries he’s not doing enough to influence mainstream culture. When he was reaching the pop charts in the ’90s, he said, he loved it because he felt like he was “a light bulb in a dark room.”

“I think about it a lot. ‘What am I doing with my life, and am I doing the right thing?'” Smith says.

He pauses a moment and adds, “I do feel like the success I’ve had has given me a platform to try to let people know what’s really important in life. If you’re not feeding the poor, not looking out for the troubled kid on the block, not giving yourself away, you’ve totally missed it.”

I suspect Smith either held back a bit or made some statements which were not quoted, because giving yourself away must be a part of living out the Gospel or we will be missing it, as he says. That cup of water must be offered in the name of Christ, not the name of decency or America. It is God living among us that brings peace on earth, not simply pulling together.

Will hands off the news that author Terry Pratchett has been diagnosed with a type of Alzheimers. He encourages fans to remain optimistic and plans to keep all current commitments.

Another post from Mr. Key, this one comparing the speeches of Al Gore and William Faulkner.

Shawn Macomber records the skinny on a writers strike rally in Washington Square Park: big names and faces.

The Writers Guild strike is everywhere because when you go to one of their rallies you get to see Tony Soprano’s wife standing next to Joe Pantoliano on stage while Sopranos creator David Chase and Richard Belzer, holding a small dog to his cheek, look on. It’s because even if Tina Fey looks like she’s not into it, she’ll still pose for a photo with you and the guy who plays Kenneth the Page on 30 Rock. It’s because the ex-intern from The Office will nod at you if you smile at him as he leans nonchalantly against a tree. . . . . The gathered heard a thousand times this day how brilliantly writers are able to express themselves, yet, aside from one Daily Show personality and comedian extraordinaire, Colin Quinn, no one saw fit to let the writers speak for themselves. (“I want this to end so the Writers Guild can go back to doing what they do best,” Quinn ribbed. “Sending three giant envelopes of detailed health plan information out every week.”)

Somebody mentioned it today, and I looked it up, and it’s true—it’s C.S. Lewis’ birthday. He was born November 29, 1898. I’m not an anti-smoking zealot, but I wish he hadn’t been a puffer. We might have had him around into the ’70s or ’80s.

Not that this helps you. You read this blog tomorrow, don’t you? I’m a day late. I should have told you about it Wednesday.

That’s me. Always on the receding slope of the bell curve. Yesterday I looked at my desk calendar to see when I needed to send out memos to instructors, so they could get their book orders to me.

Turns out I should have done it last week.

Today as I was leaving work, I thought about stopping at the grocery store. Then a voice in my head said, “No, you have something else to do tonight.”



“What could it be?” I wondered. I consulted my pocket calendar.

I had an appointment to give blood.

Two nights ago.

Ack. I’ve become one of those embarrassing old bachelors who misses all his appointments, dribbles food on his vest and is the last to know when he has holes in his clothes.

I need a keeper.

A critical point in Steve Allen’s career shines a new light on the current writers union strike. Allen began The Tonight Show in 1954 and originated the concept of modern TV talk shows. When Doris Day did not show up for an interview,

Allen was left to his own comic devices with twenty-five minutes of airtime on his hands, which he filled by interviewing people in the studio audience, lugging an old stand-up mike up and down the aisles. ‘The physical thing of carrying this big mike around the room helped to get laughs. I just horsed around, like with my pals. That opened up a lot of possibilities.’ He later wrote: ‘I don’t recollect what was said during the next twenty-five minutes, but I do know that I had never gotten such laughs before.’ … Allen had discovered his natural ability to play it as it lays, to talk without a prepared script or format. ‘For two years I had been slaving away at the typewriter … with only moderate success. Now I had learned that audiences would laugh much more readily at an ad-libbed quip, even though it might not be the pound-for-pound equivalent of a prepared joke.’

Where are comic talents like this today?