Thoughts thought while preparing to go to church for the meeting last night:

“Looks like rain. I’d better wear my trenchcoat.

“If I wear the trenchcoat, I’ll have to wear a tie.

“You cannot wear a trenchcoat without a tie. If you do, you look like a pervert hanging around a playground, not the International Man of Intrigue you bought the coat to resemble.”

Dave Lull sent me this link to a Reason article by Jonathan Rauch which explains Honor Cultures (one of my current obsessions) pretty clearly.

I don’t have much time tonight. I’ve got to go to church to participate in a long, boring, meeting. I know it’ll be long and boring because that’s the only kind we do.

I agreed a couple years back to serve on a constitutional revision committee. Since then we’ve held zero meetings. I came to look on the obligation the same way we Boomers think back on the atomic bomb scares of our childhoods, something we feared then but need not worry about now (oh, wait…)

But the call finally came.

I’m pondering whether to attend the meeting or just kill myself.

Decisions, decisions.

Being dead is an acceptable excuse for non-attendance, right?

I drove up to Fargo, North Dakota on Saturday, for a meeting of the Sverdrup Society (I edit their journal and newsletter). It’s about a four hour drive, with stops. Getting to Fargo from here involves passing through Fargo’s sister city, Moorhead, Minnesota. That reminded me of a story told by my brother Moloch (whose birthday it is today, by the way. Remind me to call him).

Moloch and his wife were visiting Concordia College in Moorhead, their mutual alma mater. They took a guided tour led by a young female student. As they passed by a small hill on campus, Moloch said, “There’s where the biology lab used to be. They tore it down and put in that hill.”

The student said, “No. That hill has always been here. The students talk about it. There’s an Indian legend about it and everything.”

Moloch and my sister-in-law assured her that the hill was modern and man-made, and they’d spent a fair amount of time in the old biology lab on the site.

Afterwards Moloch said to his wife, “You know what this means, don’t you?

“It means we’re older than the hills.”

I thought I’d link to a couple more Viking photos. Since I’m constitutionally incapable of balance in thinking about myself, I need to alternate my nihilist and pessimistic posts with posts of a more full-of-myself, “look at me!” nature.

This first picture is from the Viking Meet in Elk Horn, Iowa. The sinister gang I’m posing with is not my own Viking group, but the Skjaldborg guys from Omaha. And no, I did not tease the big guy about his pink tunic.

This one is from two weekends ago, in Dallas, Wisconsin. Here we see me demonstrating graphically to the others exactly how far my fame and fortune as an author take me in terms of… well, fame and fortune.

Credit to Eric and Shari Anderson for the pictures.

In May 2007, The Eshet Chayil Foundation invites all children of David, the King of ancient Israel, to a reunion in Jerusalem. If you happen to know anyone who qualifies, please let them know.