Judges

I started reading Judges this afternoon. An interesting cycle is shown by the nation of Isreal - apostasy, oppression, distress, then deliverance. Over and over again. I find the similarity to my own life startling. Right after God initiates a big change in my life, I so easily begin to forget what I have learned. I go back to my old self, even though it is not what I truly desire. I forget the truths about Christ that I have Known. Not only that, I even turn my back on them purposefully. I think I can do things on my own. That I can fulfill my own desires.

Then step two sets in. I find the things I ty to rule as master only master me. Because of my own voluntary enslavement, I lose some of my own choice. The more I let my sin rule me, the more oppressed I become.

Praise God for distress. Praise God that He created us not to have true peace outside of Him. Even when I don't directly recognize it, the gnawing uncomfort keeps at me. I Know I am missing something.

And I think this is the point at which I am most receptive to Christ. The distress causes me to look for Something. Something to change my situation. Something to change me.

It is in the middle of my distress to believe that deliverance is possible. My old ways of coping try to take over. God can and does choose to comfort me directly at times, but I think most often He works through other people in my life. It becomes vitally important for me to hear again and again about the grace of Christ, no matter how many times I have heard it, even Understood it, in the past.

Deliverance is inherantly a messy process. Things get cut off and pruned. Shaken up. Placed back upright where they belong, not on their heads where I like to keep them.

At some point in the middle of this last step in the process, dawn breaks. A glimpse of a sunrise has just shown over the hill, and I see hope. Music sounds deeper and food tastes better right now, and I mean that with no exaggeration.

Judges is an interesting book.

Entry posted by byscuits at 12:36 PM | Comments (0)

Gmail?

Anyone need a Gmail invite? I have 6 of them to give away.

Entry posted by byscuits at 06:08 PM | Comments (0)

Garden State

This a movie wholely unlike any I have seen before. Zach Braff writes, directs, and stars in this entirely new generation of cinema. Several times while watching, I just sat staring at the screen. I was in a state that every once in a while just takes me over. All at once the movie culminated into one single moment where I had no thought in my head. I couldn't take it. I was stunned. Like when you see that perfect painting or photograph. It takes your breath away. No specific thought, just an utter appreciation of what is before you. Garden State did that to me.

Andrew Largeman (Zach Braff) is an actor in LA. Well, actually he is a waiter. But like nearly every resident of LA, he aspires to be an actor. His antiseptic apartment is complete with bed and phone. And not much else.

After a call from his father (Ian Holm), Large returns home to New Jersey, the Garden State, for his mother's funeral. He's back where he grew up after being away for nine years. At the funeral, he runs into some old friends that he knew from way back in the day. His friends really haven't changed. And even though Large has been away for 9 years, when he gets back to Jersey, you realize he is home. It's where grew up. Even though he went away for boarding school and college, he is still, at the core, from Jersey.

I guess that's why the film resonated with me so much. I've been away from Missouri for starting on 9 years now. And even though I have learned a lot and changed in many ways, I will always be from Carl Junction. At the core of who I am, that will never change. And that's not necessarily a bad thing, just a statement of fact.

While at the doctor's office to have some headaches checked out, Large meets Sam (Natalie Portman). Now I have not been a big proponent of Miss Portman ever since her Star Wars days began to roar their terrible roars and gnash their terrible teeth. But she was different in Garden State. She didn't play some idealized woman. She was a messed up kid. It was a nice change.

This film was awkwardly realistic. Interactions between characters didn't have the polish you usually see in movie dialogue. No one was impossibly witty or funny like they are on the Gilmore Girls. These were imperfect people, complete with charms, quirks, and faults. I would almost describe this movie as the antithesis of Largeman's LA apartment. It was anti-antiseptic.

I cannot get away with writing this review without mentioning the soundtrack. Right after I saw the movie the first time in the theater, I went right out and bought it. Been listening to it near nonstop. And the second time I watched this past weekend, I more fully realized how perfect this soundtrack really is. Part of what I mean about this being an entirely new generation of cinema. Finally someone gets how to use mellow indie music properly in a film.

By the end of the film, I wanted to track down Zach Braff to work for the man. I would love to be involved in films like this. In just about any way possible. But for now, I'll be content just to watch.

Towards the end, Zach's character kisses Natalie Portman. For just a moment, I suspected Zach wrote this entire movie just for that kiss. But perhaps that's just what psychologists would call "transferrence," I dunno.

Whatever the case, this is definitely in my top 5 of all time.

Entry posted by byscuits at 11:29 AM | Comments (1)

Stay out of trouble

Still listening to the Kings of Convenience new album, Riot on an Empty Street. I like it almost as much as their first album, Quiet is the New Loud. Very mellow, tight harmonies. And some good lyrics too, if a bit heavy on relationships. A couple of the songs really like to play themselves in my head, this one at the moment:

Stay out of Trouble, KoC
So baby, what we've got
has lately not been enough.
I wish I had your scarf still,
that once embraced and kept me warm.
I wish you could be with me,
in these last days when I am still
hopelessly poor.

Stay out
of trouble, stay in touch.
Try not to think about me too much.

I kind of imagine this guy, walking down the street on a winter day. Maybe wearing just a jean jacket. He's a bit cold, walking around without the reminding scarf she gave him. But with a little patience spring will come, and he will be plenty warm, no need for the scarf.

On a purely technical side-note, I recently finished upgrading the software that runs this blog, Movable Type. Comments that get posted now have to be approved by me, so that means there won't be any more blog comment spam. All of the comments about online casinos and much less savory products and services were driving me nuts. :) The only drawback is that your comments will take just a little while to show up on the blog.

Entry posted by byscuits at 02:37 PM | Comments (0)

A delayed commute

It was a typical morning on the subway, me with my headphones on listening to the new Kings of Convenience album. A young man was seated across from me, very well dressed, with a Rubik's cube. I saw him look at his watch, then start twisting like mad. In about a half a minute, he had the thing completely solved. After checking his watch, he looked around the car, simultaneously turning the cube randomly in his hands. Once satisfied, he checked his watch again and started in earnest. If I wasn't so impressed, I might have found it a slightly more comical and much more odd.

Then, all of a sudden, the silence was broken. People were yelling. At first, I thought they were cheering. I pulled out my right earbud and looked around to see what was going on. A guy struggled with something caught in the door while someone else ran to the end of the car to push the emergency button. I looked back to the door and saw the man yank a briefcase from the pneumatic clutches of the subway doors. He looked around at the people near him for a moment, then shrugged. About this time I realized that this man had two briefcases in hand. One was clearly not his. At the other end of the car, I heard the man speaking to the emergency button. "Yes, we have a man's briefcase that got caught in the door." You see, in order to keep a door from fully closing and thus missing a train, it is common practice for commuters swing a briefcase or equivalent between the doors just before they close. Apparently, this particular door wasn't sensitive enough and this particular man was deprived of his work fuel. The response came from the red button, "Was the man dragged at all?" From the car, "No, but we do have is briefcase." The men near that door kind of looked around at each other a bit. A minute later, a light blue uniformed man, complete with official "T" brand on his shoulder, walked with a moderately bored look on his face towards the individuals clustered around the door. He silently held out his hand and received the briefcase. He then performed a slightly sloppy about-face, and headed back out of our car.

My fellow T riders and I then returned in silence to our personal space. Rubik's cube began timing himself again. Three minutes later, the morning commute resumed, only slightly delayed.

Entry posted by byscuits at 09:20 AM | Comments (2)

The Great Divorce

I have been reading The Great Divorce by CS Lewis this week. It touches on ideas about heaven and hell, and questions many preconceptions that Christians hold. I borrowed this book, but I think I need to get my own copy so I can mark it up when I reread.

I don't even know how to describe this book. For starters, it is fiction. Written a bit like some of Lewis's other Sci-Fi novels, this book uses a narrative story to ease along some very difficult notions about what heaven and hell really are. We follow the main character on a journey in a solid world where he is but a ghost. Even walking on the blades of grass cause great pain, as he is not substantial enough to crush them underfoot. He is exploring a world where even a simple light rain could be fatal.

Along the way, he meets "Solids" as well as others just like him, Ghosts. He overhears many conversations between different pairs of Solids and Ghosts that show much of human nature, sin, and love.

There is the mother that cannot let go of her dead son, claiming that her great love is what caused her never to change his room. She uses his memory to abuse her husband and daughter, all the while claiming it her motherly love was too great for the others to understand. That only she truly loved him.

There were many other equally blind characters in the book, but I won't ruin them for you. I really recommend this book, as it is a quick, easy read. Towards the end, there was one quote that really stood out to me.

Only the Greatest of all can make Himself small enough to enter Hell. For the higher a thing is, the lower it can descend -- a man can sympathize with a horse but a horse cannot sympathize with a rat. Only One has descended into Hell.

Entry posted by byscuits at 10:24 AM | Comments (1)

Worst Airline

I recently had a very bad experience on American Airlines, and decided to get some retribution. They did not care to help me out in any way when they delayed my flight three times total, twice for mechanical and once for weather, nor did they care when they could not even get me into my destination city within the next three days. So I had to fly into an entirely different city and have a family member drive to pick me up. In the middle of all this, I was stuck in Chicago. Plenty of American Airlines employees cared about my plight, but the airline had created policies such that no one had any power to help me. I talked to the highest ranking American employee in all of O'hare (I wasn't even supposed to ever be in Chicago), and she could not even give me a $5 meal vocher. Did I mention they lost my luggage, too?

This is why American is the worst airline. A while back, I posted a little on this matter in an entry here. Basically, I had attempted to set up American Airlines with a google bomb, trying to get their website, aa.com, to show up near the top when you do a search on google for "worst airline."

I was just informed by my brother-in-law that American Airlines shows up THIRD! You can see for yourself right here.

This is very exciting. With your help, we have brought them up to #3. With just a little more help, I am quite confident we can bring them up to the #1 worst airline. So to all of you technophiles, I need just a bit more help. Please forward this blog entry around to those with their own websites and blogs. All they have to do is link aa.com to the text worst airline.

If we hit #1, I am considering contacting American Airlines directly. Or possibly bigger action. If we can get to #1, I will write up the entire story and try to get it posted to Slashdot.

This is very satisfying. Not at all surprising that they are in Chapter 11. Worst airline indeed.

Entry posted by byscuits at 11:44 AM | Comments (3)