The Nappy Cat Chronicles

I like how, after he has destroyed Earth, Jesus will relax in his Egyptian-style crown and smile like he’s in a beer commercial.

Endless celestial sex? Where do I sign?

In addition, though most people, including scientists, consider the biblical teaching of origins to be religious and consider evolutionary ideas scientific, we should challenge such a view. In the secular media, for instance, the debate is often described as “creationism vs. evolution,” as if the “ism” should not apply to “evolution.” This is not accurate, because believing in evolution, like believing in creation, requires acceptance of a certain presuppositional dogma and requires placing one’s faith in a story about the unrepeatable past.

Dear Dr. Moore,

The purpose of Newspeak was not only to provide a medium of expression for the world-view and mental habits proper to the devotees of Ingsoc, but to make all other modes of thought impossible. It was intended that when Newspeak had been adopted once and for all and Oldspeak forgotten, a heretical thought-that is, a thought diverging from the principles of Ingsoc-should be literally unthinkable, at least so far as thought is dependent on words. Its vocabulary was so constructed as to give exact and often very subtle expression to every meaning that a Party member could properly wish to express, while excluding all other meanings and also the possibility of arriving at them by indirect methods. This was done partly by the invention of new words, but chiefly by eliminating undesirable words and by stripping such words as remained of unorthodox meanings, and so far as possible of all secondary meanings whatever.

George Orwell, 1984, Appendix

[h/t Andrew Sullivan]

From the “I feel so very sorry for her children” file, a Christian lady goes nuts in a coffee shop:

From the “Jesus appeared to me in my food” file, a woman and a little girl find Jesus inside of a potato:

It was her 10-year-old granddaughter who made her give the potato a second look. “My granddaughter said Granny did you see that in the middle? I said what?

And taking a closer look she saw the cross with Jesus in the middle. “It’s remarkable. Even when I cut the good part off the cross ended up being shaped like a tomb from long ago.”

From “Tom Cruise is a Scientologist” file, Tom Cruise on being a Scientologist:

Charlie White’s projects form a nonsequential tale of American life. When viewed in isolation, Charlie’s images appear perverse and cartoonish. The ultimate in “freaky pictures I found on the internet.” However, with the exception of his 1999 series, In A Matter of Days, the meanings behind Charlie’s narratives are clouded by the eerie and seemingly sardonic nature of the images. It is left to you to make sense of it by filling in the blanks and deciding upon the existence of the transitional plot devices that may or may not bind the elements.

Links:

• Main Website
• In A Matter of Days
• Understanding Joshua
• And Jeopardize the Integrity of the Hull
• Everything is American

Jack Radcliffe’s photographs are not spectacular. His photographs could have easily been taken by anyone with a black-and-white camera. However, the people and their circumstances that he has captured are endearing and have the compelling quality of longentivity. Especially compelling is the series of photographs that capture the development of his daughter, Alison, from an infant to a married woman. Fortunately for his subjects, Jack’s series are neither voyeuristic nor exploitive. The photographs that he has chosen to display are those universally meaningless yet ultimately visceral moments for which the camera was invented.

Links:

• Main Website
• Alison
• The Isbert Family

I can’t remember how I found Larry Sultan. It’s very likely that I simply stumbled upon him during a stroll through the webs of the internet. Larry has numerous shoots for magazine and advertisement campaigns to his credit and three hardcovers bear his name: Pictures from Home, Evidence, and The Valley. In addition to being brief exposés on intimate moments, Larry’s photographs are visually provocative and moody. After viewing his photographs, you are left with the impression that Larry reveals his subjects in the precise manner in which his subjects, given talent and opportunity, would reveal themselves.

Links:

• Stephen Wirtz Gallery Selections
• Bill Charles Selections

Brian McBride - Overture (for Other Halfs)

[audio:Brian McBride - Overture (for Other Halfs).mp3]

Brian McBride - Piano ABG

[audio:Brian McBride - Piano ABG.mp3]

Brian McBride - A Gathering To Lead Me When You’re Gone

[audio:Brian McBride - A Gathering To Lead Me When Youre Gone.mp3]

allmusic.com review:

After numerous excellent releases as part of Stars of the Lid, Brian McBride takes an excellent solo bow with When the Detail Lost Its Freedom, as serenely beautiful as his past work would show, but with its own distinct character. Rather than lengthy washes of psychedelic ambient guitar, McBride, using a sampler as the key instrument, here creates more focused, orchestrated songs with the help of a variety of guests, resulting in compositions that have similar emotional impact but in a different vein. Guitar drones and echoes certainly play key roles, but generally as part of a larger structure — thus the recurrent four-note melody in “A Gathering to Lead Me When You’re Gone” or the rigorously structured cycle of sound on “Retenir,” sound waves constantly approaching and retreating like their beach-bound counterparts in the ocean. Lead track “Overture (For Other Halfs)” sets the tone, feeling akin to Aphex Twin’s high-church hush on Selected Ambient Works, Vol. 2 as performed for an elegiac sunset, with the assistance of heavily treated violin parts from Eden Batki to add even more depth and beauty. Its uninterrupted flow into the following “Piano ABG” shows that the gentle ambition of McBride in terms of extended composition remains intact, and from there When the Detail makes its steady, captivating way. Songs like the breathtaking “The Guilt of Uncomplicated Thoughts,” a lush combination of everything from understated trumpet to an exultant, aspiring melody, feel like messages from some lost, distant landscape. There’s even singing at points — McBride himself, as well as two separate female vocalists — which further adds to the unexpected pleasures of this striking album.

I was at work one recent day when I felt the strong urge to be more manly. It is a strange feeling for us guys to have, but it does happen. And, as strong of a feeling it was, I can honestly say that I have no idea on how it came to me. Sure, most of us guys wonder what it would be like to be in the Strongest Man Contest with the ability to toss fifteen grand pianos into the third story of a three-story building in less than a minute and half. And it was not like I was not moving large pieces of furniture at my job, but I had the feeling. So I decided to do the next simple best thing and went to the grocery store to buy BEEF! You were expecting beer, weren’t you?

Ah, yes! Beef! There is nothing as manly as eating murder, as Dennis Leary once put it. Since the near beginning of time, man has enjoyed eating meat. Back in the day, men would go out in hunting parties to make absurd noises, talk about hunting, and making up stories to tell their wives who didn’t care, until a deer would come long and they would stone it to death. This was before beer and guns. Of course, with the changing times, the modern world, and the Gaming Commission, men, these days, have to settle for places like the grocery store. This has a lot to do with the fact that we can no longer shoot and kill the squirrels tearing at the bird feeders or the cute little cuddly rabbits in the backyard because of a certain group of people we will not mention. I am not walking into that or the animal rights groups.

Fortunately, though, there is hope for us guys. With the invention of grilling like primitive cave beasts and watching the game, the beef market supplies all of our manly needs in the local grocery store such as The Price Chopper, which could certainly be a group of wild beastly men with hatchets! At least, we could imagine this. So I went to the local Beef Department to look at all of the beef that is wrapped in plastic to prevent us guys from cooking it on the spot. I got myself a T-bone steak, the most manly one, and took it to the register to check out.

But something hit me! As I turned around to see what it could have been, I realized that I was missing a key element to my feast. That is right! A1 Sauce! I have not had A1 Sauce in a long time, but it is the perfect thing to have. The A1 Sauce, sometimes confused with A-1-A, a road in Florida and in many Jimmy Buffett songs, was the perfect steak sauce for anything. I should be getting a check for this advertisement any day now. This stuff goes way back into Skibicki History in Tampa, FL. As another hot great night in Florida, my dad did the great routine of grilling steak. And with the steak, we always had the A1 Sauce on the table. There were two reasons for this. One, it was a great thing to read on the table when you had nothing to say. Two, my brother and I were at a younger age where the taste buds rejected anything unless it was candy.

But over the years, my taste buds began to die off, and the A1 Sauce seemed to slowly lose it’s place on the dinner table. This is the sad part. But whenever it did show up, it bought up great dinner memories such as where is the expiration date on this sauce? We had an A1 bottle for at least eleven years, and it was still good. Also, was the discovery that the bottle said to “Shake well”. And with the manliness of age and corniness, my dad would always “shake well” in his seat, because it was A1, and it said too! Maybe, this is why it slowly disappeared over the years.

Either way, with the A1 Sauce and my beef, I must say that Dennis Leary was right! Murder is that good! I feel manly already! Now, if I could only bench-press a Yugo?

Skibicki

P.S. What was that other sauce that actually said “Shake the Bottle” As if anyone would shake something else!

Darwin’s theory of evolution helped fuel the rise of Hitler and contributed to the school-shooting massacre at Columbine, a former St. Petersburg City Council member wrote in a letter urging the Pinellas County School Board to expose students to alternative theories.

“Evolution gives our kids an excuse to believe in natural selection and survival of the fittest, which leads to a belief that they are superior over the weak,” Bill Foster wrote board members in a letter received this week. “This is a slippery slope.”

He continued: “One of the Columbine shooters wrote on his Web site, ‘You know what I love? Natural selection! It’s the best thing that ever happened to the Earth. Getting rid of all the stupid and weak organisms.’”

Dear Bill Foster,

We are a people of different faiths, but we are one. Which faith conquers the other is not the question; rather, the question is whether Christianity stands or falls… We tolerate no one in our ranks who attacks the ideas of Christianity… in fact our movement is Christian. We are filled with a desire for Catholics and Protestants to discover one another in the deep distress of our own people.

- Adolf Hitler, in a speech in Passau, 27 October 1928

Is Jesus a mental disorder?

(Warning: Ranting ahead!)

The cultural topoi that surround the Jesus mythoi is well illustrated by the above “interpretation” of Jesus. In the West, we see Jesus as a very attractive man. We portray him as a well-groomed white man with long and flowing brown hair. Often, he is portrayed as tall with solid frame. He casts out demons by day and saves the world by night. He is a pious John Wayne.

Of course, this beauty is a complete lie. Jesus was likely a short and malnourished dark-skinned man with ratty hair and swollen feet. However, even in the Catholic Church, whose dogma considers Jesus to be a lesser saint of sorts, the contemplation of him as a man from the people is blasphemy

This fixation on the indelible beauty that is Jesus can cause people to have problems with reality. Case in point: The View’s Sherri Shepherd. Aside from never choosing a side in the age old the world is flat versus the world is round debate, she also believes that Jesus predates everything. Now, I get it. Jesus is eternal, nothing that came before his greatness matters, before Christ, ante Christum, blah, blah, blah, etc.

Thanks to modern comforts such as programmable televisions and remote garage door openers, this type of nonthought works for her. And, though she seems honest enough in her confusion when confronted, she makes a great case for Bokononism.

In brief, Bokonoism is the (fictional) belief that ignorance is bliss. This is akin to a mental disorder in that, in both cases, stimuli are incorrectly perceived and/or incorrectly interpreted: An individual who experiences social phobia often misreads social interactions and a schizophrenic completely misperceives his environment.

Where does this take us? Christians who fixate on Jesus often misinterpret the willingness of others to adhere to Jesusly standards and will misperceive their failures as a sign of a demonic interference. Unfortunately, for the rest of us, these Christians don’t even attempt to live in reality. And, so, we’re stuck with their dumb shit like their outrage over the movie adaption of The Golden Compass, their smearing of the homosexual lifestyle, and their saber rattling known as the War on Christmas.

One of my favorite pseudo-libertarian blogging heads gets it wrong. It’s completely uninteresting and predictable that the two leading collegial Messiahs garnered the most votes. Furthermore, IOZ’s particular strain of fatalism prevents him from predicting the future when a blend of romanticism, mysticism, and happenstance is involved in current events. The prevailing conventional wisdom that the nominees will be Clinton 2.0 and Romney or Giuliani is, like most prevailing conventional wisdoms, most likely a simple gut reaction.

The prevailing conventional wisdom also posits that Huckabee’s win is a “good thing” for McCain. I think this is completely incorrect. Here’s why:

• Huckabee received nearly 40,000 votes.
• Romney received nearly 30,000 votes.
• The anemic candidate Thompson received a little over 15,000 votes. McCain received just under the same.
• Ron Paul received nearly 12,000 votes.
• Giuliani received 4,000 votes.

The tea leaves are scattered, erratic, and the only meme that can be generalized to New Hampshire is that Huckabee is now a “serious” candidate. This means that, from here on out, anything you think you know about Huckabee’s chances is, in all likelihood, completely wrong.

That Huckabee is now viable is both fortunate and laughable. It’s fortunate in that it broadens the field. It’s laughable in that, as I’ve written before, Huckabee is a complete youth pastor who enjoys sharing his “message of vertical politics.” Quickly now, ask yourself “What the hell is/are vertical politics?” Surprisingly enough, vertical thoughts and vertical politics involve “think[ing] on things from God’s perspective.” I can only hope that, someday, God will stop perseverating upon abortion and gay marriage and begin to ponder universal health care and energy independence. Until then, I’ll be voting for Obama.