Saturday, 14 July 2012

Today I officiated wedding #3 of 4 this month.

As far as commutes go, this was the best one: it was only about five miles from my front door to the event center. All in all, I was away from home for less than two hours. But with Jennifer spending the day at the cabin with all the other ladies in her family, I still had to find something to do with the kids.

Enter my mom. She’s been in town for about a week now, and when I asked her if she’d like to spend the day with us, and watch the kids for a couple of hours, she accepted.

I gotta admit, I felt a little strange leaving my mom’s presence to go perform a wedding ceremony. The reasons are varied, but they stem primarily from the fact that, as a Witness, I had wanted to perform wedding ceremonies, but was denied. So, first of all, performing a wedding ceremony is kind of an act of rebellion against my mom’s religion. Second, it’s a reminder that I’m not a Witness anymore; if I was a Witness, I wouldn’t be performing weddings and, even if I was performing weddings, I surely wouldn’t be performing weddings for non-Witnesses. Third – and this one’s the biggest – my mom remarried back in 2009, and I was not invited. Actually, I was invited, then I was un-invited, then I was re-invited with the condition that I sit in the back, don’t talk, and leave immediately after the ceremony. So I didn’t go. So – and maybe this is all in my head – but leaving to attend a wedding today was a reminder of my mom’s wedding; a wedding I did not attend. How funny that I should attend – and officiate – a wedding of two people I just met earlier this year when I didn’t even go to my own mother’s wedding. So, you know, that’s all weird.

When I returned this evening, I of course began talking about the details of the ceremony: how beautiful the landscape was, how hot the sun was (yep, it was another outside ceremony), and some other observances. My mom was detachedly involved in the conversation, probably just out of courtesy. But she left to drive back to her sister’s home less than five minutes after got in the door.

Like I said, weird.

Sunday, 15 July 2012

Being as today is the only day on our wall calendar between July 6th and July 21st that we don’t have anything written down, I was hoping to get a lot of housework and yardwork done. Alas, we are currently in day #20 of shitty weather, so it was hot, even in the house.

We didn’t get much done in the house, either (though I did manage to replace the showerhead in the bathroom), due to Jennifer’s computer. Turns out, it’s dying. It’s six years old, and it’s time for the planned obsolescence to kick in. She spent last night trying to finish up a home video she’d been working on before the computer crashed and she lost all her hard work. And today she had to figure out how to create a birthday party invitation for Isla’s upcoming birthday. This is trickier than you might think.

For one thing, we don’t buy those generic fill-in-the-blank invitation cards. We make our own. And Jennifer has such demanding standards of quality, that basic image editing software, such as iPhoto or Paint aren’t sufficient. She has 9or would that be had?) Adobe Photoshop on her computer, but with that one out of commission, she had to resort to mine. Not only do I not have Adobe, but I don’t even have the newest Mac operating system (I don’t care about updating), so my wife couldn’t just pop in the disc and load it onto my computer. She found an older version and managed to download that onto my computer. Success!

Anyway, the video is done, Isla’s card has been uploaded to the printing shop, and now we just have to get a new computer. Yuck.

Thursday, 12 July 2012

 Today I had my six-month dental check-up.

When the dentist came in and took over from the hygienist for a few minutes, I told him I had a chip on one of my molars. I said it had just happened a few days ago, and I don’t even know how I chipped it. My tongue just went over there and noticed the rough spot, and I’ve been favoring it ever since. He took a look, noted that chipping of the back molars was common when people have such a cusp, and suggested we just leave it alone. Fine with me.

He walked away, and the hygienist told me my molars (teeth #3 and #14) have a Cusp of Carabelli.

I felt the tooth on the other side of my mouth and noticed she was right. “Not everybody has them,” she said. Wow! I’ve lived all this time and never knew I had two Cusps of Carabelli. This was astounding. It’s like when I noticed that not everyone has hanging earlobes, or that some people have hairlines that come to a widow’s peak.

 After several back-and-forth movements of my tongue to study this new-found part of my body, I asked the hygienist: “Does it give me any special powers?”

I think it was a good question – maybe I can walk through walls, but only if my tongue is touching one of the cusps at that moment. Maybe possession of a pair of cusps means that I could be one of Professor Xavier’s X-men.

The hygienist laughed, and said that unfortunately it didn’t endow me with any special powers. Too bad. I was hoping that ‘with great cusps of Carabelli comes great responsibility.’

Friday, 13 July 2012

So, here’s an article from Gallop regarding their recent (and recurring) survey.

Basically, every so often, they poll Americans on their willingness to vote for candidates with certain traits. They break it down my age group, too, so you can see how the respondants’ ages affects their answer (or, correlates).

Of special interest this year, if the respondants’ willingness to vote for a Mormon. If you scroll down in that article, you’ll see that 72% of people self-identifying as Democrats would vote for a Mormon, while 90% of Republicans said they would. This is amazing, because in most other cases, Democrats are more open-minded here; they’re more willing to vote for a woman, a black person, an atheist, a Muslim, and a gay person. Republicans are more willing to vote for a Jew or Catholic…but only just barely (3% and 2%, repectively). But when it comes to Mormons, they’re 18 percentage points ‘ahead’ in their tolerance.

Why is that?

Simple, says ElectoralVote. Accoring to this brief article, published today…

While interesting, what the poll really says is what people are willing to tell a pollster, rather than how they would actually vote. Although 18% of the respondents said that would not vote for a Mormon, when push comes to shove (and the shoving date is Nov. 6, 2012), given a choice between a white, Republican Mormon and a black, Democratic generic Protestant, it remains to be seen whether the expressed bigotry against Mormons dominates. It is also possible that some of the anti-Mormon voters rationalize their vote by convincing themselves that Obama is a Muslim, which in their eyes is even worse.

For the most part, I think this is an accurate assessment, though I also think it’s safe to say that when push comes to shove, 18% of Republicans still will not vote for Romney. Many probably just won’t vote. Some will write-in a candidate or leave it blank. Others will opt for Obama. I don’t think this is necessarily because Romney is Mormon, it’s simply because they maybe don’t like the guy.

Tuesday, 10 July 2012

So, I found a penny today. This brings my total haul to $13.70 for the year.

As you may recall (if you’re really, really pathetic), I found $13.68 total last year. I was hoping to beat last year’s haul by mid-year this year, but it turns out I was one week off: instead of making the goal on July 2nd, I made it yesterday. While out for a walk with my wife and daughter (son was at his granparents’ home), I found both a penny and a nickel. Combined, this brought my total up to $13.68, which tied last year’s total. About a half hour later, I found a penny on the floor at McDonald’s —

WAIT! You were at McDonald’s? You, James?

Yes, and I apologize. It is, however, the closest Red Box location, so it kind of made sense to stop there. With Owen away for the night, we figured we’d have time to watch a movie.

—and that meant I officially beat last year’s total.

So, this morning, I woke up with an extra $13.69 to my name. Then I found this here penny, so now I’m at $13.70. My goal now is to find $100 a day, everyday, for the rest of my life.

Wednesday, 11 July 2012

Today, in Toastmasters, a member gave a speech titled “Memoria,” probably because his topic was memoria.

Basically, this is a fancy term the Greeks gave to one of their rhetorical devices: memorizing your speech. Or, more correctly, delivering your speech without writing anything down.

The club member noted that it was Socrates who exhorted this method, claiming it gave your words more authority and afforded you – the speaker – more respect. Socrates, he noted, really walked the walk, since he didn’t write down anything. In fact, everything we know about Socrates is from the writings of his most famous pupil, Plato. It’s a bit ironic, the speacker noted, that our only knowledge of Socrates distast of writing things down comes from his student…who wrote those things down.

The speaker offered an example of a speech delivered largely in memoria style: Robert Kennedy’s words immediately following Dr. King’s assassination. Kennedy was on his way to deliver just another campaign speech (he was running for President), but was informed en route that King was shot. Moments before taking the platform, Kennedy was updated and told that King was dead.

The Toastmaster suggested watching this speech as a superb example of speech-giving from memory. Obama could take a lesson. So could I.

(To be fair, Kennedy does have notes, and he does use them. But I think it’s apparent he’s not relying on them at all.)

Finally, can you recall all the words to The Very Hungry Caterpillar? You don’t have to remember them in order, and entering any one word will give you each occurance of that word. I scored 105, which put me in the 97th percentile. See how you do.

Monday, 09 July 2012

In between preparing for and officiating at two weddings this past weekend, I managed to re-attain my goal of seeing every Oscar winner for Best Picture.

As I may have mentioned before, that’s been one of my life goals for over twenty years now. The goal started off small: I had a list hanging up in my bedroom of every Best Picture winner from 1927 to the present (the present, at that time, was the early 1990s). I had seen about 15 – 20% of them.

After getting married, my wife said she thought my goal was a great idea, and we made a concerted effort to fill in all the holes. By 1998, I believe, we had seen them all. In fact, that year, we even went to the theaters to see all the Best Picture nominees (this included three great films: Life is Beautiful, Saving Private Ryan, and Shakespeare in Love – the eventual winner), so our goal was in tact even before the Oscars were awarded the following year.

Every year since then, I’ve either gone to the theater or rented the winner as soon as possible. My wife is right – this is a fun goal. Not only did it expose us to some of the greatest films ever made, and some of the lousiest, but I like that I have to put forth a little bit of effort every year to maintain the goal. In that way it’s different than some other life goals I’ve had – such as the goal of performing a wedding ceremony. I’ve attained that goal (and others) and no matter what I do for the rest of my life…I can always say I’ve done it.

Anyway, it took three evenings, but we finally finished watching The Artist, which is the 2011 winner.

Some clever people online have pointed out that this is the first silent film to win since 1927 (the first year of the Oscars). Some people who think they’ve even more clever pointed out that this is not true, since The Artist is not truly a silent film. But this is poppycock. Claiming The Artist is not a silent film would be like claiming Schindler’s List is not a black-and-white film, or that Mary Poppins is not a live-action film.

But I digress.

Artistically (if you’ll excuse the pun), The Artist was a great film. The camera work was outstanding, reminding viewers of a time when cinematographers used the camera itself to help tell the story. And, without the medium or sound, the film deftly made use of shadows and light. Again, this is an art that I feel has been cast aside. Once the advent of sound arrived, I think only Chaplin and Hitchock (two directors who came to fame in the silent era) and Orson Welles managed to continue their work as art. Oh – and some foreign guys, too, but they were foreign, so it doesn’t count.

I also want to mention the actors’ expressions: their exaggerated gestures and flouishes were corny. To me, this was a wonderful homage to the silent era.

But…

The story wasn’t anything special. One part Sunset Boulevard, one part Singing in the Rain, one part Vertigo, and one part Citizen Kane. Don’t get me wrong, these are all first-rate films, but it means The Artist didn’t exactly bowl me over with originality in the screenplay department.

It was also a little long – especially for such a simple plot. Many silent films fall victim to this. In fact, some of my favorite silent films are in the under-30 minute catergory. The drawnout story explains why my wife and I twice fell asleep during the film, and had to restart it twice on subsequent nights.

All in all, a really good flick. B+. Definitely rent it.

If you are interested in seeing some silent films from the silent era, I suggest:

The General

Clocking in at about an hour and 10 minutes, this is how long a silent film should be. In my opinion, the most entertaining film you can watch without having to hear a thing. I recently re-watched this flick with my son – and if you have young kids at home, you should have them join you – and he liked it as much as I did.

Wings

Okay, so this one’s a little long (2+ hours). But it has a great story. Considering the time it was made (1927), there’s some amazing flight sequences, too. As a bonus, the film stars Clara Bow, who was pretty much the most popular silent film actress of her day. Wings was the first Best Picture winner.

The Kid

If you ask most critics what the best Charlie Chaplin film is, they usually say Modern Times or The Gold Rush. They’re wrong. this is his best feature film. It’s from 1921 and it co-stars Jackie Coogan (who would, decades later, gain fame as Uncle Fester from TV’s The Addam’s Family). In typical Chaplin fashion, it’s funny and poingiant. It’ll only take you 68 minutes to watch, too.

Safety Last

I’m sorry to say I didn’t get around to watching this film until earlier this year. But you should find time for it, too. It’s funny, fast-paced (relatively), and has a great ending.

Battleship Potemkin

This 1925 film is probably my second-favorite silent film. It’s Russian, but since it’s silent, you don’t have to be put off by subtitles or tough accents. There’s a lot of excellent camerwork here, and some iconic images that are duplicated in films to this day (best example: the “Odessa Steps” sequence was mirrored in The Untouchables). Unlike the above films, this one is probably a bit much for the kids – lots of violence and suffering and killing…just like Old Mother Russia used to be.

The Lodger

This hour-and-a-half flick was directed by Alfred Hitchcock. It’s the film that put him on the map. Well, the British map, at least. It was only the fourth film he directed, but it was the first one to really exemplify his style of unique cinematography, and his love of murder mystery suspense. This one tells the story of Jack the Ripper. Hitchock went on to make a dozen more silent films before shifting to sound, but this was his finest from that era.

Finally…

The Great Train Robbery

For those of you who can’t be bothered to spend an hour and a half watching a silent flick, check out this one – it’s only 11 minutes. From 1903, it’s often been billed as the first western movie, and the first American movie with a plot. It’s surprisingly fun and fast, despite it’s age (the cinematography’s a bit rickety and the editing can be jarring). Also, it’s available on YouTube, so you can watch it right now.

Thursday, 05 July 2012

I spent all my free time today finishing up preparations for two (yep, two) wedding ceremonies I will be performing this weekend.

It was tough to find free time – especially at work. I had a very busy day at work (see my last post) and, when I thought I’d have some free time during lunch, a co-worker invited me to dine with him. I could have said no, but I try not to be anti-social, despite its overwhelming appeal.

This evening, I tried to work on my services (sermons? presentations? talks?), but this is quite a tough feat with two children that demand everything from me, and then ask for a little more. I nevertheless managed to get everything together – with the exception of a couple points of clarification I need from one of the brides – and now I can get to sleep and just practice them like crazy tomorrow.

Friday, 06 July 2012

This evening I attended the rehearsal of wedding #1. The wedding is set to be outdoors. If the wedding was today, an outdoor wedding would be most uncomfortable. On my way to the rehearsal, the voice on MPR said it was 102 degrees (I presume he meant Fahrenheit, though he did not specify). “Ugh,” I said, thinking about how uncomfortable the rehearsal was going to be with my button/collared shirt and khakis on. But then the guy said relief was on the way – and he cited (I guess as evidence) that it’s only 68 degrees in Bemidji. He then said rains were coming and tomorrow’s temps would be 15 degrees cooler.

So…yeah…then rehearsal was outside, which, I suppose, makes sense, because why rehearse on-site if you’re not gonna be at the actual site. I was pleased to see that they decided to stick a piece of tape down on the ground where I would be standing. This is great news because I would walk up to the front before anyone else and if I stood in the wrong spot, then conceivably, so would everyone else. Otherwise, it was really hot out there.

When I got back in the car to drive home, I first turned the air on full blast. I took off my shirt, shoes, and socks. After driving about 4 miles, I noticed it was actually too cold in the car, so I turned the air down…and then I turned it off. Soon thereafter, it began raining. Getting out of my car when I got home, the air was noticeably cooler. It felt great.

Saturday, 07 July 2012

Today was wedding #1.

As I said earlier, it was definitely cooler outside, though still hot. In fact, early on in the ceremony, I commended the bride and groom on getting married on the first day all month that I even wanted to be outside. The only problem with the wedding (in my opinion, at least) was that I was facing the sun.

The sun was just sitting there, in the near-cloudless sky, just above my line of sight. I couldn’t wear sunglasses. I tried squinting as often as I could and a couple times during the ceremony I noticed I had one eye closed in an attempt to block out the sun. Then I realized I should probably forced my eyelids open. I also realized that no one else was experiencing the same problem – because they all had their back to the sun. Lucky them. Anyway, I managed to get through it without inducing either a bona fide bright-light or hypochondriac headache.

On the way home, I again removed my shoes and socks. Maybe this is getting to be a trend for me. I also blasted the album SMiLE and sang along with full gusto because, you know, my nerves had just abated by half.

Sunday, 08 July 2012

Today was wedding #2.

Did I mention they were both outside?

Today’s wedding was in the shade, so that was good.

Afterward, the mini-reception was held at Stephano’s Bistro in Burnsville, an establishment I henceforth whole-heartily endorse. Looking at their website, I see they opened their doors the same year I moved out of Burnsville (1990), so that may explain why I’ve never been there. Oh – another explanation might be that my family only frequented the finest in eateries…such as McDonald’s and Burger King and (if money way good) Pizza Hut.

All in all, I’m glad this two-fer weekend is over. Planning for two weddings – less than 24 hours apart – took a lot out of me. Earlier today, my mom-in-law asked how I manage to calm my nerves before doing something like this, and my nuanced, thoughtful answer was pretty much, “I don’t.”

Here’s a picture my sister took of me and my bride (taken shortly after today’s nuptials):