Dr_Evil_Mouse

Agreed - High Fidelity nails it. His bit in Bob Roberts was well done, too.

Thanks for the link; I'll have to sit down and go through those passages, too. .

That's about the most agonisingly cute kitten I think I've ever seen.

CJ actually overheard somebody, at the end of one of our less-recognisable tunes, say, "I never clap if I don't know the song." So, good thing we knew the flavour of the place, and ran with this list: I. Psycho Killer (Talking Heads) Althea (GD) Cinnamon Girl (Neil Young) Old Love (Eric Clapton) Cold Rain and Snow (GD) Sunshine of Your Love Masterpiece (Dylan) Walk On (Neil Young) Chocolate Town (Ween) Rocket Man (Elton John) - Jon/DiscDaddy played a few tunes before set II, incl. Benny and the Jets (Elton J) and Piano Man (Billy Joel) (hopefully he can jog my sketched memory a bit for the others). The crowd went wild . II. Things We Said Today (Beatles) Midnight Special (CCR) Man of Peace (Dylan) She Belongs to Me (Dylan) Effigy (John Fogerty) Me and My Uncle (GD) > Mexicali Blues (GD) Cocaine (Clapton) Bloody Well Right (Supertramp) > Money for Nothing (Dire Straits) Ramble on Rose (GD) Ophelia (Band) Shakedown Street (GD) Running back to Saskatoon (Guess Who) And I'm pleased to report that Jimmy didn't pop any stitches (although we were in so tight in the little corner we had that he kept whacking his elbow on a window ledge and hitting that nerve that hurts so much).

Have a very happy birthday!

The first reference was one typically used by David Koresh to justify the Branch Davidians' stance towards the government. How he reconciled that with Romans, though, I have no idea. I've always seen those comments by Jesus intelligible within a pacifist framework as metaphor. Paul flattens all that out, though; if there was one book I wish had never been included in the canon, it would have been Romans. Paul should be an embarrassment to all self-respecting civil servants.

I still have to smile when one of my students complimented me by saying I was the "least boring" teacher she had.

You mean like this?

Conversely, you could also call, say, Gandhi an extremist, for the way he threw his religious convictions around. Is there not some better word than something as abstract and overdetermined as "religion" to get to what we're talking about? How about "conservative religion"? Or does that not quite hit the mark?

Yay Daveymouse on your first successful post! (It's only been what, almost two years? )

Survival of the fittest? Sounds like social Darwinism. For historical reasons, I don't think that's entirely supportable. It glosses over hundreds of years of experiments in government, both feudal and modern, as well as glossing over the variety of forms of government presently in existence in the different countries. Shi`a Islam, e.g., has as one of its hallmarks resistance against tyranny and usurped government. The ways in which it's acted against that, though, have covered the spectrum, from mystical resignation through flat-out mass violence. I think the situation is way too complex for us to guess what might happen if we pull out (although my first guess would be Syria and Iran jumping in to take the reins). It's all pretty fucked up, no doubt about that; with England having declared that they're going to start withdrawal in January, it's only going to get weirder.

Run with Camp Skank!! I'm so sorry this bullshit has happened to you, Marge - it's textbook-quality absurd. You should go on a weekend corporate-secret-sharing bender.

Good point on the tenor of this board, db (this from someone who's over-prone to seriousness and forgets that a lot). On forgiveness - I think one of the problems we have is that we tie it in with "forgetting" - viz., "to forgive and forget". I think one of our biggest problems is that we do forget a lot in jumping the gun to forget, and then get burned yet again (there are plenty of interesting theories of and studies on repression that have been done to show how memories of wounding by significant others, such as parents, can be suppressed in service of maintaining the relationship). I don't know if forgiveness is altogether possible unless both parties, the one who has been hurt and the one who did the hurting, each becomes genuinely wiser for what happened, and can reach of point of talking and thinking about it dispassionately - if they both become fully and equally human, knowing more about themselves and the other. I don't know if I'm expressing that quite right; I think it's about each giving up a claim to power over the other, with whatever that involves. As far as a Buddhist ethic is concerned, that seems to me to be pretty much on par; consciousness and compassion are equally concerned with being as fully aware as possible, and not sequestering away the unpleasant from awareness. We should never lose sight of anyone's suffering, including our own. Getting past it is something else. So, can we have a copy of the book ?

You're sounding like Richard Dawkins . No doubt there are sincere and devoted Sunnis and Shi`ites who are just as sick of all that's going on right now. The trouble is more, imo, to do with people who are fucked in the head and who express it through religious language and symbols.

Bonne fete!

I'm stealing this one from our friend Iliana: Knock knock. Who's there? Wasabi. Wasabi who? Wassa biatch like you doing in a place like this?

Yep, we're goin' to the country . Gauging by the practice last night, this is going to be a fun show. Come one, come all!

I like that one too .

As expected - Québécois as nation motion has no legal meaning: experts

And geomouse - we'll get on our drummer for that - he'd be game .

Yeah, that one's a keeper .

And it's sunny, and the stars have been shining bright for the last few nights! That makes me want to hug too . I should add, parenthetically, a blanket apology to anyone whose ribs I may have broken in the past few years of hugging. I'm just built that way.

Well, Tad Hackish is planning on bringing down the house in Manotick tomorrow night. It's a bit of a drive from Burlington, but....

Hurray for you folks, who rock .