Monday, June 13, 2005



He opened the jar of pickles when no one else could. He was the only one in the house who wasn't afraid to into the basement by himself. He cut himself shaving, but no one kissed it or got excited about it. It was understood when it rained, he got the car and brought it around to the door. When anyone was sick, he went out to get the prescription filled. He took lots of pictures ... but he was never in them.
-Erma Bombeck, Family - The Ties That Bind... And Gag

More than 150 large temples, built between 4800BC and 4600BC, have been unearthed predating the pyramids in Egypt by about 2000 years. Archaeologists are now beginning to suspect that hundreds of these very early monumental religious centres, each up to 150 metres across, were constructed across a 400-mile swath of land in what is now Austria, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, and eastern Germany Every End is a Beginning: Laugh and stormy lines of Bohemian Slavs

Dozens of webdiary posts dot the net. Most lead somewhere on a daily basis but nowhere in the longer term. Then somewhere is often a political punch line. This one by Jack leads to existential moments as every end is a beginning ... No more satisfying deathbed utterance can be imagined for Thoreau than the reply to a question put gently to him by Parker Pillsbury a few days before his death. Pillsbury was an old abolitionist war-horse, a former minister who had left his church over the slavery issue, a man of principle and proven courage who...could not resist the impulse to peer into the future. You seem so near the brink of the dark river, Pillsbury said, that I almost wonder how the opposite shore may appear to you. Thoreau's answer summed up his life,One world at a time, he said. Do the lifestyle choices required to become an achiever in 2005 AD - a winner, a leader of society and a role model for younger men - mean that 'good fatherhood' takes second place on the Alpha Male list of things to do? Fatherhood and the Alpha male

Art of Living & Literature Across Frontiers: One world at a time: Searching for Life's Signposts
The color of my hair dates me, as does the music I recall at existential moments in my own life. For those who follow the timeless One, time is meant to be a gift and an opportunity.

As the years progress, the pattern of the Catholic Liturgical Calendar has become so much more meaningful to me. Like everything about the Catholic Christian life, it is a deep mystery and gift that is to be unpacked, over time. I hope to share some reflections in this article that have come from my own participation in the liturgical cycle and my own aging. Human beings have always marked time by significant events. The real question is not whether we will mark time, but how we will do so. What events and what messages are we proclaiming in the process of our calendaring of time?


For the Christian, time is not meant to be a tyrant, somehow ruling over us. Rather, it is to be a teacher, instructing us and presenting us with opportunity. Rather than an enemy, it is a friend
• I'll be done learning when I'm dead Time: Tyrant or Teacher [World Square - which has World Tower at its heart - covered four city blocks alone. It had as many people working and living in its vicinity as Grafton on the NSW North Coast, while an estimated 35,000 workers and 16,800 residents use it SYdney BElow PArk; Got a £20m question you can't solve? Try child's play Second-guess an opponent ; When Robert Chalmers's novel failed to leap off the shelves, he resorted to giving it away in the streets. Or, at least, trying to... Rhodri Marsden joined him The Great Book Giveaway (Will You Read It Then?) ]
• · How to Recognize The Future When It Lands On You Television reloaded ; Every booklover should know about La Vie en Rose - a company they creates and sells book gift baskets: A Tisket, A Tasket, A Book In A Basket ; Who Counts In Chicago Publishing? Who really books in Chicago
• · · The distrust of appearances and official versions was further enhanced by the Watergate scandal in 1973-4 The Economics of Conspiracy Theories ; To be what the philosopher, David Hume, called a "mitigated", or moderate, sceptic is, in addition, deeply frustrating
To be a sceptic is a difficult and dangerous business

• · · · 'Missing link' between madness and genius Genius cannot exist without mental disorder ; Psychiatrist John Gartner embarked on a search for what makes Americans different and found his own manic tendencies at the core of the national character. Crazy Success ; A look at how the great and the good can be comprehensively wrong An Intelligent Person's Guide to Ethic
• · · · · A lesson with the art master What Good Are the Arts? ; We don't believe in horoscopes - so why do we read them? What if a story could change your life?
• · · · · · With my intimate friends after midnight, sometimes, we sang those songs, because it was our childhood. If we didn't become complete idiots, it's a miracleUmberto Eco: Miracles in Milan Alvin Toffler introduced the concept of future shock in the early eighties and it hasn't got much better Film: A Good Woman