WOUNDED BIRD

Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Bacon Sandwich Cures Hangover

From the Telegraph.

A bacon sandwich really does cure a hangover - by boosting the level of amines which clear the head, scientists have found.

Researchers claim food also speeds up the metabolism helping the body get rid of the booze more quickly.

Elin Roberts, of Newcastle University's Centre for Life said: "Food doesn't soak up the alcohol but it does increase your metabolism helping you deal with the after-effects of over indulgence. So food will often help you feel better.

When you wake up the morning after an overdose of the drink, wishing you had died in the night, have someone who still cares about you prepare you a bacon sandwich, or, failing that, get your arse out of bed, or off the floor, or wherever you wake up and fix yourself a bacon sandwich. The scientist says so.

Thanks to Lapin.

Monday, April 6, 2009

Holy Week & Easter At Wenchoster

From the Pharisaios Journal:

Mark, Chapter 16 (The Codex Codpiecium. Translated from the Latin.)
And lo! The day after the Sabbath, Mary Magdalene, (1) and yet another Mary, and Salome (no, not that one) (2) brought a selection of balms, and came they unto the garden. And it was exceeding dark, and slippery. And behold, they sat on an rock and waited for the sun to rise. And at the appointed hour it verily did. And it came to pass that, squinting, came they unto the tomb. Now they were sorely troubled, for they knew of the stone which had been placed diligently at the entrance to the tomb, for it was a whopper and exceeding heavy, with rough edges. And lo! They looked, and behold the stone was rolled back. And it was so. Then entered they into the tomb and saw a youth, fair of face and limbs, dressed in white. And he was amazing (3). And he did wink, and saith he unto them, “You’ve just missed Him. He is not here. He arose early and said something about getting unto Galilee before you.” And lo! The women ran out quivering deeply, and said nothing, for they were sore afraid. Verily.
Footnotes:
(1) Yes, that one.
(2) Early manuscripts omit this comment.
(3) Here the text is unclear and rather shaky.

A little different, but I like it. Verily.
An excerpt from "Word From Wormingdale" by Canon Daphne Pullover. At one of the Compline services, the canon read from the diary of the Rev. Truegood, who served at Wormingdale in the 19th century.

CANON PULLOVER MUSES ON THE FLEETING NATURE OF HOLY WEEK
On Good Friday, Truegood went to the church and discovered what Mrs Greyflood had done to the font: “The wooden cover was removed, and in the ancient stone bowl was placed a china chamber full of flowers in water, the whole surrounded by flowers all wild, primroses, violets, wood anemones, wood sorrel, periwinkles, oxlips and brilliant yellow daffodils, all laid upon ferns, with larch sprays drooping over the brim. Around the base were laid bands of ivy and moss.” Truegood was so enraged by this desecration of the holy basin that he scooped up all the flowers and flung them out of the church door, from whence Mrs Greyflood ran screaming to her husband, a former prize-fighter and champion of the Wenchoster Fights of 1817. It was only the presence of the churchwardens that prevented a bloodbath of epic proportions when the angry husband arrived to deal with “that blasted vicar!”

Read the rest of Canon Pullover's musings at Word from Wormingdale. Click and scroll down.
And last, but not least, a word from Bishop Codpecium himself.

Hello! You know, Easter for me is a tame of anticipat-i-on after what hes been a lawng Lint. Es we awl troop through Holy Week we cen feel secure in the knowledge thet there are certain things to which we cen look forward. After the gloom end desperat-i-on of Good Frayday the late of the Paschal Ceremonies brings much joy. Plunging the incense grains deep into the cendle awlways gives me a Passover thrill. Cerrying the cendle aloft dine the nave end singing “The Late of Christ,” the hot wex dripping over may fingers; soaring tribles in the Exultet; the flush of the asperges end the scent of finest grains in the thurible. Awl these are things of the senses end cen be expected over the feast. Then there are the more earthy celebrat-i-ons: Large gins in the study after Hay Marss, luncheon with the Dean (who awlways produces a fane chocolate pudding garnished with candy balls end chocolate chicks) end getting on one’s hends end knees with the cwar boys to hunt for Easter eggs in the thickets behained the Pelace. Ah, Paschal bliss indeed! May we awl come to shar in the Resurrect-i-on this Easter, end lake Mary be amazed in the garden!
Bliss you awl!
+ Roderick Codpiecium

Explore the entire website of The Diocese of Wenchoster.
Bliss you awl at Wenchoster and everywhere!

From Doxy - Please Pray....

As I type this, David’s brother-in-law, Jim, is in emergency surgery. He apparently began experiencing paralysis today as a result of bleeding in his brain and was admitted to Neuro ICU in Charlottesville, VA, where the family lives. From the information we have gotten, the surgery is strictly to try and buy some time by stopping the bleed and releasing some pressure---the brain tumor itself is too deep to be removed.

I will be so bold as to ask your prayers for Jim, Ruthie, and the boys—and for the medical team. Apparently Jim was lucid and verbal before surgery and he had a chance to talk with both boys. My heart is breaking for all of them.

Love,

Doxy

UPDATE: 1 a.m. report:

Judi (one of David’s three sisters) reports that Jim is awake from surgery, and Ruthie is with him. He is mentally alert and responding. We won't know more until tomorrow but are thankful for this.

And this came in while I was typing this note:

(From Judi) I just saw Jim. He's not yet fully awake and still has a tube in so he can't talk - but he squeezed my hand very firmly many times. The CT scan showed that they did what they thought they could do with the surgery. Ruthie is anxious for them to take tube out to see if he can talk. That will probably happen late morning.

Thank you for your prayers! I am mindful today that every moment we have with those we love is a gift.

Love,

Doxy

Sunday, April 5, 2009

In The Bloomin' Garden

Yersterday was a beautiful, cool spring day. The sun shone with only a few wispy clouds in the sky. We tend to jump from winter to summer here, with little that we can call spring weather, but we had spring yesterday. Our garden is not near its high point with blooming flowers, but I found a few flowering plants which are pleasing to the eye.

Mock Orange

There's another name for this bush, but I can't think of it now.

Petunias

More Petunias

Plumbago

~~Impatiens~~ Vincas

Thanks to Lisa for the correction.

Red Tip Photinia

I'm not sure about the name for this bush. The leaves at the top are a reddish color. We have four of them planted in front of the house, but only one has blooms of any consequence. Online I find only a redtop grass.

UPDATE: I corrected the name of the bush in the bottom photo. Thanks to Pat-Arkansas for the proper name.

St. Luke's Lutheran Church

Stained glass window at St. Luke's

Doorman-Priest serves at St. Luke's as a Candidate Pastor and Lay Minister. On my first Sunday in England, I attended DP's church. It was my first time to attend a Lutheran service. That's hard even for me to believe, but it's true. That Sunday was a Communion Sunday, and the service seemed somewhat like a cross between an Anglican service and a Roman Catholic service, but similar to both. I felt quite at home. The congregation is diverse. You can see by the schedule of services just how diverse. Along with members from European countries, there were those from African countries and perhaps the Caribbean.

In Estonian Contact: *****
In German Second sunday at 4:00pm
Contact: *****
In Latvian Contact: *****
In Polish First sunday at 9:30am
Contact: *****
For Lutheran Students Contact: *****

The church is quite near my hotel, but I managed to get lost, as seems to happen much too often, and I took the long way there.

Our man Doorman-Priest in his alb

DP preached that Sunday, and a lovely sermon it was. You can find it at his blog, The World of Doorman-Priest. I thought it was so good that I wanted to applaud, but I didn't, being a visitor and all. I expect that he'll make a wonderful priest.

That Sunday was Mothering Sunday, and members of the congregation were invited to go forward and take a flower, name their mothers, speak a descriptive phrase about them, and place the flower in the vases near the altar.

After taking Communion, the communicants remain standing in place as the priest (well, a bishop that day) prays a blessing before they return to their places. It's a lovely moment in the liturgy.

Window near the entrance at St. Luke's

The church is next door to the bishop's house, and was once the stables to the house, but a lovely job of renovation made it into a small, but quite pleasant church building.

Forgive me, but I'm rather proud of my pictures posted here.

After church, DP drove me to his house, where I met the whole family, Mrs DP and their two lovely daughters, and we dined on Mrs DP's delicious lunch. After lunch we chatted and later watched "Lavender Ladies" with the marvelous actors, Maggie Smith and Judi Dench. I'd seen the movie before, and they had, too, but we all love it, and it was a joy to watch it again.

Sunday was the worst day of my English cold, and I was sneezing and sniffling all afternoon. Mrs DP gave me my very own large box of tissues with a healing component embedded in them to use there and take back to the hotel with me. I needed them badly.

The dears knew I needed a quiet day. God bless them.

Saturday, April 4, 2009

Haley's Hotel - Leeds, UK

My arrangement titled "Still Life With Flowers Card And Apple". Is it art?

As I walked into my home away from home, I was greeted with flowers and a card which had been left by Mrs Doorman-Priest. Unfortunately, I missed meeting her then, because I was out buying my cell phone, or mobile phone, as they say "over there". The card read:

"Welcome to Leeds, June!

We are all looking forward to meeting you."

What a lovely gesture of welcome!

The two pictures below show my room at Haley's. DP must have spoken up for me to get this bright and spacious room. I had what amounted to a bed-sitting room, and I did not feel cramped into a small hotel room. Since I was there for an extended stay, it was good to walk into a room like this when I returned to the hotel dead tired in the evening. The curtains were closed when I took the picture, so you don't get the full effect of how bright and cheerful the room actually was.

The bathroom was lovely, too, equipped with one of those wonderful deep English bathtubs, which - alas! - I could not use. If I had got in and sat down, I would not have been able to get up due to my ruined knees.

Below is a picture of the gift bag from the staff of the hotel, which included Thornton chocolates and good strong Yorkshire tea. We're already into the second layer of the chocolates, and they are delicious, and I've been drinking the tea every morning with great enjoyment. I've never had anything more than a chocolate on the pillow at night from hotel staff. I was overwhelmed!

The staff was unfailingly kind and helpful, especially during the lost wallet episode. They could not have been nicer. Their card read:

"June,

We hope you have enjoyed your stay here at Haley's.

With love from

All the team

XXXX"

Can you believe this? It's hard for me to believe that it wasn't all a dream, but I have the evidence. I had to take the tea out of the box and put it into a plastic bag, because I couldn't fit the box into my suitcase.

I believe the folks "over there" love me more than the folks here at home. Of course, they only had to put up with me for a few days. Those here have to live with me, which is a whole other thing.

"No Them Only Us"

The artwork pictured above, a double-sided print by Mark Titchner, is from the exhibit described below at the Leeds Art Gallery.

Rank: Picturing The Social Order 1615-2009

This fascinating and unusual exhibition, which looks at how artists have pictured the shape of society from Renaissance times to the present, opens its UK tour at Leeds Art Gallery. A society without stratification is barely imaginable, but how do we picture our own system of hierarchies, of difference? British writers, political theorists and artists have used numerous images to picture ‘who we are’: describing us through ‘orders’, ‘estates’, ‘classes’, ‘stations’, ‘degrees’, or ‘ranks’. But only this latter term has kept the same meaning over six centuries. With over 100 exhibits, new work from leading contemporary artists and the presentation of new social research from academics and government agencies.

The words on the painting were suggested by Bill Clinton's acceptance speech at the 1992 Democratic Convention.

And so we must say to every American: Look beyond the stereotypes that blind us. We need each other - all of us - we need each other. We don’t have a person to waste, and yet for too long politicians have told the most of us that are doing all right that what’s really wrong with America is the rest of us - them.

Them, the minorities. Them, the liberals. Them, the poor. Them, the homeless. Them, the people with disabilities. Them, the gays.

We’ve gotten to where we’ve nearly them'ed ourselves to death. Them, and them, and them.

But, this is America. There is no them. There is only us.

One nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Well, we're not there yet, are we?

I was intrigued by the sculpture/painting the moment I read the words. It is a large block with all sides painted, taller and wider than it is thick, like a domino. At first, I thought the words were quite satisfying - if only the world was like that - but, as I thought about them more, I realized that more than one meaning was applicable.

What does it say to you?

The poster below, titled "Pyramid of Capitalist System", was included in the exhibit, also. It is dated 1911, and was published by the Industrial Worker then out of Spokane, Washington, which describes itself as the "Foremost Exponent of Revolutionary Industrial Unionism".

To read the words, click on the picture to enlarge. See what the caption for the church says. Sadly, it's too often true. The whole pyramid looks just about right for today.

A blogger in the UK, Good As Dead doesn't like the exhibit at all.

There is a faint smell of some thing gone off wafting through the cherished halls of the Leeds City Art Gallery. It is the careers of the curators of the latest installment in the continuously disappointing gallery programme. Not that this Blog wishes to make any enemies within the Leeds arts intellgensia (who us?!), but the current show Rank: Picturing The Social Order 1615-2009 is so SHOCKINGLY BAD that the curators should soon be meeting their P45s in a dark Leeds alley.

Whew! The writer should tell us what he/she really thinks.

Another blogger from San Francisco, r+d, panned the show, too, but with less vitriol, saying that it was not an art show, but an educational exhibit, and that there was good art in the mix, but the art was overwhelmed by charts and graphs and educational tools.

A blow-up of the frontispiece of Thomas Hobbes book, Leviathan, was part of the exhibit.

My thought? Ah, what do I know? However, I engaged with the show on quite a high level. It's possible that the educational material overwhelmed the art, but, on the whole, I felt both pleasure and excitement as I walked through the exhibit the first time and again with Erika and Susan on the day of our gathering for lunch at the Tiled Hall Café in the Leeds Art Gallery.

As to "Rank", the subject of the exhibit, "Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose".

Friday, April 3, 2009

Bad Notre Dame!

From the Times-Picayune:

New Orleans Archbishop Alfred Hughes on Thursday joined a growing chorus of Catholic bishops deploring the University of Notre Dame's decision to award President Barack Obama an honorary degree at graduation exercises next month.
....

"He feels as though this is not just an issue for Notre Dame. This is an issue on which Catholics everywhere are expressing disappointment. It clearly goes against Catholic policy against honoring pro-choice politicians. He's just making the point that Catholics should be standing up for life everywhere," Comiskey said.

Archbishop Hughes, you who learned how to be a bishop under the infamous Cardinal Bernard Law in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Boston, who is now hiding in his basilica in Rome to escape possible prosecution for covering up child abuse by priests under his authority, you who had to travel to Boston to testify concerning the abuse that took place while you were a bishop there, what moral authority do you posses to chide the leadership at Notre Dame for conferring an honorary degree on President Obama?

Your spokesman said that you stand up for life everywhere. What about the Roman Catholic Church's policy to forbid the use of condoms by members of the flock to protect themselves and others from serious STDs like HIV? How is that standing up for life? It's no less than a policy to insure sickness and death. In Africa, where AIDS is rampant, where your church denies married couples in which one party is HIV positive, the right to use condoms to protect the other party, how do you twist this counsel to represent standing up for life, when, as a result, many will sicken and die because of it?

I'm sorry, Archbishop Hughes, but the moral ground crumbles beneath you. Why in heaven's name would anyone look to you and your brother bishops in the RCC for moral guidance? Spare me the hypocrisy of your criticism of the leadership at Notre Dame University. Physician, heal thyself.

On campus, however, where the invitation increasingly dominates other issues, more than 600 letters to the independent student newspaper, "The Observer," are about evenly split for and against the invitation, editor Jenn Metz said.

She noted a sharp difference in sentiment between alumni, 70 percent of whom oppose the invitation, and students, 73 percent of whom favor it.

It seems that Notre Dame students are getting smarter.

UPDATE: At OCICBW, MadPriest published an exchange between Paul Pease, AKA TheraP, and Fr. Michael F. Patella, O.S.B., S.S.D., an associate professor of New Testament at the School of Theology Seminary and the College of Saint Benedict/Saint John’s University in Collegeville, Minnesota, who writes the “Seers’ Corner” for The Bible Today, published by Liturgical Press.

Paul writes:

Now to the query: If someone is convinced that using a condom will prevent the infection of his partner, that is his intention and the fact that his partner (wife, we suppose) will not get pregnant is a secondary effect.

It seems to me that the Principle of a Double Effect, which we covered thoroughly in Moral Theology, would allow condom use when the first (intended) effect is prophylaxis, while the second and unintended effect is non-conception.

If this reasoning still represents the teaching of the Magisterium, please let me know; if not, please tell me what has replaced the thinking behind legitimately removing an ectopic fetus from a place where it will endanger the life of the mother.

Fr. Patella answered:

Dear Mr. Pease,

The principle of double-effect is still very much part of Catholic moral theology and is still held by the Magisterium, and the cases you give here are perfect examples of it. I hope this information is helpful.

(Emphasis mine)

My question: Why haven't the pope and the majority of RC cardinals and bishops thought the question through in a rational manner and come up with the same logical and compassionate answer as Paul and Fr. Patella?

Which Reminds Me...

Saintly Ramblings' comment to the post below, which, by the way, goes on my top ten list of cleverest and funniest comments, reminded me of a story that Grandpère told me. He was at my son's house and saw on the counter an offer for a Victoria's Secret credit card. He looked at it and said, "What's this?" My 13-year-old granddaughter told him, and as he continued to gaze at the scantily-clad model pictured on the offer, she said, "Grandpère, you're old enough to be her grandfather!"

Quick deflation.