Did you paint that red/blue/black avatar, Cranberry?
It’s good!
Best wishes,
Jerry
The syndrome is similar to that experienced in telephone conversations. An absence of body language will necessarily result in occasional misinterpretations of intent.
When we write we obey a set of punctuation rules which do not conform to the actual meaning of the sentence.
Therefore if I type: “Give me the ball”, the reader will interpret the sentence based on context, personal opinions of the writer and the readers own emotional state.
“GIVE me the ball.”
“Give ME the ball.”
“Give me THE ball.”
“Give me the BALL.”
Here are two conversations werein the sentence above is used and has a different meaning based on context.
#1
Jane: “Dick will you give me the ball?”
Dick hands Jane a hammer.
Jane: “Give me the ball Dick.”
#2
Jane: “Dick will you give me the ball?”
Dick gives the ball to Sally.
Jane: “Give me the ball Dick.”
I enjoy playing with these things in actual conversation.
FWIW, here’s the official web site of the organization in which Madonna is involved - http://www.kabbalah.com/k/index.php/
Here is the opinion of cult hound Rick Ross - http://www.rickross.com/reference/kabbalah/kabbalah27.html
Do a search with keywords Madonna Kabbalah and find out more than you ever wanted to know.
And now I’ll say farewell to this thread.
Hey I’m from the south and I know what Cabela’s is…
they sell all that huntin’ stuff and send out way too many catalogs.
I haven’t posted in a while and I’ve only skimmed this thread, but I sure identify a lot with the ‘what in the world is going on here’ sentiment expressed in Weekenders’ original posting. I see some of what is going on as a tension between freedom and judgement. I felt a lot of this after 9/11, when there was this undercurrent of anti-Britney Spears sentiment, a sentiment that I will admit I shared. My thinking was, and still is, sure, we have in this country the freedom to walk around–or allow our children to walk around–looking like whores or lap-dog rent-boys. But, do we have the intelligence and good judgment not to exercise that freedom? Our culture is based on displays of excess and inordinate and long-term unsustainable consumption to a shameful degree. Is this what we want to be known for?
Sure, if you have the means, in this country you are free to buy yourself a $100,000 Road Behemoth that guzzles petroleum like a fire on an Iraqi pipeline. (Why do do I think the two are connected?) But do you have the wisdom, the judgment, the discipline, the sense of connectedness with other folks, NOT to buy it?
The freedom that allows these excesses is priceless. The unbridled and tasteless exercise of that freedom is a cosmic disgrace.
I am not setting myself up as some sort of arbiter of good taste, though I think I can discern real trash when I smell it.
All of that having been said, there is nowhere else I would rather be.
Right now I am looking out of our apartment, across the East River, at the lower Manhattan skyline–a skyline in which there has been an ugly gap for just over two years. I was there that day, I was there today. If the Good Lord is willing, I will be there tomorrow, providing, en route to the office, directions to the many fine folks from the across this country and around the world who want to catch a glimpse of what is not there anymore.
I too am trying to catch a glimpse of something that is not there anymore, but I never go the one block from my office to Ground Zero to find it. I’m not sure what it is, but it has something to do with the wood burning stove in the kitchen of the house I grew up in. It has something to do with the bread my Grandmother baked. It has to do with a different way of being in the world. For sure, it is not going to be found on some make-believe survival set on Fox TV. Reality TV, my ass. Whatever it is, I think I sometimes come close to experiencing it when I am playing music. That’s the consolation. Plus, I get to share such disconnected thoughts with the unsuspecting C & F crowd if they are not smart enough to pass this one by.
Be well and thanks for the opportunity to get this out,
Tom D.
Amen, Tom.
Very well said.
Best wishes,
Jerry
There’re a lot of them. It feels like there is about one Southern Baptist in Oklahoma for every two people affiliated with another religious group.
I’ve never met a “neohippy,” by the way, though I’ve known many Southern NeoPagans. Rather or not that is the same thing is a question I don’t feel qualified to address without much more coffee in me than I’ve had a chance to drink yet.
Neohippy is no more the same thing as neo-pagan than old hippies were the same thing as old pagans. Though the two are not necessarily mutually exclusive. Much as a basketball player isn’t the same thing as a soccer player, though one could be both. An interest in sport may lead one to try out different things.
Cowtime wrote:
Hey I’m from the south and I know what Cabela’s is…
they sell all that huntin’ stuff and send out way too many catalogs.
Tom Dowling, you have ecapsulated what I usually just make curmudgeonly, inchoate gripes about (..or should that be “about which I make curmudgetc. etc.”? 
)
Self-entitlement born of “freedom” and fueled by ennui and credit…yeah, that’s the stuff a richer life is made of. :roll: