THIS is a Nixie tube clock.
I want one, badly.
Soon.....soon....

Real Aardvark Birthday Update

(Don't sing the song...I don't wanna pay royalties)

Had my wife and our children over for lunch.
Spinach rolls, pizza rolls, and fajita meat for the fromage-o-phobe.
Spinach rolls? Pizza dough, filled with steamed spinach with ricotta, mozzarella, and pepperoni.
Fold, seal, drop in Fry Daddy. It's like a calzone.

Birthday cake: Scratch golden cake (It's really white, but has whole eggs.) Fudge icing (scratch, natch) which was as smooth as tourist trap marble-slab fudge.
Breyers Natural vanilla ice cream.
The Dread Dormomoo cannot handle eating wheat, so she has experimented with oat and rice flours. She baked an oat flour cake with the rest of the regular ingredients, and so enjoyed cakey goodness with the rest. (I tasted a bit. She missed nothing! It is a GOOD recipe!)

Now to the goodies:

A dinner and movie out with my daughter!

DVD: The Adventures of Mark Twain (Will Vinton's Claymation tour de force) You can read the characters' lips. Available at willvinton.net or Wal-Mart. This has long been a family favorite, now on DVD! This is ME being happy!

The Chronicles of Narnia OST on CD. Faboo!

2 Luminarc martini glasses

7-piece cocktail set, with shaker and all.
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So my bid to become the Most Hated Christian Blogger continues. Martini...Christian...cocktail sets...Bible and prayer....Does Not.... Compu............BOOOOOOM!

It's called occasional self-medication. Like Prozac, but cheaper. Government intrusion has made the medical field outrageously expensive. This isn't. Besides, it's the only civilised way to consume olives.

Wait, I'm hearin' it...the whispers....
"He NEEDS it like medicine...you know what THAT means...! Of course we are only discussing this so we can PRAY for him..."

Thanks for the prayers. Can the rest.
The Scripture teaches against drunkenness.
Not occasional imbibing.
Got a problem, go to God with it. He wrote the Book.

Hey, it's my BIRTHDAY! I'm practising being CROCHETY!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME (Tomorrow!)

Can it get any better?
I have dodged the Reaper's Scythe for forty-nine years, now.
Where has it GONE? The years, I mean. I have no interest in the Scythe.
NONE.

I am a Christian. I believe in Eternal Life. I believe in heaven. Most importantly, I do not believe heaven is the Eternal Pew, with hymn sings on the hour. There is ample indication that the Believers of today, will be the fellow regents of the new heavens and the new earth after the Day of Judgment. We will have Meaningful Work in running the Redeemed Creation.

I'm just not ready to GO yet! I could get all spiritual and talk about all the Work to do...all the Teaching I could do by sticking around, what a powerful Example I could continue to be...you may all stop going LOL, now... but really, I'm just having too good a time NOW.
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Here is a Link of Sadness

Shucks, here is the text:

To: Time Warner

We the Undersigned do whole-heartedly disagree with the moral overtone, or lack thereof, of Cartoon Network's "The Grimm Adventures of Billy and Mandy."

The hints of paganism, the coining of a phrase from Aleister Crowley's "The Book of Law," which is steeped in satanism, is completely uncalled for in a cartoon which is marketed to children and young teenagers, as is "The Grimm Adventures of Billy and Mandy."

Therefore, by signing this petition, we speak as one voice to the management of Cartoon Network, Turner Entertainment, a division of Time Warner, Inc. that this show MUST be taken off the air immediately.

Sincerely,

The Undersigned

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Where to start...?

• PRAY FOR THE HEADS OF TIME WARNER! Don't write foolish petitions that waste your time and energy. You feel like you have Done Something Important.

But you haven't.

• Do your homework. From twenty years ago. The Billy and Mandy writers did not coin the phrase. They QUOTED it. And by writing this, You look Stupid. And since I am a Christian, you make ME look stupid, too!

Thanks.

• "...This show MUST be taken off the air immediately." Ummm, WHY? Because a quote in a cartoon show made grownups get upset and put together an online petition? The economy of the Western World trembles. Remember how quickly Captain Planet was yanked? Remember?
  

• "we speak as one voice to the management of Cartoon Network". How about speaking as one voice to the WORLD about the Kingdom of God, and The Love that Jesus showed in dying for us? Have you written invitations to a home Bible study, where the Gospel is taught, and how to Live it, rather than lookin' for the Beast, and wondering when the Rapture is gonna take us away from the heathen Turner execs? I'm betting that your time and energy could be better spent.

My time is running out. The little Nixie tube clock that times out my life has less time on it than it did before, so don't waste my time with inconsequentiae. What did Jesus teach, to preach the good news, or to write whiny little petitions about shows that will vanish in a couple of years anyway?

Besides, I have my own work cut out for me. I'm hunting down the covens of young people driven to witchcraft by their watching Scooby-Doo. Haven't found any yet, but I KNOW that they are out their. Kids ALWAYS do what they see on TV.

That's why I'm a starship captain!

Much has been written on art, and much has been written on the Christian faith. However, when the two collide, you don't generally get Reesey goodness. At least, not today.

An amusing cartoon: a car bumper on display on a pedestal, behind velvet ropes. On the bumper is a sticker that says "Honk if you love Jesus!". The caption reads "Christian Art, circa 1980".

Or not so amusing. "Christian Art" at the beginning of the Twenty-First Century tends toward the light-limned landscape- kind of a New-Agey Norman Rockwell thing, or the whole doves-and-crosses motif. It tends to be Art with a Purpose: Hello! Art to witness with, kind of a canvassey Jesus fish. Somewhat of a change from Michelangelo and Durer.

I recall Larry Norman getting in trouble with fellow evangelicals for deigning to insist that his art, his excellence in it, was witness to Christ and His excellence. Reformed brethren tend to sling accusations of heresy fairly freely (ask Walt Hibbert). That is the level of vituperation brought against Larry "I Wish We'd All Been Ready" Norman, if my Teflon memory serves.
He moved on from doves-and-crosses music to more subtle work, and some folks react poorly to change. (For my money, "Jesus Music" ended when The Second Chapter of Acts disbanded.)

I print t-shirts for my livelihood. We started the business back in our sojourn through Flandersville, and our intent was to provide believers with super-cool-and-groovy Witness Wear. Thing was, people were more interested in our printing caps for their businesses, shirts for their poker runs, youth groups, and conferences. We had to serve our customers, and our Lord, with the excellence of our work, whether it had a 3:16 on it or not. The formula has worked for fifteen years.

1 Corinthians 10:31, "Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God."

Colossians 3:17, "And whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him."

Works for me.

The Aardvark awards his seal of approval to Pretty Lady for her offering:

Read it!

There is wisdom here, people.

Piling on.

Ooh! I used a sports term!
I did not awaken to a Morales-free world today, and I am in a quandary. Biblically, I see no problem with capital punishment. (Hmmm...death by puns.) I do have trouble with our current corrupt State having the ability to put people to death. Worrisome. But the judicial piling-on against this execution was breathtaking. The Court insisting upon a medical person to administer the barbiturate OD was breathtakingly obvious. Unless you defrost Kevorkian, you are unlikely to find a doctor ethically able to push the plunger. There are apparently some vestiges of Hippocrates left. Maybe call a veterinarian.


AHA! Call in an abortionist! No medical scruples to worry over, plenty of experience in tissue destruction.

It's good to have skillz.

Here is another favorite photo of mine. I took it at the Bethea Reunion, Dillon SC, back in 1976.
This is Georgia Bethea, The lady who worked as housekeeper for my grandparents, and helped to raise my father and his brothers. She liked to be called "Mammy Georgia", and was, by generations of young'uns who loved her.

The serenity in her face has been sought by many for their lifetimes, yet never found.
Photo (c) 1976 W.B.Hardy

Talk radio.

Yuk.

I've mostly given it up. Really. But I catch bits and pieces. Here are some thoughts.

Ellis Henican- Stick with stupid cartoon voice work on AdultSwim. He listens to what the other person says, returns to his original point as if validated by the caller.

Michael Medved- I liked him once. He tends to make polemical straw men of his opponents' points, then interrogates them like the Army-McCarthy hearings. Unpleasant.

Sean Hannity- I live in the town where he got his radio start. Call it Bethlehem. He is the template Three Monkey Republican, and he offends me. How can you determine that one is a "Good American" by saying "Hello!" to them on the 'phone? He talks the party line, but I don't think he can think creatively.

Rush Limbaugh- Not. Fun. Anymore.

Mike Gallagher- Not. Too. Bright.

G.Gordon Liddy- Boy, I wish he was on here again. And I hope I look that good when I'm his age. He's smart, logical, Jesuit-trained- oooooh conspiracy!!

Vox Day has long posited the mommiefication of our culture, due to the "successes" of the feminist agenda. Two current egregious examples are

• The fuss over scenes in the Curious George books.

Yes, Robin Roth, a California high school teacher (who also runs an "animal rights" website) is mumphing over the monkey. She complains that Curious George teaches animal abuse (keeping critters in zoos) and poor parenting (The Man in the Yellow Hat is George's parent? I guess it takes a jungle).

• The banishment of dodgeball and now tag from schoolyards.

The widdle kiddies musn't get hurt, or "feel threatened" in public school. Ah, I guess they've figured out a way to banish bullies, too.

Because so many of the feministas are not, or cannot be mommies, they must anoint the entire culture with their oozing maternal instinct. Having made the Western world safe for abortion, they must now enwomb all of society, 'til we are all safe, warm, and sterile as they.

I was going to go on about suckling at the dry teat of feminism, but became too disgusted at the image to continue the thought.

Questions no-one responds to.

• WHY is an abortion a GOOD thing? I know that it is The Most Important Thing In The World, but why is it a good thing?

• How can anyone seeing this kind of insanity passing for governance in good conscience pay a dime to support it anymore?I did not say "out of fear". I said "good conscience".

"Lawmakers want to know why a federal panel allowed a state-owned United Arab Emirates shipping firm to pay $6.8 billion to acquire six major American ports -- including critical ones in New York, Baltimore and Philadelphia -- despite its home country's glaring ties to international terrorism. But the White House is yawning."

The hills are alive with the sound of crickets...

Ephemeral art.

All is vanity and striving after wind.
We strive for our fifteen minutes of fame, or fifteen hits a day, or fifteen hundred, on our blogs.
Yet all of our efforts are only for the day. Yesterday's entry is old news, old hat, and of little interest to the Gentle Readers. There are no conservatives in the Blog-o-Verse. The Old is never Good Enough.

So to keep you happy, and thus attain our small fame, and strokes for our fragile egos, we write.
Inconsequentia, ephemera, the odd non-sequitur. Anything that wanders across our field of vie...oooooh look, a KITTY!

Blogging is an odd sort of beast; not like a book or magazine. Even with archives, the old rarely does a lot. It all has to be now.
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The Dread Dormomoo was reflecting on men and women:

Women multitask well in everything but men.
Men don't multitask well in anything but women.

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Abbadee, abbadaa, that's all, folks!
At least it was new.

Deadeye Dick's True Crime.

People, not even Matt Drudge has this one.


I hear from reliable sources, to whom I have promised anonymity, that the REAL crime that VP Cheney committed is so heinous that The White House is covering it up at all costs.
I may not be here long after revealing this...may have to join Fred in Mexico.

It seems that before Dick Cheney brutally shot his friend Harry Whittington with birdshot in the heart...


Cheney made him wear panties on his head.

OK, I couldn't resist.
A second contest.
Best caption in my opinion. You win an Aardvark Tees shirt of your choice.
This is one of my favorite photos ever. The bright artifacts around the tree in the centre are actually in the photo, and probably make it Art Bell worthy.
(c) 1976 W. Hardy

The Aardvark used to be quite the shutterbug, even making something approximating a living at portraiture and product photography. Other things included album cover art and interior design shots. My love was candid work, as well as odd nature work, as you see here. (photo (c) W.Hardy 1976)

So, tell me what it is! The first person to guess correctly, shall win a shirt off of our website, linked to the right. Contest runs 'til 25 February, 2006.

I must admit, Pretty Lady inspired my putting up a photo.

I'll be sharing more 'varky artistic goodness betimes.

Ben Bernanke Slugged Me!


Many have rubbed shoulders with greatness.
I had to rub my own shoulder.

Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke was a friend of mine.
Well, we went to the same school.
Ok, I was in Jr. High, and he was a Junior.
But we WERE in the Dillon High School Band. He was a Sax, I was a lowly third trumpet. He was one of the whip-cracking overseers employed by Miss Helen Culp, the uber band directrix. He cracked with the best of them. He was...tolerant of me and my ilk, and regaled us with his repository of "Hopkins" stories -essentially travelling salesman yarns with an English butler instead of Willy Loman. He was HI-larious.

Ben's parents owned the JayBee Drug Store in Dillon, SC. Bought my first pipe there. Tons of sulphur and saltpetre for pyrotechnic experiments. Great store! They were The Jewish Family in town-there were more, but EVERYONE knew the Bernankes. Dillon also had a number of Lebanese families named Saleeby. "Saleeby's" was a notable men's shop in Dillon. I bought Paula A. a choker there, but that's another story...

We were at the marching camp in late summer, and Ben had been cracking wise, so I began to dither about his name...I couldn't remember it, quite.
Then I said "Ahhhh, Bernanke...I always confuse you with the Saleebys!".

He looked at me, grabbed me, and punched me in the arm. Hard.


Twice.


But it was worth it. I got 'im!

In keeping with the masthead of this effort, I would like to look at the the way things SHOULD be.

I have noted for longtimenow the coarsening of our culture, and especially church culture, Christian culture. People whom I KNOW were not brought up to do so, not taught to speak thusly, are seemingly caught in the grip of coprolalia.
It's not just the idle word bit of "damn" this, and "to Hell with" that. I mean the random and frequent dropping of F-bombs in everyday situations, not in extremis, as well as the expostulary questioning of one's parentage. But bad language is only a part (actually a small, prodromal part) of the malaise. Witness:

"(Betty) Friedan was a Marxist, a myth-maker and a moron. I'll urinate on her grave if I ever happen to stumble across it. She was one of the most ruinous public figures of the 20th century and it's truly a shame her mother wasn't an abortionette like the vast majority of her followers."

I shan't attribute this, but it does serve as another example of the ruinous trend that concerns me here. Suffice to say that it is from a Christian blogger. Now, I remember a time- and I am not yet fifty- when "gosh" was a worldly euphemism, and "darn" was worse...and NOBODY'D better hear you say "durn". That "u" is an exponential intensifier, I guess. And no-one would even consider speaking of the dead so. They could not defend themselves, and so such was bad form.

To wish abortion, even on an ardent foe, was imponderable. Personally, I have no trouble with "Friedan was a Marxist, a myth-maker and a moron". She was demonstrably these and more, but the rest is just nasty.

It is reported that Gary North, that Y2K worthy, said that when he heard of Friedan's shuffling off this mortal coil, he went out to dinner. This may be the unfortunate juxtaposition of two separate events, but the implication is celebratory.
This too seems nasty to me. I'm picturing Jesus dancing a jig, and shouting "w00t" upon hearing of Judas' hempy end.

When has abject nastiness become a hallmark of Christian discourse? Paul made a few improvident comments, and is not praised for them. I do not call for a Pollyanna
environment...the thought sickens me, and reminds me of certain fellowships wherein you did not have a church "potluck dinner". You had a "Pot Bless"...
The gospel is in no way a tapioca thing...it has teeth, the better for the hound of heaven to bite you with, my dear. But it does not look like the world. It proclaims that whilst we are in the world as Christians, we are not OF it. Is profanity trendy? Perhaps. Is having unpleasant attitudes and expressing them? Clearly. But when were we called to be the hip, with it bunch?

Oooooh, you're JUDGING......

Just checking the fruit, ma'am. and I also speak as one of the repentant afflicted, who is aware of the discontinuity between "ought" and "do".


I believe that it is time to put out a call...A call for Christians to be Christians first, and political animals second, lest the world look on, and being unable to see the purity of our hearts, find us indistinguishable from themselves.

A sort of braglet...sort of.

Is it bragging, when you acknowledge that it's not your fault?
Our little family business has been putting along since around 1990.
We print t-shirts. Shirts for little rural ball teams, shirts that are becoming nationally known,
shirts for anime fans, gamers, political shirts, snarky shirts.

Shirts for you.

We have chugging along, primarily doing custom t-shirt printing: school, church and business shirts.
We began selling generic Sci-Fi and fantasy shirts of our own design at conventions, as well as swapping dealer space for printing official con shirts. People liked our stuff. Above was an early favorite. Didn't matter if we were at a con, or at a craft show next to ladies who sold wooden cutouts of cows...people loved that shirt.

But SF con business remained fairly flat, and ultimately became moribund.
Meanwhile our personal interests moved East. Far East. we discovered Japanese animation, or anime. Then we learned of Anime conventions, so we followed our formula, developed general anime and Japanese culture designs, and offered our printing services to convention promoters.

Sonotori!

Enter the realm of exponents! Our business has grown amazingly, and for the main reason that the original Sci-Fi cons existed: the fans have no better place to go! The conventions serve as a kind of cultural church, an ecclesia of the odd. School acquaintances don't relate to the people who would rather watch Totoro, and dress like Witch Hunter Robin. The need to be with fellow fen drives the trend. That, and the fact that it is a convenient place to get stuff: DVDs, soundtracks, toys, models, costumery. Our shirt designs are in fact ours for the most part, and no-one else has 'em. Our shirts and staff are developing a fan following of their own.

And that's a real kick!


We are astoundingly thankful to our Father, and to our many customers and fans, who have enabled us to have a livelihood that we truly enjoy! Thank you! We'll keep doing cool stuff.

Of Toons and Men.

The current Muslim furor over editorial cartoons in the Danish press is a bell-wether of Things To Come. Lookit, the grumpy followers of Allah's Religion of Peace are living in an essentially freethinking society. Freethinking begets ridicule of things that don't track, that are not consistent.
They are strangers in a strange land, guests who are insisting on Their Own Way.
In short, the Muslims are insisting that the Danes follow Sharia law. Now, I realise this is NOT a shocking revelation to some, but to most, well, we need to think this through.

Muslims guesting in a Land Not Their Own are insisting that their hosts follow Muslim Law: No pictures of Mohammed. Threats and death are being leveled at the infidels, who by definition do not believe what the Muslims believe. Besides being impolite, and just bad form, the followers of the hirsute prophet are demanding that their hosts follow the Religion of Peace, at least in form.

If the Danes-or any other enlightened European country- knuckle under to this pseudo-religious thuggery, it will be a Sign of Apocalyptic proportions to the American Left, which of course they will not get. All of the years spent worrying, all of the forests levelled for paper to print editorials and other rants, all the polls and phone campaigns to strike fear of...fear of...

THE CHRISTIAN RIGHT taking over,

and making us all watch Superbook and Jerry Falwell, and making our women look just like televangelists' wives; all the effort will be wasted, as they spent their time fighting what could be the only real counter against the Islamic predation of American Freedom.

Yes, the Gospel, the essentials of which form the basis of Western Civilisation, and Western Thought (read Schaeffer's How Should We Then Live...or watch the video series), forms a bulwark AGAINST mindless kneejerk Following. Even IF the "Christians took over" which can't happen, the regime would be far more benign than the most mellow mullah's demands.

But who in his right mind would want such a thing? I guess that the left-of-centre will have to start practising:
"Allahu Akbar....."

When you repeat the Lie often enough, it becomes Truth.

"Ye shall be as gods."
"The Jews run everything, and it's all their fault."
"The Late Great Planet Earth"
"The 16th Amendment was duly ratified."
"It's Tax Time, and you need TaxPhraud software!"

Repetitive ummmm, repetitions cause me worry. The worry that I am Being Had;
That I am being Convinced of Something against my better judgment, like believing
"pasteurized process cheese food" is in fact food. Or that instant coffee is good to whatever drop. Or that it is coffee.


The endless ambient drumbeat of H&R this, and TaxAct that, and April 15th is coming soon just leaves me suspicious that I am being sold a very expensive tale, one that I am to accept without examination. We hold this Truth to be self-evident, that You Owe US.


I begin to question this...stridency.
The Founding patriots decried taxation without representation.
Fellow American, are YOU being represented?

We have raised four kids, the Dread Dormomoo and I, and that means that we have gone through a lot of Easter Egg hunts. One thing we noticed early on, having a Liberal Arts Education and all, is that little kids, two, three and four years of age, will see where another child finds an egg, and will then go to that precise spawn spot to find an egg, too! gasp! No egg. An older cousin finds another egg! Zip, zam, zowie and SWOOSH! Little 'un rushes over there, expecting an egg, again. Looking for a payoff where someone else got theirs.

Behold the Entertainment Industry. The Japanese animators have made a yen-machine of cartoons; the entire country is anime crazy. Police dramas. Police comedies. Giant robots. Martial arts sentai teams, Harem farces. Science fiction epics. Giant monsters. Vampires. Magical girls. Girls you'd think were magical. All with the whole big-eyes-small-mouth thing going on.

So now we have American studios producing fauxnime (r), these phony-baloney cartoons with the look, but not the substance. Dumbed-down anime. Much as I love the Warner Bros. animated Superhero mill...Teen Titans is just not there. Like-Totally Spies, fer shure.
Samurai Jack in all its PC-itude (hint: real anime would have had blood, not sparky, 'splodey
robots.) Just so you know the Aardvark is not a Japan-o-snob...Megas XLR ROCKS!

On the other hand...Winx. Does the planet REALLY need Eye-talian fauxnime?