Epigramata

Does thinking that naming newly-discovered features on Pluto after pop-culture SF TV and movie stuff is lame make me a bad person?
We can't have run out of astronomers and physicists already.
----------------------

Zimbabwe's response to international badfeels by restricting hunting will have a typical result. Many safaris give the hide and meat to local tribes. This form of sustenance will now be limited, or cease all together.
Betcha the BBC won't whinge about THAT!
----------------------

JUST realised why Joel Osteen and his pastorette wife seemed so familiar.
Twenty years ago they would have been Amway Diamonds, exhorting the faithful at "Network Marketing" functions.
---------------------
"Cannon" is a projectile weapon.
It is also a fat detective.
"Canon" is The Proper, Accurate, Official Story-line.

Learn it.
Live it.
You don't have to love it. Just do it right.
---------------------

The experiment may be done this season. 14 tomato hornworms devastated the hydroponic tomato plants. Few leaves remain, and most of the tomatoes are well-gnawed.
However, I HAVE found NHK World online.
---------------------

If a picture is mounted on a hook on the wall, then it has been hung.
If a person has been suspended with a rope by the neck until dead, dead, dead, then he has been hanged.
---------------------

Everyone loves evolution, until THEIR favorite critter starts to go extinct.
--------------------
If you wish to add tartness to a comment or post, remember:
"Hell" is not spelled "He'll".
--------------------
 Just picked some ENORMOUS herb leaves from our garden. Composting must have given them a huge basil metabolism.
--------------------

I have the Blu-ray of Gerry Anderson's "Journey to the Far Side of the Sun". Started watching it Friday night.
It's the first time I have "gotten" Blu-ray. It's like a different movie.
--------------------
Does being utterly bored with All Things "Star Trek" make me a bad person? See also "Doctor Who".
--------------------

Ricky Gervais has a picture of a woman who allegedly shot a giraffe in Africa on a hunt.
One of the animal lovers commenting said "Yeah let's hunt her down instead.".
All the cognitive dissonance we have come to expect....
--------------------
Our homeschooling days....



---------------------
What do you think? (This is NOT an anti-Catholic screed. It is a glimpse at the damage of overexposure.)
I believe that television has effectively wrecked the Papacy as a force for good.
Back before the Pope had wall-to wall TV coverage (say, the early '60s and before) he remained a mysterious moral figure Over There, one who rarely spoke, but when he did, it was with authority and intelligence, and it affected the whole of Christendom, whether one subscribed to his church and preachments or not. His authority was moral, not based upon consensus nor polls. Now, though, we have the Cable Pope, the CNN/FOXNews/MSNBC Pope, the news cycle Pope, who must fill the ears of the Faithful (and the not-faithful) with politically-charged pronouncements. It's like Christmas every day. It is tiresome. It dilutes his effectiveness, this foaming cataract of sound-bites.

Constant commentary wearies a soul, and the current Pope, the Eco-Pope, the Relevant Pope, comments overmuch, because the news-critters hang upon and report his every utterance.
We need the occasional glittering moral gem, not an endless string of dollar store beads.
----------------------


----------------------
TRIGGER WARNING: Spiritual content. May induce swelling and hives.
This may be borrowed at will. (This is not related to the "angry 'Vark" post.)
----------------------
Theology, the Queen of the Sciences, is HARD. Understanding that reading Scripture follows the same rules of grammar and logic as reading Tolstoy or Tom Swift is HARD. Grammar and sense do not become magically squishy Because Religion.

If you are going to play in the Theology Sandbox, you may wish to understand the rules of your own game. The pronouncement "You don't go to church, so you're goin' ta Hell." may be satisfying to your religious pride, but remember how Jesus dealt with similar attitudes in the puffed-up Pharisees of his day. Also, realise that your "sola fides" belief is completely wiped away by that statement, because you have made the avoidance of hell dependent upon a work, "going to church". That is a heretical doctrine, and could put you in peril of the same destination, as might your pride-filled counsel.
This is why systematic theology is important.
---------------------

For anyone wishing to bother to check, there IS a difference between the Old Testament and the New Testament (hence the "old" and "new"). A cursory glance would reveal that Old Testament law strictures are no longer binding upon followers of Christ, especially Gentiles (non-Jews). (Acts 15:1-31).
But if you want to continue to call Christians hypocrites for not stoning divorced persons, or for wearing poly-cotton, in the depths of your ignorance, you go right on ahead. Continue to appear as intelligent and informed as you are.
---------------------

At last I have been provided as good an epitaph as any I could wish, all things being equal.
"He made preachers laugh out loud."
---------------------

Tiki becoming more mainstream does not fill me with joy.

--------------------

Just remember.
In Washington-speak, a "cut" is usually just reducing the size of an increase. Calling it a "cut" just gets more arm-flails.
--------------------

Happy Sunday, Kiddies!