Robert's Blog

December 22, 2004

santa baby

this is the 20′ tall santa that is on top of the benny’s car wash on coursey boulevard. i thought it was funny looking so i snapped a picture of it.

i’ve recently decided that i’m going to try and learn at least a little something about digital photography. i figure the best way to do that is to read as much as i can and have a photo project each week that forces me to takes pictures. photo friday puts a theme on their website each week and then takes submissions of photos interpreting that theme. it’s not really a competition. it’s more like a group of people working on things together by putting up their pictures and making comments on each other. i don’t ever expect to be a decent photographer but i figure working on this could at least help me improve a little. if nothing else, t will help me to take at least one picture each week.

if any of you guys & girls know of a good online tutorial for digital photography i would appreciate the url. thanks.

December 21, 2004

CHRISTmas truce

Last survivor of ‘Christmas truce’ tells of his sorrow – guardian article

i had heard about this story before, of an unauthorized cease fire that took place around CHRISTmas day 1914, but i never really believed it was true. apparently it is a true story and this article details some of the memories of the last survivor of that day. the stories say that the two opposing sides just stopped shooting and began celebrating the only thing they could celebrate in the middle of that war ravaged land. they exchanged gifts, the sang songs, they even supposedly played football (soccer) in “no man’s land.”

it’s a really cool story. yet the sad thing is that the unofficial truce eventually ended and the people who were moments before celebrating “GOD with us” began shooting each other and destroying the image of their MAKER later during the same day. if only we could follow the PRINCE of PEACE all the time in such away that everyday would be a CHRISTmas truce.

December 21, 2004

state religion

the picture to the side is from my youngest’ school second grade musical. the picture is from the song they sang named “yankee doodle santa”. it’s basically a combination of the song yankee doodle dandy and basic modern commercial santa claus mythology. santa at least started out as a spiritual icon. he was a hero of the faith until his basic history was stolen for commercialistic gain. so santa is not completely a spiritual icon anymore, yet “yankee doodle santa” is still basically a combination of a religious and national image.

this is just a children’s musical yet this one song does convey a tendency within american CHRISTianity that i hate and that is the deification of all things patriotic and american. just consider the painting that is within the rotunda of the capitol building in washington. it’s called the apotheosis of washington and apotheosis means “deification”. at the center of our government is a mural depicting our first president becoming “divine”. this actually sounds very similar to the imperial cult of rome or the deification of egyptian pharaohs. both of these practices happened to get people to worship the state. the nation in and of itself became the focus of the people’s religion. if the people worshipped the state then they would support it.

modern american CHRISTianity has a tendency to fall right into this. often we like to think that agreeing with the state is the sign of a good CHRISTian. this is called “state religion” or nationalism by some. i just call it wrong. so we smile when our kids sing songs like “yankee doodle santa.” we also turn our churches into huge patriotic parties during the fourth of july and our conservative churches barely ever cry ‘foul” over what our nation does.

the santa, or saint nick, who has been turned into an image of commercialism and now nationalism was originally a follower of CHRIST who because of his love for JESUS gave out gifts to people in need. the original nicholas was an example for us to follow. “yankee doodle santa” is just a joke to be laughed at because he has no real hope.

December 21, 2004

42

i took the boys to see national trasure this afternoon and i would like to make a few comments.

first, i became very excited during the previews (sometimes my favorite part of going to the movies). the reason for my excitement was the trailer that appeared for the hitchhikers guide to the galaxy. when i saw the trailer all i could say was “don’t panic”. the movie comes out may 6, 2005. i’ll count the days until it arrives. i just hope that it lives up the trilogy – all five books of it.

second, i was excited about the movie for a few different reasons:

it was nice to watch an adult movie with my kids and not have to worry about the language or content. the movie was clean without being preachy or cheesy. according to screenit.com there were only a few words to watch for within the whole movie.
it was a suspenseful, action packed, and entertaining.
for a nicholas cage movie the acting was not all that bad. i usually find cage to be the same character in each of his movies. he was still very much the same in national treasure but i felt like he had toned it down a little and i appreciated that.

third, the movie was a complete rip off from the da vinci code. the only difference is “national treasure” is based on searching for a “lost/hidden” treasure while “the da vinci code” is based on looking for the “lost/hidden” holy grail. it’s literally the same story – just with a changed object to find. it should be interesting to see what happens when the da vinci code movie comes out in 2006 since it seems like “national treasure” may have ripped off their plot already.

fourth, about half-way through the movie strobe lights started going off within the theater. then there was an announcement over the intercom asking everyone to please exit the facility in a calm and orderly manner because there was an emergency. it was the fire alarm. i now know why they say to never shout out “fire” in a crowded theater. the reason is because people start looking out for themselves. even though everyone was confused their primal instincts for survival started kicking in and they started “walking” fast for the exits. the boys and i were on the front row of the middle section and it was hard to get out because the people form the back kept on pushing through. i kept on having the hold the boys back from getting walked over. about the time that i got the boys safely out of the row an employee had come in and said it was a false alarm. thankfully, we were right at our seats and able to plop right back down. it made for a thrilling movie experience.

December 20, 2004

justice in housing?

jordan cooper recently quoted the following from an ap story. here’s the quote:

a two-bedroom rental is even more of a burden – the typical worker must earn at least $15.37 an hour to pay rent and utilities, the national low Income housing coalition said in its annual “out of reach” report. that’s nearly three times the federal minimum wage of $5.15 an hour.

you can read the rest of the article here.

this is absolutely amazing to me. it kind of destroys the concept of a “livable wage”. how can a wage be considered livable when you can’t even afford a one bedroom apartment on that wage? i’m not trying to support the concept of “entitlement”, or trying to argue that the government should “ordain” that everyone get a certain amount of income. it just seems that a worker should be able to at least afford housing (without any luxuries) on the minimum wage.

December 20, 2004

fine dining

last week, the 13th to be exact, was noah’s, my youngest, birthday. tradition at the terrell household is that the evening of your birthday you get to pick what the family eats – be it going out to eat at your favorite restaurant or having the family cook your favorite meal at home. noah is definitely a child who loves to eat out so pam and i knew that we would be eating out the night of his birthday. in fact, noah had been talking about his birthday for weeks before hand. noah had decided that the family would go to “las palmas” – the best mexican restaurant in baton rouge (which isn’t saying much because baton rouge is not known for mexican food). this was cool because pam and i both like “las palmas” and adam, my oldest, somewhat likes the restaurant also. this seemed be a “win / win” situation and i was excited about that.

of course, noah decided to change his mind the actual day of his borthday. that afternoon after i picked him up from school he announced his decision to change the plan. it went like this. “dad,” he said, “do you know where we are going out to eat tonight?”

“yep,” i said, “we’re going to ‘las palmas'”

“nope”

“what? you said ‘las palmas’ this morning.”

“i changed my mind. now i want to go to my favorite restaurant in the whole world.”

it was at this point that i braced myself. first, i really thought that las palmas was his favorite restaurant in the whole world (excluding rasin canes or mcdonald’s), and second, this was his birthday and our tradition said that he got to pick the spot. what would happen if he picked “ruth’s chris steak house” or some other extremely expensive place to eat? so i prepared myself for the worst and asked “what’s your favorite restaurant?”

noah said “the same place i went for my birthday last year and the place i want to go every year!”

last year for some very random reason noah picked to eat his birthday meal at “the golden corral“. we had only eaten there once before during his six previous years of life. we did not eat there again duriong last year because his borthday meal wasn’t the best experience. i’m not usually a food snob. i like very simple foods and simple resturants. yet our previous experience at “the golden corral” had been such that i could not believe that noah would want to go back there. so i asked him why it was his favorite restaurant.

“because i can get pizza, nachos, and tacos at the same time.”

his answer made sense so we went to “the golden corral” and i have to admit that it wasn’t that bad.

December 20, 2004

jonnybaker: open source conferencing…

i’m mainly blogging about this article because i want to remember it and i don’t desire to keep it as “new” on my bloglines feeds. it’s an interesting concept for doing “church” or maybe more “sunday school”. you set up different rooms for that are then filled with “themes” that have been suggested by individuals within the group. the only person who has to stay in these rooms are the ones who proposed the “theme” for that room. everyone else is free to roam from room to room. this way they will “cross pollinate” the conversations from each room. at the end of the day all the groups give outline of what was discussed in each room.

i want to remember this because i would like to do it someday. pasting it here on the blog is easier than filing the thing away somewhere only to be forgotten.

December 19, 2004

fred the explorer & the weekend

pam, the boys, and i just got back from the mobile, alabama for the weekend. we were there to throw a surprise party for pam’s dad. the surprise was that his birthday isn’t until december 28th and pam’s birthday was actually the 18th, the day the party was thrown. what better way to surprise someone with a surprise party than to hold it on someone else’s birthday. it was a good party and he was definitely surprised.

fred, the explorer, had a “check engine” light on its dashboard come on this afternoon. well, there is 180 miles between mobile and baton rouge and i really didn’t feel like breaking down in-between the two cities so my dad and i took it to autozone to have them pull out their “code checking thingy”. this little device hooks up to an electronic port in the truck and is supposed to tell me why the “check engine” light is on. it took awhile but we finally got the guy to bring the “code checking thingy” to my explorer and plug it in. the “thingy” told us that my truck was suffering from a code “p0455” – which was an “emissions evacuation system leak – gross leak”. this sounded pretty bad to me. still the guy at autozone didn’t know what it meant and nether did my dad or i so we went home to search the internet – the source of all automotive knowledge. after a quick search of the net i found out that my truck was probably suffering from the most deadly of all vehicle problems – a loose gas tank cap.

we tightened the gas cap and the “check engine” light hasn’t come on since then.

i feel better knowing that my truck takes such good care of me.

December 19, 2004

CHRISTmas and family

i’m presently at my parents for the next several hours ending a weekend that has been spent with the two families. i’ll post more about it when i get back home. all and all it has been a good weekend.

side note – i’ve recently fallen in love with photoblogs. it’s cool to check the pictures of people i do know and even cooler to check the pictures of people i don’t know. i’m not sure why it fascinates me to look into the lives of total strangers.

one of the photoblogs that i really like right now is top left pixel.