Those howling huskies give me a whole new appreciation of lizards and turtles as pets.
Anyway, it’s nice when all your pets get along, but it’s not something you can count on all the time. Our two cats would cheerfully murder each other, although they will close ranks if a moth or spider threatens them. They may believe they’re protecting us.
From our friend Marcia Settles, at “A Mom Looking Up.” We are not alone. –LD
We hadn’t seen this movie in several years, so we watched it the other day and it was just as wonderful as ever.
It isn’t always easy to get an all-star cast to work together, but in Death on the Nile, the stars are out in force. What a cast! Peter Ustinov as Hercule Poirot, supported by David Niven, Bette Davis, Mia Farrow, Lois Chiles, Maggie Smith, Simon MacCorkindale, Jack Warden, Olivia Hussey–whew! With Angela Lansbury, who won an Oscar for her portrayal of an alcoholic romance writer who’s seen better days. Fantastic performances all around.
And if you like movies with lavish sets, exotic locations, and a plot that twists and turns all over the place–well, this one’s for you. Want escape? This film’s got it. For 140 minutes, you’re out of here. Much, much better than the David Suchet remake.
In a little while, we’re going to follow our New Year’s custom of watching George Pal’s 1960 classic, The Time Machine. Followed by Patty’s heavenly pork casserole for supper.
Happy New Year, everybody!
Grinning like the Cheshire Cat… Grin now; you won’t feel like it later.
Here’s something for the whole world to be ashamed of. In 2018, the leading cause of death, world-wide, was… abortion! (https://www.wnd.com/2018/12/shocking-statistic-shows-planets-leading-cause-of-death/) Yup, 41.9 million babies were aborted this past year, far outstripping the second-highest cause of death, cancer: 8.2 million people died of cancer.
Even more incredibly, for every 33 live births on the planet, there were ten abortions–that’s almost a full quarter of all babies conceived. Including 60% of all black babies in America. These are World Health Organization stats.
Which country has the highest abortion rate? I can’t tell you that: the list is different in every article you read. But one thing that does come across is that wherever you legalize abortion, you get more abortions. Sort of like legalizing pot.
I don’t know who said this, but whoever it was deserves a round of applause.
Man: God, why didn’t you give us a cure for cancer?
God: I did, but you aborted him.
This has to change in 2019. We have to try to change it. The Lord our God will require of this age all the innocent blood shed under its auspices.
“Clergy for Choice”–consider well your works. You never know when it’s too late to repent. Claiming, as you do, to speak in God’s name, you ought to know your punishment will be severe. The Lord doesn’t like false prophets. You could look it up.
(Thanks to Phoebe for the news tip.)
Today, fertilizer… tomorrow… lunch?
For untold thousands of years, people have been trying to decide what to do with dead bodies. Eight thousand years ago at Catal Huyuk, they kept the dear departed under the clay floors of their homes. Today we’ve got embalming and burial, or cremation–
And the Urban Death Project. Does that name give you the creeps? It gives me the creeps. Anyway, they’re experimenting with the feasibility of turning human bodies into compost (https://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/14/science/a-project-to-turn-corpses-into-compost.html). Saving the planet, don’t you know.
Decent people in all times and places show respect for the dead. They may have many different ways of doing it, some of them radically and unnervingly different, but the motivation is the same. I’m just not sure of the motivation of this bunch of Urban Death Project characters out in Seattle.
Flash! Just In!
Inspired by the work of the Urban Death Project, and virtually overnight, Fimbo University has created a Compost Studies degree program. After a mere eight years in the program, graduates will be fully qualified to serve as compost. “They’ll be able to fertilize anything!” exclaims the first chair of the new Department of Death Studies (who really is a chair, by the way: an actual piece of furniture). “At one fell swoop, the whole looming problem of perpetual unemployment is wiped from the board!”
Higher education marches on!
One of those things I never worry about is Christmas-time church services being too Christian. But in case it worries you, there’s a pastor in Germany who has a solution to the problem.
https://leeduigon.com/2016/02/03/star-wars-pastor-doesnt-want-his-church-to-be-too-christian/
Tailoring your church services around a popular movie series looks like a sure-fire way to pump up church attendance. If you get bored with Star Wars, you can start on the Harry Potter movies, or Rocky, or Jurassic Park–any old franchise will do.
I can’t remember which apostle it was who first worried about Christianity being too Christ-centered, but I’m sure this pastor in Germany could tell you.
Now it’s 2019 (gotta get used to writing that!), and let’s start off with a hymn requested by “TheWhiteRabbit,” The Angel Gabriel–sung by the King’s College Choir at Cambridge.
We’re still doing Christmas hymns, folks, so if you have any requests, please feel free to make them.