Hymn on a Harp: ‘All Through the Night’

This was the first thing I posted today, but the computer and WordPress decided it’d be fun if they made me do all the work and then made the post disappear without a trace. So I’m trying again.

All Through the Night, old Welsh melody, performed by Siobhan Owen at St. German’s Church in Cardiff, Wales.

If I can get things to work around here, I want to post something about the life of St. Germanus–it’s quite inspiring. I might have to bump some nooze to fit it in, but I doubt anyone will complain about that.

‘How Did Civilization Start?’ (2019)

326 Gobekli Tepe Stock Photos - Free & Royalty-Free Stock Photos from  Dreamstime

Gobekli Tepe… It has no business being there.

I don’t know how civilization started, but one thing I do know for sure–this dagnabbed computer had nothing to do with it!

How Did Civilization Start?

I’m having rather a hard time with this machine today, it doesn’t want to cooperate in any way. Yes, I know I’ve run this post before. Crikey, I’m lucky I can run any posts at all, the way this thing is acting up.

Maybe computers made some ancient civilizations… fail. Disappear, go extinct, turn into piles of junk.

I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised.

Killer-Diller Kittens!

Holy moly! This is not a nursery–this is a gladiator school! See the kittens practicing their lethal moves. There’s a victim in there somewhere, but we only see his or her leg. “Where’s the rest of me?” Dude, you’re in there with all those kittens and you have to ask that?

‘Joy to the World’ (In March… Why Not?)

A Christmas hymn, in March? Well, why not?

Isaac Watts wrote Joy to the World in 1719, and as you can see, it’s still going strong. Here we have a modern rendition of it by Pentatonics. Again, why not?

I’m saving Easter hymns for a little later.

Oops–Dueling Is Illegal (‘Oy, Rodney’)

a gripping page-turner headed for the top of the NY Times bestseller list | Romance novels, Funny romance, Book parody

We are dumbfounded by developments in Chapter DXXXIX (look at all the cool x’s!) of Violet Crepuscular’s epic romance, Oy, Rodney. The Queen of Suspense is at it again! See how she ratchets up the tension till you could just plotz! Well, I could…

As if he weren’t already in enough trouble, having challenged himself to a duel and rashly accepted, Lord Jeremy Coldsore has a private consultation with a solicitor named Jox, who normally hangs out in Charles Dickens books. Here in Scurveyshire he used to mind Farmer Feep’s ferocious feral pigs.

“Not only can you not back out of the duel without destroying your reputation for untold centuries to come,” Jox counsels him, “but as the shire’s justice of the peace, you have another problem. Dueling is against the law! First you broke the law by challenging yourself to a duel, then you broke it by accepting, and as justice of the peace, you ought to put yourself on trial, and, if found guilty, sentence yourself to be drawn and quartered!”

“I hadn’t thought of that,” Jeremy admits. “I say–they don’t still do that, do they?”

“I’m afraid they do, my lord… in Scurveyshire.”

[Loud, portentous music signals the end of this present chapter. Readers who can’t tolerate the suspense are urged to seek professional help.]

Who Was This Apostle Simon?

St Simon the Zealot | Art UK

There’s a tradition that he was martyred by a saw… but who knows?

In Luke 6:15 and Acts 1:13, he’s called “Simon Zelotes.” In Matthew 10:4, he’s “Simon the Canaanite”–which seems a rather odd nickname for a First Century Jew. But either way, he’s one of Christ’s original 12 disciples and therefor an apostle. But the Bible tells us almost nothing about him.

And get this: he was neither a Zealot nor a Canannite (whatever a “Canaanite” was at that late date in history). He is tagged by a Hebrew word that sounds like “Canaanite,” and another word that means not “a Zealot,” but simply “zealous.” The Zealots didn’t really pick up steam until some decades after the Crucifixion; and their movement culminated in the Romans destroying the Temple and leveling Jerusalem.

There are church traditions, etc., involving St. Simon, but there’s really nothing outside the Bible. He has no lines to speak, no teachings to impart. But he was a disciple, a companion of Our Lord Jesus Christ–isn’t that enough?

I learned in Sunday school that Simon was a Zealot. This was almost certainly wrong. The Zealots were an organization similar to the French Resistance in World War II, dedicated to freeing their country from Roman domination…“by any means necessary.” Their policy proved to be suicidal.

My pal Pastor Mark once said to me, “The Bible tells us everything we need to know, but it doesn’t tell us everything we want to know.” Guess he was right.

‘Biggest Dinosaur Yet?’ (2017)

THE BIGGEST DINOSAUR EVER ! - YouTube

The little tiny black thing is a full-grown human being.

I’ve been in love with dinosaurs all my life, but I still find it almost impossible to imagine an animal as big as our apartment building. Or even bigger. I mean, literally, compared to some of those dinosaurs, we human beings are like crickets or something.

Biggest Dinosaur Yet?

Imagine these creatures walking, eating trees, herding together. Why did God make them so huge? We certainly couldn’t have developed much of a civilization with these brontosaurs stepping on our buildings. Has God put them in the fossil record just to remind us who He is?

Because we do need reminding, don’t we?

‘Christ Triumphant, Ever Reigning’

The music for this hymns, Christ Triumphant, Ever Reigning, was composed in 1948; so it’s only a year older than me. I wish I could tell you who was singing it, but YouTube didn’t provide that information. We’ve got the lyrics, so you can sing it, too.

Emergency Cat & Dog Video

Desperate times call for desperate measures. Usually I wait till evening to post a critter video. Today, at the rate I’m going, this blog won’t make it to the evening.

But ain’t domestication grand? Sometimes it seems they forget all that cats and dogs business and just melt into one happy family.

But I speak as someone who used to have a cat, a dog, and an iguana cuddled up together on his bed.

More Pig Zoomies

Sometimes you’ve got to make your own fun. Animals know this: it’s why they invented zoomies.

This piglet has a black belt in zoomies. If he’s still into it as a 500-lb. hog, he’s going to need a bigger playground.