I read an interesting story about the new St Louis Rams coach Steve Spagnuolo. This story from when he signed his last contract with the NY Giants: “With his signature, Spagnuolo writes “HEB 11:1”. Hebrews 11:1 is a verse from the Bible, and it says: “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” Source
I couldn’t help but think of my friend Jimi the other day. Jimi is the type of friend that gets annoyed easily, and sure way to get his attention is to say “PIN Number,” because you are basically saying “Personal Identification Number Number.” Well, Brian Williams was on the Daily Show last week and when he said “PIN Number,” he stated it was his favorite redundancy.
And why do we say cheddar cheese? Is there any other kind of cheddar?
And what about tuna fish? Is there another kind of tuna? Tuna chicken? Tuna beef? Tuna pork?
One of my personal favorites is the ATM Machine. This drove me batty as I worked at a credit union.
Or how about the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim? Los Angeles is translated from Spanish to English as “The Angels,” so you are basically saying The Angels Angels of Anaheim.
After replacing a faucet for WifeGeeding, a task that took much longer than it should have, I decided to play catchup with what I had on the DVR, which just happened to be two HBO specials.
The Trials of Ted Haggard was extremely interesting. It’s another Alexandra Pelosi documentary. I have so many thoughts on this film, but I’ll just try to keep it to a few. First of all, I find his relationship with Pelosi, the daughter of the Speaker of the House, quite interesting, She filmed an earlier documentary in which Haggard was highly featured, who at the time was a very popular and powerful Evangelical preacher, and then you had this liberal film maker, a culture clash if you will. But he must of somehow bonded with her as she followed him around after his exile from the church, and he was extremely honest and transparent. It was amazing to see a man that would be the feature speaker at a packed stadium, and then be so down on his luck he had difficulty in finding a job, having to settle on a commission based insurance sale job. He talked about suicide as an escape and a way to free him and his family from the stress and embarrassment, and I felt I could totally relate; and then you could see the pain in his face as he spoke on how bad he felt that his family had to weather the storm with him, and moved about four times in a year shacking up with empathetic friends. There were times his former church made statements on his behalf which turned out to be untrue, and no matter how much the press lambasted the statements, he never once tried to discredit the man who said them. It was interesting to see how the church gave him a years worth of salary on the condition that he leave the church and the state. This is one of my criticisms of the church in general. When a person is in need of love and support, that person shouldn’t be outcasted. Instead, it’s a prime opportunity for ministry and grace, along with discipline. And all of this coming from someone that never really liked Ted Haggard. In closing, it was interesting to see him talk about how he now read the Bible in a different perspective.
The second HBO film I watched was called Taking Chance, and I will be surprised if this film based upon a true story doesn’t win anything come award time, and it was one of those films that had WifeGeeding tearing up profusely. In short, Kevin Bacon plays a Marine Core lieutenant colonel, who finds out that a Private First Class from his home town was killed in action in Iraq, and feels compelled to escort the body. The film shows a lot of things one normally wouldn’t consider. You see how the bodies are in body bags and transported in ice from Iraq to the mortuary at Dover Air Force Base. You see how the bodies are cleaned and prepped with the utmost respect and care, and you see how the personal items on their bodies are removed and cleaned; for instance, the watch and necklace the Marine was wearing was blood stained. One thing worth noting, is that you never really see a high ranking officer escort such a low ranking enlistee, so that was touching in itself. But you get to observe from the lieutenant colonel’s point of view how the public reacts to him as he escorts the body in full uniform. It was just extremely touching, and as I stated, it was based upon a true story. More about that here. It’s one of those gut-rentching movies that makes you feel like a better man for watching it.
There was one point in the film that you notice the Marine being buried doesn’t have shoes on, and I guess that was done on purpose but I don’t why.
In one part of the movie a lot of vehicals pass the one carrying the body, and they all turn their lights on. I’m not sure what that was suppose to mean or symbolize. I know a lot of times during a trip to the cemetary all the cars part of the funeral drive with their lights on, but in this case these folks just happen to by driving by. Maybe that was the point, that they just wanted to be a part of it and how their respect.
I couldn’t help but think of my father’s funeral while watching this film. My father wasn’t killed in action, but he did have a military funeral. I remember speaking to the officer in charge (a captain) of the funeral detail as he was prepping my father’s uniform. When I expressed my appreciation for being a part of this for someone he never knew, I will always remember his response. With the highest respect and a most serious and genuine look on his face, he told me it was his honor, and I totally believed him.
I also remember that captain giving my mother the flag that was on my fathers coffin, and I remember my mother saying “Thank you, sir” in a very shakey voice.
There was a point in the film where the Marine’s body stayed in an airport storage building overnight, and the escort stayed the night just to be with the body even though he had the option of staying in a hotel for the night. He stayed with the body because he didn’t want him to be alone. That reminded me of when my father was disinterred and moved to the Dallas – Fort Worth National Cemetary several years after his death. He was disinterred the afternoon before, kept in his coffin and sealed vault, and transported the next morning, which meant that my father was staying overnight at a transporter’s place. After I saw that scene in the movie, I wish I would have stayed with my father. From my understanding, since the casket and vault weighed over a ton, it just sat on a trailer overnight, something I just totally didn’t feel comfortable about.
I still have much regret for not serving in the military
On to other things . . .
I had about twenty emails regarding Standing verse Sitting, all of which were quite interesting.
If your a fan of the Price is Right fail sound, just click on the big blue button. Link
I remember one evening WifeGeeding and I were eating out and ran into one of my students and her family. That student introduced me to her family as “Professor Geeding” which still makes WifeGeeding chuckle, so I guess I now need to give her the memo.
Since I feel like I have a lot to learn in our new church, I’m doing what I can to be quiet, not be noticed, and simply observe and absorb. That’s not working out too well. That plan backfired when we started the Denominational Differences series in Sunday school, which I wrote about before. But last week our classes were combined with another to take part in a True Colors personality assessment. Last week I went pretty much unnoticed, but this week we continued were we left of from last week. As I mentioned last week, I was a Green. Well, this week we started off in our group color for more discussion, but then we were told to go to the color we scored lowest on. Well, in a class of about 40 people, I was the lone person in the Gold group. I was the laughing stock of the class, which I didn’t really mind, because I found it pretty humorous myself.
The presenter also provided two examples of professions of Greens, analysts and college professors. Funny thing, since I’m an analyst and my name page now states that I’m a college professor.
OK, I’ve listened to the U2 album some more and it’s started to grow on my, especially the first two songs on the album.
Remember, it’s U2 week on Letterman, that’s five nights of my favorite band and late night host.
The Professor…that’s what I shall refer to you as…The Professor over at Bag of Nothing.
Welcome back.