bookmoth

Tam:

I always cry when HAL sings "Daisy" in 2001: A Space Oddysey. I mean, sure, he's a psychotic murderous artificial intelligence, but he meant well.

Yeah, he meant well. And I'd like him more if he wasn't trying to murder my latest crush (yes, I just saw 2001 this month. Yes, for the first time. And loser that I am, I got a crush on Dave. Yes, I'm comfortable with that.)

Daisy, Daisy, here is my answer true.
I'm not crazy over the likes of you.
If you can't afford a carriage,
Then forget the bloomin' marriage,
'Cause I'll be damned
If I'll be crammed
On a bicycle built for two.

Citizens protect their own freedom as much as the "rough men who stand guard in the night" do. The military and its personnel are wonderful, and we need them, and if I weren't starting a new job tomorrow, I'd be at Arlington Cemetary with a handful of flowers and tears and thank yous. Instead, I'll hold my hard to my heart at the flags over skyscrapers.



We have rights and responsibilities that we and others have fought for.

Some of these are:

the right to self defense and the tools thereof

the right to read Thucydides, even on vacation

the right to wear camo bikinis





Happy Memorial Day. Honor it as you see fit.

// posted by bookmoth 11:34 PM (0) comments

Healing the Children went to the Dominican Republic last week. I went to take pictures. The trip lasted, oh, one night. Then we flew home, with a plane-load of kids who needed medical care in the US.




Here are a couple.

We brought candy and coloring books for the little kids and teen magazines for the older girls. And I brought a Spanish-English dictionary that came in really useful when a girl who had never flown before began complaining of pain in her ears when we were landing ("yawn" I said. I'm not even sure if I said a noun or a verb, I gotta work on my Spanish. But it worked. I communicated. And she felt better.)

Discussion at theothersideofkim.com about what classical or modern literature / nonfiction are "must reads" and a brief foray into why reading matters.

Anyone wondering what I think of The DaVinci Code can find out from Gunner, who responds to criticism of the novel better than I could.

Summary? It's a novel. There's no human or legal right not to be offended. Oh, and it's a novel.

Mom went on to explain that her children were only permitted to read 'the classics'. Any book that was written before 1960 is permissible.
She said, "But because the 60's ruined our culture, and perverted our sense of literature, and raped the ideals of America, I will not permit my children to read anything published after 1960."

One of the perils of homeschooling.

It frightens me to think what Mom X is teaching her children. It scares me to think of their isolation. I think I shall begin an Underground Book Railroad for them, and the Hardy Boys will not be included.

From here.

http://www.starpulse.com/news/index.php/2006/04/28/brad_pitt_aamp_angelina_jolie_to_star_in

Who is John Galt? Brad Pitt, apparently.

And Dagny Taggert is Angelina Jolie.

I can't comment on the quality of the adaptation, but so far, the choices of actors for main characters seems like it will work well - potentially. We'll see.

O say, can you see, by the dawn's early light,
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming?
Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through the perilous fight,
O'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming!
And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there:
O say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?

On the shore, dimly seen through the mists of the deep,
Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines in the stream:
Tis the star-spangled banner! O long may it wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion
A home and a country should leave us no more?
Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps' pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave:
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

Oh! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved homes and the war's desolation!
Blest with victory and peace, may the Heaven-rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause, it is just,
And this be our motto: “In God is our trust.”
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

It's a poem about war. About watching the enemy bomb your country in a battle and wondering, hoping, that your flag will stay up. That you'll keep your country and your freedom.

I'm not sure what "Nuestro Himno" is about. Especially with the rumors of changing the lyrics to remove references to bombs and blood. The bombs and blood were kind of the point. The USA fights back against invaders. And so far, we've always won.

What was the first dramatic moment after the fall of the World Trade Center and the collapse of part of the Pentagon? The display of the Star-Spangled Banner. It (the song and the flag) says we can't be defeated easily. The flag rises from the ashes or survives the rockets and bombs. America survives.

We are a country born from war. We have freedoms other nations either dream about or dread. In that, we're unique. People have fought for the defense of this peculiar country. People died. The very least we can do is honor the martial existance of our country in our anthem.

***********

Update: from Xavier:

http://xavierthoughts.blogspot.com/2006/05/our-anthem.html