David Gilmour "Echoes" Acoustic Version

Abbey Road is just the code name I have for the big warehouse space I have out back.   You can imagine it's the real Abbey Road studios if you wish.  But I do thank David and Richard and the others for treating us to this song today!

Overheard at Table 3: Halo 4 - Forward Unto Dawn

Does anybody know what this movie is about?

I dunno.  I think you actually have to be playing Halo to know what it's about.

Don't you know?  You play every game known to man?

I don't play Halo.

Why not?

I'm a Call of Duty type of guy.

For some reason, that frightens me.

Overheard at Booth 4: Hart Crane's Grandmother's Love Letters

This little gem was sent to me by poets.org yesterday.   Had to read it several times, because it kept revealing nuanced sounds on each reading.   Mainly sounds of the rain, and occasionally the sound of a sheet of paper being gently slid behind one another.

My Grandmother's Love Letters by Hart Crane     There are no stars tonight But those of memory. Yet how much room for memory there is In the loose girdle of soft rain.   There is even room enough For the letters of my mother's mother, Elizabeth, That have been pressed so long Into a corner of the roof That they are brown and soft, And liable to melt as snow.   Over the greatness of such space Steps must be gentle. It is all hung by an invisible white hair. It trembles as birch limbs webbing the air.   And I ask myself:   "Are your fingers long enough to play Old keys that are but echoes: Is the silence strong enough To carry back the music to its source And back to you again As though to her?"   Yet I would lead my grandmother by the hand Through much of what she would not understand; And so I stumble. And the rain continues on the roof With such a sound of gently pitying laughter.        Today's poem is in the public domain.

 

About This Poem Hart Crane spent a large portion of his formative years living at his grandmother's home in Cleveland, Ohio, and perusing her extensive library.   Today is the anniversary of Hart Crane's birth.

Overheard at Booth 3: Talking Yahweh

So, basically, her sisters are Jehovah's witnesses and they can say, "Yahweh is great" and "Praise Jehovah," but my wife won't let me say "Praise Jesus!" around them because that might "offend" them.  What kind of baloney is that?!

Overheard at the Counter: "Boo Hoo" Christianity

I'm so tired of "boo hoo" Christianity.   Every Sunday it's the same sob story.  "The hedonists won't let us pray.  The ACLU won't let us have the 10 Commandments in front of schools.  The liberals don't want us to say the name Jesus.  The intellectuals want us all to gay marry and make our teenager daughters have abortions."

PLEASE!  SHUT UP!

If we as Christians truly know that we serve the Creator of LIFE THE UNIVERSE AND EVERYTHING, then we have absolutely nothing to whine about!   But still we prance around like a bunch of mewling babes like "wah wah some mean bad ol' liberals took away our lollipops!"

Christianity has nothing to whine about.  It's had pretty much a free ride for the last millennium or so, and quite frankly, if people are anti-Christianity, it's because we Christians have done such a piss-poor job of representing our Christ.

Look, can we expect some Muslim to spread the message of Christ?  Some atheist?  Some Buddhist?  Nooo, we Christians have to spread the message of the love of Jesus Christ.  Frankly, if we had been doing our jobs all these years, every one would be a Christ follower now.   The fact that they are not just proves that we, as Christians, are sloppy, lazy, and frankly, incompetent.

So let's get over this "boo hoo - the world's against us" Christianity and get out there and start digging wells, feeding the hungry, building shelters for the homeless, bringing medicine to the sick, protecting the innocent, seeking justice for those who have been wronged, and providing comfort and companionship for the incarcerated.   

Let's get out there and start WORKING!

Overheard at Booth 3: On Our 8th Wedding Anniversary

The Woman: I know you say you love them and all that and I really do thank you for helping me raise my kids, but they're teenagers now and they really need your support and you need to stop hushing them and acting like they're bothering you and always getting on to them for talking back to me and I know they're rude sometimes but you're always on their case and if you don't start acting like the father that they need well I don't know how much longer this can go on and Thomas really needs you right now because he's crying out for a dad figure and God knows I don't want him around his bio-dad but at least he acts the way a real man is supposed to act and Ginny she just needs some man to look up to as a dad and she can't do that with you because you never stand up for anything and she needs someone to help her look for summer jobs and how can she use you as someone to look up to when all you are is some guy who's been stuck in the same job he hates for 11 years and what do you think, you've been really quiet this whole time, what are your thoughts?

The Man: My thought is "Whoo hoo.  Happy Eighth Anniversary, Honey."

Overread at Booth 2: Some Teenager's Spanish Schoolwork

Left on the table at Booth 2, one sheet of paper, half-filled with this one paragraph, obviously some teenager's Spanish schoolwork.

Sadly, they left no name, no date, no way to mark their existence.  Just their words.   How like some of the cultures:

Ambiente

 

 

 

China está quemando más carbón, casi igual del reste del mundo. El razón que carbón es muy popular es porqué es barato. Es peligroso para la población de China, porqué causa problemas de salud y problemas de contaminación. Los médicos ponen culpa a la contaminación del aire para el asma y otro aumento de problemas de salud. El ambiente está siendo afectado por la contaminación y el aire de las ciudades más pobladas es brumoso y espeso. Si China y otros países encuentran de una manera segura para quemar carbón de forma segura más del medio ambiente, incluso si esto significa un método más caro, entonces deberían hacerlo por el bien del mundo.