The Night of the Hunter

The Night of the Hunter
1955
Robert Mitchum, Shelly Winters(at her most beautiful and alluring), Lillian Gish

I'm close to turning lights out, surfing channels, and come upon the opening lines of a black and white movie, spoken just after a camera in the sky has captured children - playing hide and seek - come upon the body of a youngish women. Female voice-over - coming from out of the sky:

A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit. Neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Wherefore by their fruits, ye shall know them.

From an outstanding review by Tim Dirks:

The camera then tracks after an open touring Essex car [stolen], a Model T driven down a country road by a sinister, crazed, malevolent, black-cloaked, wide-brimmed and hatted 'Preacher' Harry Powell (Robert Mitchum), one of the 'false prophets.' In a chilling, perversely evil and memorable monologue to the Lord, the killer-evangelist with borderline sanity, glances heavenward and delivers an insane prayer. He complains that he is "tired" of ridding the world of tempting females [one being the dead body just discovered]. As he drives by a cemetery, he reveals that he is a serial killer who receives divine inspirations to first marry, and then murder and rob women (usually rich lonely widows who do not see the menacing perversity in him):

Well now, what's it to be Lord? Another widow? How many has it been? Six? Twelve? I disremember. (He tips his hat.) You say the word, Lord, I'm on my way...You always send me money to go forth and preach your Word. The widow with a little wad of bills hid away in a sugar bowl. Lord, I am tired. Sometimes I wonder if you really understand. Not that You mind the killin's. Yore Book is full of killin's. But there are things you do hate Lord: perfume-smellin' things, lacy things, things with curly hair.

Thus was I pulled into a film noir classic: The Night of the Hunter - the only film ever directed by Charles Laughton. Tis a pity, as Mr. Laughton obviously had much to give as a director. I was entranced and hypnotized by this film, which was by turns suspenseful, darkly comedic, darkly observant of humanity, and spiritual. This film was Hitchcock meets Blood Simple meets Fargo meets Elmer Gantry. The thrust was simple yet profound; the craftsmanship simple yet rich and elegant; the musical score compelling and suspenseful; the direction filled with metaphor and classical reference.

A bit about the other actors(photo):

Shelly Winters was outstanding as a widow knocked askew by grief. That's Peter Graves as a heroic and tormented criminal. Lillian Gish (photo 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6) steals the film by allowing the self-awareness and moral strength of a 50 year old woman to shine through her performance.

Spoiler alert!

The film title seemingly refers to a long childrens' nightmare of a night in which an eight year old brother and five year old sister escape a basement of death, flee overland to a river, and drift a rowboat downriver in the light of a quarter-moon. Still a steadily plodding horse carries Mitchum after them; always somehow keeping pace, no matter how fast they flee; always magically following in the correct direction.

The title, however, more aptly refers to a night in which Mitchum's demonic character is trying to wrest the children from the protection of Gish's shotgun-toting embodiment of faith and moral courage. She shoots Mitchum. As he flees to her barn, he emits a hellish demon-screech which is quite unlike anything previously heard from his character. She instructs the town's telephone operator:

Send the state troopers. I've got something trapped in my barn.


She says it as a matter-of-fact declaration. Mitchum stays obediently in her unlocked barn. He knows he is beaten. Gish displays little concern that he may come out and harm her or the children. She knows he may not - in the true sense of "may I?" - for he does not have her permission. She has vanquished a demon.

I've got something trapped in my barn.

Gish hasn't entrapped it via physical constriction, but rather with faith and moral courage. That is the way you vanquish a demon. Lillian Gish is the hunter of the movie title, and the night belongs to her. Her prey was threatening two innocent children (who represent all mankind). Her faith and moral courage entrapped it just as surely as a jungle pit entraps a tiger. After, Gish tells the boy(summarizing from memory):

You are more capable and resilient than you know.

The state troopers are on the way. Yet, after Mitchum is carted to prison, the film goes on. The children(representing mankind) are threatened by less obvious yet still dangerous forces, and they are not yet grown up enough to handle those forces on their own. The point of the final scenes is that Gish's job is not finished, and will not be finished while she remains on this earth. The children, who will follow her example as adults, will need to always be on guard. Through her example of direct and forthright action, she is showing them the way.

Robert Mitchum is greatly under-appreciated as an actor. He progresses the story via his physicality and sexuality. Mitchum must be the stuff of down and dirty sexual fantasy for many women. Here, he is menacing, and revolting, yet - I surmise - also subconciously thrilling. The duality reminds of the way Grace Kelly was cool and composed in the Hitchcock movies, yet I subconciously sensed she was hot, hot, hot - and yearned for her. Mitchum reeks of testosterone and danger, in the way a tall and powerful stallion reeks of testosterone and danger. A talented horseman can generally control and ride a stallion, yet he never forgets that proximity to a stallion is proximity to true danger. Stallions bite with bad temper, and can turn hooves on you in an instant. Brain damage or death are a real possibility. It tends to focus one's attention. One may wonder why the horseman goes near the stallion. Yet he does.

Thumbs up. 5 Stars. Way to go Turner Classic Movies.

Dirks:

Although one of the greatest American films of all time, the imaginatively-chilling, experimental, sophisticated work was idiosyncratic, film noirish, avante garde, dream-like expressionistic and strange, and it was both ignored and misunderstood at the time of its release. Originally, it was a critical and commercial failure.

Robert Mitchum gave what some consider his finest performance in a precedent-setting, unpopular, and truly terrifying role as the sleepy-eyed, diabolical, self-appointed serial killer/Preacher with psychotic, murderous tendencies while in pursuit of $10,000 in cash. Lillian Gish played his opposite - a saintly good woman who provided refuge for the victimized children.
[...]
The high-contrast, melodramatic-horror film with macabre humor deliberately pays tribute to its silent film heritage, and to pioneering director D. W. Griffith in its style (the use of stark, expressionistic black and white cinematography, archaic camera devices such as iris down) and in its casting of Griffith's principal protegé/silent star, the legendary Lillian Gish (in her first film since Portrait of Jennie (1948)). [...] In Laughton's words, it was
"a nightmarish sort of Mother Goose tale."

From its start, the film is designed to have the special feeling of a child's nightmare, including the difficult keeping of a secret, and a magical journey to safety - all told from a child's point of view.

Dirks mentions this as a horror film. Roger Ebert says many horror films have copied bits of The Night of the Hunter - especially a scene where Mitchum calls down the cellar stairs to the children hiding below: "Chilll..dren?". It's good I didn't know this in advance, as I don't watch horror films! Might give me nightmares....

Addendum I:
In searching out photos, I notice this movie has been colorized. This is a desecration. This film came out when color was becoming widely popular - which may have partly accounted for its commercial failure. The movie is a children's nightmare put onto the screen. Filming in black and white was a conscious artistic choice.

Addendum II:
Roger Ebert:

"But does this familiarity give The Night of the Hunter the recognition it deserves? I don't think so because those famous trademarks distract from its real accomplishment. It is one of the most frightening of movies, with one of the most unforgettable of villains....
[...]
It is risky to combine horror and humor, and foolhardy to approach them through expressionism. For his first film, Laughton made a film like no other before or since, and with such confidence it seemed to draw on a lifetime of work. Critics were baffled by it, the public rejected it...."

e.e. cummings: what Got him was Nothing

what Got him was Noth
e. e. cummings
poem #30 from 95 poems. 1958

what Got him was Noth
ing & nothing's exAct
ly what any one Living
(or some
body
Dead like even a Poet)could
hardly express what
i Mean is
what knocked him over Wasn't
(for instance)the Knowing your

whole(yes god

damned)life is a Flop or even
to
Feel how
Everything(dreamed
& hoped &
prayed for
months & weeks & days & years
& nights &
forever)is Less Than
Nothing(which would have been

Something)what got him was nothing



e.e. cummings wrote poetry like a jazz musician plays scat - jumping from here to there, improvising, who knows where he would go next. Some detested it:

So far as I am concerned, Mr. Cummings may do anything he likes with the alphabet, the English grammar, and the multiplication table, provided only the result of his activities be something interesting, and after a reasonable period of application, comprehensible, to a reader of culture and brains. Mr. Cummings may not, however, I say, write poetry in English which is more difficult for me to translate than poetry written in Latin. He may, of course, write it. But if he publishes it, if he prints and offers for sale poetry which he is quite content should be, after hours of sweating concentration, inexplicable from any point of view to a person as intelligent as myself, then he does so with a motive which is frivolous from the point of view of art, and should not be helped or encouraged by any serious person of group of persons...

Edna St. Vincent Millay
Savage Beauty
pg. 370

I generally dislike "Modern Art". However, on reflection, I think I dislike it not so much because it is modern, as because I perceive the artists "works" as being shallow and mediocre. Not that I know zhizhi about art. I don't. But, sometimes, from the end zone, shallow and mediocre is very clear. I think I would like interesting and significant modern art - which, of course, is really just: "art".

I like scat. I'm coming to like jazz more and more, and to appreciate music more and more, and I like scat.

And I like e.e. cummings. I think he is interesting and significant. For all I know, cummings was an atheist - yet I see this particular poem as quite theological. In Ecclesiastes, Solomon gives voice to the same sense of futility as cummings, saying "All is vanity, and striving after wind." The bigger theme, I think, of cummings and Solomon, is that whenever one is stripped of all artifice, and all fantasy, one comes face to face, finally, with truth. And God.

That moment will getcha.

New Evidence: Saddam Trained Thousands of Int'l Terrorists

From Powerlineblog:

We spoke with Steve Hayes of the Weekly Standard earlier this week; he told us that he was about to publish a bombshell: documents and photographs discovered in Iraq show that in the years leading up to the war, Saddam's regime trained thousands of international terrorists at several camps in Iraq. Here is Steve's story:

THE FORMER IRAQI REGIME OF Saddam Hussein trained thousands of radical Islamic terrorists from the region at camps in Iraq over the four years immediately preceding the U.S. invasion, according to documents and photographs recovered by the U.S. military in postwar Iraq. The existence and character of these documents has been confirmed to THE WEEKLY STANDARD by eleven U.S. government officials.

The secret training took place primarily at three camps--in Samarra, Ramadi, and Salman Pak--and was directed by elite Iraqi military units. Interviews by U.S. government interrogators with Iraqi regime officials and military leaders corroborate the documentary evidence. Many of the fighters were drawn from terrorist groups in northern Africa with close ties to al Qaeda, chief among them Algeria's GSPC and the Sudanese Islamic Army. Some 2,000 terrorists were trained at these Iraqi camps each year from 1999 to 2002, putting the total number at or above 8,000. Intelligence officials believe that some of these terrorists returned to Iraq and are responsible for attacks against Americans and Iraqis.

***

The discovery of the information on jihadist training camps in Iraq would seem to have two major consequences: It exposes the flawed assumptions of the experts and U.S. intelligence officials who told us for years that a secularist like Saddam Hussein would never work with Islamic radicals, any more than such jihadists would work with an infidel like the Iraqi dictator. It also reminds us that valuable information remains buried in the mountain of documents recovered in Afghanistan and Iraq over the past four years.

Only a tiny fraction--between two and three percent--of the 2,000,000 "exploitable items" recovered in Iraq have been translated. Only in the last few weeks has the Bush administration finally made a commitment to devoting the necessary resources to reviewing and translating the Iraqi documents. Until now, the administration has been reluctant to allow access even to the handful of unclassified documents that have been translated. Thankfully, that posture is changing.

While we have barely scratched the surface of Iraq's intelligence records, it is already obvious that Saddam was a major supporter and enabler of Islamic terrorism:

"As much as we overestimated WMD, it appears we underestimated [Saddam Hussein's] support for transregional terrorists," says one intelligence official.

Apparently there are boxes full of photographs of jihadists training in Saddam's camps. I'm looking forward to seeing them.

Posted by John at 05:33 PM

Longhorns Are 2005 National Champions!

1970 to 2005 = 35 years

Longhorn fans will be insufferable for another 35 years
- but I'm still thrilled it happened!

Reggie got the Heisman, but Vince got the championship.

What a ballgame. Congratulations, Longhorns.
~
~
~
Historic Perspective:

Texas defeats Michigan and USC in back to back Rose Bowls. That's three storied institutions; in College Football's most storied venue; wearing three classic uniforms and three classic helmets - including two helmets: Texas and Michigan, which are in the conversation for best helmets in the nation.

I thought Texas was lucky to defeat Michigan last year, because I thought Vince Young was fortunate to find running room at some key moments of the game. It looks like I was wrong. Vince makes his own luck.

Vince's burning competitive leadership is reminscent, really, of Roger Staubach. He would not let Texas lose.

2005 Texas, with a tough and fast defense, a massively talented offensive line, and Vince Young, deserves to be remembered as a fine championship team. They are not flukes. Rather, they deserve status in the upper tier of championship teams.

Quirky tableaux:

Matt Leinart, interviewed on the field, after the final gun:

It's tough. It was a great win, uh, los... uh, we fought hard. It was a tough game.

You can tell its been two years since Leinart lost a game. Dan Fouts, attempting serious comment after Texas recovered their 33rd fumble of the season:

Texas puts it on the ground so much, they've become good at going after it.

Fouts put that commentary on the ground, and never went after it. Keith Jackson, after a Vince Young run:

He runs better to his right.

Riiiiight. From Annika's Journal:

That game was as good as the ABC announcers were biased.

Misc. Commentary:

No one has ever made 4th and 5 look so easy. From the 9. With 25 seconds remaining. Cake.

Reggie Bush is the love child of Tony Dorsett and O.J. I thought Reggie's failed lateral was an excellent idea, which only lacked execution. I thought he took a measured and reasonable risk. I was surprised it didn't work. I love everything about Reggie Bush, except, maybe, his father.

USC RB LenDale White was spectacular, right up to the moment he was stopped on the final fourth and two with two minutes to go. Bill Parcells would salivate at the chance to draft White.

Vince Young's physical strength was amazing - pushing through tackles, and forcing a fall forward for extra yards, time and time again. Vince obviously enjoys the weight room. If he declared himself a RB, he might be the first pick in the NFL Draft.

What do the Texans do if Vince declares for the NFL draft - as he gives every indication of intending to do? It will take years of losing before Vince can read defenses well enough to be a competent NFL QB. Jehosaphat! What a dilemma for the Texans! If Vince declares, I would hate to be the Houston GM. I guess I would take him. What else can you do? If you're gonna go down - go down in flames! That's entertainment!

Vince's NFL decision: On one hand, no one has ever needed another season of reading college defenses worse than Vince does. Texas coaches still have him reading only half the field on most plays(another tidbit picked up in pregame hype!). OTOH, Vince has an improbable chance to play for his hometown team. I think he should take it. It's better than ending up with Bill Bidwell. Or Al Davis.

Oddly, if there was one critical play in a game filled with big plays, I think it was Leinart's careless interception toss on the Texas goal line, with USC leading 7 to 3, and storming downfield towards a second touchdown.

Texas still hasn't stopped USC's waggle pass. If USC had only run White plus the waggle on their next to last drive, they would've still been driving when the clock ran out.

Both TE's were spectacular.

Texas' offense looks hully-gully, but its not. It's a showcase offense for Vince Young - the strength of the Longhorn team.

Vince didn't get the Heisman, but keep your eye on speedy Longhorn RB Jamaal Charles, #25, for the 2008 Heisman Trophy.

I thought the incompete pass call on Jamaal Charles was the right call, but damn, it was close!

I liked Pete Carroll's decision to go for it on 4th and 2, with 2 minutes remaining. Don't play not to lose - play to win. As much as anything, its an attitude you want to infuse in your team. In addition, if you can't stop Texas from going 60 yards to win the game, you're not that good a bet to stop them from going 85 yards to win the game.

Texas defense gave up 38 points, yet I thought they were outstanding. Speed, baby. They got hellacious speed. The defense is run by a former Auburn assistant, and uses defensive principles popularized by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers(a factoid I learned during the unavoidable pregame hype).

Mac Brown. Vindication. He's had his nose publicly rubbed in it by Gary Barnett, and after the OU losses (including a dogpile by me!). How sweet for Mac. Does a coach have to be a tactician to be an outstanding coach? Heck no! Leave that stuff to the assistants. A coach has to recruit, and coach his players' attitudes. Mac has done that so well, the entire Longhorn team is now convinced they have been coaching him! That's coaching! Salute, Mac. Couldn't happen to a classier guy.

And salute, Big 12. After the bowl victories by Texas, Kansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma, and Missouri, you guys are suddenly looking better. Too bad Iowa State ran into the buzzsaw that was the TCU Fightin' Horned Toads!

The lamp of the body is the eye

The lamp of the body is the eye;
if therefore your eye is clear,
your whole body will be full of light.

But if your eye is bad,
your whole body will be full of darkness.
If therefore the light that is in you is darkness,
how great is the darkness!

Jesus, quoted in Matthew 6: 22-23
New American Standard Bible

The Small Moments Fill Me With Wonder

My eighteen year old son, Jake, is an excellent trombone player. I was reminded of his play as I sat Christmas morning in Jefferson Baptist Church, in Baton Rouge, LA, watching a flutist and several horn players raise their instruments to their lips, then blow just the right notes.

Jake plays in churches, and in other venues. I sometimes watch him raise his horn, to maybe play solo notes in a silenced chapel or auditorium, and I wonder at how he can be so confident that the right notes are about to come out? He is immensely confident that just the right notes will come out at just the right moments. Why is he not more nervous? Why does he not fear failure to a palpable degree?

The answer, of course, is practice. But only partly. Jake knows he may crack a note, or fail in some other way, yet he accepts that he is imperfect. He is undeterred that some listeners may not accept his imperfections or failures. Jake takes a stand that their beliefs, and any condemnation those beliefs generate, are about the listeners themselves - and are not about him.

To take that stand to heart, and to act out of it, is a courageous thing. And that courage must be summoned not just once, but again and again - maybe during the same performance! It is our lot to be courageous one moment, fearful the next, then courageous again. The cycle is never-ending, because we never "make it" in this life. We never get to a place of solid and constant courage. If we are to be courageous, we must summon it again and again.

There are sparks of divine grace in those summonings. Glimmers of God. The sparks and glimmers cue us to turn our faces to God; and to wonder at the loving gifts he bestows upon us, and at his perfect plan.

For instance, why does a loving God allow fear in our lives? In his novel "Gates of Fire," Stephen Pressfield asserts that the opposite of fear is love. Maybe God allows fear so as to prompt us to turn towards Him, and to let ourselves be washed in His love - the true antidote for fear. Maybe God does everything so as to prompt us to turn towards Him.

Consider: If God allowed us to become constantly courageous, could we then still identify fear? Some of my loved ones have died. My love for them lives on, but my memory of the contours of their faces dims with time. I reassure myself: "Oh, their faces were like this...." But, were they really? Similarly, if I were constantly courageous, would the memory of fear fade, like the memories of the faces of my loved ones?

Without a close familiarity with fear, could we anymore identify courage? What would we measure it against? Courage would be constant, normal, mundane, taken for granted. Could we anymore identify a spark of divine grace in that courage? Would that avenue to God, paved with sparks and glimmers, be then shut off to us forever? I wonder. Humbly. And with great reverence.

Christmas morning, I was awash in wonder as I watched the flutist and the horn players: the beauty of the music, the skill and artistry of the performers, and the confidence and courage. All of existence intertwined perfectly, surrounding and flowing through the musicians and their instruments.

A Teenager's Room

In Denham Springs, LA, where I sit on my futon bed in the room I am sharing with my nephew, Agent 90*, for the Christmas holiday. I spy:

• 19 caps and visors neatly hung on the door
• sports trophies, plaques, award medallions, and personal team photos
• toilet items
• walkie talkies
• TV and Stereo remote controls
• CDs
• hand gripper
• baseball bat weight
• "Money Mizer" change separator
• "Plinco the Monkey", awarded, by class vote, for being the most interesting student in Spanish class
• LSU action posters: football and baseball - Geaux Tigers!
• An LSU football, signed by Nick Saban, mounted on a plaque
• hung on pegs: several colors of elastic baseball belts; plus football belts; plus lanyards, plus a dress belt
• Basketball
• Football
• pillow shaped like football
• football minihelmets: LSU and Dallas Cowboys
• a closet stuffed with clothes top, middle, bottom, and spilling out
• a 7 point rack of deer antlers(with an 8 point rack on the way!)
• World globe
• IPod
• Collection of Quarters from 30 of the 50 states
• Boom box
• Board games: Stratego; Payday; Monopoly; Battleship; Scrabble; Rules of the Game; Texas Hold Em Poker
• Daniel Boone style coonskin cap
• DVDs: collection of Indiana Jones movies; Hoosiers; Bull Durham; Sahara; Friday Night Lights; Rundown - starring The Rock; Cast Away; Coach Carter; Longest Yard - starring Adam Sandler
• the all important Playstation PS2, sitting upon the child's chair I grew up sitting in at our tables on Royal Oaks in Waco, and on Cromart Ave in Ft. Worth
• an "Arrow of Light" from Boy Scout Pack 19
• bag of baseball equipment
• bucket of baseballs
• about 8 pair of shoes: tennis, basketball, jogging, cleats, dress
• bag of golf clubs
• two LSU flags: one purple, one gold
• special double issue of Field and Stream magazine, open to page on how to make your own hunting knife from an antler

*"Agent" stolen from Richard Lawrence Cohen

Christmas Gift Project: A Cautionary Tale

Upper middle class kids gets all the toys they really want from Santa Claus. Most everything else is detritus, which fills up toy closets and basements until it overflows into the house proper.

I had an idea to write a children's book for my seven year old nephew. It would be about 500 words and 25 pages - illustrated with pictures from Google. I imagined the entire process would be about 5 hours of enjoyable project; as opposed to 2-4 hours of detestable shopping; for a gift my nephew didn't even know he wanted, and which would only swell the impressive toy overflow already spilling into his house. Writing a book looked like a genius idea!

With a loose outline in my head, I began to write on Thursday night. I love to write. When I'm really into it, I lose all track of time. I was really into it. I arose after 45 minutes, and it was over 4 hours later. Over the next 48 hours, I would easily spend 90 minutes rewriting and editing what I had already spent 4 hours rewriting and editing. The thing is, its not War and Peace. Its a children's book! And I kinda knew what I wanted to write before I began! I don't know why it took so long, but I couldn't have written what I wanted to write any faster.

Friday night, I began Googling pics to match the words. Its pretty hard to think of pics which illustrate concepts such as pride and hubris. Even when you know what pics you are going for, its pretty hard to find just the right ones. I am something of an idealist. I searched through pages and pages of Google pictures.

When you find the picture you want, you must determine an artistic placement for it on your page. If the action is exiting the right side of the picture, you don't want the picture action to be exiting the right side of your page, and vice verse, plus up and down.

I decided to make some pages simple and sparse; and to complicate some pages with groups of pictures and multiple sentences. By Saturday afternoon, I had finished color printing the pics into their proper page locations. I was happy with the pics. I was getting excited.

I began(low-tech style!) to print the text into the white space on the pages. I arranged the text by visual estimation, printed it onto a practice sheet, held the practice sheet and the picture sheet against the light, estimated corrections, and repeated the entire process as needed. I abused Print Preview to an obscene extent. It will never be the same.

I was surprised by the impact of the pictures upon the words. Lots of words were rendered unnecessary. I deleted a lot of words, changed a lot of words, and rewrote entire sentences. Where the pictures were fun, I often toned down the words. The finalized text, read without benefit of pictures, can seem dry and disjointed. Yet, together, the words and the pictures flow in a fun way.

The pages were finished late Saturday, and it looked like a good book. I had put an unexpected 15+ hours into the project. On the plus side, I had enjoyed the process, and was excited about the almost finished product.

I began to think of other 7 year old friends who might like the book. So, off to Office Max to bind a few copies, when, whammo! - color copying costs 69 cents per page! Still, I was excited enough by now that I spent $35 to make two bound copies for gifts. I don't think children would dig the book in black and white. I kept the original color copy for the future - just in case.

And that's how I turned a good and good hearted idea for a 5 hour project into 16+ hours of labor, $10+ of expended printer ink, and $35 of vanity spending at Office Max.

In future, if I print one pic per page, with simply arranged text, maybe I could produce the 25 pages in an hour. Add a 40 minute run to Office Max for a $4 binding, and there would be a gift for another 7 year old friend. Its a new plan!

Finally:

Merry Christmas to All!

If you read my blog(and some people do!), all best wishes for a wonderful and loving holiday season.
`
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The Boy Who Thought Ahead

I wrote this as a Christmas gift for my 7 year old nephew:

It started when he was a young boy, and
he never went into the street
without first looking both ways:
he was a boy who thought ahead.

It continued when he played soccer.
He learned to act as if he was kicking
the ball into one side of the net,
then kick it into the other side to score a goal.
He knew the goalie would go for his fake.
He was a boy who thought ahead.

When the weather might turn cold,
he left the house with a hat or a hood.

When he had a big day coming up,
he went to bed a bit early.

When the bases were loaded,
he thought ahead.
He would throw to home plate on a grounder,
or check the runners if he caught a pop fly.

When he had homework,
he tried to get it done early.

Sometimes, he thought of good birthday gifts
for his family.
He would make a mental note -
or even write his idea on a paper
he kept in his drawer.
He was a boy who thought ahead.

He would watch
opponents' eyes
before a football snap.
The eyes would often tell the tale
of where the entire player would be going
after the snap.

He would study
where the opponent
might plan to move his chess pieces.

He would think ahead,
and open doors for his Mom.

He would fake
a basketball shot
to get his opponent
into the air.
He would drive to the basket
while they were coming back to the ground.
He learned to shoot lay-ups
from both sides of the basket.
He was a boy who thought ahead.

He learned good table manners,
so he would be a welcome dinner guest.

He only went swimming when an adult was present.

He ate vegetables so he would grow tall and strong.

He drank plenty of water on hot days.
He was a boy who thought ahead.
It was a gift.

However,
the boy
became a bit
too proud
of his ability to think ahead.
He began to think ahead
when he really needed
to pay attention in the moment.

There's a Greek word
for allowing pride
to create overconfidence:
Hubris.
Hubris has caused trouble
for famous Kings and Queens and warriors.
Hubris will sneak up on all of us
when we least expect it.
It snuck up on our hero.
Too much thinking ahead
began to cause problems.

While he dressed for school,
the boy would think about brushing his teeth.
Sometimes he put on one red sock
and one blue sock.

When he brushed his teeth,
he would think about riding to school.
Sometimes, he accidentally put foot cream
on his toothbrush!
Yuck!

On the schoolbus, he would think about doing math.
Sometimes he almost got off the bus at the wrong stop,
until the driver called out to him.
Thinking ahead could be a problem!

When he went to recess, well -
he did focus on play during recess. Thank goodness!

One day, the boy sat down to talk with his Dad:
"Dad, thinking ahead can be helpful,
but too much of it can be unhelpful!"

His Dad said:
"True. The Bible says there is a time for everything.
So, there is a time to think ahead, and a time to focus on the moment.
Its pretty easy to figure out - how did you get confused?"

The boy's eyes twinkled as he remembered his goof-ups, and he smiled a mischievous smile:
"Dad, we must have Greek ancestors.
It was Hubris!
I was too proud and too confident about thinking ahead!"

The boy then recounted his misadventures.
He and his Dad laughed happy laughs,
without thinking at all.
The end.

Genius Mascots Denied: Part III & IV

Recap - I: Grandview, Texas:

Grandview Gravy? Denied!

Grandview Gravity? Denied!

Grandview Grasshoppers? Denied!

Actual mascot: Grandview Zebras



Recap - II: Tuttle, Oklahoma:

Tuttle Turtles? Denied!

Actual mascot: Tuttle Tigers



III: Frisco, Texas:

Frisco Freedom? Denied!

Frisco Treats? (Mascots = pretty wrappers around individual candies. Marketing tie-ins can raise funds for the school district or the athletic department. When football team gains a first down, band plays final line of the Rice-A-Roni jingle; or the jingle of whatever candy company has a marketing tie-in with the school.) Denied!

Actual mascot: Frisco Racoons



IV: Rolla, Missouri:

Rolla Fallas? (Helmet emblem = three overlapping autumn leaves) Denied!

Rolla Maulas? (Mascot = masked professional wrestler w/Jersey accent) Denied!

Rolla Koalas? (HOW could anyone NOT choose ROLLA KOALAS?!) Denied!

Actual mascot: Rolla Bulldogs



I weep for the school-spirited children of our nation.
`
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Phantom Regiment, and Life

Phantom Regiment is a drum and bugle corps squad. Over Thanksgiving weekend, 500+ candidates tried out for approx. 220 slots on the squad for the Summer 2006 Season. Candidates came from many places in the world, including France, Korea, and Japan.

Phantom Regiment is known to have the best horn line in all drum and bugle corps. This is partly what attracted Jake to the team - the other part being that two of his good friends also tried out for the team. All three made it - yea!

Drum and bugle corps don't use trombones. Jake made the team as an Euphonium player - though Euphonium is an instrument he has never played. An Euphonium is vaguely like a Baritone - which Jake learned to play for the tryouts - though Phantom Regiment uses no Baritones. Why learn the wrong instument? Hmmm. I hadn't yet thought to ask. A Baritone does use the same mouthpiece as a Trombone.

On Sunday, November 27, I picked Jake up after his weekend of try-outs at Huntley (IL) High (appropriately located on Harmony Road!). Jake was forlorn. He thought he had been cut in the tryouts for the squad. Here's what actually happened: Jake made the squad, but Phantom Regiment administrators left him off the official roster until he could resolve scheduling conflicts. Jake mistakenly thought he had been cut.

Oh, the sadness. It was like his dog died. Bye bye, best horn line in America.

Since we had only about 16 or 17 hours to drive, I decided to let Jake talk about things as he felt like it. I did not account for cell phones. First, maternal grandmother called. She got the full story. Then mother called. Full story. Jake was dying a thousand deaths. Then paternal grandfather. Full story. 10,000 deaths. Then paternal grandmother got on the phone. Full story. 100,000 deaths. They tortured him as if they were the Egyptian Secret Service, and he had secretly been rendered for interrogation. Brilliant parent that I am, I could only think of one thing to do: we stopped for ice cream in De Kalb, IL.

Didn't help much. Jake was frustrated. He declared he wanted to get back to Texas so he could attend classes on Monday. I confidently asserted that stopping for ice cream would not interfere with getting back to Texas.

We started trucking, and we truck pretty good. We only stop for gas and quick bathroom breaks. During a stop we complete 6 or 8 football pass patterns to stretch our legs. One can always find a location for a "Staubach warm-up" pass. You only need a narrow alleyway through a service station parking lot, and a nice leading lob pass. After, we are basically good for another 300 or so miles.

6:30 PM Springfield, IL gas station: Jake gets a call from his high school Band Director. The high school band will practice for their Christmas concert at 6:45 AM - 12 hours & 15 minutes from now. Jake promises he'll be there. His high school is 750 miles away from this gas station. Uh oh.

Jake drives almost till midnight, all the way to Joplin, MI. I drive through the deepest part of the night, N to S through OK on Hwy 69, passing through one 35 mph town after another. A toll booth guy told us(accurately) this was an hour faster than going through OK City on the Interstate. Still, those 35 mph towns really get to you when a 6:45 AM deadline is looming.

We make it to Jake's high school at 6:50 AM, after travelling the last 750 miles in 12 hours & 20 minutes - including the last part, which entailed fighting through Dallas - Ft. Worth commuter traffic. Woo hoo! Jake had called ahead to inform that he would be late. Band Directors are as demanding as Vince Lombardi.

Here's an irony: the De Kalb ice cream prevented us from making it exactly on time. I oughtn't have been so cock-sure about getting back to Texas.

During the night, we talked about Jake's not making the squad. Jake felt he had deserved to make it. He got very high marks during the tryouts for musical ability, but his marks were apparently not high enough during tryouts for "visual presentation." Oddly, Jake is an outstanding technical marcher (a sentence I never, until this very moment, ever envisioned writing or uttering). The Euphoniums all marched in one big crowd in the school cafeteria, and Jake felt he had been overlooked in the mishmash. He had some regret about messing up the proper Euphonium "Rest Position", but did not feel that was a serious enough error to keep him off the squad. So,

• Jake had some regret(poor Euphonium Rest Position).
• He had some sense of having been a victim of bad luck(via poor judging of his marching skill).
• He had some sense that he had let people down (family and friends).
• He had some sense of embarrassment that family and friends would believe he was not talented enough to make the squad.
• He had quite a lot of sadness that he would not have the fun of being on the squad for the 2006 Season.

These are all extremely human feelings, and extremely common experiences. We talked about some of the following:

Regret
All you can do is all you can do. When you see ways to improve your best for future situations - take note!

Meanwhile, ain't none of us ever gonna be perfect. And a perfect God designed it that way. It is misguided and fantastical to beat ourselves up for being human.

Being a Victim of Bad Luck
First, some perspective: Many people experience way worse luck than this.

Second: The weekend was a lesson about winning and losing. Luck is often a factor - which is why the journey is just as important as the end result.

Jake gave the performances he gave over the "intense" weekend of try-outs. Do the opinions of fallible human judges either validate or invalidate the quality of Jake's efforts, performances, and experiences? Of course not! Do the whims of good luck or bad luck either validate or invalidate those performances and experiences? Does an arbitrarily created method of score-keeping either validate or invalidate those performances and experiences? Of course not. And of course not.

Jake's performances and experiences were ends unto themselves. Who would assert that Jake's efforts did not bring joy to God? Or that Jake's performances were not windows through which observers might glimpse aspects of God's glory? Who would assert that Jake's efforts did not fit neatly into God's eternal plan? The Lord works in mysterious ways. The journey is an end unto itself.

Letting People Down
Intellectually, Jake knew he had not let people down.
Instinctively, he felt he had actually let people down.

Its important to understand that instinctive feelings do not equate to truths. Your instincts are instincts. No matter how strongly instincts scream out, they are not truths to be relied upon, but rather circumstances to be considered.

Imagine you are walking across the African prairie, and you encounter a lion. Your instincts scream out that the best action is to run. And yet, the best action may be to crouch quietly in the tall grass, with heart thumping fast, and let the lion pass by your position.

Its important to keep instincts in perspective. They are circumstances. They are not truths.

Embarrassment
First: Is it our life's major purpose to impress others with our wonderfulness? Though I've done plenty of trying to impress, I choose a larger purpose. Luckily, almost any purpose is larger than the purpose of impressing other people!

Second: In fairness, we are social beings. Social relationships are important. The respect of one's peers has its place. The good news is that we can credit our friends with having intelligence and understanding. If any of Jake's "friends" are so shallow as to have their opinions of him impacted by his Phantom Regiment results, does Jake really desire to continue those "friendships?"

Third: Not making the squad prompts sympathetic attention from girls. I declare this a good thing.

Sadness
Jake's sadness was about mourning and grieving. Mourning is passive. It happens to all of us. Grieving is active, and brave. Grieving is a proactive process of relearning the world. Something has happened, and the world will never be the same for us. Grieving is our method of learning to live and to thrive in the new circumstances.

Grieving is our frequent and sometimes constant companion. Sometimes we grieve a thimble-full, such as when a company stops making a favorite product, or when our favorite team loses a big game. Its valuable to recognize and acknowledge that we grieve small occurrences(in appropriate proportions!).

Sometimes we grieve an ocean-full. Especially during these times, we often wish life could go back to the way it was before our loss. These are appropriate wishes. They serve as a way of acknowledging and honoring the depth of our feeling for the one we have lost. However, it is unhealthy to become stuck in a state of such wishing. The world has changed. It is healthy to acknowledge the truth of that, and to go about relearning the world as it is now.

There's a tendency, whether a loss is small or large, to try and ignore it, and to move on with other activities. Friends see us in pain, and their hearts go out. They council us to "just don't think about it." This is well-meaning, and exactly wrong. We ought not wallow in an unhealthy fashion - we can use our best judgment about that. But we ought not pile up a mini-mountain of pain which we have never acknowledged, and never worked through. That is a recipe for myriad long-term problems.

The Anchoress wrote beautifully about pain. We should not seek it; but, as much as possible, we should not resist its appropriate appearance. The key is to tamp down our initial reaction to pain. Rather than unconsciously react, consciously respond. Let the pain occur as God designed it. Let it be. Just look at it. Look on in wonder.

Jake was responding to his pain in a healthy fashion. It was inspiring. God is in the small things. Jake's chance to be a member of Phantom Regiment was (apparently) gone. He was in mourning, and was bravely grieving. We talked about such things, and about other, more lighthearted things. He is a wonderful young man, and I am terribly proud of him.

Then, on Monday, Jake discovered he had actually made the squad, if only his scheduling could be worked out. Forget all that healthy, tiresome grieving! Yuck. That bitter medicine. That tasteless ordeal of gruel. Oh joy! Oh ecstasy! Its the best horn line in America!

And, oh parental joy! For Jake's happiness - but, also: How good is that life lesson?! For him and for me? What better demonstration of the randomness of good luck and bad luck? What better demonstration of the illogic of judging yourself, for good or for ill, according to the arbitrary standards and judgments of others - as if those standards and judgments actually mean something about you, or about the quality of your work? What better lesson for Jake and for me to vividly remember?

Its about the journey. Thankfully.

The Funeral of Donnie Van Meter

Donnie Van Meter died in a traffic accident at age 41. He is survived by his wife: Kenny Beth, and his daughters: Morgan and Madison - ages 12 and 10. He was laid to rest at 10:00 AM today, in his home of Robinson, TX, which is just south of Waco.

Donnie coached every softball and basketball team on which Morgan and Madison ever played. Last summer, when Morgan's softball team finished as the second best team in Texas, Donnie struck up a friendship with the coaches and parents of the best team in Texas: Graham, TX. He told them Robinson was coming to get their championship medallion in 2006. The day before Donnie's funeral, three of the Graham coaches and parents drove four hours so they could personally express their condolences, and also present Kenny Beth, Morgan, and Madison with their team's 2005 State Championship Medallion.

The night before Donnie's funeral, a long line of mourners had to wait over an hour to view Donnie's body.

This morning, the mourners at Donnie's graveside service included several dozen ten to twelve year-old girls - many of whom wore blue jeans, athletic jerseys, and tennis shoes. Some of the jerseys said "Robinson All-Stars," and these all-stars wore their 2005 State Runner Up Medallions outside their jerseys, dangling from their necks on red, white, and blue striped ribbon.

Most of the girl mourners were stoic throughout most of the ceremony - until the very last song - performed by a single acoustic guitar. The finality of the notes, carried on the November breeze, began to be too much for the girls. A few began to cry, with heads lowered and shoulders heaving. Then, a few more. Soon most of the 40 or so girls were sobbing great salty tears, which visibly dropped from their cheeks, and plopped into the yellowed winter grass below. Of the many ways to ceremonially depart this Earth, being serenaded by the tearful lamentations of young girls is not the worst, by a long shot.

Hangin With Dad

You cannot understand until you get into my Dad's head. My Dad intends lack of criticism to be understood as praise, i.e. his silence means there is nothing to criticise - which is its own form of praise/approval - and he intends it to be understood as such. Here is a typical interaction between us:

Dad: Criticise. Criticise.

Me:

Dad: Harshly criticise. Harshly criticise.

Me: Sharp retort.

Dad: How dare you be disrespectful to your father!?

Me:

Dad:

Me: (Isn't that nice! Dad is bestowing praise. His silence means he approves of my actions and/or my personal presentation!)


Here's a variation:

Dad: Criticise. Criticise.

Me: Sharp retort.

Dad: What? What'd I say? You're awfully sensitive today, aren't you?


Here's Dad and I having an extended conversation:

Dad: Who was that kid you used to have on your team?

(I coached 9 different teams and approx. 150 players)

Me: Which one?

Dad: You know, the one whose parents thought he was the greatest thing ever?

Me: Every kid's parents thought their kid was the greatest thing ever.

Dad: You know. Don't be like that.

Me: I really don't know.

Dad: Yes you do. His Mom was really overprotective.

Me: Every kid's Mom was really overprotective.

Dad:

Me:

Dad: I just don't understand you sometimes.

Me(in a helpful tone): Baseball player? Was it A, or B, or C?

Dad: None of those. You know the kid! I can't believe you. He was a pretty good little infielder.

(This is a big break, as Dad only believed about 4 of the 150 kids were good players.)

Me(in a relieved tone): Was it D, or E, of F?

Dad: That's it! F! Well, his Dad used to always stand around and criticize your coaching, so one day I said to him "You know, there's one difference between Greg and us." And he said "What?" And I said "He's the coach, and he gets to make the decisions." So then he walked away, and he never came back down there and talked to us.

Me: Yeah, you've told me that before. You were smart to get rid of that guy. He didn't know what he was talking about.

Dad: Yep. He never came back down there, that's for sure.
`

Liveblogging West Wing Debate

Apparently, this is live television. It's surely scripted(to an unknown extent), and rehearsed(?!), but its not pre-recorded.

Both candidates profess pre-debate terror.

Senator Vinick - out of conscience, proposes ditching the time limits on responses -like that would ever happen!

Congressman Santos naturally accepts. What else could happen in Hollywood? Still, great premise.

My expectations for this are the same as my expectations were halfway through the FX series "Over There": the producers/directors will tease me by touching on my side of issues, then they will drop the hammer with bs at the end of the show. That pretty much happened with "Over There", which had an American unneccessarily killing an innocent Iraqi boy in the last episode. I must say, though, I really enjoyed the entire "Over There" series. Good show. I made it appt. TV. On balance, it was a net positive for America's effort to help Iraqis succeed in being democratic.

Let's debate!

Immigration

Santos: problem of illegal immigration is ...

Vinick: changes subject to CAFTA, which Santos "voted for before he voted against."

Santos: rehabs John Kerry for future Presidential run.

Santos is waiting to drop the hammer re immigration... ... waiting... here it comes:
false alert - here it comes again: ".. this is an economic problem. Its about Mexico's economy. There is no real solution for this. "

Great. Typical Dem. No ideas on how to solve the problem.

Balanced Budget:

Vinick: even Santos' tax increases won't be enough to pay for his spending increases.

Santos: I will balance the budget by raising taxes on the rich. Vinick has written loopholes into the tax code for the rich.

(This totally skirts the fact that lower taxes increase tax revenue by jazzing the economy. Grrrr. GRRRRRRR!!!)

Moderator Forrest Sawyer:
Spending Cuts? Specifics?

both evade.

Vouchers!!

Vinick: Parents want them. Dems blocking them.

Santos: bbffffftttt.

Vinick: Head Start doesn't work! (audience audibly ooohs/booos)

Santos: Head Start works, but we lose the progress once the kids start school.(He doesn't cite any relevant studies or statistics for this assertion.)

Forrest Sawyer threatens Vinick re: civility.

(I call bullshit. Vinick paid for that microphone!)

Vinick: stop pretending everyone can and should go to college, or that everyone can and should go to MIT.( Excellent!)

Santos demgogues Vinick: so you're just going to give up on those Head Start kids. I'm going to stake my Presidency on improving public education.

Health Care

Vinick: make health care tax deductible.

Santos: this unfairly penalizes low income Americans.(a fair point, as far as I can see.) Nationalize health care.

Vinick: impossible to do effectively.

Santos: my ideal plan: let all Americans have the equivalent of Medicare benefits. Private insurance companies spend 25% on administrative costs. Medicare spends 2% on admin costs. (this is horribly misleading. Medicare is huge - this cuts admin. costs on a percentage basis. Also, Medicare is notorious for getting ripped off by Drs and health care vendors. Medicare pays mind boggling vendor ripoff costs, b/c they almost never investigate anyone who may be ripping them off.) Medicare is the most efficient healthcare system in the world. (oh my God! can't breathe... must .. calm... down) Takes gratuitous shot at HMOs. (Santos is saying Socialism will work! roll eyes here.) Santos takes shot at Pharmaceutical Companies.

Vinick defends Pharma Co's: amazing accomplishments - they save lives. (this has the following benefit for Dems: it identifies real life Repubs as defenders of Pharma Co's. Still, I'm glad to see it. If there's a Pharma Co problem, the solution is more Pharma Co competition - not more govt. We may need to check that Congress hasn't passed laws which prevent new Pharma competition from entering the market. The FDA may be guilty of such barriers to entering the Pharma market. It would be good to take a look at that.)

Canadian drug price limits are unfair to Pharma Co's. Aids drugs in Africa. (Boring).

Vinick: Tax cuts will help impoverished countries of Africa. They have the highest tax rates in the world. Keeps their people poor, and without capital for building things, and without ability to attract foreign business investment. Those nations have high tax rates to prove to us they can pay back our massive loans. Therefore, we have encouraged those nations to lock themselves into economic depression. In this situation, our charity will never be enough.(good stuff)

On commercial now - they have written in parts where each candidate gets a bit tongue tied and flustered. This is good, since we haven't seen a good Presidential debater in a long time. The best debater of my lifetime? Cheating a bit: Dick Cheney. He is fantastic at zeroing in on the important points. If you could combine Cheney with Reagan's charisma, you would have supercandidate!(and mass Dem suicide.)

Jobs

Santos: technical bs answer.

Vinick: I would cut jobs in my first term.. I will reduce the number of jobs in the federal govt. The Presidents job is to get out of the way of private business.

Santos: Government needs to interfere with (implied corrupt) CEOs - such as Airline CEOs running their airlines into bankruptcy.

Santos: Abe Lincoln was a liberal Republican President, then Repubs got pissed off and ran liberals out of their party. (Santos hints, IMO, that Repubs are racist meanies.)

Santos makes long speech about accomplishments of Dems over years - with no response from Vinick!! Vinick folded! Damnit.

Death Penalty

Gun Control

Vinick: pro 2nd amendment

Santos: we need bullet control.(roll eyes here)

Oil and Energy

Santos demagogues Vinick's Oil Industry ties(via campaign contributors?).

Vinick apologizes for his tone!! (I call triple bullshit!!! Bs Bs Bs!!)

ANWAR

Santos: not enough oil to make a difference.

Vinick: we'll never know until we start drilling. Clap if you've ever been to the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge?(zero claps. Vinick is very strong here- thank God. How could anyone honestly lose with all the facts on their side?)

Nuclear Power Plants:

Santos: radioactive waste!!

Vinick misspeaks: "nuclear is completely safe"(Repub misspeaking is the only way the Dems could win this argument also. The fix is in.)

Vinick: the market is the thing which can save us. (You preachin' to the choir!)

Santos: Global Warming!! (these days, crying "global warming" is like crying "racism" - it stops all conversational give and take.)

(Vinick may stroke out at some point. He's getting pretty hot.)

Santos: I will never go to war for oil. (huge applause) I invite Sen. Vinick to join me in that pledge.

Vinick: Oil is a commodity. You don't have to shoot people to get oil. You just have to pay for it.(Vinick refuses to take Santos' pledge. More to come later in the campaign about this. My antennae are up.)

Closing Statements

Santos: govt is good. free market = scary, dangerous bogey man. I grew up a poor (Mexican) child. I'm not using my race as an advantage! I'm so virtuous for not having done so!

Vinick: Thanks Santos for dropping the rules. Different ideas about govt. I have more confidence in freedom. I don't want any more govt than we can afford. I don't want govt trying to do things it can't do. (Hooray!) The Presidential Choice = more govt vs. getting control of govt. (Hooray!) The Presidency needs experience and muture judgment.
(You preachin to the choir again! Vinick is talking about Santos' age, but I say the Dems are children with immature judgment. Do not let the children get their hands on the nation's controls!)

Final Analysis: Hollywood writers did as good a job as they could've of presenting conservative ideas they don't believe in. Very commendable. Alan Alda did as good a job as he could've of presenting ideas he doesn't believe in. Very commendable. That said, as presented, Hollywood made sure Santos won the debate by a narrow margin. Further, the Santos campaign will grab onto Vinick's refusal to take the "no war for oil pledge", and they will hammer Vinick with it for weeks. As they hammer Vinick, the West Wing writers will be metaphorically hammering President Bush. Blegh. Maybe the writers will surprise me by having Vinick eventually and effectively answer this scurrilous charge - which will pave the way for a Vinick campaign victory.* We shall see.

Final Grade: A+. Really. Outstanding episode.

* I'm not very excited about a possible Vinick campaign victory. I'm suspicious. It seems logical that writers who do not believe in conservative ideas will always find subtle, maybe even unconscious, ways to make a conservative President look bad. Ditto for Alan Alda. He's a decent guy, but it makes me queasy to think of him making the case for conservative causes.

7 Things About Me

1. Seven celebrity crushes.

1. Misty May - I love this woman. She is fierce, yet I sense an inner goodness.
2. Patricia Heaton - Just a freckled girl from Cleveland, Patricia is an interesting and gutsy person. Look behind the eyes.
3. Jennifer Lopez- she would have to magically(or drunkenly) find me irresistible, and she would have to magically disappear after a wild weekend.
4. Jewel
5. One of the great basketball players of all time: Diane Taurasi. The strong Italian look is very sexy.
6. Anna Kournikova: The face that launched a thousand magazine covers. I never liked her until I saw her throw out a pitch and be interviewed at a Rangers' game. She is over 6 feet tall!
   
   Bonus women:
7. Brandi Chastain
8. Heather Juergensen - from "Kissing Jessica Stein".

2. Seven things I can do.

1. I am naturally very good with kids.
2. Score in the paint.
3. Skim-read very fast, yet still understand what is written.
4. Disagree with you while not being angry with you, and while still respecting your right to your opinion. Related: I listen and understand your opinion. I can lay out your opinion and your argument in a clear and understandable fashion.
5. Apologize
6. Stand my ground
7. Roof a house.

3. Seven things I can't do.

1. Skateboard or Surf.
2. Play any musical instrument.
3. Write or understand any computer code.
4. Be comfortable and relaxed at a large cocktail-type party.
5. Plumbing.
6. Trigonometry and Chemistry - faked my way through both classes.
7. Hang out with someone who is shopping - this causes actual, physical, Passion of the Christ level of agony.

4. Seven things that attract me to the opposite sex.

1. If a person loves me, I am attracted to them.
2. If a woman truly likes and appreciates manliness - that is attractive. It's okay if manliness sometimes frustrates her, so long as she appreciates - deep in her core - the good and noble qualities of men. By appreciating manliness, she makes herself a very attractive woman.
3. Everyone is touched by God - yet, with some people, His light shines out in every direction. It's very attractive.
4. Humor/wit
5. Softness
6. Courage: to be direct with people, and to get up and try again, after getting knocked down.
7. Nurturing

5. Seven things that I say most often.

1. Remember the song "Rock Me Amadeus"? I like to insert a choice epithet in place of the "Rock" in that phrase.
2. When I yawn, I say "Higgabah". No reason. The sound just fits my yawn.
3. "Things are actually going amazingly well in Iraq."
4. "The Texas Rangers need to just sit tight! Good pitching is on the way!"
5. "I'm actually very good with kids." For some reason, people don't seem to believe it. A prophet(or child-care expert) is never respected in his hometown!
6. The Lord's Prayer
7. "Groovy", as in: "How are you, Greg?" "Groovy!"

6. Seven things I plan to do before I die.

1. The Smithsonian - and tour all of D.C.
2. Yoga
3. Take a motorcycle trip to Yellowstone National Park.
4. Tango
5. Read the entire Bible.
6. Rome
7. Fish Newfoundland and Nova Scotia.