Gorgeous evening at the drinking club. It was my first trip in over a month, work and kid obligations having kept me distracted from drinking chores. After 90 minutes there, I came home, opened a microbrew, and sat on the front porch with Marie and listened to a new Diana Krall CD I'd just received in the mail. Very close to a nice evening: soft music, soft autumn weather, soft conversation . . . and Meg, Max, and Tess climbing all around us, spilling food, yelling (joyously and otherwise). We then watched The Office season premier, which was good, but I fell asleep halfway through.
__________
Christmas in September. It's the memorial of St. Wenceslaus.
__________
Today's Catholic Church and capitalism. A very good starting point. One of the best blog posts I've seen this year.
Aside: In addition to its solid treatment of the subject, this might be the archetypal blog post: individual analysis, excerpts, good links. It has everything that makes blogging a unique form of literature.
__________
No matter how boneheaded they might be, I'll end up voting for a Republican. And this is why:
A fairy tale about two princes falling in love sparked a backlash – and a lawsuit – against a teacher and a school last year when it was read to a second-grade class in Massachusetts.
But the three frontrunners in the Democratic presidential race suggested Wednesday night at their debate in New Hampshire that they'd support reading the controversial book to children as part of a school curriculum.
_________
Moderate-drinking mice are better adjusted than teetotalling mice.
__________
The fake wine plague.
__________
Better late than never, Miller:
Following an uproar over its sponsorship of the annual homosexual event known as the Folsom Street Fair, Miller Brewing Company has pulled its support from the event.
The scuffle over the brewer's sponsorship is over a poster for the fair that portrays half-naked sado-masochists as Christ and his disciples at the Last Supper.
I love this line from the story:
The group responsible for creating advertising for the “world's largest leather event” said it was not intended to be either "pro-religion or anti-religion."
Well, I guess, maybe. If you're a leather-totin' homosexual, such a portrayal of Our Savior might be a compliment of sorts, but could someone really think that it's a neutral-type statement? Is it morally neutral for a hooker to call another person's mother a whore?
