The Old Testament Song

Taylor and her best friend Sydney sing the books of the Old Testament for our church's talent night.

Smugmug

I'm experimenting with a new photo sharing site called Smugmug. I've loaded most of my Peru pictures up there. Check it out and tell me what you think.

Is Google making us stupid?

My friend Scott brought this article to my attention.

Over the past few years I’ve had an uncomfortable sense that someone, or something, has been tinkering with my brain, remapping the neural circuitry, reprogramming the memory. My mind isn’t going—so far as I can tell—but it’s changing. I’m not thinking the way I used to think. I can feel it most strongly when I’m reading. Immersing myself in a book or a lengthy article used to be easy. My mind would get caught up in the narrative or the turns of the argument, and I’d spend hours strolling through long stretches of prose. That’s rarely the case anymore. Now my concentration often starts to drift after two or three pages. I get fidgety, lose the thread, begin looking for something else to do. I feel as if I’m always dragging my wayward brain back to the text. The deep reading that used to come naturally has become a struggle....

The challenge is to read the entire article. It is quite fascinating and a little disturbing.

dog dreams

Here's a picture from Taylor (age 7).
Her cartoon has a surprisingly adult-ish wit to it I think. The New Yorker cartoons have nothing on this.

Can you tell she wants a puppy?

Gulf Shores

 

We were at Gulf Shores, AL last week with a group from church. It was a blessing to be there with good friends. We ate lots of good food, enjoyed the company and played games. Most importantly, the girls enjoyed the beach and Dad stayed out of the sun.

bloo bunny

blue bunny was in blue bunny town - Addy

wisdom and folly

Please check out the spankin' new blog from my friends Jim and Amy. Jim's a philosophy prof and rock n roll fanatic so you know it will be interesting.

Here's a little taste...

Long before I ever became an academician I loved rock n’ roll-from the crunch and sizzle of Jimmy Page guitar riff to the soul-soothing wail of Aretha Franklin. But most of all, I loved the songs themselves, from love ballads to R&B grooves to punk rock political anthems. And I’ve spent decades building my music catalogue, both to enjoy the music and to get a better grasp on the evolution of this art form.

It wasn’t long ago that to call rock music an “art form” was a howler. And it has only been very recently that study of the popular arts generally has become a legitimate field of scholarly inquiry. Happily, today there are several academic journals devoted entirely to the subject, and even the most prestigious aesthetics journals routinely feature treatments of rock music. Finally scholars have realized what should have been obvious all along. The study of popular culture is important because it provides us with insights in a wide range of subjects: art, anthropology, psychology, sociology, cultural studies, and philosophy, to name a few. And study of the history of popular culture is significant for the same reason that any historical inquiry is significant. It provides us with a better understanding of human nature and society.

Stanley Kubrick's Boxes

I'm not a big fan of Kubrick's films (to be fair I've only seen Full Metal Jacket), but I found this documentary about Kubrick's archives to be fascinating. This might give some of you a better insight into what an archives is and what an archivist does (in particular see part 4).



The video is just shy of 50 minutes and does contain strong language.

hattip: FilmChat

Bleed Into One

I for one want to see this documentary. Enjoy the trailer.

Peru Branch

My purpose in traveling to Peru, was to assist the Peru Branch of the Summer Institute of Linguistics in their archiving and learn about their history. Here are a few pictures of the current office in Lima.

 

 

 

Universidad

I'm behind in blogging about my trip to Peru, but I'll try to post more stories and photos over the next days.

On my first Monday, most of the staff at the Institute Linguistico de Verano were attending a dedication of their former reference library to a local university. So I attended the ceremony despite my lack of spanish comprehension.

Iglesia

When I arrived here in Lima on Sunday I was operating on just a few hours of sleep, but I wanted to go to church with my hosts. So after a quick shower, we drove across town to the Spanish-language Four Square church they attend.

While I studied spanish almost 20 years ago in high school, my comprehension is pretty low. The worship was easier to follow. I made attempts to sing along - understanding a few words and phrases. All but one of the songs were new to me. It was fun to sing the familiar song Blessed Be the Name of the Lord with my Peruvian hermonos & hermanas. I really like their song Mas a Ti, Menos a Mi (More of you, Less of Me).

The sermon was more difficult to follow. My host had a spanish/english bible so I knew the scripture passage. Abe translated portions for me as went along. Fortunately, the pastor was a very dynamic speaker making it interesting to listen to and observe.

The church exterior / courtyard

The pastor

Sunday dinner with my hosts the Koops

A dinner guest

Lima, Peru

After 20 hours spent in 3 airports and 2 planes, I arrived safely in Lima, Peru on Sunday morning. I will be here for two weeks, working with and visiting colleagues at the Instituto Linguistico de Verano. I will attempt to blog and post pictures when I can. I am encountering many new sites, sounds, smells, tastes and people. Finding words to describe it all is difficult, but I'll try to share as much as I can in the days to come.

The coastal highway

The home where I'm staying (a third floor apartment)

A view from my host's home

Across the street

YouTube Baby!

I'm officially a web geek now that I've posted my first YouTube videos from the Mike Roe House Show. Enjoy.

Pale Blue Eyes

Workin' On A Building

City of Refuge

Ache Beautiful

The Michael Roe House Show

Michael Roe has been playing and singing since 1979, first with the 77's and more recently solo or with the Lost Dogs. Rumors of a new 77's album have been circulating for a couple of years, and now it look like it will be a reality. So Mike journeyed out on a brief solo tour (the John the Baptist Tour) to preview the "new" songs. The new record will be made up of old school blues and bluegrass gospel spirituals rescued from obscurity, covering the likes of Elvis, Bill Monroe, Blind Willie Johnson, and the Velvet Underground.

We had the privilege of catching the Nashville stop on this tour where Mike and some friends played in the dining room of Mr. True Tunes himself, John J. Thompson. I had heard about these "house" shows, but had never attended one. JJT had cleared out all the furniture from his living room/dining room which made enough room to pack in about 30 loyal fans. It was cool to visit with other Nashville members of the 77s fan community: Zayne, Paul & Amy, and Kyle.

Since this is Nashville, Mike brought out a group of special guests to jam with. Joining him were Phil Madeira and Jimmy Abegg on guitars, Matt Slocum (Sixpence None the Richer) on cello, and Steve Hindalong on percussion. With little or no rehearsal the ensemble opened with a cover of the Velvet Underground's Pale Blue Eyes. I didn't write down a playlist, but it was made up entirely of songs from the new album, until the end when Mike and Matt performed a gorgeous rendition of Ache Beautiful.

This house show was great. Sure the seating was tight and the room was hot - nothing to complain about though when you're witnessing a one of kind jam session by veteran musicians. The sound was raw which fit with the songs - lots of blues with a bit of folk and bluegrass thrown in. I for one can't wait for the new album.

Denomination Blues

We saw Buddy Greene perform last night with the Pa's Fiddle Project band. Check out some of his work on Youtube. This one is Denomination Blues.

Happy Land - Pa's Filddle Project

Last night we had one of those Nashville moments where we enjoyed top notch musicianship at a free concert. The event was Pa's Fiddle Project - a musical odyssey inspired by the music mentioned in Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House books. Janell has been reading the books to our girls (so far they've read Little House in the Big Woods, Little House on the Prarie, and On the Banks of Plum Creek), so the whole family attended the show at Vanderbilt University. The songlist included Arkansas Traveler/Devil's Dream, Sweet By and By, Money Musk, Highland Mary, The Girl I Left Behind, Old Dan Tucker, The Gum Tree Canoe, Barbara Allen, Captain Jinks, The Blue Juniata, Irish Washerwomen, Oh! California, and On Jordan's Stormy Banks. The project and concert are both products of Vanderbilt's Blair School of Music. They have two cds available (highly recommended). This music is a cross-section of Americana: hymns, sprituals, ballads, bluegrass, etc... and will appeal to historians, lovers of american folk music, and of course fans of the Little House books.

Air Show

Yesterday the Blue Angels performed at the Smyrna Air Show. We didn't go, but we did the next best thing by watching parts of the show from a friend's back yard. We had a blast with lots of food, a trampoline, kittens, a couple games of corn hole, and of course the Blue Angels.

beauty from ashes

Nearly two years ago I posted briefly about the tragedy at Taylor University when four students and one staff member were killed in a horrific car accident. The story made national headlines when it was discovered that the identities of two of the victims had been switched. One girl lived and the other died. The story is resurfacing now because the two families involved have collaborated to write a book. Dateline NBC produced a very well done story last week that is available on YouTube in twelve parts. (part one is posted above).

While I can't begin to fathom the pain and anguish that the families have experienced nor can I find a nice neat explanation for why such a tragic event could happen. I do take hope and inspiration from the faith that each family expresses as they share their story. Did God pre-destine these events to occur? I don't know, but I am confident that He does find a way to bring beauty out of ashes.

Billy Graham Center Archives

Wheaton College hosts the Billy Graham Center for Evangelism which has a robust archival program that "gathers, preserves and makes available for use unpublished documents on the history of North American nondenominational Protestant efforts to spread the Christian Gospel." I met the head archivist, Bob Shuster, via email through a mutual contact at SIL. He's been offering me words of encouragement as I transition to archiving within a missional context.

The BGC Archives has a wonderful website chock full of informative articles, interesting exhibits, and finding aids to their collections.

I highly recommend these to start with:

Postcard Evangelism, Part I : Humor

"The Zamzam has been a long time in sinking!":The Tale of an Uncompleted Journey