Sick As A Dog

Today I did nothing but try and get over this nasty flu. Coughing non-stop, up all night, popping cough drops like candy, burning my mouth with gallons of hot tea... fun.

The only good thing was struggling through my son's little league game to see him pull a line drive over the left fielder's head.

Sorry, Wrong Number (1948)

Sorry, Wrong Number stars Barbara Stanwyck, in an Oscar nominated performance, as Leona Stevenson, a rich, invalid woman who accidentally overhears a phone call about a murder of a woman later in the evening. As the story unfolds, Stanwyck begins to believe that she is the target of the murder and is unable to escape the house.

The film is based on a very popular radio program of the same name that was originally performed by Agnes Moorehead, who is better known to my generation as Tabitha's witch mother of Bewitched fame.

As Stanwyck desperately tries, at first, to report the potential crime and then unravel the true mystery behind it, begins to suspect her husband, played by the handsome and young Burt Lancaster, may be behind her future death. Stanwyck does an admirable job playing Stevenson, who is actually a bratty rich girl who manipulates and demands her way through life. But, at the heart of her agressive behavior are deep-seeded fears of loneliness. And here she is, alone in the house, unable to leave her bed, the potential target of a killer. Her Oscar nomination is worthy of her performance as she carries the film.

The end is extremely suspenseful and satisfying as you find yourself peering into the large, empty house, looking at shadows for movement of a killer who may or may not be out there. Stanwyck lost the Oscar to her friend, Jane Wyman. Every time she visited Wyman's house and spotted the Oscar statue, she would jokingly state "that is really mine, you know."

A good flick with excellent writing and nice acting. Sorry, Wrong Number is worth a peek.

Sick and Prayers

Feeling a bit under the weather today. Been fighting a sore throat and a cough.

Also, special prayers for friends of the family who are dealing with a family crisis.

Wish I could write more...

The Anti-Christ

The fundamental view of Revelations is that the Anti-Christ has yet to appear on this planet. This presumption sure has made for a lot of great books and movies. However, many scholars believe the Anti-Christ has already come and gone… it being Nero. I watched a wonderful show about the Bible the other night and it spoke about the belief that Nero was the Anti-Christ.

First, who was Nero? He was the step-son of the Emperor. His mother convinced the Emperor to name Nero successor instead of the Emperor’s own biological son. When this was done, they killed the Emperor, leaving Nero in power. Nero’s mother believed that his new power was equally her’s. He disagreed and had her killed.

Later, Nero wanted to build a grand, massive palace in downtown Rome. The problem? A lot of rich Romans had homes there. The answer? Start a fire and blame the Christians. So, a fire broke out in the middle of Rome and Nero blamed the young Christian movement. This act began an era of Christian persecution rarely matched in history.

Nero then built a massive, indulgent palace with gold encrusted into the stone, and precious stones used throughout the architecture. He built a man-made lake that was gigantic and his self indulgence was so massive that everyone in Rome hated him. Eventually, Nero took his own life and the Romans immediately tore down his palace. They drained the lake and built the Coliseum on it’s location, using the aqua ducts that once fed the man-made lake to feed the Coliseum so that mock naval battles could be displayed.

As mentioned everyone hated and feared Nero. In order to speak cryptically, there was a process, the name of which escapes me, where you would take the original Greek, convert it to Hebrew and convert that to numbers. Using this process Nero converts to 666. The defining moment for scholars in Nero’s assignment as the Anti-Christ is that in an ancient parchment of Revelations, they found the number of the Anti-Christ to be 616, not 666. Why does this solidify Nero as the Anti-Christ? Because one of the ways to spell Nero’s name was Neron (like Pete and Peter), and if you take Neron, convert the Greek to Hebrew and convert the Hebrew to numbers, you get 616.

That’s a pretty compelling argument. So, if Nero is the Anti-Christ then what about the second coming of Jesus? Well, as far as I can tell, scholars haven't found any evidence of that :)

St. Perpetua, Martyr

On the Catholic News Agency website, today they showcase the Saints St. Perpetua and St. Felicity. They were martyred around 202 for being Christians. Perpetua was from a Roman family, who's father was a pagan and who's mother was a Christian. Perpetua was thrown into prison and, despite her father's best efforts, would not give up her faith. She kept a journal of her ordeal.

In this journal, she documents her father's pleas for her to deny her Christianity. I found her statements interesting, in that, I remember my wife telling me "Catholicism isn't my denomination, it is who I am." Perpetua's conversation with her father shows a similar understanding:

"While we were still under arrest my father out of love for me was trying to persuade me and shake my resolution. 'Father,' said I, 'do you see this vase here, for example, or waterpot or whatever?'

'Yes, I do', said he.

And I told him: 'Could it be called by any other name than what it is?'

And he said: 'No.'

'Well, so too I cannot be called anything other than what I am, a Christian.'"

And later, in her diary, she has a vision of her eventual journey to Heaven. At the urging of her brother, she prays for a vision of whether she will be freed or condemned for her faith. She gets her wish and speaks of a path to heaven not unlike Jesus description... Jesus spoke of a path narrow to salvation and Perpetua's vision is similar:

"I saw a ladder of tremendous height made of bronze, reaching all the way to the heavens, but it was so narrow that only one person could climb up at a time. To the sides of the ladder were attached all sorts of metal weapons: there were swords, spears, hooks, daggers, and spikes; so that if anyone tried to climb up carelessly or without paying attention, he would be mangled and his flesh would adhere to the weapons."

At the foot of this ladder is a dragon, Satan, that would try to stop anyone before they were able to climb onto the ladder leading to salvation...

At the foot of the ladder lay a dragon of enormous size, and it would attack those who tried to climb up and try to terrify them from doing so. And Saturus (another martyr) was the first to go up, he who was later to give himself up of his own accord. He had been the builder of our strength, although he was not present when we were arrested. And he arrived at the top of the staircase and he looked back and said to me: 'Perpetua, I am waiting for you. But take care; do not let the dragon bite you.'

'He will not harm me,' I said, 'in the name of Christ Jesus.'

Slowly, as though he were afraid of me, the dragon stuck his head out from underneath the ladder. Then, using it as my first step, I trod on his head and went up."

Satan cowered at the power of Jesus and she used his head to step onto the ladder. What a perfect vision of subservience. When she reached to top of the ladder, she saw a vision of Heaven.

"Then I saw an immense garden, and in it a gray-haired man sat in shepherd's garb; tall he was, and milking sheep. And standing around him were many thousands of people clad in white garments. He raised his head, looked at me, and said: 'I am glad you have come, my child.'

He called me over to him and gave me, as it were, a mouthful Of the milk he was drawing; and I took it into my cupped hands and consumed it. And all those who stood around said: 'Amen!' "

She awakened from her vision, still feeling the lingering effects of her journey.

"At the sound of this word I came to, with the taste of something sweet still in my mouth. I at once told this to my brother, and we realized that we would have to suffer, and that from now on we would no longer have any hope in this life."

You can read her entire journal here.

I love her description of the path to Heaven... it is a narrow path, so narrow that only one person can journey it at time. It is a path guarded by Satan in an attempt to keep us from taking the journey. And, if during this journey, we are careless, the metal weapons surrounding the path will keep us from surviving it.

Powerful images and food for thought for all of us. Do we take our journey too carelessly? Is being a good person good enough? Will our faith be strong enough to push Satan aside on our path to salvation? Will we get distracted on our path and fall prey to the dangers on every side?

A tough journey, no doubt, but with a reward worth any discomfort we may feel, including at the cost of our own lives. Perpetua believed as such. And so should we.

And The Winners Are...

Despite my entry below called Oscars the Grouch, here are the list of winners at last night's Academy Awards:

Best Film (Live Action Feature): Crash
Best Film (Live Action Short): Six Shooter
Best Film (Animated Feature): Wallace & Gromit in the Curse of the Were-Rabbit
Best Film (Animated Short): The Moon and the Son: An Imagined Conversation
Best Documentary (Feature): March of the Penguins
Best Documentary (Short): A Note of Triumph: The Golden Age of Norman Corwin
Best Foreign Language Film: Tsotsi

Best Actor: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Capote
Best Actress: Reese Witherspoon, Walk the Line
Best Supporting Actor: George Clooney, Syriana
Best Supporting Actress: Rachel Weisz, The Constant Gardener

Best Directing: Brokeback Mountain, Ang Lee

Best Screenplay (Original): Paul Haggis and Bobby Moresco, Crash
Best Screenplay (Adapted): Brokeback Mountain

Best Music (Original Song): "It's Hard out Here for a Pimp," Hustle & Flow
Best Music (Original Score): Brokeback Mountain

Best Cinematography: Memoirs of a Geisha
Best Editing: Crash
Best Visual Effects: King Kong
Best Sound Mixing: King Kong
Best Sound Editing: King Kong
Best Costume Design: Memoirs of a Geisha
Best Art Direction: Memoirs of a Geisha
Best Makeup: The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

Oscars the Grouch

You know, being the certifiable movie-nut that I am, I should have been glued to the television last night watching the Academy Awards but, the entire thing has lost its luster for me. I used to dream of winning an Oscar, but those days have passed. I used to want to make a living in the Hollywood system, but those days are passed as well.

Now I want to make my own projects, my own way, without the great sacrifice to my family that being a Hollywood-ite would entail. The older I get the more I am aware of the moral consequences to entertainment. Granted, there is nothing wrong with pure entertainment. As I like to say, rollercoaster designers aren't going to hell because they make really good rides, and neither should filmmakers if they make a film that offers a really good ride.

However, I do see the consequences of inundating our society and our children with morally questionable subject matters. I do understand that I am held morally responsible for my stories and the effects on the souls who watch them.

Plus, the Academy Awards has been so politically charged, against my core sensibilities, that I would find myself seeing who won, then muting the television when the acceptance speeches commenced. So, why watch at all? I can just read who won later.

And I have become increasingly adverse to the culture of celebrity. A friend once asked me if I had heard a rumor about Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston and I responded that the day Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston are curious about my life, I'll be curious about there’s. Until then, they are not on my radar screen.

So, watching the celebrities with surgically repaired faces, bosoms and stomachs, strutting their stuff down the red carpet, wearing dresses by Overpriced Designers R Us, flaunting rented jewelry that is so expensive they could feed the homeless for a year... well, I've just kinda lost the point of it all.

As my children has grown and my faith has grown, I've been able to peel away from my life the layers of the world that used to be important to the core subjects that actually make me tick, that truly inspire and touch me. And watching which dress Hilary Swank is wearing or whether the foreign film sympathetic to suicide bombers in Palestine wins anything... they just doesn't mean as much as it used to.

However, I do remember that the Oscars still represent the culmination of some peoples dreams... hec, they used to be the culmination of my own dreams, and that is the one thing that harkens me back. So, I'll watch the highlights and revisit the award ceremony next year.

Maybe things will be different.

Wonderful Weather

One of the perks of living in Florida is the weather during this time of year. This weekend has been beautiful... mid-70s, sunny, cool.

Today we took advantage of the weather. First, we all went out for a nice two mile walk. Afterwards, we rode our bike a few miles to my son's baseball practice. While my son and I worked with the rest of his team on fundamentals, my wife and daughter relaxed in the bleachers, soaking in the sun and breeze.

Its days like this that make all of the brutally hot weather, humidity and hurricane threats worth it.

Okay, maybe not the hurricane threats.