Parenthetically Yours

Favorite Things Friday

It’s good to be back on the blog and to be sharing all my opinions with anyone who will listen (er…read?). Turns out, that’s about 100 people. Not enough to swing an election…but more than enough to, say, help me move. A good number. (note: no. I’m not moving. Just a figure of speech.)

It’s Friday. It’s time to let you in on my little secrets this week.

KONA COFFEE  So yeah, I went to Hawaii last week and got back this past Monday. Before I even boarded the plane in Nashville, I knew what I would be bringing back home: a tan and some Kona coffee. Only coffee grown in the Kona region of the Big Island can be labeled “kona,” therefore it’s a very limited (and expensive) coffee. On the mainland, it’s generally only available once a year (late spring) and usually fetches $30-$50/lb. I thought it would be much cheaper in Hawaii. Ha. Nothing is cheaper in Hawaii. Even sunburns have a consumption tax. I bought two 8 oz. bags (one for me, one for a friend) at $19 a pop and am a third of the way through mine. You really can tell a difference. It’s mild and mellow, like Hawaii. Even this dark roast I’m sipping this very moment has zero bitterness, but strong flavor. I’m more than a little tempted to drink this other bag and not tell my buddy I got any for him. Is that wrong?

AMERICAN IDOL  Yeah. It’s that time of the year (we’re about five or six weeks deep at this point) and I have to admit, I’m completely hooked…again. For the most part, there’s a ridiculous amount of talent on that show, year after year and my picks have won the past three years running. The top 12 was just rounded out last night (I picked 10 out of the 12 so far, thank you) and now we get into the popularity contest of it all. My picks for the final two? Lil Rounds and Danny Gokey. They both have great stories, humility, charm, and talent for days. I used to be totally ANTI-IDOL…but with my growning appreciation for David Cook, Carrie Underwood, Eliott Yamin, Kelly Clarkson, Jennifer Hudson, etc…well, you can’t argue with genuine talent. I’ll admit a few big disappointments so far this year (which I won’t mention for risk of sounding too much like a super-geeky-fanboy), but all in all, once again, Katie and I are glued to the TV every Tuesday and Wednesday nights.

THE JESUS I NEVER KNEW. My friend Tony Lucido gave this groundbreaking book by Philip Yancey to me a little over a year ago. I’m just now picking it up to read. Why did I wait? I recommend this book to anyone who grew up going to church.

Thank you, and good night!

(rw)

Favorite Things Friday!

First of all, let me start out by telling you that it's 6 outside. No, that's not a typo and I am not exaggerating for comedic effect. It's 6 degrees. So, when you live in a house that was built in 1924, well...let's just say that insulation technology has come a L-O-N-G way since the roaring 20s. Our thermostat is reading...well, it's not reading anything. It's totally pegged all the way to the left, resting somewhere below 55. My guess is that it's high-40s, low-50s in our house right now. I'm wearing snow boots, thermal underwear, lined pants, a sweater, a scarf and a winter hat. This is an intro for my favorite thing today: Drew's Brews Coffee. Drew Park roasted coffee for years at Nashville's first artisan coffee house, Bongo Java, and started roasting his own beans in 2007. He's slowly built a following around his own hand-made recipes, roasted daily in small batches. Today I'm having a cup of his Gravel Springs roast. Dark and smoky...sooooo good on this frigid morning. Mmmm...hands warming.

#2 on the list is Fred Armisan and Kristin Wiig.  The time I saw Fred Armisan on SNL several years ago, his humor and delivery was so subtle that I thought, "This guy is either an idiot or a genius." Turns out, it's the latter. He can be Adam Sandler ridiculous or Andy Kaufman awkward--either one cracks me up. Kristin Wiig is the funniest girl on Saturday Night Live since Amy Poehler and Tina Fey. Her characters and accents are uncanny and she's not at all afraid to look ugly for a laugh...and that makes me laugh. Suffer though the ads for a couple of my favorite sketches featuring these two.

Finally...this photo by my friend Jeremy Cowart. It's an older photo of his, but one of his most enduring. Go to his website and freak out. For this one, from his book Hope in the Dark, I'll let the picture speak it's thousand words.

(rw)

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year.

Franklin is a ghost town. By that, I don’t mean that it’s uninhabited. I mean it in the same way one might say, “Arkansas is RAZORBACK country,” or, “Nashville is a guitar town,” or, “Rome is a Pope town.” In other words, they like their ghosts around here. Last year around Halloween, Katie was at Bible study one evening, so a couple of friends and I went on the Haunted Franklin Ghost Tour (yeah, I get the irony). We spent 90 minutes touring various buildings downtown behind a sarcastic thespian-type wearing a civil war-era get up as she filled us in on the local haunts of Franklin’s sordid past. It was actually really informative and since I’m a history nerd, I loved it. I also know which downtown buildings I DO NOT want to spend the night in. Scary stuff. Who knew my town was Tennessee's most haunted? I mean, if you believe all that.

My memories of Halloween revolve around KISS because I only remember dressing up as Ace Frehley for three years in a row. I also remember watching KISS Meets the Phantom of the Park on Halloween night one year. It had to be 1978 or something. Mom and dad were at a party so we got stuck next door with our neighbors. After returning home from tricks and treats, our bellies full of discount candy, we settled down by the warm glow of the television. It was my generation’s Beatles on the Ed Sullivan Show. Of course, the main difference is that the Beatles were geniuses and KISS were buffoons. Tell that to a 10 year-old boy with stars in his eyes, though. It was bigger than Star Wars for me. 

I’ve never lived in Franklin, though, until after the wedding in January, so this will be my first official Halloween here. Apparently, it’s a pretty big deal downtown where we live. Our neighbors said they spent hundreds on candy last year and that kids are literally lining up the sidewalks. One lady used a counter to keep track of her ghoulish little visitors and by the time the night was over, she had clicked the thing over 1,500 times. Up and down Main and Fair streets people have begun decorating like it’s Christmas. One family is readying their garage to be transformed into a haunted, um, garage (?) with a GIANT pumpkin façade. Kids will walk through the mouth of said pumpkin to get inside. I’m not kidding when I say they’re REALLY into Halloween here.

But before some of you get up in arms about the theological correctness of “celebrating” All Hallow’s Eve—don’t. It’s all in good fun here and the kids get to play dress up and get free candy. That’s it. Hopefully my (and your) faith and theology can withstand one night a year giving away sweets to 6 and 8 year-old Spidermen and Hannah Montanas. And I can’t wait. I already have my Ace Frehley mask.

Check back next week for my Top 10 Ways to confuse trick-or-treaters.

(rw)

OH yeah...it's Watercooler Wednesday!

O MTV, Where art thou?

I don’t even know where to begin with this post, so I’ll just ask—did you see the MTV Video Music Awards last night? I’m still shaking my head. It was, by a great margin, the absolute worst broadcast I’ve ever laid my eyes on. I know what you're thinking. "Worse than Clay Aiken's Christmas special?" Yes. Worse. Katie and I are dumber for having spent the majority of our evening looking at the television in disgust. And not because we don’t “get it.” It was simply embarrassing to watch, like a 50 year-old chubby guy wearing skinny jeans.

Like I said, I don’t know where to begin, so I'll start with the host, Russell Brand.  Yeah, you know the big superstar comedian? Oh, you don’t? Neither does 99% of the United States. Having an underground comic from Europe host was MTV’s (failed) attempt to be uberhip but all it accomplished was proving how increasingly irrelevant the show and the channel has become. Brand's comic character is a self-absorbed, clueless rocker guy. In theory, it makes sense because the audience in Los Angeles for the show was full of those types. The problem (and it’s the problem MTV has had for 15 years now) is that character doesn’t play well, if at all, to the rest of America. He made fun of our president, sexual morality, and told us how to vote. Is there anything more annoying than someone not from America telling us their opinion on our politics? If I have to listen to liberal propaganda, I want to hear it with a New England accent, not an old England one. The saddest thing is that the opening skit with Jonah Hill and Britney Spears was the funniest, most self-deprecating moment of the night. Why didn’t the two of them host? Or Seth Rogan? Or a Ben Stiller/Jack Black combo. Anyone but the fake, unknown rockstar pretending to be subversive. In fact, the only genuinely subversive moment of the show was the ever-classy Jordin Sparks responding to Brand’s comments about the stupidity of virginity. She defended her values and said, “not everyone wants to be a slut.” You go girl. I guess virginity and sensitivity is the new punk rock.

Unlike MTV, there was a little music last night…but again, horrid. There’s a big difference between being shocking and groundbreaking and simply trying to be shocking and groundbreaking. It’s the difference between Nirvana and Tokio Hotel. Or the difference between The Office and The Hills. One is an innate quality, the other is manufactured. Sadly, most every performance fell into the latter category. Even the world-class talents of Rhianna and Christina Aguilera were completely overshadowed by the dark, pretend-scary production. Thankfully, a little band from my zip code stole the night. Paramore were stellar and owned the stage like they were the 1976 Rolling Stones. The swagger, the attitude, the music—it was all there and came off authentic. And they showed up on the red carpet in two tiny Smart cars as opposed to a Hummer limo. Eco-friendly and rebellious at the same time. Franklin, TN in the house!

I think that’s what it comes down to for me: Authenticity. Does it coming from a true, unfiltered place within? Or is it manufactured to simply keep up with appearances? MTV put together one of the most pretentious, offensive, and vapid broadcasts in the history of the medium. Please OH PLEASE let this give rise to a new rebellion—one that values substance over fluff and truth over pretension.

(rw)

I'm not an addict...

I need an intervention. I have an addiction and Katie is enabling it with her own habit. Our drug of choice? Intervention.

Have you ever watched it? It’s a show on A&E that is the most dramatic and honest (brutally) show on television. You can even watch full episodes on their web site. The premise is they follow an addict for a couple of weeks under the guise of filming a documentary about addiction. It’s all leading up to the show’s climax, the intervention, at the end of the hour-long show. We’ve watched 6 episodes this week alone. Here’s why, though. It’s totally redemptive. It’s about the triumph of love over death, of relationship over sickness, of wholeness over brokenness. And I cry in every episode. Sometimes you sympathize with the addict, sometimes with the mom, or the husband—but in every episode, there’s at least one heroic person who’s reached the end of their rope. Most times, heroism happens at the end of ropes.

The show has the exact same format each week. We’re introduced to the addict in a confessional-style interview. The producers inexplicably have them spell their name (a silly thing that I’ve begun to say along with them) then the family's and friends’ interviews are spliced in to give an overview of the problem. There’s always a photo and video montage of the addict as a child where you see the innocence, the enthusiasm, the smiles. But there is always something sinister, something darker just around the corner which leads into the addiction and its effects that leads up to the unexpected intervention. But the absolute best part of the show happens immediately after the subject is checked into rehab. The screen fades to black and three words appear: Two Months Later. The suspense is incredible. Did he succeed? Did she do it? Most of the time it’s a success story that get the tears flowing. Other times you find out they’ve relapsed or got kicked out of recovery.

The things people use to numb their pain can be surprising, but thing is, we all have a tendency to self-medicate. Some people spend money to forget their problems, some eat. I know people who are addicted to church and worship as a form of numbing themselves. That sounds like heresy doesn’t it? The truth, though, is that to the extent that we use anything (whether it’s worship music, dating, shopping, or heroin) as a means of escaping the things the Spirit wants to deal with (our pain, brokenness, insecurities, etc), we’re missing the entire point Jesus was trying to make when He said the Truth will set you free. Ignoring the truth is called denial and numbing the pain with anything is called medicating.

The people on Intervention aren’t any different from any of us except maybe they’re just riskier with their drugs. 

(rw)

Unfaithful

Dear Internet,

I'm sorry. There I said it. I'm sorry for not spending quality time with you lately, but I promise it's not you, it's me.  I know that sounds cliché, but it's true. You've always been there for me and you have done nothing to cause me to stray. But I think it's best to be honest with you, because if we can't be honest with each other (or at least fake sincerity), what kind of a relationship do we really have. So...here's the truth: there's another woman...and a man...and a few teams of them. Yes, it's true...I've been spending all my time lately with Michael Phelps, Nastia Liukin, Shawn Johnson, Jonathan Horton, Dawn Harper and the entire US Olympic Team and they've got me doing things I would never do before. It's all so exciting! I watched the opening ceremonies (all four hours) with my jaw on the floor and stayed up to the wee hours yesterday to watch table tennis and badminton live. Badminton! And I didn't even know it was spelled badminton until this week! It's bad and I'm afraid only getting worse. I've been crying at VISA commercials and rooting for Russian gymnasts. What? I was a Ronald Reagan/Cold War era kid! How can I root for Russia? As long as they beat China...GO RUSSIA!

I also need to admit that I've been using you, internet. I used you to go here and here. I'm sorry, but I can't promise that I won't do it again. I'm not saying you did anything wrong, but even the Today show is more interesting than you. Is that too harsh? Remember, we promised honesty to each other. And I'm honestly not interested in you. But it's not you, it's me. Maybe it is a little bit you.

Internet, we're not finished, we can work through this. Before you know it, we'll once again be surfing hand in hand to our favorite sites: craigslist, ebay, drudgereport, dooce, consumerist...all the old familiar places. We'll make new memories and have a fresh start. I promise.

I promise I'll come back. But first, the women's water polo team is playing for gold.  Go girls!  U-S-A! U-S-A!  

(rw)

P.S.  I've posted this for all the world to see on Randy Elrod's Watercooler Wednesday post.

Unsolved Mysteries

So I’m sitting here watching Weird Travels on the Travel Channel and the entire episode is dedicated to Sasquatch/Bigfoot sightings around the country. They spent time in the usual spots—Oregon, Washington, northern California—including a humorous segment on the Skunk Ape of southern Florida. I was quite surprised to learn that there are hundreds of sightings a year in Texas. The mystery here isn’t that there may or may not be a large hairy creature skulking about the east Texas woods. If you’ve seen large hairy creatures skulking about the east Texas woods, you’ve simply come face to face with my father-in-law and his deer hunting buddies.

That’s no mystery. The real mystery is that there are actual Texans who believe such nonsense.

(rw)

Gnashville Star

Last night we watched the season premier of Nashville Star. We recorded it Monday night and I’d been looking forward to finally sitting down and watching it. Ok, to be perfectly honest, I was really excited. Too excited. I'm the guy who used to obsess over all-things-obscure and now I'm pining for the season premier of Nashville Star. It’s more than a little embarrassing. But I’ve learned my lesson.

What we watched last night was possibly the worst assembling of mediocre talent that I’ve seen in a L-O-N-G time. And I’ve seen some pretty bad assembling of mediocre talent (Rascal Flatts anyone?). I’ll admit, part of my excitement about NS has/had to do with living in Music City. I’m proud to live here. Like the weather, love the people. Big enough that there’s always something to do, small enough that I’m not smothered by stuff. Plus, past seasons of NS always had some real, genuine talent and the producers seemed to put substance over style. Well, now it’s gone corporate (read: NBC picked it up) and every contestant seemed just a little too groomed. I won’t go into mocking individuals (too easy) or their performances, but all in all, Monday night’s show could’ve been a worst-of compilation of American Idol auditions. Even the best performance of the night (Gabe Garcia, a Hispanic country traditionalist from south Texas) was just a decent George Strait imitation. Give him the title already and replace the show with The Office/30 Rock reruns every Monday. I’d rather watch a live feed from Tina Fey’s kitchen for an hour. Cheaper and more entertaining. Maybe she’ll say something witty about boiling orzo. Orzo not.

I think the thing that is most upsetting about this so-called “Nashville Star” trainwreck of a show is that in the contact list of my phone are independent artists who are not “stars” but could out-sing, out-perform, out-create any of the artist placebos we saw last night. So, for you dear reader is my partial list of the real Nashville Stars (in no particular order):

Andy Davis
The Daylights (Los Angeles via Nashville)
Anthony Skinner
Laurianne Cates
Dave Barnes (already shining like a star)
David Mead
Matt Wertz (he's becoming a star too)
Disappointed by Candy (my current fave local band)
Tyler James
Matthew Perryman Jones (staggering lyrics)
Landon Pigg (oh, wait…he’s sorta famous now)
Andy Gullahorn
Paper Route
Tyler Burkum
Drew Cline
Jason Moore
The Katies
Jonathan Steingard
Erin McCarley (about to be famous)
Trent Dabbs
Jesse Deyo
Jason Eskridge
Will Hoge
Wes Hutchinson (NYC via Nashville)

PLEASE spend part of your day listening to ALL this music. I promise you'll be surprised and will most likely find a new favorite.

Don’t get me wrong. The time wasn’t totally wasted last night. The best moment of the night happened when judge John Rich told fellow judge Jewel (What? Why?) that she had no business commenting on someone’s quality of singing because basically she can’t sing either. That was worth the two hours right there. Awesome.

(rw)

Watercooler Wednesday: Mac or PC?

Hotel Awesomeness/Morning Metal

This may be just a little too techno-geeky, but we stayed at the Hyatt Place hotel yesterday and I have to sing (type) its praises. The rooms are super comfy but really simple. I could seriously live in one of these rooms as a small studio apartment. But the coolest thing about the room, by far, is the giant 52" LCD television with this control panel mounted next to it. With the right cables you can plug in your laptop and use it as your computer monitor. Or if you travel with your gaming system (which I don't) you can plug it straight in here. Or plug in your iPod or iPhone or other audio equipment. And there are plenty of electrical outlets in the rooms. Dang...this is starting to sound like a commercial. Where's my check?

So, I'm at this festival in Snyder, TX and it's primarily metal music all day long...and then us. My guess is that all the metal kids will be on their way to 7-Eleven jonesing for Mountain Dew by the time we hit the stage. The families will start showing up later in the evening for our set. It reminds me of a show I did about 10 years ago in Colorado. It was all metal and goth music all day long. I remember a band called Rackets and Drapes played that evening. I made the mistake of thinking they were called Raquets and Drapes. I thought they were just into tennis and/or home decorating. Nothing could've been further from the truth. These girls were downright scary. For some reason I recall them dipping popsicle-stick crucifixes in red paint and either sprinkling the crowd with them or throwing them. I would've loved to have been in that band meeting when they came up with that idea. "We need something extreme to get our point across. Hey, don't you have all those leftover popsicle sticks from that Jamestown settlement project you were working on for 4th period History? I have an idea!" I think it was intended to be some sort of visual aid to enhance their alarmingly angst-y Christian rock music, not unlike those felt-board displays from the Sunday Schools of my youth. I've blocked most of it (the performance, not the felt-board lessons) from my memory. Both therapy and aging are equally effective means of forgetting.

But I digress. So this morning I wake up, have a little coffee and do a little reading--a nice quiet morning. I love quiet mornings. Around 10:30 I walk into the venue, a little bleary-eyed and looking for the dressing room. I hear the faint rumbling of bass and drums coming from the other side of the door but figured it was just another soundcheck happening. Nope. When I opened the door, I was smacked in the face with metal. Living Sacrifice was on stage--not soundchecking, but playing their set...at 10 in the morning. It was like raising the spoon to your mouth to take that first sweet bite of Cocoa Puffs...and chomping down on a heaping spoonful of glass shards. Or maybe being woken up by your mom hitting you in the head with a two-by-four. Or walking into room at 10:30 a.m. and Living Sacrifice is playing a full volume. Actually, it was exactly like that. Don't get me wrong: LS are an amazing band and have influenced thousands of kids across the world. We're even from the same hometown. Gotta love 'em. But I think metal sounds better sometime after noon. Preferably about 30 minutes after lunch. Sorta like swimming.

(rw)