In contradistinction to most holiday weekends, the US and UK are both enjoying long weekends at the monent: the UK is just having a Late May Bank Holiday, and the US is enjoying Memorial Day weekend.
I do hope that most of you in the US are having better weather than we are. As is usual for Bank Holiday weekends, it began to piss down rain yesterday evening, continued throughout Sunday, and is scheduled to continue through Monday. This meant that we have sat at home and watched the rain, for the most part.
Saturday was good: we went to the table sale at church and spent, spent, spent. We got a genuine Bush transistor radio from the late 1950’s (not one of the retro replicas that is sold on every streetcorner website). It only has medium wave (AM, for you USans) and long wave (which doesn’t have any broadcast stations in the Western Hemisphere, but which has lots of stations in Europe, Russia, and Northern Africa). The sound of this radio is fantastic. Listening to it, and comparing it with the DAB radio in the kitchen, is like listening to the London Philharmonic Orchestra vs. the University of Southern North Dakota at Hoople Pick-Up Orchestra. Yes, there’s a bit of static. I deal with it. I am listening to Radio France at Allouis; a streaming version of this can be gotten here (scroll down and you’ll see a list of stations; click “France Inter”) and you too can listen to what I’m now listening to. They really knew how to make radios in Ye Olde Days. We also bought a white begonia for the back yard and some other plant whose name I forget, some pottery, bought a pound’s worth of tombola tickets, all the prizes of which were stuffed animals. We won a stuffed bug, which HWMBO felt was awful. So, with permission, we switched the ticket to a blue bear who is now getting acquainted with the other bears and various beasties. Oh, and a lampshade for the light in the stairway.
As we returned home with the loot, it began to rain, and that was it for the day. We stayed in, and watched The 50 Films You Should See Before You Die on Channel 4. I’ve bolded the ones I’ve seen.
1. Apocalypse Now (1979)
2. The Apartment (1960)
3. City Of God (2002)
4. Chinatown (1974)
5. Sexy Beast (2000)
6. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
7. North By Northwest (1959)
8. A Bout De Souffle (1959)
9. Donnie Darko (2001)
10. Back To The Future (1985)
11. Alien (1979)
12. Lost In Translation (2003)
13. The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
14. Lagaan (2001)
15. Pulp Fiction (1994)
16. Touch Of Evil (1958)
17. Walkabout (1971)
18. Black Narcissus (1947)
19. Boyz N The Hood (1991)
20. The Player (1992)
21. Come And See (1985)
22. Heavenly Creatures (1994)
23. A Night At The Opera (1935)
24. Erin Brockovich (2000)
25. Trainspotting (1996)
26. Hero (2002)
27. The Breakfast Club (1985)
28. Fanny And Alexander (1982)
29. Pink Flamingos (1972)
30. All About Eve (1950)
31. Scarface (1983)
32. Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)
33. Three Colours: Blue (1993)
34. The Royal Tenenbaums (2001)
35. The Ladykillers (1955)
36. Fight Club (1999)
37. The Searchers (1956)
38. Mulholland Drive (2001)
39. The Ipcress File (1962)
40. The King Of Comedy (1983)
41. Manhunter (1986)
42. Dawn Of The Dead (Director’s Cut) (1978)
43. Princess Mononoke (1997)
44. Raising Arizona (1987)
45. Cabaret (1972)
46. This Sporting Life (1963)
47. Brazil (1985)
48. Aguirre, The Wrath of God (1972)
49. Secrets & Lies (1996)
50. Badlands (1973)
Around 1:30am, I woke up with the sensation that I was going to be ill. I think that it was acid reflux, something with which I have not previously been burdened. I nearly inhaled it, and spent a bit of time coughing and spluttering. When it happened again, I went downstairs and sat in my favourite chair and slept for the rest of the night. Not totally satisfactory, but I managed to get through the day.
Today was Pentecost, so I put on my jauntiest red bow tie and sauntered over to church. Again, the Rector demonstrated that he hasn’t the faintest idea of how to put together a good liturgy and, yet again, we were there for an hour and a half. Home again, for a light lunch and surfing in the afternoon.
It looks like we’ll be going to Shanghai from the 16-21 of June to visit our friend Choo Beng. I’ve not been there before; I gather there’s a bit to see and do, but I would prefer to go to Hong Kong. Oh, well, next year, if I’m spared. We’ll also be taking another short trip to a resort to just lay on chaises longues next to the pool and drink concoctions brought to us by good-looking young men.
Tomorrow will be rest and relaxation.
I hope that most of you will have a much more relaxed and productive Bank Holiday weekend, what’s left of it.
we had our long weekend last week in the Great White North (Victoria Day, her birthday was/is 24 May, these days we get the monday before), so I’ll be at work on the 28th, but properly wearing White Shoes).
Sorry to hear about your liturgically unsatisfactory pentecost. Church of the Redeemer, Toronto, by contrast, had a liturgy that was absolutely spiffing. Of course, i’m always well disposed to a service that includes the hymn Siyahamba (that would be We are marching in the light of God)
we began with most of the church lights dim, and out came Jean (who is a crackerjack storyteller) in a mountie-jacket-red dress; and she told the story in Acts 2 – in the biblical text, but completely off-book.
at Gospel time, the principal reader was Andrew Wesley, our aboriginal associate. he read the passage first in English, then it was read by other congregational members, next in Punjabi and then in German. Then Andrew re-read it in his native tongue, Cree. Later polyglot moments were: the sanctus (a version we’ve sung several times before) which was in Spanish, and most of the eucharistic prayer was in Latin. And they asked us to pray the Dominical prayer in whatever language we felt comfortable doing it in — eight were provided in a handout, I did French .
But the piece of resistance, as they say, was the sermon. Now preaching is one of Andrew (asbil, our rector)’s real gifts, but this one he surpassed himself in text and delivery. He was talking about fire and holiness, and telling our stories; starting off (and regularly returning to) the fire of the paschal candle, and how we tell our stories. He was in his story-telling outfit (not alb). We had all the children up in church for the whole service, rather than returning around about the offertory, and it became clear why. While delivering his sermon, andrew ate fire. Torches lit from the paschal candle – started off with moses and teh burning bush (hand extinguish the torch); then the tale of pentecost, then how we tell our own stories, and thereby spread the fire of the spirit just as the apostles did. Thc children were transfixed, and the grownups not far behind. He spoke of the fire that came down on each aposle at pentecost, and then there was literally a flam on his own tongue. There was another routine where he has one lit torch, one not lit; and flame was transferred to his mouth, and then to teh second torch. The flame in each of our mouths, as we tell our stories, is how others catch the flame of the spirit, by our witness.
unforgettable.
(and I rememberd what day it was 5min before departure, so I *did* get to wear my red shirt to church. (crimson, not scarlet; I’m a winter and look like death in a mountie-jacket)
The only ones I’ve not seen are:
A Bout De Souffle (1959)
Lagaan (2001)
Come And See (1985)
Hero (2002)
Manhunter (1986)
Secrets & Lies (1996)
Badlands (1973)
🙂
as to movies, the only ones on this list I have seen are A Night at the Opera, All About Eve, and Terminator 2. I guess movies aren’t really my thing.