Month: May 2007

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Falwell in Limbo

Falwell Says ‘Misunderstanding’ Keeping Him out of Heaven — For Now

Conservative Christian leader still confident about receiving eternal reward

ALMOST HEAVEN, W. Va. (AP) — The Rev. Jerry Falwell, founder of the Moral Majority and a scourge to liberals, sodomites, unbelievers and the damned of all stripes, said Tuesday his death came quickly and without suffering but expressed impatience with a “misunderstanding” he said was delaying his expected speedy admission into the eternal company of the Lord.

“Jesus gathered me to his bosom, from right there in my office,” a still ashen-faced Falwell said in a hastily called press conference after his lifeless but still bulky form was discovered at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Va.. “It was painless, really, and as usual I felt well prepared to meet my Maker — in fact, I popped a Tic-Tac as soon as I started to feel my end was near.”

But Falwell said despite his fresh breath and a lifetime of chastising the ungodly, his expected quick admission to Paradise had met with an unanticipated, and unwelcome, delay.

“I can’t think of anyone more qualified to bask in the eternal light, the everlasting warmth of Our Lord Jesus Christ,” Falwell said. “I can’t think of anyone who was a more humble servant in the cause of the Almighty. Why God himself wasn’t at the front door to welcome me I can’t say.”

Instead, Falwell said, he was forced to stand in line “for an indeterminate time” with others among the recently dead also seeking admission to Heaven. The crowd included “obvious gays and lesbians” as well as “miscellaneous famine, flood and war victims” and many who appeared poor and homeless, Falwell said.

“Jesus talked about doing right by ‘the least of these,’ but a lot of those people are fit for nothing else than slow roasting in the unquenchable fires of Hell — for the lice if for no other reason,” he added. He said he intended to approach God or lesser Heaven officials to discuss expedited entry for well-qualified applicants such as himself.

The minister, whose sonorous sermonizing and fiery fulminations will no longer thunder through Lynchburg’s massive Thomas Road Baptist Church except on tape and DVD, said he was particularly incensed to find himself queued up behind “hip-hop fans, humanists, atheist lawyers, liberals, agnostics and ACLU riff-raff.” He said many of “questionable beliefs” were admitted into the Lord’s presence even after acknowledging in entry interviews that they enjoyed sex on television or in person and had worked to keep Christian prayer out of U.S. public schools.

“I don’t get it,” Falwell said. “Perhaps this is a celestial prank, a misunderstanding or a test of some kind. More likely, the hand of Satan is at work, right here at the very threshold of my eternal reward.” If Satan is not involved, Falwell said, “this is not making a lot of sense to me.”

The late minister reported he ultimately grew tired of waiting for an expeditious entry to Heaven and is now seeking temporary lodging elsewhere until the admissions backlog clears up. One result, Falwell said, is that a planned “Rev. Jerry Falwell: In Heaven and Loving It” day scheduled to be celebrated both in Heaven and on Earth has been postponed.

“We’ll reschedule,” Falwell said. “Sooner rather than later — as soon as the Lord gives me what’s coming to me.”

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Practically Tuesday Monday Notebook

Home truths: If someone is explaining to you that they’re not an asshole — like the animal control officer who stopped me just around the corner and told me that if were an asshole, he’d write me a ticket for walking The Dog off leash and more than six feet away from me (per city ordinance) — the someone is probably an asshole. And if someone apologizes for being an asshole, they’re probably not one. I said probably. Thus concludes this adult language interlude.

Dog moment: Speaking of The Dog, a year ago today we brought him home from his Central California wanderings; since he’s still not talking, we don’t know anything about that adventure except the way it ended. And now he has his own pet: a mildewed rawhide chew-thing that he buried in the backyard for some weeks or months and recently uncovered for his renewed canine enjoyment. He’s very protective of the rawhide chew, which we’ve named Filthy Bone. As in: “Scout, you can’t play with Filthy Bone in the house.”

Read and wonder: A long piece in The New York Times Magazine about the Iraqi diaspora — the flow of refugees all over the Middle East — and the unhappy consequences present and perhaps future of same. A much shorter piece in today’s San Francisco Chronicle on an Indiana teacher fired for suggesting in class that she’s not for the Iraq war. That story begins:

“When one of Deborah Mayer’s elementary school students asked her on the eve of the Iraq war whether she would ever take part in a peace march, the veteran teacher recalls answering, “I honk for peace.”

“Soon afterward, Mayer lost her job and her home in Indiana. She was out of work for nearly three years. And when she complained to federal courts that her free-speech rights had been violated, the courts replied, essentially, that as a public school teacher she didn’t have any. ”

She has appealed, but without much hope of a reversal, to the Supreme Court of the United States. The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decision upholding her firing is available here as a PDF file.

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‘Made It Ma! Top of the World!’

Deplorable movie moms: A brief tribute on this most maternal of days.

Ma Jarrett (“White Heat“)

Margaret White (Carrie’s mom in “Carrie“)

Elizabeth Stroud (“Birdman of Alcatraz“)

Kate “Ma” Barker (“Bloody Mama“)

Lady Macbeth (“Macbeth,” especially the Roman Polanski version)

“Ma” Alien (“Aliens,” especially)

Zinnia Wormwood (“Matilda“)

Petal Bear (“The Shipping News“)

Ma Vicious (“Sid and Nancy“)

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Friday Notes

Honor America, damn it: The New York Times had a story yesterday on the measures the Yankees take to get ballpark patrons to pay attention to the playing of the national anthem and “God Bless America.” It’s simple, actually: The team has ushers block the aisles with chains during the ritual musical moments. That prevents people from proceeding to their seats (during the anthem) or getting up to buy a hot dog or beer or to take a leak (during “GBA”), until the last strains of the patriotic airs have wafted out over the Bronx. I like the Yankees’ explanation: It’s not that the team wants to force its customers attention to the business of honoring America; it’s just that the team is responding to complaints from fans who were scandalized that other fans weren’t showing proper deference during this quasi-religious exercise. (Personally, I admire my fellow citizens who take time out from honoring America to make sure the rest of us are, too. I also believe the seventh inning of major league games and half-time of pro football and basketball games should be suspended forthwith for the mandatory playing of, and listening to, patriotic songs and speeches. Medals to be awarded to those who spot and report those whose attention wanders.)

Today’s jay report: Two scrub jays — not knowing any different and influenced by my straight upbringing I assume a male and female pair as opposed to a same-sex couple — are still attending their little nest in our back-porch trellis. The number and condition of the nest’s occupants are mysteries; they seem to be completely silent till the adults show up, then they give out with enthusiastic though wheezy chirping. The only drama to date of which nearby humans are aware: the appearance of a black cat prowling the backyard in the early morning. The apparent parent jays get pretty excited about the cat, which is wearing a bell. This morning, we let out Scout, resident dog, to try to send a message to the jaguarine visitor; but Scout’s not given to chasing cats — digging up pigs’ ears he has buried around the yard is more his speed — and I’m not sure our intent was clear.

‘Death Ray’ inventor dies: Really.

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Ride Volunteer

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I spent most of last weekend looking after other bike riders instead of riding myself. On Saturday, I volunteered at the Cloverdale control (the fancy French-oriented name for a rest stop) on the Davis Bike Club’s 600-kilometer brevet. On Sunday, Kate and I worked at one of the stops for the Grizzly Peak Century, an annual hundred-miler put on by the Berkeley-based bike club to which I’ve belonged on and off (more off than on) for nearly 20 years.

The Cloverdale assignment consisted mostly of waiting for riders to come in. Three people from Davis, Larry and Dee Burdick and Betty Jane Polk, did all the hard work. They set up the stop, which was at mile 263 of the 375-mile ride, early in the morning. They had procured lots of cycling-specific powders and bars, plenty of generic salt-encrusted and sugar-filled junk food that riders crave, and had set up an outdoor stove upon which they were simmering out-of-the-can (but still tasty!) beef stew and hot water and coffee. I got there a little after 1 p.m. instead of noon, as promised, and imagined a flood of riders coming through. The event started from Davis at 8 p.m. Friday; the riders cycled through the night across the hills into the Napa Valley, across another hill to Sonoma County, then across the gently rolling to flat expanse of the Alexander Valley, past the towns of Healdsburg, Geyserville, and Cloverdale, then on a zigzag course across steep hills and deep valleys out toward the coast west of Boonville. (Why, pray tell, did this adventure start at night? It’s all about preparing riders for this August’s 1,200-kilometer Paris-Brest-Paris epic, which starts late in the evening and puts a premium on night-riding skills and equipment. For the uninitiated, PBP is the pinnacle of the decidedly fanatical but amateur sport known as randonneuring.)

Naturally, no riders had appeared by the time I arrived in Cloverdale. A warm day, challenging climbs on the outer part of the course, and the night start all probably combined to slow down the fastest riders a little. But about half an hour after I showed, the first guy came in: a rider from Seattle, Jim Trout, sporting an iPod and a wool jersey and who stayed just long enough to catch his breath before pushing on. He was a full hour ahead of the next rider, who also got in and out of the control quickly. Then more started appearing. A quintet, a couple of whom are familiar from Bay Area rides. Then a few more in ones and twos. All the while, I was hearing that a handful of randonneurs had abandoned the event out toward the end of the outbound leg and would need a lift back to Davis, 110 miles away. I was the designated lift-giver.

Soon, one of my passengers rode in. His name was Jim, and while he was still fit to continue, he had been disqualified because he was 22 minutes late getting to the control in Ukiah, roughly mile 140. He explained that he’d started the ride 10 minutes late — not a killer — but had really gotten behind by pedaling slowly as he waited for a friend who started a full hour late. Now his ride was over, and he showered, took a nap, then spent the rest of the afternoon thinking about where he might ride the 600 brevet he still needed to qualify for PBP.

Next, a guy named Foster was driven in to the control. He’d abandoned at the turnaround, mile 187. He’d simply run out of gas after riding hard at points early in the event then encountering the very tough climb from Ukiah to Boonville. Jim and Foster both had to wait for my other passengers, two strong riders who suffered show-stopping physical problems (a flareup of bone spurs for one, extreme knee pain for the other). By 4:30 or so, with more and more randonneurs coming through Cloverdale, I had all the people and bikes (four of each) I could take in the mini-van — one guy had to sit between the rear bucket seats — and we headed out for the two-and-a-half hour drive to Davis. We passed the faster riders on the way back — it didn’t look like anyone would make it within 24 hours, the time of the fastest finishers on the course in 2003 — and got back to the finish, in a park-and-ride lot on the east side of town, just before sunset.

I turned around and drove back to Cloverdale — the picture above is from Putah Creek Road, a farm byway west of Davis, in the lee of the Vaca Mountains (more pictures here). I didn’t need to make the trip, but I thought I might run into riders I knew, wanted to see how everyone looked as they began their second night on the road, and knew there was a chance I’d run into someone out there I might help.

One impression: Although there’s a lot of emphasis on ensuring randonneurs are well equipped for night riding — you have to have lights and reflective gear — and despite the use of some very sophisticated and effective lighting, we’re still out there on dark, dark roads, often without much in the way of shoulders, and we’re sharing them with much bigger, faster vehicles. It’s an exercise of trust, really: that you can do what’s needed to make yourself seen and stay out of harm’s way and that everyone else on the road will do the same. It works out most of the time.

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Seventy-Buck Seats

Kate’s former boss, who has done very well over the years in the antiquarian book trade, is a long-time San Francisco Giants season-ticket holder. I think Peter first got his seats in the late ’70s, and he’s kept them ever since. When he bought them, the Giants were not a hot ticket. I remember going to games in the mid-80s where attendance was less than 2,000. The team was bad. Its stadium was worse, unless you liked sitting in an extremely well air-conditioned wind tunnel. Then the team got better and eventually managed to figure out how to build a new ballpark on the waterfront just south of downtown. Not just a ballpark: a gem, which I say despite a strong distaste for the home nine. At the same time, everyone who watches baseball knows about baseball salaries. As Ralph Kramden said in an entirely different context, with an entirely different intent, “to the moon.”

One of the perks of working for Peter was that he would occasionally give away game tickets. It’s a privilege that might appear at any time, with no notice. Sunday night, he called and asked whether we wanted his tickets for all three Mets games this week. Kate grew up in New Jersey, and the Mets were the first team of her heart (I think the A’s give them a run for their money now). I went over to the store to pick up the “boards,” as an informant tells me their sometimes called. Peter and I chatted a little about the Monday game, when Barry Zito, the highest-paid pitcher in baseball (I think) would be on the mound for the Giants.

“I think the price tag was a little high,” I ventured — “ventured” because Peter has both sound and strong opinions. “The team’s taking care of that,” Peter said, “Take a look at the price on the tickets. They’re seventy dollars. Last year they were forty.”

These are great seats. The italics are deserved: they’re 10 or 12 rows up, just to the first base side of home plate. You can hear the visiting players break wind in the on-deck circle, you’re so close.

But $70? I mean, really. Who’s the sport for when the cheapest seat in the house is running at twenty bucks a pop? (And the most expensive seats — you can bet they’re much, much more than seventy bucks.) Thank the sports gods for commercial television — though when you see the lengths professional sports will go to to milk the audience of every last penny, you have to wonder how long you’ll really get to watch games for free.

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Please, Just Let Me Go

Trying to reduce the volume of paper coming into the house, I just called to cancel subscriptions to Wired, New York Magazine, and MIT’s Technology Review.

The first two were easy to get rid of. The Wired and New York websites don’t let you cancel — they make you call to do that. So I called, and it took all of two minutes to become a former subscriber. Technology Review was another matter.

I can’t honestly remember when I first subscribed; I’ve been seeing the magazine for years, and it makes fascinating bathroom reading. Somewhere along the line, my subscription renewal became automatic, meaning the publisher just signs you up for another tour of duty as long as they have a current credit card for you. You can see the beauty of that arrangement from the magazine’s viewpoint, and how insidious it is for the subscriber: You get a courtesy notice that you’re getting another year of two of the magazine; you actually have to read the notice and get off your ass and make a phone call to stop it from happening.

I called the Technology Review number and got into an automated voice system that after a few questions and answers informed me that since my payment had already been processed, I needed to call another number. I called that number and was greeted by the same automated voice. This time, I had the option of canceling the magazine — but not before the voice offered me a series of bribes: first, a free extension of my Technology Review subscription; when I said no to that, my choice of a travel mug or 20 bucks in gasoline rebates — that’s five and a half gallons at current Bay Area prices; when I said no, the voice offered me free subscriptions to Wired and ESPN, the Magazine. When I declined — politely, but wondering how the voice system would handle a scream — the voice said, “I’m sorry you weren’t interested in more magazines today,” told me I’d get a refund, then said goodbye.

Next chore is tracking down the rest of the stuff I automatically pay for and getting rid of what I don’t use. I’ve thought of publishing the complete list but decided it’s both depressing and maybe a little more revealing than even I think prudent (lots of hot charity action on our debit cards — we give $25 a month to the American Red Cross, automatically).

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Can You Hear It?

“He emerged from the Metro at the L’Enfant Plaza Station and positioned himself against a wall beside a trash basket. By most measures, he was nondescript: a youngish white man in jeans, a long-sleeved T-shirt and a Washington Nationals baseball cap. From a small case, he removed a violin. Placing the open case at his feet, he shrewdly threw in a few dollars and pocket change as seed money, swiveled it to face pedestrian traffic, and began to play.”

That’s the opening paragraph of an April 8 piece in the Washington Post Magazine that explores how disconnected modern urban American humans are from each other and the world around them. At least that’s my take on what the story’s about. In brief: Joshua Bell, a renowned violinist, went with his Stradivarius to a subway station in downtown D.C. There, he set up as a street musician and over an hour played some of the most celebrated and difficult pieces ever written for the violin. Bottom line: hardly anyone in the 1,100 people who passed Bell as he played seemed to register what was happening. The consistent exception: young children, who when they appeared seemed drawn to Bell and the music. Unfortunately, they were in the company of adults who hustled them on their way — to day care or other appointments.

Great idea for an article, even if the conclusion one is led to is somewhat disheartening:

“In his 2003 book, Timeless Beauty: In the Arts and Everyday Life, British author John Lane writes about the loss of the appreciation for beauty in the modern world. The experiment at L’Enfant Plaza may be symptomatic of that, he said — not because people didn’t have the capacity to understand beauty, but because it was irrelevant to them.

” ‘This is about having the wrong priorities,’ Lane said.

“If we can’t take the time out of our lives to stay a moment and listen to one of the best musicians on Earth play some of the best music ever written; if the surge of modern life so overpowers us that we are deaf and blind to something like that — then what else are we missing?”

The Post followed up with a couple more pieces: An online discussion of the experiment and the article and a more optimistic take on what it all means from poet laureate emeritus Robert Pinsky.

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More Wildlife More of the Time

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Shot from the car on the road out of the Berkeley Marina: It looks like a northern Pacific rattlesnake — very much like the one I photographed during a bike ride last year). A good-sized snake, too: about 30 inches. But: no rattle. After some reading (here and here), my non-expert opinion is that this is actually a gopher snake.

I drove past it, then backed up to take a look. It was right in the middle of the lane, and I thought about doing a Steve Irwin and picking it up and getting it off the road. But I didn’t. When a car came up behind me, I pointed down at the snake and pulled forward. The driver slowed, then went around the snake. I’ll be surprised if I don’t see it squished flat the next time I’m out there, though.

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