Wednesday, April 21, 2004

Venus and the Crescent Moon

As I drove home from work tonight (at 10:30 PM) I had this sight before me all the way:




It really was quite beautiful - the photo doesn't do it justice.

The moon was a judicial scale held in the fist of Venus. It's the sort of thing fairy tales and tall stories around the campfire late at night are made of. You can almost see prehistoric man dancing around the campfire, singing odes to the moon.

Of course, now we know everything. We've actually been there and back and demystified it.

That's a very unfortunate thing... the mystery is beautiful.

How can Venus line herself up so perfectly with the moon like that (at least to my eye)? How does God hold them all in the palm of His hand?

Regards,
Basil

National Turn off the TV Week

This week is National Turn off the TV Week. Maybe you have heard about it?

http://www.tvturnoff.org/

Well, so far I have protested National Turn off the TV Week, by watching a movie every night.

(By the way, they expect you to turn off the TV, the VCR, the DVD Player, your computer, your video games, etc... just to proove you are a FAMILY oriented person!)

Monday night I watched Star Wars Episode I (on my new home entertainment system, by the way) and then last night I watched Master And Commander (less-than-an-hour-from-the-store fresh). Great movies, both of them.

Personally, I think if someone watches so much TV they need to turn it off, then then need something more than a National Turn Off The TV week to do it. They need a deep and inner spiritual transformation.

I don't watch regular TV hardly at all. I can't stand the mindlessness of it, for the most part. When I've had a long day, I'm inclined to sit down and watch something on the TOOB, but I'd rather it be something meaty that I can sink my teeth into.

TV-Bashers don't get it. The ordinary person now days knows more about the history of the world, animals in exotic places, and their neighbors down the street than EVER BEFORE in the history of the mankind thanks to Television. The ordinary person now days can think in several layers of abstraction, and follow numerous plotlines that are interwoven as intricately as a web, thanks to good, wholesome, high quality movies that come out of Hollywood. Well chosen TV programs, and good well-made movies can challenge you to think, grow, learn, consider things, to a greater degree than ever before. I'd venture to say that a number of video games can do likewise.

If you are a "user" - that is, rather, an "abuser" - if you are adicted to Trash TV (now TTV), then that's your problem. Get a life... watch something meaningful and challenging.

Cheers!

Basil