Skip to main content

10 Day You Challenge - Day 2: 9 Loves

So here I am, 2nd day in and I'm already 4 days late... But I did say this would be a bit sporadic...
Anyway, today it is supposed to be 9 loves. OK... (I really can't wait to get to the simpler ones like books)... Let's clear the decks and take it as read that I love my family, God and pet cat... So in many ways I'm giving you 12 loves for the price of 9... But there is no way on this virtual planet that you are getting me bearing my heart on those three... The first 2 because this is entirely the wrong forum to do them justice, and the third because there is already too much cat-related wackiness on the web, and I don't want to be associated with that...
So here goes on a variety of things that I love in no particular rank order:

1) FOOD - Now there is an entire day given over to foods... but this is food in general. I have a serious psychological problem with food. It is my primary response to any emotional state; I'm happy - I eat,  I'm sad- I eat,  I'm stressed- I eat,  I'm relaxing- I eat,  I'm confused - I eat... Is it any wonder I have diabetes...

2) RUGBY - Used to love playing it (badly) but after everyone got bigger than me and my knees gave out I had to make do with watching... I'm a fan of Ulster and Ireland... Word of warning: don't expect any response to a phone call when an Ireland match is on the TV.

3) LIVERPOOL FOOTBALL CLUB - Ditto any televised Liverpool game (televised on terrestrial TV that is as I am far too tight to pay to watch football, and especially to give Rupert Murdoch any money). The past 20+ years have not been as positive as the first 20 years supporting them, but still glad I picked them over Leeds, or Manure... Cut me and I bleed red... obviously...

4) BELGIAN BEER - Curious in a Methodist minister, I know. I like ales in general, in moderation, but I love Belgian ales in their almost infinite variety, a love-affair that bizarrely began on my honeymoon to Bruges, which is as far as I could get us on my stage manager's pay...

5) BOOKS - I have as dangerous a relationship with books as I do with food. I am going to get run down reading while I am walking one of these days. There isn't as much room in my current manse for bookshelves as there were in my previous one and this has caused me serious trauma... and this is an illness I seem to have passed on to my second son.

6) COFFEE - It is suspected that my blood type is not AB positive, but Arabica. And it really must be real coffee - please don't fob me off with instant or decaf... I probably won't say anything (actually I probably will) but even if I don't I will file it away in my mental little black book...

7) GOOD COMPANY - I will rarely initiate such gatherings but I love it when I am with good friends chatting about all sorts of weird and wonderful things, laughing until I pass out (that did happen once) and mocking each other mercilessly.

8) THEATRE - There are not enough words to express my love of theatre... Good theatre and bad... I find both stimulating - and frequently both leave me saying I would love to be back doing more... the good because I would love to be part of it, the bad because I think I could do better... But given that my memory is now shot and I suffer from a certain level of stage fright that is no longer necessarily true... I don't love all theatre however... I loathe, hate and detest commercial pantomime which is simply expensive thespian junk-food, which, if we are not careful will serve as an innoculation to many regarding real theatre...

9) THE WEST WING - Simply the best piece of TV I have ever watched... and watched... and watched again... There is barely a week I could not illustrate my sermons with an excerpt from the West Wing... But I resist because a) not everyone has seen it, and b) people might get very bored of that very quickly... But I don't think I could ever get bored of it... Although I haven't watched an episode for about a year now... Last year was just too hectic for our usual winter rewatch... However I may just start again soon... It's just a pity the idiots on Capitol Hill don't pay more attention to it...
Bartlett for President...

Cheers

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

A Woman of no Distinction

Don't often post other people's stuff here... But I found this so powerful that I thought I should. It's a performance poem based on John 4: 4-30, and I have attached the original YouTube video below. A word for women, and men, everywhere... "to be known is to be loved, and to be loved is to be known." I am a woman of no distinction of little importance. I am a women of no reputation save that which is bad. You whisper as I pass by and cast judgmental glances, Though you don’t really take the time to look at me, Or even get to know me. For to be known is to be loved, And to be loved is to be known. Otherwise what’s the point in doing either one of them in the first place? I WANT TO BE KNOWN. I want someone to look at my face And not just see two eyes, a nose, a mouth and two ears; But to see all that I am, and could be all my hopes, loves and fears. But that’s too much to hope for, to wish for, or pray for So I don’t, not anymore. Now I keep to myself And by that

Psalm for Harvest Sunday

A short responsive psalm for us as a call to worship on Harvest Thanksgiving Sunday, and given that it was pouring with rain as I headed into church this morning the first line is an important remembrance that the rain we moan about is an important component of the fruitfulness of the land we live in: You tend the land and water it And the earth produces its abundance. You crown each year with your bounty, and our storehouses overflow with your goodness. The mountain meadows are covered with flocks and the valleys are filled with corn; Your people celebrate your boundless grace They shout for joy and sing. from Psalm 65

Anointed

There has been a lot of chatter on social media among some of my colleagues and others about the liturgical and socio-political niceties of Saturday's coronation and attendant festivities, especially the shielding of the anointing with the pictured spoon - the oldest and perhaps strangest of the coronation artefacts. Personally I thought that was at least an improvement on the cloth of gold canopy used in the previous coronation, but (pointless) debates are raging as to whether this is an ancient practice or was simply introduced in the previous service to shield the Queen from the TV cameras, not for purposes of sacredness, but understandable coyness, if she actually had to bare her breast bone in puritan 1950s Britain. But as any church leader knows, anything performed twice in a church becomes a tradition. All this goes to show that I did actually watch it, while doing other things - the whole shooting match from the pre-service concert with yer wumman in that lemon-