I am trying to polish my manners. I can be a very gracious host. Wouldn’t you agree? And I always enjoy good tastes and great flavor in a delicacy!

According to the Mirriam-Webster Dictionary:

Main Entry: gra·cious
Pronunciation: \ˈgrā-shəs\
Function: adjective
Etymology: Middle English, from Anglo-French gracieus, from Latin gratiosus enjoying favor, agreeable, from gratia
Date: 14th century
1 a obsolete : godly b archaic : pleasing, acceptable
2 a : marked by kindness and courtesy <a gracious host> b : graceful c : marked by tact and delicacy : urbane d : characterized by charm, good taste, generosity of spirit, and the tasteful leisure of wealth and good breeding <gracious living>
3 : merciful, compassionate —used conventionally of royalty and high nobility

… or as I’ve decided to call it “Back Friday”, because that’s all I saw – people’s backs!

So. This was my first and last Black Friday. OMG! I cannot believe people do this every year! I went for one thing, and one thing only, that 19″ TV I’ve been looking for. Walmart had it in their sale flyer as available Today Only from 5-11am. So I arrived right at 5am and was absolutely amazed to see the parking lot completely FULL! I had to park in the restaurant’s parking lot across from Walmart.

I was pleasantly surprised to see plenty of carts. Unfortunately, the store was crammed full in every aisle except on the food side. You couldn’t take more than one step without stopping. Carts were overflowing. In fact many people had several carts. I finally made my way back to Electronics only to find the shelf empty. I asked an employee if they were out of them already. She explained that there was a line for a coupon to get them and pointed me in that direction. I figured they’d be out by the time I got to the front of the line, but guess what? I had my TV in my cart in about 2 minutes! Yay!

I went up to pay for it and was extremely happy to see no lines in the 3 Express Lanes for 5 items or less. I was actually back in my car with my little TV by 5:25am! Woo Hoo!

I looked back as I drove out of the parking lot. I still can’t imagine why people do that every year. And the Mall which I avoid every day of the year… what must that be like today? Wow.

I hope you all had a fabulous Thanksgiving. I sure did. Although I barely took any photos at all, unless you count the ones I took of my cats! It was a spectacularly gorgeous day and they all enjoyed having the windows open. In fact, all 3 of them somehow managed to slip out the front door for a few moments while I was gone to pick up my camera. When I saw the front door open a tiny bit it scared me to death, but they were in the shrubs against the house and I got them back in the house quickly. They got to smell some grass. It was great fun for them while it lasted.

I may do some painting today, or I may not. We’ll see how I feel later. I hope you have a nice, relaxing day with leftovers and pie!

Big Hugs ♥xo

Zelda and I made it! We finally saw New Moon! Yesterday we went to the premiere here with a couple of friends and Mama Soul. We saw some people wearing Twilight-shirts, a couple of Twimoms and even a Twidad. I didn’t even know they exist until yesterday… And a lot of girls wearing plaid. Coincidence? A subtle tribute to Rob? Who knows? (I do!) Our premiere outfit? A blue blouse just like book-Bella, Ray Bans like Edward and the original Bella-bracelet from Italy (Great story concerning that one, I’ll tell you soon in another post!). So today we’re gonna present you our New Moon review part 1. Part 2 will follow soon… and include a lot more details cause we’re gonna see the movie about 23 more times before writing that. Just in case you haven’t seen the film yet (You better got a good excuse for that!) and want to have the real surprise when watching it for the first time: SPOILER ALARM! Starting now and ending at the end of this post. So here we go:

Taylor Lautner sometimes wears a shirt in New Moon...

First of all, down with Cathy the Cougar! Chris Weitz, do you want to marry me? What an enormous improvement in comparison to Twilight! I’m not going as far as to say it was the perfect movie, but honestly Chris, you’re so down with the kids! Or rather the Twilight-fans. Or Zelda and me. This is how vampires should look when they sparkle! Like diamonds and not that ringing and tinkling in the woods crap. Two minutes into the movie and I already love Charlie so much. How sweet when he almost started to sing, or when he came to look after Bella when she was screaming in her bed. We even got the names of the months after Edward left. Something I had really been hoping for!

... but most of the time doesn't, because he shouldn't!

And the e-mails for Alice idea to show how Bella feels, what an incredibly clever move of you, Chris! And I loved that Harry Clearwater, the king of homemade fish-fry, died as a hero trying to protect Charlie from Victoria. And oh how Rachelle looked awesome with her flaming red hair. Zelda totally liked the cliff diving scene. When Bella first sees Victoria under water and then there’s Edward beside her… epic! And the funny stuff, like the cinema scene or the “You like older women, huh?”. Not exactly as funny as the spider-monkey line but still… And Jasper and Emmett were so much… uhm, cooler, cuter? Whatever, better anyway!

Ok, there were a few things that were kind of strange and I think we got to mention them as well in order to try and stay honest. Sometimes it was a bit too cheesy. Cheesier than the books. I even felt kind of 2nd-hand-embarrassed for Edward being so hardcore romantic. I noticed that Edward’s abs seem to have looked a lot better on the pics from the set we saw a few months ago. In the actual Volterra scene, they were barely visible. So what happened there? I mean, isn’t Edward supposed to have at least a six-pack? Jacob even got an eight-pack, so in comparison to that… sorry to say Rob, but Taylor wins this one!

Caius Malfoy and his Volturi friends

Did anyone else think Marcus and Caius looked like Denethor, Faramir’s dad from Lord of the Rings, and  Draco Malfoy’s older brother? Did the Volturi fight scene between Edward and Demetri remind you of the Gandalf vs. Saruman battle in the LOTR?

And there’s another thing. Not your fault Chris, this is just how Stephenie Meyer wrote Bella and the reason why this girl sometimes annoys the crap out of me in the books: Who do you think you are, Bella “don’t hurt him, kill me instead” Swan? Why should the Volturi treat Edward’s life against yours? You’re nothing but a weak clumsy girl, okay? Sorry to say, but deal with it!

All in all, we got everything we wanted… Well, almost. Taylor Lautner wore a shirt in at least three scenes. BIG FAIL! Sorry Chris… But don’t worry, Zelda and I enjoyed the movie a lot. We’re probably going to watch it over and over again for the next few weeks… Only because of important blog journalism of course so that we can present you a more detailed review soon. Wanna know what Mama Soul said about New Moon? She made so many great hilarious comments that she will get her own post this week. Don’t miss it! There’s no better way to watch this film than sitting in between her and Zelda. We’ve got enough stuff to write about for at least four weeks, so keep coming back to check what else we got in store for you!

a

Off to call Zelda and ask her when we’re going to the cinema again

Saveyoursoul

a

PS: We rate New Moon 4 out of 5 Heineken bottles

How did you like New Moon? Do you wanna marry Chris Weitz as well? Because I do… Which scenes were your favorites? Could the movie live up to your expectations? Any details or thoughts you want to share? Leave a comment or write an e-mail!

(images: google and me)

Mai can haz Italiano?

No? Well, can mai at least have some LOLs?

Yes! Wendy has featured the DailyGs on LOLspot! All 3 of us! Here’s a peek!

http://wendyslolspot.blogspot.com/2009/11/daily-gs-hit-lolspot-just-in-time-for.html

MAGIA, ESPADA Y FANTASÍA (VI)

La segunda parte de la monumental adaptación a la pantalla de la obra de J.R.R. Tolkien por Peter Jackson y su equipo da comienzo en el punto en que la Comunidad del Anillo se disuelve: Frodo y Sam siguen su camino hacia Mordor, Merry y Pipin han caído prisioneros de los orcos de Sauron, y Aragorn, Legolas y Gimli, dejando a los pequeños portadores del anillo que encuentren su propio destino, van tras los cautivos para liberarlos, mientras Sauron y su aliado Saruman siguen acumulando fuerzas con las que aplastar a las razas libres de la Tierra Media, desunidas y parapetadas tras sus débiles defensas…

Tras el impactante efecto sorpresa de la primera entrega, Las dos torres ofrece más de lo mismo (pero peor) en la forma, aunque empieza la decadencia en cuanto al fondo. Como dijimos en su momento en esta misma sección, a medida que la trilogía avanza, sus grandes virtudes se van poco a poco diluyendo y los pequeños inconvenientes del primer capítulo, minimizados ante la grandiosidad del conjunto, van creciendo hasta poco a poco adueñarse de este puente hacia la conclusión. El problema, precisamente, es la entrega incondicional a la espectacularidad de las formas y el paulatino descuido de unas, ya de por sí, demasiado elementales, lineales, esquemáticas cuestiones de fondo (personajes, psicología, motivaciones, reacciones ante los hechos…) siguiendo, obviamente, las pautas marcadas por Tolkien pero haciendo que la película, exactamente igual que su antecesora y su continuación, dependa en exclusiva de los conocimientos previos del espectador sobre la obra literaria a fin de que pueda entender la lógica de acontecimientos y personajes, sin que se trate de un producto cinematográfico autónomo. A ello no es ajena la introducción de las grandes batallas y de las escenas de acción propias de la historia en las que la entrega a la espectacularidad es total, y en las que se desvirtúan algunos logros de la primera parte. Por ejemplo, donde hay un ingente esfuerzo por utilizar el maquillaje y la caracterización para la construcción de las diversas criaturas “no humanas” y de ambientación y dirección artística para los espacios, comienza a haber demasiada labor de computadora a fin de recrear enormes ejércitos en movimiento, espacios abiertos o decorados en los que transcurran los combates, auténticamente de videojuego por más espectaculares que sean, y también en el momento de provocar un buen número de efectos de la violencia sobre individuos y objetos. La batalla principal es tan grandiosa como artificiosa, con algún que otro guiño que supera lo humorístico para adentrarse en lo ridículo, completamente fuera del tono general de la historia, y las múltiples y complejas tramas paralelas que como un mosaico van salpicando la narración y cambiando el punto de interés y de tensión a cada momento, unidas a la excesiva duración del film, hacen que el ritmo vaya desde la lentitud más extrema al servicio del crecimiento de una tensión no siempre lograda (porque hay que entender que al igual que se depende del libro para presuponer aspectos de los personajes el espectador ya conoce el desenlace de los hechos sobre los que se pretende cargar emoción) hasta la vertiginosa sucesión de acontecimientos acelerados que siembran la película de altibajos y lagunas de emoción.

El problema es que la ingenuidad y expectación del discurso de la primera parte se torna aquí en una oda a las imágenes animadas desprovistas de discurso de cualquier tipo o, lo que es peor, intentando alcanzar la sublimidad de ciertos mensajes a través de la mera repetición de frases y situaciones pretendidamente trascendentes y decisivas (cuando, insistimos, el lector de Tolkien, espectador a quien va dirigida la película, no como intención, pero sí como construcción, ya sabe qué va a pasar y qué no) pero que, a través de ese culto a lo entendido como modernidad e innovación visuales, son en el fondo de una emotividad vacía, de una emoción nula, sin una aventura real, sin un riesgo o un peligro que realmente cruce al otro lado de la pantalla, sin unos personajes vivos por los que podamos sentir una empatía que vaya más allá de lo que los personajes dicen representar, sin llegar a sentir algo por los personajes en sí.

La película acumula historias que transcurren de manera paralela pero no por ello gana en solidez, muy al contrario, es una forma de perder pulso, de deshilvanar un puzzle que en la primera entrega había quedado ensamblado de manera aceptable. Se vuelve facilona, vulgar, reiterativa, simple y lineal, por más que visualmente pretenda todo lo contrario, resultar majestuosa, abigarrada, rica, espectacular; busca enganchar por la belleza y el impacto de imágenes grandilocuentes, olvidándose de atraparnos por el cariz de los acontecimientos que cuenta, y es ahí donde, a pesar de que engancha y obliga a seguirla, apuesta por explotar los elementos más pobres y simplones del lenguaje cinematográfico y busca convencer a través de algo, en el fondo, tan fácil como es apabullar, embaucar por aplastamiento.

Habiendo alcanzado así la trilogía la cúspide de lo que podía ofrecer, buena parte de esta segunda entrega y toda la tercera parte son un lento caer hacia la superficialidad en el discurso y el tributo a las formas animadas por ordenador en detrimento de la historia misma, al metraje excesivo en la creencia de que la mejor adaptación es la que cuenta todo (ya dijo Voltaire que el secreto de aburrir consiste en decirlo todo), de que a más, siempre es mejor. Y el cine nos ha dado gran cantidad de muestras, seguramente las mejores, de que lo mejor suele ser siempre lo contrario.

Was the question posed by a tweet and blog entry from the lovely peeps at Amnesty.

Hmm! I think it’d have to be Aneurin Bevan with a few slices of bara brith.

But alas he’s dead. So I’d settle for Sir Ian McKellan, tea with Gandalf – perfect!

Who would invite? Post me a comment.

We are thankful for our home, which is very cozy and safe. We are thankful for our family. We are thankful that Whitey has come to live with us, even if we do have a little rumble every now and then!  

We are thankful for all our friends in the Cat Blogosphere. Even more so because you continue to visit us even when Mom has been so busy remodeling the Swamp before we all move there that we can not visit as much as we normally would.

We are also thankful that this little kitten is about to celebrate his/her first Thanksgiving in his/her new home! Tripod is already starting to play and has been purring up a storm!

And tomorrow, we will be hoping that we are thankful for some Turkey!

We wish you all a wonderful Thanksgiving!

I was at the airport this morning and I looked down at my feet and saw a black leather suitcase. Upon opening it I discovered a thick manuscript titled ‘Twilight 3: Scrappy-Doo Makes A Boo-Boo’. Obviously someone had made a huge mistake and left an item of great value behind.  However a quick skim and I found out that in a jealous rage Scrappy attacks Edward with a meat cleaver and then forces himself on to Bella. Now I thought this was odd as Scrappy, other than being an asexual minor, was in fact a fictional cartoon character. Would it be like when Paula Abdul danced with MC Skat Kat in the ‘Opposites Attract’ film clip? It just wouldn’t work. Surely this version was a clever decoy to keep the “Twihards” guessing. So I installed the latest copy of Microsoft Decoder on my laptop and proceeded to retype the whole script. A day later when I hit DECODE I was presented with ‘Twilight 3: Hot Runnings’. I noticed it was fairly similar to that Disney movie about the guys that form a Jamaican bobsled team, except this was set in Iceland and Edward, Bella, Jacob, Hitler and Gandalf form a relay team that hopes to compete in London 2012. Hilarity ensues when Gandalf realises he was in a superior movie trilogy and plots the deaths of his teammates. After succeeding he has a tea party with Jude Law and Bono. Ha! Nice try, I figured this was also a decoy script as there would be no way Gandalf would let this pass – he would not kill off Hitler and then dine with Bono.

Even though both decoys proved to be of a higher quality in comparison to Twilight 1 and 2, I was still sick of being stuffed around by jackass writers. I was ready to give up. But I decided to give it one last go. Luckily as the true plot was revealed titled ‘Twilight 3: Edward vs Dracula’. Edward is enjoying a quiet nighttime read of ‘He’s Just Not That Into You’ at a local beatnik cafe when the Count comes up behind him, taps him on the shoulder and asks him “are you serious with all this shit?” before ripping his head off and feasting on his jugular. As the petrified cafe patrons look on Dracula boldly declares: “Who is glittering now, bitch?”. The end. Turns out it’s a short film that they plan on running during the halftime show of the 2010 Superbowl.

In conclusion how much did my blog hits just go up? Would it be as much as a post titled ‘2 and a Half Men Is  Abreast Of The Rest’? Results in a few days.

Our latest member of the Viking Fellowship is an old friend.   I have known and played with Cap since I first started playing MMOs back in 2001.  Back then he was Cappy the Ogre Warrior of Norrath and he later became Capron the Barbarian Shaman.  Huge change in Lord of the Rings Online he is playing a Hobbit Burglar.  Capron started playing with us just a few weeks ago but is already level 44.  He is a MMO pro.  I am overjoyed that Cap has joined us.  He is an excellent player but also he is the life of the party.  Cappy is the funniest player MMO Viking has ever played with.  Smart comedy like 30 Rock not dumb comedy like 2 and a half men.  Cappy used to play Everquest in the back of his classes on his laptop which Beo and Nin thought was awesome.  I also love the fact he chose a Hobbit Burglar.  The fellowship really can use a burglar well for all the conjunctions, specially due to the fact Red seems to always be low on power.  Red will say this is due to the fact he is using all his warden skills possible and getting every inch out of it.  I think Red needs to drink more power potions!   And we needed a Hobbit.  This is Lord of the Rings dammit, sequel to The Hobbit.  This time the hobbit isn’t hired by Gandalf and 13 dwarves to burgle but by Redranth and 2 dwarves!  My favorite races in lotro in order are dwarves, hobbits, female elves, female humans, male humans, male elves.  I don’t know why people play an MMO to play a human that seems boring.  There might be a third dwarf, another old friend added to the mix if he ends up enjoying lotro.  MMO Viking hopes so.  You can never have too many dwarves!

There is a side of things Boethius does not talk about in the passages we have already seen.  He does not ask whether the good man who is destroyed or harmed by the wicked suffers real harm or destruction.  He talks about this elsewhere, however, and the answer is No.

It seems to me that Boethius must say this in order for the world to be set right.  If one is seriously to believe that the wicked have no power, while one nevertheless experiences the mundane fact that the wicked kill people every day, or forge malevolent rings, or construct unassailable fortresses from which to deploy vast armies of orcs, then one must save face somehow.  One must revert to saying that those who seem to have power over the body have no power over the soul.  And perhaps one will emphasize the fact that the wicked have only a transitory power even over the body, and that in the resurrection, the wicked will have power over nothing.

The resurrection is a controversial subject to broach in Middle Earth.  Elves have no need of it, and Men do not philosophize about it.  Death is a gift, a boon from Iluvatar, and appears not to need revoking.  I will let that sleeping dog lie.  But even without a resurrection in Middle Earth, it is fairly clear that death is not an evil.  In the unknown realm into which the dying go, the goodness of Iluvatar must still order all things.  And one suspects that in that realm, whether in or out of the world, wrongs will be set right.

Thus Boethius appeals to the afterlife:  no matter what goods may be destroyed in this world, our happiness consists in another, in becoming divine (as he puts it): in becoming “gods.”  This, too, is what the wicked lose.  Moreover, whatever wrongs we suffer in this life at the hands of wicked men or fickle Fortune, are actually goods sent by divine mercy to prepare us for the long-awaited happiness.

These are threads Tolkien does not weave into the trilogy.  The reward of good deeds in Middle Earth is the song that is sung of them afterwards, by whoever is left to sing.  The righting of wrongs in the afterlife is a hope which, if yearned for, is still unspoken.  And yet there is the hint eveywhere that death is not really to be feared, that (like Gandalf, perhaps) the righteous man is ultimately unslayable.  He may go to the halls of his fathers, he may go down into the earth or pass over the falls to the sea–but in the end he is accounted for, and preserved from the reach of those who can kill the soul.  In whatever place the dead wait, he too awaits the unbending of the world and the fate of the children of Iluvatar.

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about my discovery of the Incarnation Figure as an archetype in storytelling. There are obvious connections between this and the Christ Figure that w are so familiar with given that the Christ that the figures tend to emulate began being Christ through incarnation, the embodiment of something greater in than our world in our world. But the difference that I pointed out is that Christ Figures tend to have death and resurrection or sacrificial element to them and Incarnation Figures don’t always express that.
As intriguing and powerful as Christ Figures can be, I find them troublesome at times. I have seen too many Christians try to grade a story’s value on the presence or lack of Christ Figure. If it has one, it’s a good story, if not it fails. And this is whether the story is told well or the characters are believable or if there is any suspense to make us care what happens.
The other problem I frequently see is when a Christ figure is imposed in attempts to co-opt a story and make it a Christian tale. Take “The Matrix” for example. Certainly there is the element of sacrifice on Neo’s part as he stays behind to let the others escape. And there is something of death and resurrection. But did he really die? OR did he simply, finally understand the Matrix well enough to know that he didn’t have to die there? To me this story is more about faith and finding out what can happen when you truly believe more than it is about a Christ figure and the redemption that follows.
People often describe Gandalf from The Lord of the Rings as a Christ figure. Again there is a certain validity to that in terms of his death and resurrection. But as much as he is a Christ Figure, he is also an Odin Figure, at least up until the resurrection point. It’s almost as if Gandalf starts as Odin and finishes as Christ. And that’s not much a of a stretch given that Odin is a bit of Christ Figure himself, sacrificing himself unto himself.
But my favorite example of the failings of the overstressed Christ Figure is Hell Boy. In the second Hell Boy movie, the story follows the typical Christ Figure arch, as he sacrifices himself to save another, descends into the pits to eradicate the forces of evil and save all the Earth. Powerful stuff. But how many Christians stumble on this because he is a demon – and not just any demon, Satan’s son who’s true destiny is to bring ultimate destruction on the Earth? Is such a character an acceptable Christ Figure?
I think this is one of those examples that parallels the story of the Bronze Snake from scripture. God commanded Moses to make a bonze statue of a snake. This statue heals anyone that looks at it. The odd part is that most times that snakes appear in scripture, they are symbols of evil, demons or Satan himself. Jesus later tells us that the snake was an image of him. The image of evil expresses the ultimate good. Perhaps Hell Boy falls in this same category.

True knighthood is the Holy Grail of manhood, a revelation attainable only by the pure.  The proud are ever barred from taking a draught from it.

Our very captivation with the Holy Grail consists in the fact that it has not been found and only few have even seen it.  And, of course, the reason that the mysterious cup remains ever out of reach for the ordinary man and is because its quest is fraught with danger:  fearful obstacles, inscrutable riddles, and deadly foes.

To those who possess true manliness, such obstacles are the reason why The Quest is so appealing.  By definition manliness is the penchant to overcome obstacles. The more hopeless the attainment, the bigger and better is the man who laughs in the face perils to be found there.  Those who are lesser men still aspire to the Grail, but fear leads them to experience the danger only vicariously by following along at a safe distance, through spectator sports, litrerature and movies.

And yet there is a temptation in that boldness to which those gallant men of the Round Table too easily succumb.  The bigger and better that a man thinks he is, the more likely he is to fail utterly in attaining the goal.  Gawain, for example, showed himself the fool for this very reason.  And Lancelot had to be taken down a few notches (many actually) before he was even granted a partial fulfillment of his desire.  Galahad attained the grail, not so much by his prowess, but more so, by his humility and purity.

There is a strange and wonderful coincidence of opposites in the embodiment of true chivalry:  courage, strength, boldness and skill, on the one hand; reverence, humility, meekness, and deference on the other.

In a sermon written during his Anglican Period, entitled, “The Weapons of the Saints,” Venerable John Henry Cardinal Newman couched the spiritual life in terms of a war in which the stratagem for victory demands an inversion of worldly values:

But in that kingdom which Christ has set up, all is contrariwise. “The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds.” What was before in honour, has been dishonoured; what before was in dishonour, has come to honour; what before was successful, fails; what before failed, succeeds.

It is this inversion that constitutes the real difficulty to the attainment of the Holy Grail of true knighthood.  It is the riddle of riddles.  The Black Knight, enemy of our souls, guards the bridge that leads to the hermit who is ensconced away from the manners of worldly men.  It is from him that we are to unlearn our pride and find the real weapons by which we are to succeed in our quest.

Cardinal Newman’s sermon is a commentary on Our Lord’s words: Many that are first shall be last, and the last shall be first (Mt 19:30).  And he supports his thesis from many other passages of the New Testament concerning, for example, strength made perfect in weakness (2 Cor 12:9), the of putting down the proud and the exalting of the humble (Lk 1:52), the blessedness of those who suffer and the woes of those who are satisfied (Mt 5:2-10; Lk 6:24-26), and God’s choice of the weak and despised to do his work (1 Cor 1:27).  It should be abundantly clear to anyone with a modicum of familiarity with scripture that God triumphs in and through those who have rejected worldly ambition and self-assuredness.

The invisible powers of the heavens, truth, meekness, and righteousness, are ever coming in upon the earth, ever pouring in, gathering, thronging, warring, triumphing, under the guidance of Him who “is alive and was dead, and is alive for evermore.”

Truth, meekness and righteousness, according to Venerable Newman, are the real weapons of the saints, the means by which they are victorious over Satan, sin and death.  The Holy Grail of Christian Knighthood is so hidden that in order to find it the knight must lose himself in the process.

This is that intangible, greater thing, after which young men aspire.  It is the stuff of true nobility.  It is strength without arrogance, command without self-interest.

Venerable Newman notes that “we like to hear marvellous tales, which throw us out of things as they are, and introduce us to things that are not.”  The paradox of the cross and of the victorious King who triumphs through His own death is the cosmic myth, the retelling of which is the incantation that opens the sealed doors of our hearts. He that openeth and no man shutteth, shutteth and no man openeth, is the only one with the key (Ap 3:7).

The beloved disciple saw Him mounted on a white horse, and going forth “conquering and to conquer.” “And the armies which were in heaven followed Him upon white horses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean. And out of His mouth goeth a sharp sword, that with it He should smite the nations, and He shall rule them with a rod of iron.” [Rev. xix. 14, 15.]

The Quest of the Holy Grail is a lesser myth, as are all other stories when compared to the gospel myth in which the most fantastic tale is merged with history, and where what Tolkien called eucatastrophe, a literary climax beyond our wildest hopes, is made the substance of all our hopes and the ground upon which we walk in the daylight of this world.

Indeed, the return of the king in Tolkien’s mythology is an ascendency by way of descent.  Aragorn and the Dúnedain are content to be despised if that will better equip them to protect and defend the peoples of Middle Earth.  Aragorn himself must choose the path leading downward, literally underground, through the Paths of the Dead under the White Mountains, like Christ in His harrowing of hell, if he is to triumph on behalf of those entrusted to his care.

After Gandalf  had “passed through fire and deep water,” and had completed his own christic transformation, he delivered a message to Aragorn from the Lady of Light, Galadriel:

Where now are the Dúnedain, Elessar, Elessar?
Why do thy kinsfolk wander afar?
Near is the hour when the Lost should come forth,
And the Grey Company ride from the North.
But dark is the path appointed for thee:
The Dead watch the road that leads to the Sea (Book III, Chapter V).

Aragorn chose the path of truth, meekness and righteousness.  He was prepared to face his fear, and he was not afraid to confront his own ego with the double-edged sword of God’s truth.  He chose to go down in order to go up, to be last in order to be first.  Yet the myth of Aragorn cannot be a vicarious substitute for our own humiliation.  We must really experience it.  Newman has it right:

We so love the idea of the invisible, that we even build fabrics in the air for ourselves, if heavenly truth be not vouchsafed us. We love to fancy ourselves involved in circumstances of danger or trial, and acquitting ourselves well under them. Or we imagine some perfection, such as earth has not, which we follow, and render it our homage and our heart. Such is the state more or less of young persons before the world alters them, before the world comes upon them, as it often does very soon, with its polluting, withering, debasing, deadening influence, before it breathes on them, and blights and parches, and strips off their green foliage, and leaves them, as dry and wintry trees without sap or sweetness.

We must not loose our idealism as we grow older, but “heavenly truth” should purify our tendency to experience knighthood vicariously through its trappings and shards.  Ours is to be the knighthood of the real Dúnedain, a hidden knighthood in search of the hidden, but very real Holy Grail.

As a Franciscan, I have had many opportunities to reflect upon the militant example of Saints Francis and Maximilian, and of the great tertiary St. Louis of France.  The Holy Patriarch of the Seraphic Order, Our Holy Father St. Francis, was well aware of the Arthurian legends and aspired to knighthood and the Holy Grail himself.  Later, after he too had chosen the path downward, he called the simple brothers who lived in seclusion and despised status and pomp, his “Knights of the Round Table.”

In this last week of ordinary time, during the “octave” of the Feast of Christ the King, we look for His return at the end of the world, when he will preside over the cosmic resolution to the perennial struggle of St. Michael and the dragon.  Then He will raise his wounded hands over the universe and all of us will be witnesses of the full revelation of His truth, a more powerful illumination than possession of the Grail itself.  Then we will all know what true chivalry is and whether we are worthy to drink from the cup filled by the hands of Him who carried the sword of truth and slayed the dragon by His humble acceptance of our condition and by His willing suffering and death.

The weapons of the true knight are those of the saints: truth, meekness and righteousness.  They are best fitted to help us along the way of our Quest, a path that leads up a narrow crag in a mountain.  But this path to the heights strangely leads us downward by many uneven steps, until we arrive in the sanctuary of the Holy Grail and find rest in the yoke of Christ on the Holy Mountain of His Passion, Death and Resurrection.

A new 39 minute Lord of the Rings episode telling of Aragorn’s hunt for Gollum before The Fellowship of the Ring. This high concept short film is brought to the screen for free by Independent Online Cinema. www.thehuntforgollum.com
Made by talented volunteer filmmakers for under $5,000, the film is a faithful tribute to the style of Peter Jackson’s trilogy and the world of J.R.R. Tolkien telling how Aragorn tracked down Gollum between The Hobbit & The Fellowship of the Ring.

The film achieved over 1 million views in the first week of release in May 2009. (Dailymotion) and wide press acclaim for it’s high production values on a microbudget.

This Youtube version is slightly extended with 1 scene added back in.

www.thehuntforgollum.com
www.independentonlinecinema.com

This weekend we are dreaming of Christmas Temptations, Primo Catnip and festive Red and Green Mousies! And did you hear? Next week there will be Turkey in the House! Woot!

Let me whap the ways!

I love when pop culture references come up in a reading.

For the magician card, my favorite reference is the Disney movie “Halloweentown”. I love the line that “Magic is just wishing for something, then letting yourself have it”

If you want to get all intellectual about it, this could speak to psychology, and “self-sabotage” , how and why we don’t let ourselves succeed. But I don’t want to do that today. Today, let’s soar and fly, because we let ourselves.

The Magician card is fun, powerful, evocative. In my eye it brings forward images of Merlin, Dumbledor, Gandalf. Wisdom, humor and above all…magic.

What is magic? The ability to move things around without physical effort? The ability to make what we want appear out of thin air? If you could have magical powers like a legendary wizard, what would you do with it? What would the things you do with your magic say about you?

While we could talk all day about magic, the wizard archetype, and making life magical, let’s focus just on the balance aspects of the card.

Think of labor-saving and thing-making stereotypes of magic we’ve always seen in books, movies and tv. Underneath that is simply desire and fulfillment. We desire ease…and magic fullfills that. Over centuries this desire has shown itself culturally. Times of rest in the agrarian culture, labor saving devices in the modern industrial one. We desire certain things…some attainable, some more fantastic. Again these have been symbolically fulfilled on a cultural scale. Man wants to fly, so in time we invent airplanes, balloons, hang gliders, helicopters and more.

So magic has to do with the balance of desire…the wish for something…and our ability to have it fulfilled.

The magician is often associated with the Alchemist…changing one thing into another that is more desired. There are consequences. We might get gold from lead, but the lead is lost in the process. We may find sudden wealth, but at what price of contentment…and taxes? Again…balance is the key. You may desire love or a relationship with a person…but at what price? Is the cost of fullfillment make the desire worth it? When does harm to others negate our wish? If you knew the consequences, would you keep the same wish? Genies are magic too…of a trickier sort, often with hard lessons in tow with the magic.

Magic, manifestation…the law of attraction. It’s all related. If we wish for something, we have a choice…

We can set our intention…but then put on the brakes and not allow ourselves to have our wish made real

We can make a wish, then do nothing…nothing but be disappointed when the wish goes unfulfilled, ultimately rejecting the magic at our fingertips

Or we can wish for something and allow it so aggressively and excessively that we also allow all the imbalances and lessons that come with it.

Magic is a double edged sword. I wonder if that is why a knife or anthame is part of magic lore and tradition.

Yes, we can allow ourselves to have our wishes. It is ok to allow our happiness. Yet the balance of that is doing the work needed, and having the compassion to not harm others in the rush of attainment.

Desire and fulfillment, attraction and repulsion, self and others. These are the dichotomies of the magician.

May you make a good wish…and let yourself have it. May your life be magic.

♪ ♫…iz super sneaky! ♪ ♫

First off, being a raid leader is a hard job, I do not envy them their job, I do not want to do their job. I was a tank for years, so I had to call the shots for 5 mans ALOT, and that was enough to drive me bat shit, especially in pugs.  The raid leaders are doing a fabulous job, and I’m not knocking anyone. Perhaps I got a little tired last night, but I did get a little miffed. Quite possible just my time of the month, but I have to get it off my chest. 

So last nights raid went off an hour late. I understand 10 or even 15 minutes, hell I’ll go even 30 minutes, but an hour is a tosh excessive, but thats just me. If we got off on closer to time, maybe we could of squeezed in another attempt on Anub. I don’t think going in with 24 people will kill us.  That’s an hour of porn watching I missed!

That’s not what pissed me off the most, the biggest thing about last nights raid that pissed me off, is on Anub. I asked for someone to mark the add which they want to kill. They did not, so I picked one. I picked the wrong one, after two Arcane Blasts which I cast at 1.44 seconds, (Thanks 704 Haste)  the add came right for me, I ice blocked like a pro. he then later burrowed. Then in Vent they were yelling at DPS for pulling Aggro.  Yes I use Omen, but after 2 arcane blasts, and there is no threat on an add, guess what. Yeah Omen pretty much tells me I’m screwed, oh wait don’t tanks have something called TAUNT!.  Maybe next time I’ll wait for 3 sunders to show up on the mob like old school.  If your not going to do what I ask you to do, so I can do my job effectively, don’t yell at me, or I will lay the smack down.  

Otherwise the raid went pretty well, we executed with maybe one or two wipes. Although I joke, and say I’m gonna hug some Orbs, juggle them with my hands, and have them smack me against my chin….wait? wha?  I actually tried to avoid them as best I could.  In general I think I performed rather well. I died at the end of Icehowl, after an ice blast, I died when he goes into the middle, I must of stood too close or something.  I died on the first wipe of the Champions, but the next try I went Arcane Shatter spec, yes DPS went down a bit, but Slow I think helps alot. They don’t get immune to that, and slow casting makes for slower casting of heals, and damage spells means good stuff for everyone.

I did win a Blade of Tarasque last night ( I can’t link right now) but it has haste, and hit on it. Lets just say there was two wands in my dress last night.  I won the roll, thank god no clothies brought dice yesterday. I also got some badges, think I might break my Tier 7/8 bonus, and get the Tier 9 shoulders, they are hot in terms of stats.

**Edit – I want to say that this is no way a comment of the people that led the raid or the officers, just some things happened on the raid last night I didn’t approve of, that’s all and that’s it.  I don’t want people thinking I’m sitting seething over stuff, or I’m mad at someone when I’m not.  I simply don’t work that way. I may rant and rave a bit, but I don’t hold anger in.  Also at lunch I picked up the Bejeweled Wizard’s Bracer pattern…looks like it’s time to farm some Spellweave.

Rude Lizard iz hiding between the glass and screen. We hope he comes inside. He’s a lot more fun before he gets deaded.

Gandalf is very glad that Whitey got his own blog. Now DailyGs will be all about the Gray Boys again. And you’ll never see Whitey on DailyGs again. Right Grayson? …Grayson?