May 9, 2008 

we love our mom



Pictures by BRENT PALMER

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May 5, 2008 

Existentialism on Cinco de Mayo

So my mother-in-law is in town and we went to the main hispanic section of Brooklyn, Sunset Park, today for a Cinco de Mayo lunch. In the middle of a normal lunch my daughter made a funny statement that I like the more I think about it. To me it perfectly captures the existential malaise in the work of the author Walker Percy, amongst authors. A little more pithily, of course, coming as it does from a three-year-old.

Laura: "Adaline, eat your chicken."
Adaline wistfully ignores her mom.
Laura: "Adaline, how about some rice or beans? Which do you want, rice or beans?"
Adaline: "Mom, I just want to fly away to Neverland."

I couldn't have written it better myself. She is definitely my child.

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Apr 18, 2008 

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Apr 17, 2008 

This weekend in NYC

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Apr 2, 2008 

Denominational Renewal

The talks from the recent conversation in St. Louis are now available on-line here. Jeff White's was unfortunately not recorded properly, but you can listen to the beta version from Baltimore (and the other St. Louis talks, as well) if you scroll down this page, to "Denominational Renewal". If you're unfamiliar, a description of the purpose of this conversation can be found on the Denominational Renewal home page (from the first link above). These talks are attempts to articulate what it means to be a healthy, catholic, and missional denomination in a faithfully confessional and Reformed context. That being said, I think, with a little personal 'translation', they will prove to be immensely helpful to any Christian hoping to be more catholic, missional, and faithful in their own confessional tradition.

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Mar 28, 2008 

Spring Cleaning



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Mar 26, 2008 

La Blogotheque's Take-Away Shows

I've never blogged about the French website La Blogotheque because I always kind of assumed anyone who liked independent music already knew about it. A couple of recent conversations taught me otherwise, so here's a post. Click on the link above to see almost one hundred of the most wonderful videos, called "Take-Away Shows". They're beautifully filmed and capture some of today's best independent musicians playing stripped-down and live in natural settings. I sat next to the brain behind the site on a flight from NYC to Austin last Fall for the ACL fest and watched him edit a video on his laptop, which is when I was reminded of the site after it had been lost in my bookmarks tab forever. I haven't watched even 1/4 of them, but here are my favorites so far. (Oh, and in case you're counting, I'm pretty sure Brooklyn has more bands on there than any other locale. I'm just sayin'...)

Brooklyn band The National performing at a dinner party:



Brooklyn band Grizzly Bear harmonizing in a shower:



Brooklynite My Brightest Diamond a couple blocks from my house in Prospect Park:




(Some) Texans The Arcade Fire in an elevator:



Non-Brooklynites and non-Texans Menomena in Paris, with dancing Parisian kids:



The most eclectic, beautiful, and fascinating (includes Brooklynite Sufjan Stevens):



And I didn't link one-half of the Brooklyn bands. Get the idea? Anyways, these are my favorites so far. Feel free to share your favorites here so I can skip to the best ones. Enjoy!

11:26 AM | | | links to this post