Month: January 2008

How shall we sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land?

25 After you have had children and grandchildren and have lived in the land a long time—if you then become corrupt and make any kind of idol, doing evil in the eyes of the LORD your God and provoking him to anger, 26 I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you this day that you will quickly perish from the land that you are crossing the Jordan to possess. You will not live there long but will certainly be destroyed. — Deuteronomy 4:25-26

Did God give O.C. woman backstage pass to ‘American Idol’?

Leesa Bellesi threw her hands up in the air and prayed: “Here I am Lord, send me to the backstage of ‘American Idol.’ ”

She was watching Season 5 of the ultra-popular television show in her Laguna Beach home at the time.

It was her calling, she thought, “to minister to the needs of the people on that show.”

Several weeks later, out of the blue, a pretty girl named Katharine McPhee walked into Lake Avenue Church in Pasadena where Leesa’s husband, Denny, founder of Coast Hills Community Church in Aliso Viejo, was serving as the interim teaching pastor. Katharine asked Leesa and Denny to pray for her – as she was about to go into seclusion for “American Idol.”

Continue reading “How shall we sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land?” →

EMusic downloads!

Thank you everyone who gave me advice. I was getting tired of my own. Downloads were:

Amon Düül 2 – Yeti, via ortho_bob

Burial – Self-titled, via ortho_bob

Crippled Pilgrims – via obnoxicant

Graeme Downs – Hammers and Anvils via planetdracula

[ Yin Xiang . Liu San Jie ] Zhi . Le (Music Of Impression Sanjie Liu) – via planetdracula

Sharevari (Instrumental) from an 80s disco comp

The King of the Fairies (trad. arr) from some Irish comp

Has he stood firm against the manimals?

raar manimal

I didn’t get a chance to see or hear the State of the Union address this year, but I do want to know. He gave a stirring declaration of principle and courage in his 2006 address: that he would not tolerate man-animal hybrids. I have looked in vain for some evidence of action after this. The man is a lame duck, I understand. He’s had reverses. But can’t he think of his legacy?

This is not the first time I’ve expressed my concerns. And still the White House is silent.

Treachery, or mere incompetence? Please tell me he said something reassuring tonight.

bloated corpse

I own an HP color inkjet printer that also scans and copies. It’s handy and well-made.

Today I had to update the driver software to fix some bugs.

The download was 200 megabytes.

The uncompressed installation itself was over 400 megabytes.

There was no “custom install” option of less components, only the “default install” of every damned thing.

I had to opt out of their Customer Participation thing which is a daemon that runs constantly telling HP what’s going on.

I had to opt out of instant registration, and then opt out of both a reminder on next login and a dock item that would remind me to register. I also had to opt out of instant registration on the web.

Finally, it shat two useless items on my dock, the photo sharing app and the “device manager” app, that I will use maybe twice a year if at all.

The driver itself is tiny.

I DIDN’T WANT FINS, CHROME, AND FINE COREEEENTHIAN LEATHER ON MY GODDAMNED PRINTER DRIVER.

Edit: I had to buy black ink, which I did on Amazon. HP Ink. One cartridge, high quality, 660 pages: $18. Two cartridges bundled, lower quality, 480 pages each: $33. Math is hard.

For now is the time for your tears

Gregory Haidl, son of ex-sheriff’s official, to be freed from prison Saturday
From Times wire services

The son of an ex-Orange County assistant sheriff gets released from prison Saturday after serving his sentence in a videotaped sex assault case.

Gregory Haidl, 22, is being paroled from Pleasant Valley State Prison in Coalinga after serving part of a six-year sentence. He was given credit for good behavior.

Prosecutors described Haidl as the “maestro” who directed his friends in the assault of an unconscious 16-year-old girl on a pool table.

Haidl and friends Kyle Nachreiner and Keith Spann were convicted in 2005 of several counts of sexual penetration with foreign objects for the 2002 attack at the Haidl home in Corona del Mar.

Haidl is the son of former Assistant Sheriff Don Haidl.

THERE’S NO PLACE LIKE HOME. THERE’S NO PLACE LIKE… CAMARILLO?

This just in:
THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN OXNARD HAS ISSUED A * TORNADO WARNING FOR… SOUTHWEST LOS ANGELES COUNTY IN SOUTHWEST CALIFORNIA INCLUDING THE CITIES OF MALIBU… PACIFIC PALISADES AND TOPANGA … * UNTIL 945 PM PST * AT 836 PM PST… NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE DOPPLER RADAR INDICATED A SEVERE THUNDERSTORM WITH ROTATION CAPABLE OF PRODUCING A TORNADO. THE CELL WAS LOCATED 5 MILES SOUTH OF MALIBU MOVING NORTH NORTHEAST AT 25 MPH. IT SHOULD AFFECT MALIBU AND PACIFIC PALISADES BEFORE 900 PM PST.
Instruction:
IF IN MOBILE HOMES OR VEHICLES…EVACUATE THEM AND GET INSIDE A SUBSTANTIAL SHELTER. IF NO SHELTER IS AVAILABLE… LIE FLAT IN THE NEAREST DITCH OR OTHER LOW SPOT AND COVER YOUR HEAD WITH YOUR HANDS