I’m not an exclusive psalmody type (what is exclusive psalmody?). But I had to put together a little Ron Swanson inspiration for all Christians after reading a friend’s tweet:
This evening I ate like Ron Swanson and sang Psalms like a warrior.
#manlyevening
Psalms are warrior-like. Psalms are manly. I imagine that Ron prefers to sing psalms. Next someone will have to ask him his opinion of the regulative principle.
When I read your poetry, I shake my head at your unfortunate phrasing. I was glad when you recognized that to speak on universals, you needed to find strange and new ways of expression. But I winced when you went over the top. Your Vortex on a String poem was particularly difficult to stomach.
You have to be really careful about using such brutal and aggressive words. “A cavalcade of anger and fear”? “Five years in Sweden dying for you”? “My days are like a burning fuselage”? Too much; too heavy-handed.
Alas, I cannot help that I am cynical and overly critical. I am too weak to be better than that.
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Boys and girls, be beautiful. And be unashamed. Be better than me; be like John Darnielle of Mountain Goats. If I had found a lyric like “a cavalcade of anger and fear” in my old journals, I would have cringed, and perhaps even scratched it out. But that is because I am too weak and impure, too lacking in beautiful sincerity to pull it off. When Darnielle sings lines like that, you can see and hear how invested he is in them; he makes you believe that it truly was a cavalcade of anger and fear. What does it matter if haters don’t like the expression? He’s telling you how it was.
Earnestness is a beautiful quality. Mean what you say. Sell out to it. Live to what you’ve attained.
It is common for children to be beaten by their fathers. It is common for men to be left utterly alone. It is common for men to despair. Speak to those common things in a way that acknowledges how huge and terrible they are. They might happen to every man, but that makes them no less immense. And the salvation that comes to men is no less immense. Offer it sincerely, and earnestly. Find and express the beauty in it, caring nothing for the fact that millions before you have voiced the same thing.
Don’t be cool. Be beautiful. Be true. Be good.
He very much minds having an ad popping up on his mySpace telling him what to do, especially on a Sunday!
Apparently there is now scientific evidence for what those of use over thirty have known for a long time: pop music is getting louder and all sounds the same. Certain questions and particular algorithms were run on pop music from 1955 to today.
A team led by artificial intelligence specialist Joan Serra at the Spanish National Research Council ran music from the last 50 years through some complex algorithms and found that pop songs have become intrinsically louder and more bland in terms of the chords, melodies and types of sound used.
“We found evidence of a progressive homogenization of the musical discourse,” Serra told Reuters. “In particular, we obtained numerical indicators that the diversity of transitions between note combinations – roughly speaking chords plus melodies – has consistently diminished in the last 50 years.”
They also found the so-called timbre palette has become poorer. The same note played at the same volume on, say, a piano and a guitar is said to have a different timbre, so the researchers found modern pop has a more limited variety of sounds.
Intrinsic loudness is the volume baked into a song when it is recorded, which can make it sound louder than others even at the same volume setting on an amplifier.
The emphasis in this ought to be “pop” music. One of the temptations in interpreting this is simply to conclude that everyone, artists and consumers alike, are just getting dumber n’ dumber. I think there’s something to that, but there’s a positive force at work here as well.
Pop music used to be better because it used to be very difficult to make a living as a musician if you weren’t signed to a major label. This kept a lot of talent in the “industry” that is now, thanks to newer media, able to make money through a variety of ways. Smaller record labels have many more options, and touring is something smaller acts can do and actually make a little bit of money at.
Sports analogy: in the U.S. we’re obsessed with big-time sports. Gotta make the big-time, make the big salaries. A huge proportion of athletic talent gets funneled into the “major” sports. Its hard to make a living in anything outside of those sports, and the only sport that pays well on a minor league level is the one that is most European in structure: baseball. In other countries, including much poorer ones, the salaries of stars in star sports are more modest, but an athlete can actually make a living playing women’s volleyball. The structure of TV deals, ticket sales, salaries, it all means that a much greater number of athletes can be supported.
For the past several years the American music industry has been shifting from a “mega” model to one which can support and sustain more musicians…albeit more modestly. Those still stuck (probably willingly stuck, let’s be honest, there’s still a ton of money) in the mega music industry have less and less talent to work with, and so they focus on putting out a homogenized easy-to-produce product. Trot out all the Katy Perrys and Lady Gagas you like, the advent of a new Madonna is extremely unlikely in this our internet age. She probably went to Nashville and is now touring medium-sized venues with her band.
So rejoice in the decay of American pop. It’s just a symptom of a great blessing: it’s so easy to find good music.
Ron Swanson is a hero to many. The mustachioed maven of meat and ‘merican manliness is, for me, the chief attraction of watching Parks & Recreation (notwithstanding the unrelenting cheery winsomeness of the Knope character).
A couple of posts back (James Bond’s Favorite Eggs) I embedded a video compilation of Swanson eating his Turf n’ Turf, which consisted of a 16oz t-bone and a 240z porterhouse, accompanied by scrambled eggs, whiskey, and a cigar. All of this, of course, consumed at once.
If you’re unfamiliar with the character, this clip sums him up.
Much has been made on the show of Swanson’s dietary and drinking habits. It’s become something of a cultural phenomenon with a momentum of its own. Season five of the show premieres in September of 2012, and I’m afraid the Ron Swansonness of Ron Swanson has reached a point where the writers of the show might feel they have to introduce some sort of health crisis into the character’s life.
That’s my prediction. Parks & Rec has made a lot of hay with Swanson’s unapologetic embrace of all things testosteroney; his only weakness is his women. Will they have the courage to continue writing his hilarious philosophies and appetites as they are, or will they make the man suffer a heart attack? I would be amazed if the artists behind the show managed to continue prioritizing their art over their stricken social consciences.
Actually, I have no idea if their social consciences are actually stricken. But come on, this is TV. Someone with enough power is going to make sure all the viewers know that if you sin against the god of living-as-long-as-possible, you must pay for your sins.
Sure hope I’m wrong.
Today I “liked” Tanqueray on Facebook. Do you know why? Because Tanqueray told me to.
Look at this ad, just brimming with confidence. No spiel, no trickery, no desperation. Just the command, “Like Tanqueray”.
If there’s one way to manipulate me through marketing, it’s by exuding manly confidence. Sadly for Tanqueray, I will only be admiring their mojo abstractly. I remain a Bombay Sapphire man.
Ah, sweet irenicism. Why would anyone want to pick a side when we can all just live in peace together?
Because peace comes through resolution and reconciliation. Passive-aggressive behavior only increases division and bitterness. I believe that Americans have lost, after the Baby Boomer break with our fathers, the ability to have resolution and reconciliation through frankness, conflict, and forgiveness.
Instead, ours is a society of passive one-upmanship in which the game is to get the other person to misstep and show that he is the one being mean and unkind. Once someone has been exposed in that way he must back down, humiliated. Because of this, conflict almost never happens. We usually see where our position will become untenable within the culture of tolerance, evaluate where our enemies stand on the same scale, then decide to back out if it seems that we might be shown to be unkind. The paramount goal of our verbal manouverings is to be the one who takes offense.
The best way to gain standing in a society like this is to constantly be bringing “tolerance” into focus, to make it appear as if there is hatred and anger and unforgiveness all around you while you stand in the storm as a rock of moderation.
This is so ingrained in us that, even if we are not always actively playing the game I described above, it shapes how we speak.
Am I talking about the business world? or academia?
No, mes amis. I’m talking about regular old life in society. I’m talking about community. I’m talking about the Church.
Take this sign, for example, versions of which have been flying around Pinterest for weeks (yes, I dig Pinterest, here’s my profile). And if you’re someone who has posted this or even used this in her wedding, don’t be offended. I see the cuteness of it. But maybe consider the assumptions behind such a sign.
Look how sweet this sign is. It’s all about unity. It’s about two families becoming one!
You didn’t come to this wedding with some sort of cruel agenda to be divisive by sitting with your friend’s family, did you? Didn’t think so. So pick a seat. Any seat. ANY SEAT!
Forget the built-in traditions of a wedding which have the families divided before the giving of rings, then generally mixed afterwards. You know, making two families one. You might have a better idea for the liturgy of marriage, or simply one you prefer for yourself. There’s no reason your wedding has to be just like grandma’s. But consider what a sign like this says.
Its very phrasing is manipulative. It’s an example of how the way we speak has become passive-aggressive; we’re always phrasing things divisively, paralyzing those who disagree but wish not to offend.
Christians should be all about positive phrasing. Unfortunately we’ve lost the ability to phrase things positively because saying “yes” or “it is so” is too strong. Saying “no” or “maybe” leaves us wiggle room.
This sign could have said, “Today, two families become one. Sit anywhere!” Instead, it phrases negatively. These are the effects:
Am I making mountain of molehill? Only a bit. It is only that I tire of how we have begun to use language.
Let us be open. Let us be generous. Let us be expansive and liberal and considerate whenever possible. And (here’s my negativity, my prohibition) let’s avoid prohibition. It’s ought not to be “You can’t pick a side”. It ought to be “sit anywhere”.
Let’s be rid of the hipster language that assails us and speak plainly and openly. As in, “This is my party. Please, sit anywhere. Eat anything. Drink anything. Speak to anyone you wish.” And let the Captains of Unity stop being aggrieved and resentful, and get back to their good work.
I hung out yesterday with a friend who is very enthusiastic about chickens. He has many chickens at his home, and as he sat in the garden drinking beer with me, I could tell from the way he watched my four chickens that he loved them.
He is trying to raise a bunch of Marans chickens, a French breed which it is illegal to bring into the U.S. He bought twenty chicks in Georgia, which, disappointingly, is quite legal. I guess once the chickens are here there’s no problem. This disappointed me greatly because I’d thought for a moment that I knew a chicken smuggler.
Anyway, Marans lay a dark chocolate-colored egg which is said to be super-duper delicious. My friend told me that his experience was “Yeah, yeah, I’m sure they’re good, but an egg’s an egg…wait…these are amazingly delicious!” This from someone who’s very used to the eggs of free range chickens; the Marans eggs were that outstanding. I’m really looking forward to trying some when his chickens are grown.
This friend also mentioned that Marans are James Bond’s favorite eggs. Ian Fleming loved egg dishes, and he gave James Bond a voracious appetite for eggs, particularly scrambled eggs. Here is a recipe for the Bond eggs, which has much molten butter whisked in, and was included in Ian Fleming’s short story Thrilling Cities.
From wikipedia:
When in England and not on a mission, Bond dines as simply as Fleming did on dishes such as grilled sole, oeufs en cocotte and cold roast beef with potato salad. When on a mission, however, Bond eats more extravagantly. This was partly because in 1953, when Casino Royale was published, many items of food were still rationed, and Bond was “the ideal antidote to Britain’s postwar austerity, rationing and the looming premonition of lost power”. This extravagance was more noteworthy with his contemporary readers for Bond eating exotic, local foods when abroad, at a time when most of his readership did not travel abroad.
On 1 April 1958 Fleming wrote to The Manchester Guardian in defence of his work, referring to that paper’s review of Dr. No. Whilst referring to Bond’s food and wine consumption as “gimmickery”, Fleming bemoaned that “it has become an unfortunate trade-mark. I myself abhor Wine-and-Foodmanship. My own favourite food is scrambled eggs.” Fleming was so keen on scrambled eggs that he used his short story, “007 in New York” to provide his favourite recipe for the dish: in the story, this came from the housekeeper of his friend Ivar Bryce, May, who gave her name to Bond’s own housekeeper.
Scrambled eggs are, by the way, delicious for dinner. In this iconic Ron Swanson clip (the “Turf n’ Turf), the right to consume a t-bone, a porterhouse, a whiskey, and a cigar at the same time is heralded as quintessentially American. It might be. It is certainly quintessentially testosteroney. But what remains unmentioned by Swanson is the generous serving of scrambled eggs next to the steaks. Fleming and Bond would have been proud.
