A digital commonplace for a Regular Guy called Charlie Pharis

Month: July 2005 (page 5 of 5)

“You start out with a little bit of oil…”

“You never know…you might have to cook for twenty guys someday.” So said Pete Clemenza in The Godfather.

Cue the music.

Remember Clemenza’s advice to Michael Corleone…

Heh, come over here, kid, learn something. You never know, you might have to cook for twenty guys someday. You see, you start out with a little bit of oil. Then you fry some garlic. Then you throw in some tomatoes, tomato paste, you fry it; ya make sure it doesn’t stick. You get it to a boil; you shove in all your sausage and your meatballs; heh?… And a little bit o’ wine. An’ a little bit o’ sugar, and that’s my trick.

(Well, not exactly, but it’s the only Eye-talian sauce-making scene I could think of right off the top of my head!)

This is what I’m doing on a rainy Monday afternoon. If you’re in the neighborhood, stop by around 6:00. It’ll be ready then!

Yep, You Might Be…

One of the old Foxworthy lines goes something like this…

You Might Be A Redneck If…
The fireworks stand gives you a volume discount.

And judging from the sounds all around my neighborhood tonight, that outfit in the parking lot of Wal-Mart has been plenty busy, with volume discounts for all! (I wondered why that church van was always parked out there by the TNT tent. Turns out it’s a fund raiser for the church! Which may just spawn yet another Foxworthy line…). Dang, Gary, you missed a great opportunity!

Anyway, I like fireworks as much as the next guy. I’m as patriotic as I can be. But it sounds like Baghdad tonight.

Somewhere, sometime, between now and tomorrow night at this time, the TV news in Atlanta will report a fireworks incident/accident, which, in real time, will have begun with some guy uttering that immortal phrase…

Hey! Hold muh beer an’ watch ‘is!

Just wait…

That Does It, Part Deux…

OK, so here’s another good reason to leave the blogging to people who can.

I’ve got a buddy (long-distance, of course!) who works in a homeless shelter in Canada. He’s become quite an encourager and challenger of faulty thinking. Here’s what he posted the other day

I’m running out of patience with the emergent church ‘conversation’. I can no longer fathom our never-ending quest for a profound worship experience. I have no stomach for anything represented by a Christian market moniker – fiction or music or tee-shirts or bumperstickers or little silver fish on the back of the mini-van or any of it. This job has absolutely ruined it for me and normal Christianity. I’m through. Why? Because it’s all sacred. Every single heartbreak, pain, sob and gasp and cry are the world-bound expressions of Christ Himself, who aches and pains and longs through those who are wounded, abandoned, starved for love and starved for life. All that pain is sacred, every bit of it, and I’m beginning to understand that we intersect with God in the world – in it’s wounded, raw agony, in its insatiable longing to love and be loved, in its blood and tears and in the absolute despair that is the moment of one’s realization of hopelessness. That’s where God is most real, where love is most powerful and where Christ is most present.

It’s all sacred, every bit of it – it’s all sacred.