. . .Twins vs. Brewers as the featured game on ESPN tonight.
. . .a dinner composed of real brats, boiled in Leinie's, with a tabouleh-esque salad, followed by ice cream and fresh cherries for dessert.
But the real cherry on top of the whole evening: TWINS WIN! My boys Joe and Justin did us proud (Mauer started things off with a home run in the first inning; Morneau sealed the deal with a grand slam in the 7th), Scotty Baker put in a very strong 8 1/3 innings so is hopefully emerging from whatever psychological block he's been languishing under thus far this season, and now I can watch Twins baseball with a clean conscience because the curse is finally broken!
Happy Memorial Day!
Sunday, May 24, 2009
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
This Little Pastor Went to New York
So, while Andy chills and makes videos of his kids, I wound down after Easter by heading to the Big Apple.
The time was good, but - as always - too short.
Got into town on Monday afternoon, and after a quick lunch (hmmm. . .real New York City bagels!) Sarah and I went to check out the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. Though it's close to Sarah and Rob's apartment, they've been doing work on it the past few years, so this is the first time in my visits to the city that it was possible to view the full length of the Cathedral without scaffolding and whatnot blocking the view.
It is a very impressive building, and I think it's cool they are trying to create it with old world craftsmanship, which is why it's still not completely finished - gives one a sense of appreciation for how long it must have taken to build those massive cathedrals in Europe.
It being the day after Easter, their Easter flowers were still on display - they had these giant urns FULL of flowers - probably a dozen urns lining the length of the nave, plus other lavish Easter gardens set up at various points around the sanctuary. Sarah and I estimated that each urn arrangement easily cost $1,000 a piece, if not more, and it occurred to me that this congregation's flower budget was probably more than my congregation's entire budget for the year.
This realization was akin to the feeling I get every time the train pulls into Penn Station, and I think, there are more people in this building at this very moment than live in or within a 30 mile radius of my town. Just another way that the scale of things in New York has the ability to shock and awe.
The downside to such scale, however, is the intense isolation you can feel, even when surrounded by a lot of people. Sarah had gone to Good Friday services at the Cathedral, and though she estimated there were 200 people there, because they were spread out over so large a space, she said it felt like worshipping alone.
In any case, when we were done looking at all the church art, we cruised through Columbia and picked Rob up on the way back to the apartment, then met Breen's sister Trina for dinner at this fantastic Afghani place (Ariana Afghan Kabob), then we all enjoyed an evening at the Upright Citizen's Brigade, which I've been wanting to check out for a while. I was not disappointed. Some sketches were more tightly written and performed than others, but in my opinion, even the clunkiest ones were still better than much of what has been on Saturday Night Live the past few years. Maybe the SNL writers should take a refresher course at the UCB. . .
Tuesday morning, I walked up to the God Box (er. . .Interchurch Center) to check out Sarah's new office, which has a sweet view of the Hudson and midtown Manhattan:
Then I was off to see the Museum of Biblical Art. This was somewhat disappointing. I was under the impression they had a permanent collection, plus visiting exhibits. Turned out they are all of two gallery rooms, and only host visiting exhibits, the current of which is about the Bible and film. Basically, it was a lot of movie posters and a few props from Biblically-themed films, and the commentary was kind of tracing the progression of artistic portrayals in the posters (I had the feeling I would have gotten more out of it if I was more up to speed on classical works of religious art).
What I found most interesting were two non-artistic pieces: one was a letter written by Cecille B. DeMille, who was very excited about the upcoming release of The King of Kings, and hopeful it would bring the life of Christ alive in people's hearts, as opposed to something remote, irrelevant, stuck in staid stained glass. Having spent a good chunk of the day before looking at stained glass (which was once a "new" way to tell an old story), and having been thinking a lot lately about how the gospel will keep making itself relevant and find ways to be communicated in whatever times are being lived, I thought it was interesting how this famous movie director/producer himself recognized how he was translating the old, old story into a new medium for his time. More on that later, I'm sure, 'cause I've got a post about the emergent church percolating in the back of my mind. . .
The other really interesting thing to me was the promotional materials associated with Ben-Hur, specifically the ways it was to be marketed to pastors and church groups. Ah, capitalism - leave no market untapped, no opportunity unexplored.
In any case, it took me less than an hour to go through the whole museum, so then I walked around Central Park for a while.
After a nice walk and a ride on the carousel, I meandered over to Lincoln Center for their tour, which was pretty cool. I was bummed we did not get to see The Met, as they were in the midst of dress rehearsal for Siegfried and had a small audience. But our tour guide more than made up for it in Avery Fisher Hall, when he snuck us in for about 15 minutes of Philharmonic's rehearsal.
After that, I walked down to the Time Warner Center to get some lunch at the Bouchon Bakery. It was here I had my first encounter with a truly rude New Yorker.
Digression: To me, there's a difference between urban standoffishness and malicious or intentional rudeness, and I think New York gets a bad rap for its attitude. Yes, people there keep to themselves, and drive or walk aggressively, but those are necessary skills to survive the urban jungle, and I'm willing to forgive the unintentional rudeness they can effect. In reality, most of the people I've encountered in New York have been polite and helpful if I've had to stop and ask them for directions or whatever.
This security guy at Time Warner, however, was intentionally rude. There was no place by the Bakery to sit, not even a place to stand at a counter and eat my lunch. After making two passes through the seating area, I figured I was going to have to eat sitting on the floor. This guy watched me make those two passes, move back by a pillar, set my things down, take my coat off, sit down and pull out and unwrap my sandwich, before he came over and snarkily said "You can't sit on the floor, it's against the rules." I motioned to the tables and said "But there's no place to sit and eat." He just smirked and shrugged his shoulders like "Not my problem" then repeated "Well, you can't sit on the floor."
So I wrapped my sandwich back up, put my coat back on, picked up my stuff, left the building and walked across the street to Central Park, where I ate in the drizzle as three homeless guys watched me. The food was excellent, but the ambience diminished my enjoyment of it, because I felt guilty for eating in front of the homeless guys, and I was mad at how maliciously rude the guard had been. He could have been helpful and suggested other seating areas in the building where I might try to find a place to sit and eat, but he didn't (and had I not been so flustered, I might have thought to ask). Or at the very least, he could have stopped me when he saw I was clearly preparing to sit down on the floor, instead of waiting until I was settled and had the sandwich inches from my mouth before he swooped in and took visible pleasure in ousting me. That was just unnecessarily jerky, but unfortunately, the pastor in me couldn't even stay mad at the guy that long. Instead, I started feeling sorry for him, because in my experience, people who have a lot of messed up stuff going on in their lives tend to exercise what little areas of authority they do have with a particular zeal and triumphalism. Given the zealousness with which he carried out his guard duties, I can only imagine what kind of crap and lack of agency he lives with on a daily basis.
So, after wolfing down my expensive bakery lunch (anxious to get out of the rain and away from the eyes of the hungry guys watching me), it was time to leave. All in all, another fantastic visit to the city so nice that they named it twice.
Peace,
C.
The time was good, but - as always - too short.
Got into town on Monday afternoon, and after a quick lunch (hmmm. . .real New York City bagels!) Sarah and I went to check out the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. Though it's close to Sarah and Rob's apartment, they've been doing work on it the past few years, so this is the first time in my visits to the city that it was possible to view the full length of the Cathedral without scaffolding and whatnot blocking the view.
It is a very impressive building, and I think it's cool they are trying to create it with old world craftsmanship, which is why it's still not completely finished - gives one a sense of appreciation for how long it must have taken to build those massive cathedrals in Europe.
It being the day after Easter, their Easter flowers were still on display - they had these giant urns FULL of flowers - probably a dozen urns lining the length of the nave, plus other lavish Easter gardens set up at various points around the sanctuary. Sarah and I estimated that each urn arrangement easily cost $1,000 a piece, if not more, and it occurred to me that this congregation's flower budget was probably more than my congregation's entire budget for the year.
This realization was akin to the feeling I get every time the train pulls into Penn Station, and I think, there are more people in this building at this very moment than live in or within a 30 mile radius of my town. Just another way that the scale of things in New York has the ability to shock and awe.
The downside to such scale, however, is the intense isolation you can feel, even when surrounded by a lot of people. Sarah had gone to Good Friday services at the Cathedral, and though she estimated there were 200 people there, because they were spread out over so large a space, she said it felt like worshipping alone.
In any case, when we were done looking at all the church art, we cruised through Columbia and picked Rob up on the way back to the apartment, then met Breen's sister Trina for dinner at this fantastic Afghani place (Ariana Afghan Kabob), then we all enjoyed an evening at the Upright Citizen's Brigade, which I've been wanting to check out for a while. I was not disappointed. Some sketches were more tightly written and performed than others, but in my opinion, even the clunkiest ones were still better than much of what has been on Saturday Night Live the past few years. Maybe the SNL writers should take a refresher course at the UCB. . .
Tuesday morning, I walked up to the God Box (er. . .Interchurch Center) to check out Sarah's new office, which has a sweet view of the Hudson and midtown Manhattan:
Then I was off to see the Museum of Biblical Art. This was somewhat disappointing. I was under the impression they had a permanent collection, plus visiting exhibits. Turned out they are all of two gallery rooms, and only host visiting exhibits, the current of which is about the Bible and film. Basically, it was a lot of movie posters and a few props from Biblically-themed films, and the commentary was kind of tracing the progression of artistic portrayals in the posters (I had the feeling I would have gotten more out of it if I was more up to speed on classical works of religious art).
What I found most interesting were two non-artistic pieces: one was a letter written by Cecille B. DeMille, who was very excited about the upcoming release of The King of Kings, and hopeful it would bring the life of Christ alive in people's hearts, as opposed to something remote, irrelevant, stuck in staid stained glass. Having spent a good chunk of the day before looking at stained glass (which was once a "new" way to tell an old story), and having been thinking a lot lately about how the gospel will keep making itself relevant and find ways to be communicated in whatever times are being lived, I thought it was interesting how this famous movie director/producer himself recognized how he was translating the old, old story into a new medium for his time. More on that later, I'm sure, 'cause I've got a post about the emergent church percolating in the back of my mind. . .
The other really interesting thing to me was the promotional materials associated with Ben-Hur, specifically the ways it was to be marketed to pastors and church groups. Ah, capitalism - leave no market untapped, no opportunity unexplored.
In any case, it took me less than an hour to go through the whole museum, so then I walked around Central Park for a while.
After a nice walk and a ride on the carousel, I meandered over to Lincoln Center for their tour, which was pretty cool. I was bummed we did not get to see The Met, as they were in the midst of dress rehearsal for Siegfried and had a small audience. But our tour guide more than made up for it in Avery Fisher Hall, when he snuck us in for about 15 minutes of Philharmonic's rehearsal.
After that, I walked down to the Time Warner Center to get some lunch at the Bouchon Bakery. It was here I had my first encounter with a truly rude New Yorker.
Digression: To me, there's a difference between urban standoffishness and malicious or intentional rudeness, and I think New York gets a bad rap for its attitude. Yes, people there keep to themselves, and drive or walk aggressively, but those are necessary skills to survive the urban jungle, and I'm willing to forgive the unintentional rudeness they can effect. In reality, most of the people I've encountered in New York have been polite and helpful if I've had to stop and ask them for directions or whatever.
This security guy at Time Warner, however, was intentionally rude. There was no place by the Bakery to sit, not even a place to stand at a counter and eat my lunch. After making two passes through the seating area, I figured I was going to have to eat sitting on the floor. This guy watched me make those two passes, move back by a pillar, set my things down, take my coat off, sit down and pull out and unwrap my sandwich, before he came over and snarkily said "You can't sit on the floor, it's against the rules." I motioned to the tables and said "But there's no place to sit and eat." He just smirked and shrugged his shoulders like "Not my problem" then repeated "Well, you can't sit on the floor."
So I wrapped my sandwich back up, put my coat back on, picked up my stuff, left the building and walked across the street to Central Park, where I ate in the drizzle as three homeless guys watched me. The food was excellent, but the ambience diminished my enjoyment of it, because I felt guilty for eating in front of the homeless guys, and I was mad at how maliciously rude the guard had been. He could have been helpful and suggested other seating areas in the building where I might try to find a place to sit and eat, but he didn't (and had I not been so flustered, I might have thought to ask). Or at the very least, he could have stopped me when he saw I was clearly preparing to sit down on the floor, instead of waiting until I was settled and had the sandwich inches from my mouth before he swooped in and took visible pleasure in ousting me. That was just unnecessarily jerky, but unfortunately, the pastor in me couldn't even stay mad at the guy that long. Instead, I started feeling sorry for him, because in my experience, people who have a lot of messed up stuff going on in their lives tend to exercise what little areas of authority they do have with a particular zeal and triumphalism. Given the zealousness with which he carried out his guard duties, I can only imagine what kind of crap and lack of agency he lives with on a daily basis.
So, after wolfing down my expensive bakery lunch (anxious to get out of the rain and away from the eyes of the hungry guys watching me), it was time to leave. All in all, another fantastic visit to the city so nice that they named it twice.
Peace,
C.
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