Catholic Bones

For those of you who haven’t seen the show Bones, the basic premise is that the forensic anthropologist Dr. Temperance Brennan and FBI agent Seeley Booth work together to solve murders.  One is all brain, and the other is all heart.  Together they make an unstoppable team.  The two characters represent the battles between evidence versus intuition, academic intelligence versus social skills, and reason versus faith.  Because we know that in today’s society the two things are considered mutually exclusive.

It’s this last battle that I find particularly interesting, as Agent Booth is a Catholic.  It is always interesting to see how Catholics are represented on television.  Like most  people who adhere to a religion, they are not usually portrayed in a flattering way.  The underlying assumption is that a person of faith is either a fool or a hypocrite.  Overall Bones does a better job of handling religion than many other shows.  For instance, a recent episode centered around an anthropology intern who has been faking an Arab accent so that the other scientists won’t harass him as much for being a devout Muslim.  He makes the very good point that you can still believe that God created the world in all of its mysteries and and also believe that science can help us to understand His work even better, sometimes.  Even science doesn’t have all of the answers.

I find Booth’s Catholicism particularly interesting, because in some ways he represents the “average” Catholic.  You know the kind that would probably be referred to as Cafeteria Catholic, one who picks and chooses which tenants of the faith they want to follow.  For instance, he doesn’t  seem to follow the Church’s teachings on chastity.  He has a son out of wedlock and there are references to other non-marital liaisons.  And in a last season episode, he is willing to be a sperm donor for his work partner Dr. Brennan even though the entire process goes against Church teachings.  However, you get the impression that he does attend Mass somewhat regularly.

Since Dr. Brennan is atheist, she often makes comments about Booth’s faith.  The most recent one that inspired this post revolves around the vow of poverty.  Brennan and Booth are riding along when she makes a reference to a long standing argument they have been having about the Pope’s hat.  I was just waiting for some crazy reference to it being designed to represent an obscure fish god, but instead Brennan offers the just as misguided, “I’m just saying it’s pretty ornate for someone who made a vow of poverty.”

The fact that Booth didn’t offer a rebuttal just goes to show that he is as ignorant about it as she is.  You just don’t know if this ignorance is intentional or reflects the ignorance of the writers.  Many Catholics today are very ignorant when it comes to the tenants and inner-workings of their faith.  They don’t know which things are essential to know and believe and which are optional.  They don’t really understand Church history or what things are or mean.  Welcome to the break down of Catholic religious education since the 1960’s.

Now, despite the deficiency of my Catholic religious education in some areas, I would have at least been able to point out one thing her comment.  She is misunderstanding what a vow of poverty is.  It does not mean that you can not own any possessions.  As Sister Rose explained it to us, due to her vow of poverty her paychecks went directly to her order where it was redistributed based on need.  She then received a stipend each month to cover her rent, food, and any other minor expenses that she might have.  If she needed extra one month in order to replace clothing or some other necessity she would have to apply for it.  Anything left over each month was hers to do with as she wished, and she was also allowed to keep presents.  She was always given enough to live comfortably but not extravagantly.

Last year I learned of a second misconception in Dr. Brennan’s comment.  Not all priests or religious women make vow of poverty.  Diocesan priests in fact do not make a vow of poverty.  They get a small, regular paycheck to do with whatever they wish.  As a diocesan priest Joseph Ratzinger (aka Pope Benedict XVI) would not have made a vow of poverty.  This is a very common misunderstanding out there that I regularly came across while doing research to verify my knowledge on the subject.

Now as Pope, he probably does not have to live off of his paychecks.  As a head of state, his personal needs and expenses are probably taken care of much in the same way as those of the President of the United States.  Also, like the President of the United States, there are probably many extravagant things in his keeping that do not actually belong to him personally but to the office he is fulfilling.

Personally, I think it was a rather idiotic statement for Dr. Brennan to make and not just because it was based in ignorance.  Of all the things to criticize for being too costly, she chooses the Pope’s hat??  The Pope most often wears a zuchetto or a mitre, which are both made from cloth.  It’s not like those things are encrusted with priceless jewels.  Unless she is making a reference to the now defunct Triregnum, or papal tiara.  Either way it seems like a rather silly criticism for someone of her purported intelligence and reasoning skills.

I will continue to watch and enjoy Bones despite its sometimes anti-Catholic banter.  I understand that this is sympotomatic of media in general.  And I will not hold Booth’s “cafeteria” Catholic ways against him.  Because, you see, you just can’t see inside a person’s heart.  I don’t know if Booth disobeys Church teachings out of ignorance, misunderstanding, willful disobedience, fear, an inablility to resist temptation, misplaced priorities, or more probably because he is written that way so that on one hand he can represent a religious viewpoint without crossing that line of being considered kooky.  Because the general assumption is that anyone who truly tries to allow their religious beliefs to guide all aspects of their life must have something wrong with them.

Life Unplugged

About two months ago, my husband and I started looking at some ways to shave some money off of our expenses.  Some unexpected repairs and expenses over the summer prevented us from putting as much back in savings as we had intended.  One of our goals is to have all of our credit card debt paid off by the end of 2010 and keep it off, so we were just looking to build a little cushion in our budget to avoid using our credit card if possible.

I started by suggesting that we cut back on our cable package.  My husband wasn’t keen on that idea.  He suggested getting rid of our land-line and switching to a cell phone, but I wasn’t keen on that idea.  And once he realized it would mean giving up our alarm system, he wasn’t either.  Once he started looking at the cable bill and realized how much we were paying for cable television and how few channels we as a family were actually watching, he suggested that we completely dump our cable, land-line, and alarm system.

I had secretly been wanting to ditch the cable for awhile.  And we were both having concerns about some of the attitudes the girls were picking up from Disney and Nickelodeon shows.  We started looking into how much an antenna would cost and what to expect from it.  After a experimenting with three antennas, we found success with this Clearstream 2 Long-Range HDTV Antenna by Antennas Direct.  It’s an indoor/outdoor antenna, and after a few different scans found a good place for it near a living room window.  We get all of the major networks (although CBS and NBC are more finnicky), WGN, Fox, all four PBS stations, a few other local channels, and three channels out of Chicago that feature old television shows and movies with awesome picture quality.

How are we all adjusting to life without cable television?  Much better than I would have expected even six months ago.  Rick realized he mainly used the television as background noise while he worked on other things, and he now fills that void with DVDs, podcasts,  and music.  The girls have been rediscovering PBS Kids, but they have also been learning about “new” shows like Star Trek and The Munsters.  The first week Bailey and I watched Ed Sullivan music highlights on PBS.  They have also been getting more use out of their DVD collection and enjoying a big box of VHS movies my parents passed on to them.  We also have the entire library system to tap as we catch up on our VeggieTales viewing.

As for me, the biggest thing I missed at first was the DVR.  It was a bit of an adjustment for the girls to not be able to pause in the middle of a show for dinner time or a bathroom break.  However, I almost never watched any of my shows when they aired.  And my biggest concern about getting rid of the cable was losing the DVR and making myself a slave to the television schedule.  Let’s just say that Hulu has become my new best friend.  It offers me the same flexibility to keep up with Bones and Hell’s Kitchen as the DVR did.  Come January/February Lost may be a whole other story, though.

Overall we’ve been watching less television, which can only be a good thing.  The first few weeks we spent a lot of time outside enjoying the last of the warm weather.  A recent visit from my parents kept us busy and introduced some new toys.   Internet use has been on the rise, but it can be more easily regulated.  And being able to access Disney.com has eased Bailey’s withdrawal from the Disney Channel.  For me and Rick it was worth it just to avoid watching five hours of Hannah Montana, Zack & Cody, and Wizards of Waverly Place every day.

We are still in the process of getting our phone situation straightened out.  We get a great cell phone deal through a good friend who works at Sprint, but we’re being held up by the process of switching our land-line phone number to the new cell phone.  I know it will be a bit of an adjustment using a cell phone in the house.  My biggest concerns have been keeping the cell phone charged, keeping the cell phone on, and keeping the cell phone where it can be found easily at all times (with three small children this last one really concerns me).  I will probably need to get something to keep it on my body most of the day as I work on different floors of the house.

We were less sure about getting rid of the alarm system, and we had heard that systems with a cell phone back up were available.  So I called our security company and asked about cell phone-only systems.  They said the technology was available but would cost $230 for installation and raise our bill about $25 a month.  There were no discounts for loyal customers.  Rick and I talked about it and agreed that was too expensive and counter-productive to our goals.  So I called them back in order to cancel our service.  However, this time I got a different representative who offered us free installation and only a $1 increase on our monthly bill if we signed a five-year contract.  Since our chances of being here and wanting an alarm for the next five years were high we took the deal.  It just goes to show how much these things can depend on catching the right customer service representative.

So these days we’re feeling kind of smart.  We’re getting high quality television for free.  We’re off the grid a bit and saving some money.  Next thing you know we’ll be hooking up gas-powered generators to supply our electrical needs, growing our own food, and trading in our car for a horse and buggy.  NOT!!  And as you can tell, giving up our high-speed internet was non-negotiable for both of us.

Says It All

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Who? (No spoilers)

I don’t know why I go to see Harry Potter movies when I am bound to be disappointed.  To dramatize each book properly would take a 10-hour mini-series.  There are just too many sub-plots, too many mysteries, and just too much great stuff to squeeze into two hours.  When I learned that they were going to split the Deathly Hallows book into two movies, I felt optimistic, but after watching the movie version of The Half-Blood Prince I am not so sure.  After seeing how much they have chopped out and condensed in the past three movies, I am wondering if the screenwriters, producers, etc may have painted themselves into certain corners that they are going to have a hard time getting out of without significantly altering parts of the book.  Although, I am encouraged by looking over the cast list for HP and the Deathly Hallows: Part I. Ciaran Hinds has been cast as Aberforth, which is awesome!

I don’t want to give away any details for those who haven’t had a chance to see HBP yet; I just want to make some general observations.  There were certain parts I really enjoyed, mostly scenes directly from the book.  There were things in which the mystery was completely sucked out.  There were some seemingly significant points that were completely over-looked.  And as has been the trend, there were unnecessary, extra scenes whose time could have been used instead for a scene from the actual book.  I HATE seemingly unnecessary changes.

I’m beginning to sympathize with those who hate Steve Kloves as the screenwriter.  Of the last three movies, I think I liked the one that he didn’t write the most.  He does seem to want to make Hermione the co-star and Ron kind of dumb statue.  I still don’t like Michael Gambon as Dumbledore, but at least they softened him up a little bit in this one.  Although one comical moment was when Dumbledore was drinking the potion in the cave and my husband compared the reaction to what he gets from drinking a Mr. Misty too fast.

I always wonder what a non-HP reader thinks of the movies.  There is always so much missing I wonder if they can even understand half of what is going on, or if they are seeing a completely different movie than I am.  I am sure that I will go see Deathly Hallows parts 1 and 2.  But I am seriously considering selling my DVD’s of the first five movies and not buying anymore.  I don’t want to risk my children growing up thinking that is all there is to Harry Potter.

1776

As you’ll see on my reading list for April, I recently read the book Know Your Declaration of Independence and the 56 Signers by George E. Ross.  I can trace my interest in the Declaration of Independence to the Summer of 1994.  My best friend at the time was technical assistant with Music Theater Louisville.  That summer they were doing the musical 1776, and my high school drama director had the role of Edward Rutledge, representative from the colony of South Carolina.

My parents actually had the movie version of 1776 on VHS which my friend and watched one Friday night with his mom.  We fell in love.  When it was over, we found ourselves looking up facts about the different representatives of the Second Continental Congress in the encyclopedia.  I saw the show twice with gratis tickets, and each time my drama director mesmerized the audience with his breath-taking performance of “Molasses to Rum to Slaves”.  My friend and I spent the summer walking around Kentucky Kingdom singing “Sit Down, John” and “He Plays the Violin” at the top of our lungs.  I know–we were wild and crazy teens.

After that John and Abigail Adams definitely topped my list of five dead people I would want to have dinner with.  When I read David McCullough’s biography of John Adams I was excited to realize how much of the musical came from his letters to and from Abigail.  It also made me realize how his contributions to this country are vastly under-appreciated.  And I think I sympathize with Adams’ low b.s. tolerance, which made him less than popular with his peers even though they highly respected his ability and intellect.

As I read through Know Your Declaration… I could hear the lines and songs from the musical/movie running through my head.  Certain quotes even made more sense;  I didn’t realize that when Benjamin Franklin mocks extending the olive branch that he was referring to the Olive Branch Petition.  There were a few factoids that I wasn’t sure if the book or the musical was more correct, and I did find some discrepancies in the musical/movie script.  But then again, it’s just a musical.

One thing that I loved about the book was that it listed the educational background of each signer.  Seventeen of the 56 are labeled as “self-taught” or “taught at home”.  That doesn’t even include the ones marked as having attended college but who probably received their basic education at home.  Of course, modern day advocates of public schooling like to say that people had less to learn back then.  It’s true that science and technology have blossomed in the past 230 years, but our founding fathers had an amazing depth of knowledge as a attested by their accomplishments.  For instance, Benjamin Franklin learned “grammar and logic, algebra and geometry, the principles of science and fundamentals of Latin, French, German, and Italian” through an educational program of his own design, as well as learning how to be a printer through an apprenticeship (p. 44).

I would really like to add Know Your Declaration of Independence and the 56 Signers to our personal library, but I’ll have to track down a used copy.  The book is part of series from the sixties which is now out of print.  It is great for its snapshot portraits, even though it completely omits any reference to the anti-slavery portion that was removed from the original Declaration draft.  And like most history books produced for children, character flaws of the signers are mostly over-looked.  I keep getting  these great homeschooling visions, though, of compare/contrast projects involving this book and the musical 1776.

The Many Facets of Honesty

Every season on Survivor there is usually at least one contestant who makes a big deal about what an “honest game” they plan to play.  They swear on their loved ones graves that they are telling the truth about this or that.  They go on ad nauseum to the camera about how they have too much integrity to lie to anyone, even for a million dollars.  Of course, they are usually the biggest liar of all, and the person they are lying to the most is their self.

This season (Tocantins) the award goes to Coach.  Never mind that his fellow survivors think he’s full of it from his stories of being kidnapped and beaten by natives in the Amazon among other things.  Coach keeps swearing up and down that he is not going to tell a single lie to get ahead in this game.  Never mind that two weeks ago he was behind the eviction of a major player while leading that player to believe someone else was getting ousted.  The blind side has become a kind of art form on Survivor that the audience relishes as much as the constestants (except for the one blind-sided, of course).  This has got me pondering the many facets of honesty exhibited on the show.

1.  The Honest Liar:  Usually there are one or two of these each season.  They proudly proclaim to the camera that they will lie, steal, or cheat to get to the end with no regrets.  You’ve got to admire that kind of honesty in a sad kind of way.

2.  The Surrogate Liar:  This is the person who won’t actually lie directly to a person, but they get someone else in their alliance to do it for them.  They try to get off of a technicality.  It’s like the Catholic spouse that let’s the non-Catholic spouse use the contraception.

3.  The Justified Liar:  “He lied to me first.”  “He was conspiring to vote me out first.”  “He hurt my itty bitty feelings.”  The Justified Liar will be honest with you until you annoy him somehow.  These are usually the most sanctimonious and hypocritical and whiny of the bunch.  If you vote for them without informing them first then you’re dishonest and must die.  But if I conspire to have you voted out behind your back, I am still honest as long as I don’t say “I am not voting for you”.

4.  The Omissive Liar:  Omissive Liars just kind of avoid whoever they know is being voted out so that said person can never corner them and ask them straight out who they are voting for.  When their alliance members are having a dishonest discussion with said victim, the Omissive Liar just keeps their mouth shut or goes MIA.  Purposely misleading someone is called a “lie of omission”, and it is just as dishonest as straight-out lying.

5.  The Human Liar:  Human Liars are just like you and me.  They go into the game well-intentioned.  They are good people trying to be good, but the temptations of the game are just too much for them.  They worry about people in their alliance turning on them or hurting someone’s feelings, or when they actually make it to the merge and realize that they actually do have a chance of winning, the truth suddenly becomes much more subjective.

That children concludes our lesson on Honesty according to the microcosm that is Survivor.  The only thing that annoys me worse than all of the people claiming that they are uber-honest is when two rival alliances allow a person for which neither one cares about to be a swing vote between them.  I don’t understand why the two rival alliances give that one person so much power over their fates in the game.  Why don’t they just come together to vote out that swing person and then duke it out in a fire-making challenge at the next tribal council?  Maybe because they realize that deep down they are all a bunch of liars and they can’t trust that the other team will actually vote out the swing person.

What Not to Wear

My oldest daughter (age 6) is my little fashionista. She is always constructing her own fashion magazines, she likes fashion games, and sometimes she puts some rather interesting fashions on her body. So when she came across a commercial for TLC’s “What Not to Wear” a few months ago, I wasn’t too surprised that she immediately asked me to record some episodes. However, I was more than a little reticent about doing so. She is already very lookist, and I wasn’t sure that I wanted her watching a show that might encourage her to be more judgmental of people based on how they looked.

After watching a few episodes, though, I was pleasantly surprised by the show. Yes, each episode does find the hosts Clinton Kelly and Stacey London ambushing some unsuspecting person and letting them know that their loved ones think they dress terribly. And they do make fun of some of the unflattering or just plain strange outfits that people have in their closets. However, they never attack the person themselves.

I worried that the show would be about trying to make people trendy or expect everyone to have super-model bodies. That’s not what the show is about at all. It’s about helping people, mostly women, find clothing that fits and flatters them, that is consistent with their age and stage in life, and that will make them feel better about themselves and show their inner and outer beauty.

And it’s amazing to watch the physical and emotional transformations. These are real women, and they treat them with respect and dignity and sometimes a little tough love. You have young women who are having a hard time transitioning from high school and college clothing to professional and adult clothing. You have women who are so busy taking care of their families that they’ve neglected to take care of themselves (I can relate). You have people who have given up on themselves thinking they could never be beautiful. Stacey and Clinton (along with hair stylist Nick Arrojo and make-up artist Carmindy) walk them through wardrobe changes that build confidence and self-esteem.

Three things that I like about the show:

1. They emphasize dressing for the body you have now, not the one you wish that you had.
2. They hate it when people wear pajama bottoms in public.
3. They are very sensitive to the emotional turmoil some of these people go through as they start to move outside their comfort zone and sometimes to look at themselves positively for the first time.

While part of me wishes that someone would nominate me for the show (I could totally handle a $5000 shopping spree in New York City if it weren’t for the nursing baby), I don’t see it happening. In the meantime, I’ve been watching episodes and reading the companion book which has tips for dressing a variety of body types. Lord knows, that I need all of the help that I can get. I’ve never cared about looking trendy, but I would like to have clothes that fit better and look less sloppy than the ones I’ve worn most of my life.

Getting Jiggy With It

When I was growing up one of my mom’s hobbies was putting together jigsaw puzzles. She often had a card table set up with an on-going project. Sometimes she would let me help, and she taught me how to separate edge pieces out first. By around age 10, I had my own table and puzzle board to work on. In recent years it’s a hobby that I have embraced again from time to time. The hardest part, besides finding room to set up a table, has been keeping little hands from running off with my pieces.

I have found that puzzles are a fun and educational learning tool for my children as well. We have a variety of little wooden puzzles with shapes, letters, numbers, and animals for toddlers. Then we have a few floor puzzles with an alphabet train and the solar system. We also have some 10-piece wooden puzzles that fit together to form a picture. From there we move up to a half-dozen 25-piece puzzles with a built in board that my parents got a deal on. Then we have a few fifty and one hundred piece puzzles.

My middle daughter is at just the right age (3) to start working on more puzzles together. I’ve started going through the process with her of sorting the edges and the middles. She doesn’t completely distinguish the difference yet, but she will. Right now I only give her a few pieces at a time to try to fit together. I give her some hints about where the piece might fit, or have her examine colors on a piece that might match a section she has already done. She is learning to pay attention to detail and process things in a logical manner while building confidence and just plain old having fun.

Pulling out the puzzles for my middle daughter has my oldest intrigued with doing them a bit again. I don’t know when, but somewhere along the way she and I got out of the habit. It may be one that we should revisit. In the meantime, with a little rearranging I’ve set up my table upstairs.  The winter-time just gives me the itch to get up to my elbows in little puzzle pieces and sawdust.  It also gives me something to do nearby the baby while she is napping.   Now if I can just get my “little helpers” to stop being quite so helpful.

Last Minute Election Ire

I thought the Catholics supporting Obama were catching a lot of flack, but apparently the “Slytherins for Obama” are, too. The wizard rock band Draco and the Malfoys received some angry responses to their public endorsement. They even felt compelled to write a blog entry on their MySpace page defending their decision.

I must admit that I was a little surprised at the endorsement. After all, Slytherins are known to be ambitious, greedy, self-preserving, and bullies. They seemed more likely to vote Republican. Whereas, I would expect Ravenclaws to go Democrat because they are smart but often cross the thin line between genius and stupidity. Of course, neither political party is that great, just like every Hogwarts House has its pros and cons and anomalies.

Perhaps, the fans are less upset that Draco and the Malfoys endorsed a candidate, but that they presumed to speak for all Slytherins. Draco Malfoy always was a presumptuous little git. Of course, the whole business brings home Dumbledore’s concern that “maybe we sort too soon”.

The House Formula

Lately, I’ve kind of been sucked into watching “House”. It used to come on after “Bones”, so I used to watch the occasional episode. That was before the days of the DVR; now I very rarely watch a television show when it actually airs. For all I know, “House” might still follow “Bones”. Mainly I’ve been watching reruns. Sometimes I catch them coming on, and other times I set them ahead to record.

“House” is a pretty formulaic show, though. Here is the set-up of every episode:

In the opening scene, some unsuspecting person has an emergency situation and is taken to the hospital. Dr. House’s boss, Dr. Cuddy, or one of his flunkies brings him the patient’s file which he completely dismisses as a commonplace illness until he is told about one completely unrelated symptom. He then accepts that the patient’s problem may be exotic enough to warrant his genius. Dr. House then assembles his flunkies to brainstorm about the cause in front of a dry-erase board. He proceeds to insult them and then send them off to run various tests on the patient. The patient gets worse. Dr. House insults his flunkies more, insults the patient, insults the patient’s family, insults his boss, and harasses his best friend Dr. Wilson. After several unorthodox hit-and-miss treatments, they figure out what’s wrong with the patient and start the real treatment. But something goes wrong and the patient crashes, starts bleeding out of some orifice, or suddenly is unable to breath. House and team realize they had the wrong diagnoses. At the last month House discovers some missing clue and deduces without help from anyone what the real problem is. The patient is saved. There is usually some secondary plot line that is tied to the medical emergency by a sappy closing scene.

You have just seen every episode of “House”. Thanks to the power of the DVR, I’ve noticed another nuance to the formula. For instance, the big crash/bleeding/can’t breath catastrophe always occurs between 38 and 40 minute mark of the show. I wonder if I sat down long enough if I could tie in every sentence of my summary to a time stamp. Probably.

Of course, the real question is why in the world do I keep watching this show when I know pretty much what is going to happen in every episode? I mean Hugh Laurie is a superb actor; in his role as Dr. House you would never know he was British if no one told you. I don’t think that it is it, though. I do like the dramatic sub-plots and comedic quips. I’m especially intrigued by the season where he is trying to replace his flunky team and slowly eliminates possible contenders from a big group of candidates, even though I’ve only seen a few episodes from that season and I know who wins the competition.

I know to some extent all shows are formulaic. For some reason, though, “House” really stands out as the most obvious formula to me. And I don’t know if “House” will ever hold the same level of obsession for me as say the enigmatic “Lost” has or the more subtle pullings of some of my other shows. It’s very possible that I am just filling my downtime with something new, and then once I’ve seen all of the episodes I will just move on to a different syndicated show. For now I’ll just sit back and enjoy the verbal abuse.