Today is Pentecost Sunday

...and I can think of no better way to observe it here in Blogland than to introduce you to the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir, which holds forth in New York City in a church that used to be a theater. The pastor of Brooklyn Tabernacle is Jim Cymbala, and his wife Carol directs the choir.

In Christianity, Pentecost is considered to be the birthday of the Church because it is the day the Holy Spirit promised by Jesus Christ descended to earth and filled the disciples of Jesus. “I will not leave you comfortless,” Jesus had said. “I will come to you.” The word Pentecost (from Greek words that mean “fifty days”) occurred fifty days after Christ’s resurrection from the dead at Easter and ten days after his ascension into Heaven. The immediate effect of the descent of the Holy Spirit to believers was their ability to speak in languages they did not know.

I can think of no more unlikely institution in the world (from the world’s point of view) than the church, no events more unlikely than Easter, the Ascension, and Pentecost, and no more unlikely choir (again, from the world’s point of view) than the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir.

Here are three video clips of the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir:

“Worthy Is The Lamb” (5:38)

“Thou, O Lord, Are A Shield For Me” (5:47)

“I’m Amazed” (5:15) with guest singer Jason Crabb.

The last two clips happen to include subtitles in Portuguese. I have no idea why. But it is Pentecost, after all.

Pentecôte, painted in 1732 by French Neoclassical painter Jean II Restout (1692 - 1768)

Thank God for small favors

Read this.

Then watch this (5:13).

For those of you who never follow directions, I will now explain what you have just not read and what you have just not watched.

Firstly, you have just not read “The Walrus and the Carpenter” by Lewis Carroll with accompanying illustrations by John Tenniel. In its inimitable style and no lack of detail, Wikipedia says that “The Walrus and the Carpenter” is “a narrative poem by Lewis Carroll that appeared in his book Through the Looking-Glass, published in December 1871. The poem is recited in chapter four, by Tweedledum and Tweedledee to Alice. The poem is composed of 18 stanzas and contains 108 lines, in an alternation of iambic trimeters and iambic tetrameters. The rhyme scheme is ABCBDB, and masculine rhymes appear frequently. The rhyming and rhythmical scheme used, as well as some archaisms and syntactical turns, are those of the traditional English ballad.” (If, like me, you looked up Wikipedia’s article on Through the Looking Glass at this point, you have discovered that the full title of the work is Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There and that Lewis Carroll is the nom de plume of one Charles Lutwidge Dodgson and that he wrote it as the sequel to his Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, which was published in 1865. And if, also like me, you are able to distinguish tetrameter from tetracyclene but have no clue about the traditional English ballad and have no wish to find out, God bless you, Sir or Madam, as the case may be.)

Secondly, you have just not watched “The Walrus and The Carpenter” scene from the 1951 animated film Alice in Wonderland from Walt Disney Productions. It begins innocently enough, with a shot of Alice with Tweedledum and Tweedledee, but soon it bears about as much resemblance to the original version as Marilyn Monroe bears to Mary, Queen of Scots. Furthermore, the phrase “Calooh! Callay!” is included in the animated version, and that phrase is actually part of “Jabberwocky” and not “The Walrus and the Carpenter.” The animators also stole a part of evoked the Pied Piper of Hamelin legend when they had the Walrus play a flute to entice the baby oysters into following him.

Thirdly, it is entirely up to you which version you like best. Even if you prefer Tim Burton’s 2009 version starring Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter, I will say nothing. I am not the culture police. No cartoon or twisted-sister version (Tim Burton, are you listening?) would be possible without the original, of course, but who is to say who is the more talented? Not me, that’s who.

Fourthly, any connection in your mind between this post and the illustrations at the end of my recent post about cabbage is purely intentional.

Fifthly, you should be grateful that you live in the twenty-first century and are reading this post in the air-conditioned comfort of your own home instead of living in the seventeenth or eighteenth century and listening to a sermon from a Puritan divine down at the local Congregational Church, because if you were, you would not be nearing the conclusion at this point but would be forced to sit there in austere surroundings on a hard wooden bench for another two or three hours without any padding whatsoever except what your own derriere could provide, trying to stay awake and feign interest until the Puritan divine had reached Thirty-sixthly.

I Yam What I Yam And That’s All That I Yam

Reader David Barlow, otherwise known as Putz, who lives in Manti/Ephraim/Tooele (pick one), Utah, has suggested that now that we have explored cabbage, we should explore spinach. Actually, what he wrote was:

“delightful, simply delightful post on cabbage, a most appealing vegatable<>>>now why don’t you do a post on spinack”

Despite the facts that (a) he didn’t begin either of his sentences with a capital letter, (b) he ended his first sentence with the rather strange punctuation mark <>>>, (c) he didn’t end his second sentence (which, as all former potential Jeopardy contestants know, was in the form of a question) with any punctuation at all, (d) he misspelled vegetable, and (e) he also misspelled spinach, calling it spinack, I have decided to follow his suggestion after a fashion.

I say “after a fashion” because I have no intention of doing a post on another vegetable at this time, but I tell you what I will do, I will include ten links that will enable you to create your own post on all things spinack spinach.

Here they are:

1. Spinach -- Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

2. Ultimate Spinach -- Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

3. Basella alba -- Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

4. Spinach -- FarmVille Wiki -- Seeds, Animals, Buildings, Events

5. Red Spinach -- FarmVille Wiki

6. Spinach juice -- Memory Alpha, the Star Trek Wiki

7. Creamed Spinach (a recipe)

8. Spanakopita (a description)

9. Spanakopita (a recipe)

10. Popeye the Sailor Man

In the first link alone, you will learn that spinach is thought to have originated in ancient Persia, that in 1533 Catherine de Medici (queen of France) so fancied spinach that she insisted it be served at every meal, that there are three basic types of spinach (savoy, semi-savoy, and flat/smooth leaf spinach), that spinach is packaged in air or nitrogen gas to extend its shelf life, that the United States is the world’s second-largest producer of spinach with 3 percent of world output (following the People's Republic of China, which accounts for 85 percent of output), and that the top spinach-producing U.S. states in 2004-06 were California (73 percent), Arizona (12 percent), and New Jersey (3 percent) with 12 other states reporting production of at least 100 acres.

If you have 100 spare acres just lying fallow and plenty of time on your hands, you can become a statistic in the next edition of Wikipedia’s article on spinach. If you don’t have any acres but still have plenty of time on your hands, you can play Farmville, make some creamed spinach, learn how to prepare spanakopita, or bone up on all things Popeye.

In any event, knock yourselves out. I can’t do all the work all the time, you know.

Until next time, I will be stompin’ at the semi-savoy.

Cabbage

Anything someone says three times is not necessarily true.

In my last post, I showed you some startling (or perhaps not-so-startling) statistics -- one and a half sentences into a post and already I’m starting with the alliteration -- about cabbages wordiness in government documents.

Turns out I have helped to perpetuate a hoax.

Reader and first-time commenter Dan Thoms, a graphic designer who lives in Cincinnati, Ohio, graciously supplied a link that exposes the truth of the matter.

This is the link.

As someone said, “Live and learn.”

Live and learn. Live and learn. Live and learn.

The Wikipedia article on cabbage contains 4,082 words. Here are some of them:

Cabbage is a popular cultivar of the species Brassica oleracea Linne (Capitata Group) of the Family Brassicaceae (or Cruciferae) and is used as a leafy green vegetable. [Editor’s note. Please notice that Wikipedia does not say that cabbage is a leafy green vegetable, only that it is used as a leafy green vegetable. Hmmmm. --RWP]

It is a herbaceous, biennial, dicotyledonous flowering plant distinguished by a short stem upon which is crowded a mass of leaves, usually green but in some varieties red or purplish, which while immature form a characteristic compact, globular cluster (cabbage head). [Editor’s note. I couldn’t have said it better myself. --RWP]

Cabbage was known to the ancient Greeks and Romans; Cato the Elder praised this vegetable for its medicinal properties, declaring that “It is the cabbage that surpasses all other vegetables.” [Editor’s note. Only he probably said something like “Brassica oleracea Linne alia vegetabilis surpassitorum est.” --RWP]

The largest cabbage dish ever made was on 19 December 2008 in the Macedonian city of Prilep, with 80,191 sarmas (cabbage rolls) weighing 544 kg (1,221 lbs). [Editor’s note. Evidently, them sarma had karma. --RWP]

In 1653, in a publication called A Complete Herbal, Nicholas Culpepper wrote, “Cabbages are extremely windy, whether you take them as meat or as medicine, as windy meat as can be eaten, unless you eat bag-pipes or bellows, and they are but seldom eaten in our days; and Colewort flowers are something more tolerable, and the wholesomer food of the two.” [Editor’s note. No comment. --RWP]

Boiled cabbage has become stigmatized because of its strong cooking odor and the fact that it causes flatulence. [Editor’s note. Ditto. --RWP]

In European folk medicine, cabbage leaves are used to treat acute inflammation. A paste of raw cabbage may be placed in a cabbage leaf and wrapped around the affected area to reduce discomfort. Some claim it is effective in relieving painfully engorged breasts in breastfeeding women. [Editor’s note. I’m only telling you what Wikipedia says. --RWP]

The top ten producers of cabbage and other brassicas as of June 2008 were People’s Republic of China (36,335,000 tons), India (5,283,200 tons), Russia (4,054,000 tons), South Korea (3,000,000 tons), Japan (2,390,000 tons), Poland (1,375,900 tons), Ukraine (1,300,000 tons), Indonesia (1,250,000 tons), United States (1,171,350 tons), and Romania (1,120,000 tons). Total cabbage production in the world in 2008 was 69,214,270 tons. [Editor’s note. Source: “Food And Agricultural Organization of United Nations: Economic And Social Department: The Statistical Division.” Food and Agriculture Organization. --RWP]

The time has come to close this post, and I will do so with a saying that was common in Texas fifty years ago:

“Two heads are better than one, as long as one of them is not a cabbage head.”

The problem in a nutshell.

Ronald Reagan once said, “Trust, but verify.” Someone sent me these statistics in an e-mail. I trust they are true. If they are not, don’t tell me.

.....Document................................................No. of Words
The Lord’s Prayer........................................................66
The Ten Commandments...........................................179
The Gettysburg Address............................................286
The Declaration of Independence...........................1,300
The U.S. Constitution with 27 Amendments...........7,818
U.S. Government regulations on the sale of
.....cabbage...........................................................26,911

You can’t tell the players without a program.

CNN anchor and possible Regis Philbin replacement Anderson Cooper is the son of Gloria Laura Morgan Vanderbilt, whom Wikipedia describes as “an American artist, author, actress, heiress, and socialite most noted as an early developer of designer blue jeans.” Her mother was Gloria Morgan Vanderbilt, whose identical twin sister Thelma was the mistress of the Prince of Wales. I am not making this up.

In addition to his auspicious beginning, Anderson Cooper has an older half-brother whose father was Leopold Stokowski, whom Gloria married in 1945, five years after he appeared along with Mickey Mouse, the Philadelphia Orchestra, and a whole host of animated co-stars that included ostriches, alligators, and hippopotamuses hippopotami in Walt Disney’s 1940 film, Fantasia. By “he” I mean Leopold Stokowski, not Anderson Cooper, who wasn’t born until 1967. In the interest of completeness and accuracy in reporting, I also need to tell you here that Leopold Stokowski was born in 1882, Regis Francis Xavier Philbin was born in 1931, Kathy Lee Gifford (née Epstein, her husband is Frank Gifford, a Hall of Fame former American football player and American sportscaster) was born in 1953, and Kelly Maria Ripa Consuelos, who met her husband Marc Consuelos when both were acting in the soap opera All My Children, was born in 1970. If you need to ask why (why I’m telling you these things, not why Kelly Ripa was born) you simply haven’t been paying enough attention to this celebrity-obsessed culture of ours.

You probably don’t have any idea who these two people are either.

(AP Photo by Jeff Christensen)

FYI, they are Scotty McCreery and Lauren Alaina, the winner and first runner-up, respectively, of the latest season of American Idol. He is 17 and hails from Garner, North Carolina. She is 16 and hails from Rossville, Georgia. If for any reason he is unable to complete his reign, she will take over his duties. American Idol is a scholarship pageant. Oh, wait, I’m thinking of something else.

This is why you read my blog. Where else would you find such fascinating, not to mention useful, information?

In other entertainment news, assisted suicide advocate Dr. Jack Kevorkian died today at the age of 83.

Just in case you think I’m insane, I want to tell you that there are some real nuts running around out there. For example, and with the help of the aforementioned Anderson Cooper, meet William Tapley.

One thing is sure. Little Gloria is happy at last.

Take it away, Stephen Wright!

I like to reminisce with people I don’t know.

I was once walking through the forest alone. A tree fell right in front of me and I didn’t hear it.

Right now I’m having amnesia and deja vu at the same time.
I think I’ve forgotten this before.

My neighbor has a circular driveway. He can't get out.

It doesn’t matter what temperature the room is, it’s always room temperature.

I’d kill for a Nobel Peace Prize.

I had a friend who was a clown. When he died, all his friends went to the funeral in one car.

How do you tell when you’re out of invisible ink?

All those who believe in psychokinesis raise my hand.

When I die, I’m leaving my body to science fiction.

I used to have an open mind but my brains kept falling out.

I used to work in a fire hydrant factory. You couldn’t park anywhere near the place.

Is it weird in here, or is it just me?

Here’s more. (6:16)

And even more. (4:19)

I’m beginning to understand the concept of too much of a good thing.