Shoah

Twelve years ago ...


John 5:1-5                                                                                    January 27
driving in this weather; LeAnne's house                                     10401.27


And he that was healed wist not who is was: for Jesus had conveyed himself away, a multitude being in that place.
Afterward Jesus findeth him in the temple, and said unto him, Behold, thou art made whole: sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee.
13-14


Today I will choose to be happy. I am the possessor of a grateful spirit.
Praise the slightest improvement and praise every improvement. Be "hearty in your approbration and lavish in your praise".


Ideas are great, Professor, but they're nothing without people willing to fight for them.


Quinn Mallory, Sliders, "Time Enough And World"


You wonder what some of the American Idol contestants are on; evidently they're not very good at dealing with rejection. For every Bao and Dreyh and Jeff and Katie who make it to round two, there are dozens who don't. Are we necessarily better off in our entertainment values (or lack thereof) because people have good timing when they face Paula, Randy, and Simon? It's only season three.


And now behind the curtain ...


Just this last week of January 2004 -- to make this easy, I'm looking at the day and the three days ahead of and behind it -- looks like I had finished/was in the process of finishing The Richest Man In Babylon, How To Win Friends and Influence People, In Defense of Revelation: The Elohist History, the novel adaptation of Men In Black II, The Lives of the Muses: Nine Women and the Artists They Inspired, Finity, and The Misenchanted Sword! Boy, I must have used to read a lot more!


Or at least recorded more of what I'd read ... let's see, to catch up to now I've finished Frank Miller's Batman: The Dark Knight Returns (again, ISBN 971563893414) from 1986 which I re-read because I'd forgotten a few details and was chilled by a few others. Bruce Wayne returning as Batman after a ten-year hiatus surprised nearly everybody and brought a lot of cretins out of the woodwork, lending credence to the argument that Batman makes some of his greatest enemies.


-- and nobody's very fast when he's thigh-deep in mud. (Dark Knight Returns, p.100)


Judy Jones and William Wilson's An Incomplete Education (ISBN 0345391373) I'd read and still referred to for years -- one or five sentences still creep into my conversation from this 662-page smorgasbord of everything, and it's still good for a laugh. Richard Sala's Violenzia and Other Deadly Amusements (ISBN 9781606998854) collects four of the author's illustrated stories, two of which contain the silent vigilante title character and all border the line between B-movie and horror.


WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW IF YOU'RE DATING A PAKISTANI: Sorry, you haven't given us enough information to go on. (Incomplete Education, p.381)


But let's get on to life as I know it; last night Jeffrey's Cub Scout pack had their annual Pinewood Derby with thirty-nine races (for the 39 scouts who were there when we started at six) and our son came in sixth place overall, six steps up from last year! And in every one of the seven races he was in Jeffrey's car placed first. The winning places, for those of you asking, are based on the average time each Scout had racing their car through all seven races; five Scouts' cars had a faster average time.


One creates, one destroys. Which is the greater sin? (Violenzia, p.51)


And today the twenty-seventh of January is International Shoah -- according to Dave Sim's Judenhass and other sources I haven't looked up yet, that's the preferred Judaic term for the Holocaust -- Remembrance Day. Today in 1945 the Auschwitz concentration camp was liberated by Soviet troops. Do I agree with Sim (best known for the graphic novel Cerebus) that every creative person should consider doing a work addressing the Shoah at some point in their life?


I'm not sure whether I'm that gutsy or guilt-ridden yet.


David