Rich Mullins passed away over 25 years ago. His music is as meaningful and relevant to me today as it was back then. This is one reason why I am so delighted that a recording of a concert he gave many years ago has just been released on almost all of the streaming platforms and is also available on c.d. The Album is called Deep Valley and was recorded at Deep Valley Christian Service Camp in Western Pennsylvania. Rich loved this camp and my understanding is that he performed there often. Here is a recording of the song Finish Line recorded at the camp in July of 1983. (This song is not on the album.)
Rich Mullins's music still has an impact on people today as attested in this New York Times Piece. Bellsburg, the album mentioned in the NYT piece has been available for streaming since November and Deep Valley dropped (as the cool kids say) earlier this month.
Both albums were funded on Kickstarter and produced by Old Bear Records. I received both albums on C.D. by participating in the Kickstarter. I enjoy both albums immensely. I guess if pressed, I would say I like Deep Valley every bit as well as Bellsburg as it is great to hear Rich playing in a concert setting again on a new recording. I highly recommend either album.
My wife and I are going to listen to Deep Valley on the way home from work today.
Amy gave me some White Sox Ticket vouchers as a Christmas gift and while I am excited for the future of the White Sox, I still love the past of the White Sox. Here are some videos featuring HOF pitcher Jim Kaat, The former White SOx hurler. The first is his induction speech at the Hall if Fame last summer.
The second is an interview he did on the MLB network after the passing of Dick Allen.
I was very glad to see Kaat finally make it to Cooperstown. It's too bad Allen did not make it in his lifetime, I hope that He will make it soon.
Love,
Crazy Uncle Dave
Today is my birthday and a few months ago I noticed that one of my White Sox heroes, Lance Johnson, had a 6 hit 3 triple game against the Minnesota Twins on my birthday back in 1995. Here's the footage ...
My ADD gets in the way of my everyday life but it often leaves a pleasant wake in it's path. Today, right now in fact,I was getting ready to leave the house on what will be a very busy day. I couldn't find my phone and when I found it it was totally uncharged so I needed to charge it. I noticed it had earbuds in it that were not working on my phone last night when I was trying to listen to Moby Dick before I went to bed. So, instead of plugging in the phone and continuing to get ready to leave. I took the earbuds plus the phone to the computer to check if the earbuds worked on the computer, which they did.
I thought the best way to check it, would be to go to YouTube . Instead of going to the video I was going to look up, I got distracted by a Jim Edmonds video and began watching the video of his 8 amazing catches. I liked it so much, I decided to post it here. I also googled Jim Edmonds HOF and found this good article about his qualifications to be voted in by the veteran's committee. I was right about to go back in my archives and see if I voted for him on my mock ballot when he was eligible, when my wife walked by and asked if I found my phone and then reminded me it still needed to be charged. I'm going to go back now to my busy day, which I just made a little busier for myself. Thanks ADD!.
When I post this in a few days, the today referenced at the top of this (6/24/2022) will actually be in the past. How long in the past? Only my ADD can say for sure. For now: enjoy this video of great Edmonds catches that my ADD left in it's wake.
I saw this on Bob Bennet's website just about 30 minutes too late for Father's day. I worked Father's Day at a K.C. COugars game selling concessions. Kids were playing catch with their Dads. I watched them do it and remembered playing catch on that field with my son just a few years ago.
I really enjoyed this new look at one of my favorite songs.
Yesterday, I was cleaning out some junk from my room and decided to put on some music while doing so. I chose a Randy Stonehill You tube video, that I had previously shared here.
The video is from a series called More than a Song which is part concert and part interview. After the Stonehill segment had ended I found there was another artist form my big 5. Bob Bennet, who was also in an episode. I liked it and thought I'd share it here as well
I just sent a letter to Allen Levi. If you read this blog you know he is a singer-songwriter who lives near the Alabama Georgia border. In the letter, I told him that my favorite song of his is House of Mercy from his album Rivertown. (You can check it out at Bandcamp by clicking here. Or listen to it on Spotify by clicking here.)
After I sent out that letter I realized that I had set up this song to play today. It reminded me that almost every song of Allen's is among my favorites.
White Whale - Something that someone pursues obsessively with little chance of success.
In 1993, when I was teaching English Literature while living in Russia I taught the first chapter of Moby Dick by Herman Melville. I had never read Moby Dick before and was only provided multiple copies of the first chapter. The chapter contains probably the best first paragraph of a novel I have ever read. The first sentence, Call me Ishamael is highly regarded as one of the best opening sentences ever written. It is not, however, my favorite opening sentence. That distinction belongs to the first sentence of C.S. Lewis's voyage of the Dawn Treader, "There once was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it.".
I have asked Dave from Dave out Loud to come in from out of the loud and read the first paragraph for us.
I hope you can see how amazing of a first paragraph this really is. The entire first chapter made me want to read the entire book. This is when the troubles began.
What I mean by troubles is that I was in Russia almost 30 years ago and I still haven't finished the book.
I read quite a lot while I was in Russia, but I never got the opportunity to read Moby Dick in it's entirety while there. A few years after I returned from Russia I picked up a paperback copy of Moby Dick at this relatively new bookstore called Barnes & Noble. I think it sat on a shelf for a few more years before I actually began to attempt to read it.
Moby Dick is a brilliantly written book but it seems to be a very difficult book to read. Moby Dick is approximately 209,000 words not the worlds largest novel by any means but it won't ever be confused with short. The Great Gatsby by comparison is approximately 47,000 words long , To Kill A Mockingbird is just in excess of 100,000, and the aforementioned Dawn Treader is just shy of 53,000 words. Add those 3 together and Moby Dick is almost 10,000 words longer.
Also after the first paragraph the book became much more cumbersome for me to read.
The book is a long read at 822 pages. This does not make it the longest novel ever written but it's certainly a long swim.
The format of the novel is odd. It ranges from traditional story telling to essays on the different species of whales to philosophy.
Herman Melville has a big vocabularly. If your preparing for the GRE Moby Dick is good preperation for the vocabularly section of the test.
Melville draws from many classics of western civilization. If you have not read the Bible, Shakespeare, or Plato his ideas will go right over your head.
Moby Dick was written a couple hundred years ago. The reader may need to do historical research to better understand the lives of sailors in that time period.
Moby Dick is not only a story about whale hunting. The whole back drop of the story is whale hunting. Why did they hunt whales? They needed whale oil for their lamps and cooking. This is a story about energy and what lengths we will go to provide society with it. I think this goes over many readers heads.
Moby Dick is a dense book. It must be chewed on and thought about. It's meaning and themes don't explain themselves.
Moby Dick is about life experiences that many of us can't relate to. Most readers don't understand the terror of the ocean, the hard work of harvesting energy, and the bitter loneliness of being away from friends and family for a long time. Rest assured Moby Dick captures real human experiences.
The book contains lots of symbols and metaphors and they don't easily explain themselves.
The whole. Once you add all nine of these things together into one book many people may decide Moby Dick is not a voyage worth taking. Rest assured it is. It will grow you as a person and give a perspective on life that is hard to find anywhere else. You will be glad when you finish this whale sized book.
Just a quick note about reason 5. Moby Dick is not a couple hundred years old. It is 161 years old and will not be a couple hundred years old until I am 96 years old. But I concede the point, it is an old book.
Over the years I have made several attempts to read Moby Dick and have never gotten very far in my attempts. A couple years ago, I changed my strategy about reading Moby Dick and borrowed an audiocopy of the book on Hoopla from my library and have been listening to it on and off since then. I did this mostly between April 2020 and April 2021 when I was working overnights at a local grocery store and would listen to the book for 1/2 hour or so before going to bed after my shift.
Through this method I have gotten farther through it than I ever did reading it. I got about 40 % through it this way. At some point I stopped reading it thinking I would get back to it eventually and didn't really until this Spring.
Every year during the summer months, specifically the100 or so day period between Memorial Day and Labor Day I embark on a personal Summer reading program. I tend to spend more time reading during that time and try to read at least 10 books during that period secretly hoping to read more like 20 to 25.
This year my only goal is to finish one book and that book of course is Moby Dick. I have finished 42 chapters and am about 1/3 trough the book. I am sure I will read more books than just Moby Dick this summer but I'll be much more satisfied to finish this white whale than if I read 25 other ones and this one still tasked me.
Good morning and welcome to Day 8 of the A to Z challenge. This year I chose 3 themes for the challenge: Limericks, MLB sluggers in my lifetime, and A to Z wordles. For more information about these themes click here.
Part I: A to Z Limericks
Today's limerick is also about today's home run hitter. I don't consider Hank Aaaron a home run hitter. I consider him the home run hitter. On April 8,1974 he hit his 715th al time home run to break the record of Babe Ruth. I am writing this post on Friday April 8th just a few hours before Saturdays H post drops. That means 48 years ago I watched Hank Hammer 715 on television. Here is what it looked like
On April 8 '74
Hammering Hank #44
Hit home run 7 1 5
I felt so alive
To be part of such great baseball lore.
Part II: A to Z Homerun hitters of my lifetime
Yesterday I talked about Ken Griffey Jr. the 7th leading homerun hitter of all time. For over 33 years Hank Aaron was the all time leading home run hitter. He is now 2nd behind Barry Bonds.
I was born in 1964. I was 9 years old when Aaaron broke Ruth's record. Aaronhit his first homer in 1954 and his last in 1976. From 1954 to1963 Hank hit 342 home runs. This was 5th most of all players over that time period and only 40 less than Willie Mays who hit the most in that time period.
From 1964 to 1975 Aaron hit 403 homers 387 for the Braves and 16 for the Brewers. Aaron led all of baseball by 46 homers during that period. In 1976 Aaron hit the last 10 of his 755 dingers while finishing his HOF career in Milwaukee. Aaron batted .305 in the course of his career so he was much more than just a home run hitter.
Part III: Wordle Starting Words from A to Z
Note: Correct letters in the correct places will be shown in bold. Correct letters in incorrect places will be shown in italics.
Playing wordle every day can be a big hairy deal. On March 8th I began my wordle with ...
H A I R Y - I may as well have been bald as none of those letters were in the answer
Q U EST - This got me a e and t in the right places and s in the wrong one.
SWE P T - On my third guess I was exteremely closing getting 4 of the letters in the right position.
The Academy Awards are a one week away and in preparation for the awards I have been watching some acceptance speeches. In 1970 John Wayne was nominated for True Grit and Barnbara Streisand who had one best actress in 1969 for Funny Girl was presenting the award for best Actor. Not only did Wayne put on a clinic for how to gracefully and quickly recieve an award, nut Streisand set the standard for how to read off the nominees.
We reversed our selves all the way back to the begiining of our Allen Levi concert. Feel free ro listen to just this song or listen to the concert in it's entrety.
