The Salix Reloaded

Awoken early this morning thinking that, as predicted, the world was ending this May. A few days early, sure. So I needn't have panicked. But in the wee small hours you can't think that clearly.

There was a green, unearthly light flashing in the Moot House and a sort of electronic howling sound. So donning a dressing gown and picking up my trusty Slazenger, I headed down to the House. To find Morgwulf hanging in a net above a collection of willow wands and cherry blossom. He'd walked straight into a flower-arrangers' booby-trap while trying to smash up their latest arrangement.

Well, I'm not getting myself in the firing line. I nipped back to the armoury, picked up my father's old shotgun, came back in and shot through the ropes suspending Morgwulf from the ceiling. He fell eight feet onto an awkwardly-shaped vase, and then just lay around kind of swearing and clutching his back. No gratitude at all. You can't help some people.

Great Quotations

We were much taken, in the aftermath of the death of Osama Bin Laden, by the quote from Martin Luther King that "went viral", as it is known, on the Internet:

"I mourn the loss of thousands of precious lives, but I will not rejoice in the death of one, not even an enemy." -- Martin Luther King, Jr.

Indeed, so touched were we that at this evening's meeting, those Beaker Folk that were still talking to each other had an informal sharing of the quotations that mean so much to us. And I'm glad to share them with you now. I think you'll agree, a deep and stirring quotation makes the world a more meaningful place. As Julius Caesar gasped on his deathbed, "Don't let it end like this. Tell them I said something."

---

"I'm just going outside, and I may be some time." -- Neil Armstrong

"On the whole, I'd rather be in Philadelphia" -- Tom Hanks

"They don't like it up them." -- Bertrand Russell

"They couldn't hit an elephant at this dist..." -- Nelly

"D'oh!" -- Eric Cartman

"I have nothing to declare but my genius" -- Mark Twain

"Neither a borrower nor a lender be" -- Gordon Brown

"Anyone who is capable of getting themselves made president should on no account be allowed to do the job"    -- George W Bush

"I don't care to belong to any club that will have me as a member" -- Fernando Torres

"It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife." -- Paul McCartney

"Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pound ought and six, result misery." -- George Osborne

"There's one born every minute." -- Mahatma Gandhi

"What can you say about a society that says that God is dead and Elvis is alive?" -- Elvis Presley

"A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes." -- Richard Milhaus Nixon

"Yes, Jesus loves me - the Bible tells me so." -- Richard Dawkins

Musicians v Flower Arrangers II

OK, a truce has been negotiated. I'm not saying it's pretty, and I'm not sure how long we're going to be able to maintain this, but we've drawn up strictly delineated areas for the musicians and flower arrangers. Trouble was, once they'd heard that two groups had been granted exclusive rights to certain parts of the Moot House, we'd got to draw up special areas for all the others. It's absurd, and we've got to use all four doors for people to get in and out now, but it's at least keeping the peace while we try to get charity, common sense and logic to prevail. Trouble is, if we're hoping to get those three sorted out it could be several generations before it's sorted out.

I should say we've had to negotiate the airspace above these zones as well. For most people this is capped at 6 feet, although the flower arrangers are allowed an extra 2 feet for their extra-high arrangements. It's bad news for Gardwulf, though. Being's he is 6'5", the top of his head is in a free-fire zone.

And it's gonna be murder for processions now. It took an hour to get to the Worship Focus this evening, as the acolytes negotiated their way through the checkpoints. And to make it worse the Fundamentalists have said they're going to change their password every day. And we're banned from the Green Zone under any circumstances. Meanwhile the inhabitants of the Enclave of  Extreeme Beaker Folk are absolutely livid. They're landlocked and have to sneak in early and go home after everyone else, otherwise they're scheduled for a duffing up.

When artistic souls collide

Once again we are in a state of war in Husborne Crawley. There's been border clashes in the past, but it's never reached this pitch before. It all started when Katja in the Beaker Quire bought that serpent. Not a large snake, nor the mythical representation of the one who brought all the evil into the world. But rather the traditional musical instrument.

Now it's a fine instrument, is the serpent. A deep, rich note as a wise man once said. Sure, Katja can't actually play the serpent. But then she couldn't play the clarinet either. So it's not that we're any worse off.

But the salient point about a serpent is that it's substantially larger than a clarinet. And that's what caused the trouble. Because at practice before yesterday's Feast of the Restoration of the Rump Parliament, Katja had to move a display of larkspur and late bluebells back six inches to fit in.

Well, with three minutes to go till it all started, Dora the flower arranger came in, did a last-minute checkup of alignment with her laser measuring device, and discovered that the overall symmetry had been wrecked. She kept quiet about it at the time, reserving herself to occasionally shooting random musicians in the eyes during their contributions. A form of attack that is illegal under the Geneva Convention, and also caused us to lose the kazoo part once or twice. Of course, since I was busy lighting tea lights and pouring water in and out of Beakers I never noticed this - although I did notice when, at one particularly solemn moment, a tambourine flew out of the Quire and clocked Dora on the temple. It ricocheted off and hit Hnaef on the nose, something which was later pronounced by the Music Leader, Morgulf at his press conference as "regrettable collateral damage. But quite funny".

It's a fact known to few, but tit-for-tat violence can spiral out of control. After those skirmishes we'd hoped that it was all over. But we came in this morning to find out that a chemical weapons attack had been launched. Or, to put it more simply, the pot plants were all dead and there was an empty "Roundup" can on the floor. The flower arrangers blamed the musicians, of course, but the conspiracy theorists reckon that the flower arrangers did it themselves, to give themselves an excuse for filling the euphonium with soapy water.

It's been more or less open war this morning. The Rosemary for Remembrance display has just been found in the compost heap, and Morgulf ended up on the business end of a particularly spiky display of teazles and cactuses. None of which was helping our celebration of the song "Give Peace a Chance". It was a lovely moment when we rolled out those balls of wool, passed the wool from hand to hand, and celebrated the network of humanity (to the accompaniment of "Bind us Together"). We had a real sense of a spirit of togetherness and forgiveness and everyone-is-everyone-else-ness.  It wasn't so great when Angelika set fire to the mesh of wool nearest to the music group. Although once again the wisdom of having beakers of water on standby was shown.

I've been trying to act as a raisonneur. To instil the words of NT Wright and Rowan Williams into the combatants. But for now, to patch up a fairly flaky ceasefire, we've drafted in the most effective and fearsome peace-keeping force known to humanity. Still, it's only a matter of time until the  Scout mistresses are going to be needed back at their packs, and who knows what will happen then?

---

Serpent image "Gaius Cornelius" @ Wikimedia Commons 

Schrodinger's Fundamentalists

Look, I'm not going to patronise you. Most of you know about Schrodinger's cat. So I'm not going to bother telling you all about it again. If you don't know about the Quantum Tabby, you can sneak off and have a read. We won't judge. Let's face it, Jesus had never heard of America. Anyone can be forgiven innocent ignorance.

But now we're all up to the same level. I'd like to propose a suggestion.
Schrodinger's Cat is not a real cat. It has not ceased to be, nor has it not ceased to be. It is not an ex-cat, nor a cat. It's an imaginary cat. And yet, through a made-up story of a cat, real truth has been derived. The literalness of the cat is not an issue - only the truth of the story.
In fact if a bunch of scientists declared they believed in Schrodinger's Cat as a real feline, you'd have problems with their credulity. You wouldn't necessarily want to buy the patent for a new drug from them. And if somebody claimed they'd actually done the Schrodinger's Cat experiment (and found a practical application) you'd think they were a monster. A story can give truth, without anyone actually half-killing (or half-saving) a cat. And a Fall can be true, without anyone really needing to eat an apple.

OK, thanks for listening. Now, can anyone find me a box and a radioactive source? I fancy a nice Egremont Russet.

Shying away from Death Issues

Prize for ironic typo of the year to Ekklesia, whose "Christians should not shy away from death issues, say Methodists" read, first time out, "Christians should shy away from death issues, say Methodists".
Credit to them for pointing out the mistake, which I re-read first time in surprise as Methodists aren't known for shying away from anything, given half a chance.

But it's an interesting one, isn't it? I presumed (because initially too lazy to read the actual article that is presumably linked to the headine) that Ekklesia was thinking of the sort of progressive political issues of euthanasia which presumably some unexpectedly death-leaning Methodists might have gone for. But no. This is a serious article about death itself and leaflets relating to it - not about tidily clearing up some septuagenarian who's getting in the way of the next generation. Well done the Methodists. As usual.

Sounds like it might be good stuff. Especially in a world that hides death away.  And gets rid of dead bodies with industrial efficiency, lest we stop and think and ponder that it's not just their fate - the ones who we're mourning now, with a sense of desperation and a tactful curtain and a CD of "My Way" played over at the critical point - but it's our fate - indeed, my fate - that we're thinking of.

You're 70 years (or 80, if you have the strength) alive and an eternity dead. Yet we look at the exception and hide from the rule. If we knew how long we're dead - if we looked it in the eye, and realised what it meant - what would it mean for our lives? And what would it mean for how we look at eternity?  If it meant we thought death was the end, and lived life like it was worth living, really worth living - how great would that be? And if we thought death wasn't the end - and life had an eternal value in the light of that great non-termination - how amazing would life be then?

Enough. I'm rambling. Let's live life as if Eastenders is important and struggling through to lunch is an achievement, and death's going to be like sitting in the front room, with a maiden aunt and the curate who you can't offend, without a set of dominoes and with a tea-pot full of insipid tea, forever. That's going to make the difference.

What is it to you?

There usually comes a time in the life of a small group when it breaks up. When it's the church music group, bashing each other over the heads with guitars and drum sticks, it's normally described as "artistic differences". When the Beatles did it - well, two talents that big (and their two mates) - how were they to know that, in fact, they weren't going to be any better on their own than the crazy brilliance they enjoyed together? In fact, deep down, I suspect John Lennon may have thought he was actually better. He was wrong, of course. But two leaders, two egos - the band wasn't big enough for the both of them. These things happen. Life goes on. And Ringo would never have done the voice-overs on Thomas the Tank Engine if he'd still been in the Beatles. So there's that much to be grateful for.

So when the band breaks up, it's easy enough to look across and think - well, what about them, then? The bass player who suddenly decides he wants to stop looking moody at the back and has always harboured the belief that he's actually a brilliant lead. The chubby lad who decides he's actually more than just the second-best singer. The red-haired singer who decides against all evidence that she's better on her own. The balding drummer who's just been inspired by his latest divorce to write his first solo album. You know the story. Especially when the chubby lad's top of the pops, but in rehab, or the ginger girl finds out it was all a dream.

And you look across and think - I've got my own trajectory - but what about them? Will they outshine me? Will they embarrass me? Will they come crawling back to be the backing singer one day? Just how many divorce-inspired albums will the balding drummer actually be able to make?

Or you get a copy of the old school/college magazine and find out some-one's now the Duke of Ipswich, and someone's chair of ICI, and someone's dead and someone's Prime Minister and someone's wanted in seven countries, and you're just kicking around on a piece of ground in your home town. And you think how did they do that? And where are they going next?

Sermon for Sigmund Freud's Birthday

Today we mark the birthday of Sigmund Freud. A towering figure in the 20th century. One whose analysis of dreams gave us such insight into our primeval sexes. Sorry, urges.

We owe so much to Sexy Friend. Sorry, Sigmund Fraud. Don't know why I said that. His insights into our condition freed us from our slavery to the straightjacket of19th century compulsion. I mean, conformity.
But we can see that Fraud can only take us too so far. If we want to go all the way to an understanding of the human condition we need to look for a young man. Sorry, look to the man, Jung. He it was who inserted spiritual values into the psychological. He understood the deeper, mythic values that lie within the human breast. He understood that it's not all about that horrid thing we try to drive below the surface - not that we should be ashamed of such unnecessariness.

My fathers and sisters. Sorry, brothers.  I was thinking about something else there for a moment. Let us raise ourselves up to sing the closing song, "Lord you put a tongue in my mouth". And then I must go for a walk in the grounds. I'm feeling a bit repressed. Sorry, depressed.

A significant change in the voting system

See, a significant change in the voting system might be when working class men get the vote, or women.

Or when people who've never had a vote, get a vote. That's a significant change.

So if Syria's tyrant gave up and let the people have a say - that's significant.
If Egypt's colonels are good to their word - that's significant.
If we could trust an election in Zimbabwe, or the European Commission were elected - that's significant.

But when a referendum is held suggesting the voting system is tweaked, so as to give the option to gerrymander a few votes for one minor party over all the other minor parties, and all the while the major party hopes that it won't happen, but goes along with it to get away with their own minor bit of gerrymandering, which is to correct the minor bit of gerrymandering that the other major party did over the last few years...

Sorry, even I fell asleep during that last sentence. Is the answer John Prescott?

Walked upon the Berkshire Downs Green

Meanwhile over at Clayboy, a discussion on one of Drayton's favourite websites turns into a rolling maul about that important questions, was Our Lord an Oxford or Cambridge man? A turn in the discussion that proves, if nothing else, that Clayboy is an Anglican.

I would have said it was pretty clear that, possessing as he did emotional intelligence and a keen sense of humour, Our Lord was clearly an Oxford man. If you want to understand why the first of these is an Oxford attribute, I would suggest you compare today's saint, Oxonian (indeed Brasenosian) Michael Palin with the Cantabridgian John Cleese. Just the latter's marital history should give you the clue. Oxonians seem to have a better ability to see both sides of the story, rather than just the Communist side. And of course in common with Philby Burgess and the rest, it was Judas who was famous for his silly walks.

Also, Oxford is clearly a better place for studying if you're in the habit of going Glastonbury for the occasional religious occasion. From Oxford to Glasto is a mere stroll along the sunlit uplands of the Berkshire Downs, turning left at Swindon. Whereas to get there from Cambridge One would have to have struggled through fenny wastes, watery death-traps and past wild and vicious tribes. And that's just trying to go round the Bedford ring road.

Liturgy for the Nativity of Michael Palin (1943)

Happy Birthday Michael Palin

Introit: Liberty Bell

Archdruid: Hello, good evening and welcome to Blackmail!

All: 'ullo, Wanda!

Archdruid And after going from Pole to Pole, and Round the equator, we're taking our toughest challenge of all - to journey the entire length of the A41 from London to Ellesmere Port. And just a day after leaving Hampstead... 

Hnaef: Aye, 'ampstead wasn't good enough for you, was it? You had to go poncing off to Barnsley, you and yer coal-mining friends.

Archdruid: Coal-mining is a wonderful thing, but it's something you'll never understand.

Hnaef: I never wanted to be a Hampstead playright. I wanted to be.... a Lumberjack!

Young Keith: And I'm going to be a missionary. A missionary IN ENGLAND!

All: But everyone's ENGLISH in England.


The topical referendum bit

Eileen: I am your Archdruid.

Marston: Well I didn't vote for you.

Eileen: You don't vote for Archdruids.

Marston: Well how'd you become Archdruid then?

Eileen: The Lady of the Lake, her arm clad in the purest shimmering samite held aloft the tea light Escarpment from the bosom of the water, signifying by divine providence that I, Eileen, was to carry Escarpment. THAT is why I am your Archdruid.

Marston:  Listen, strange women lyin' in ponds distributin' tea lights is no basis for a system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony.

Archdruid: And now, brothers and sisters, let us go out and vote For the Alternative Vote! It is a symbol of our struggle against oppression.

Marston Moretaine: It's a symbol of your struggle against reality.

Archdruid: Stwike him, Hnaef. Stwike him woughly.  I want him fighting wabid, wild animals within a week.

Marston: Well, I never expected the Spanish Inquisition...

Regressional: Always Look on the Bright Side of Life