Get The Flock Outta Here!

So I was on my way to the store this morning, and A Prairie Home Companion was on the radio.  Long show, short trip, so I may have missed some context, but a song begins.  It was simple, it was cheerful, and the audience was encouraged to sing along at one point, but I had never heard it before.  Oddly enough, if I had written the lyrics myself, I’d have rejected them as too simplistic in their one-dimensional and insulting portrayal of believers.  But here, without a trace of irony, they were singing what I have since learned is a christian campfire song: “I wanna be a sheep”.

Now, I understand the metaphor of Jesus as shepherd; I had always assumed that it was sort of a “given that we are lost sheep, isn’t it nice to have a shepherd watching over us” metaphor.  I had never considered the “hey, isn’t it great to be a sheep, a mindless member of a herd!” interpretation.  But it turns out there are quite a few versions (the one at that last link is bizarre) of the song up on YouTube.

Frightening.  I assume the multiple watermarks on the photos are there ironically, since good christian sheep would never steal.

I wanna be a sheep (baa ba-baa baa)
I wanna be a sheep (baa ba-baa baa)
Don’t ever wanna have to think too deep
I just wanna be a sheep (baa ba-ba-baa baa)

I wanna be a drone (mmmmmmmmmmmmm)
I wanna be a drone (mmmmmmmmmmmmm)
Don’t ever wanna have a thought of my own
I just wanna be a drone (mmmmmmmmmmmm)

Don’t wanna be a cuttlefish (cuttlefish-noise)
Don’t wanna be a cuttlefish (cuttlefish-noise)
Cos they’re too subtle fish
Don’t wanna be a cuttlefish (cuttlefish-noise)

Don’t wanna be… oh, I can’t go on.

Get The Flock Outta Here!

So I was on my way to the store this morning, and A Prairie Home Companion was on the radio.  Long show, short trip, so I may have missed some context, but a song begins.  It was simple, it was cheerful, and the audience was encouraged to sing along at one point, but I had never heard it before.  Oddly enough, if I had written the lyrics myself, I’d have rejected them as too simplistic in their one-dimensional and insulting portrayal of believers.  But here, without a trace of irony, they were singing what I have since learned is a christian campfire song: “I wanna be a sheep”.

Now, I understand the metaphor of Jesus as shepherd; I had always assumed that it was sort of a “given that we are lost sheep, isn’t it nice to have a shepherd watching over us” metaphor.  I had never considered the “hey, isn’t it great to be a sheep, a mindless member of a herd!” interpretation.  But it turns out there are quite a few versions (the one at that last link is bizarre) of the song up on YouTube.

Frightening.  I assume the multiple watermarks on the photos are there ironically, since good christian sheep would never steal.

I wanna be a sheep (baa ba-baa baa)
I wanna be a sheep (baa ba-baa baa)
Don’t ever wanna have to think too deep
I just wanna be a sheep (baa ba-ba-baa baa)

I wanna be a drone (mmmmmmmmmmmmm)
I wanna be a drone (mmmmmmmmmmmmm)
Don’t ever wanna have a thought of my own
I just wanna be a drone (mmmmmmmmmmmm)

Don’t wanna be a cuttlefish (cuttlefish-noise)
Don’t wanna be a cuttlefish (cuttlefish-noise)
Cos they’re too subtle fish
Don’t wanna be a cuttlefish (cuttlefish-noise)

Don’t wanna be… oh, I can’t go on.

Another Funeral

You can die in bits and pieces; you can die in one quick flash
Die the ancient voice of wisdom, or die early, young and brash
Tuck your body in a coffin; pick an urn to hold your ash
Your survivors will remember you and cry
In the stories of your childhood, of your young and reckless past
How you fiercely burned your candle—who could think it would not last?
You could live to be a hundred; it would still be gone too fast
Life is never seen so brief as when we die
This weekend’s funeral was, again, beautiful, though again not so beautiful that I would not have wished it unnecessary.  I was moved more than I expected to be (this was not, after all, my brother this time), and was reminded once again that each life touches so many others, often in ways that are hidden from pretty much any witness.  
Strangely, I am also reminded of the mass graves–most recently in Brazil, following the mudslides, but elsewhere and elsewhen other disasters or wars–where entire communities have been lost, or where the necessities of safety and health mean that there will be no funeral, no memorial, no gathering of loved ones.  I really am one of the lucky ones, to be able to remember my family this way.
A last thought though–yes, I’m one of the lucky ones, but luckier still would be to push these funerals as far into the future as we can.  The local papers remind us that January’s supplies of blood in the Red Cross banks are the lowest they have been in a decade.  Snowstorms keep people from blood drives, but they don’t keep people from needing blood.  So, as I do on occasion, I remind you that, here in the US at least, you can find out about your local bloodmobiles at the Red Cross website.  Tell them Cuttlefish sent you.

Another Funeral

You can die in bits and pieces; you can die in one quick flash
Die the ancient voice of wisdom, or die early, young and brash
Tuck your body in a coffin; pick an urn to hold your ash
Your survivors will remember you and cry
In the stories of your childhood, of your young and reckless past
How you fiercely burned your candle—who could think it would not last?
You could live to be a hundred; it would still be gone too fast
Life is never seen so brief as when we die
This weekend’s funeral was, again, beautiful, though again not so beautiful that I would not have wished it unnecessary.  I was moved more than I expected to be (this was not, after all, my brother this time), and was reminded once again that each life touches so many others, often in ways that are hidden from pretty much any witness.  
Strangely, I am also reminded of the mass graves–most recently in Brazil, following the mudslides, but elsewhere and elsewhen other disasters or wars–where entire communities have been lost, or where the necessities of safety and health mean that there will be no funeral, no memorial, no gathering of loved ones.  I really am one of the lucky ones, to be able to remember my family this way.
A last thought though–yes, I’m one of the lucky ones, but luckier still would be to push these funerals as far into the future as we can.  The local papers remind us that January’s supplies of blood in the Red Cross banks are the lowest they have been in a decade.  Snowstorms keep people from blood drives, but they don’t keep people from needing blood.  So, as I do on occasion, I remind you that, here in the US at least, you can find out about your local bloodmobiles at the Red Cross website.  Tell them Cuttlefish sent you.

Strange Bedfellows at CPAC

A group of gay Republicans
Would tell the truth, they vowed;
These honest, gay, conservatives
Became the GOProud
They would not live life closeted,
Nor with the liberal crowd;
They bravely blazed a different trail—
They were the GOProud
With insight and intelligence
These gay men were endowed;
Their work insured Republicans
Respected GOProud
Conservatives are gathering
To celebrate out loud;
Among the groups responsible,
The mighty GOProud
But there are some conservatives
Who’d keep their brethren cowed;
They will not share the conference with
The sinful GOProud
Some say they pitch a giant tent—
Well, gays are not allowed—
The GOP has bigots, too,
Who shun the GOProud.
Their thoughts are fixed on heaven,
So their heads are in a cloud;
They’d rather miss the conference than
Accept the GOProud
So let the Christian Right demand
Their party wear a shroud;
I’m glad the mainstream GOP
Embraces GOProud.
In the “strange bedfellows” department, the Conservative Political Action Conference (next month, in DC), “the conservative movement’s largest gathering of the year” (NY Times) has lots of daddies.  Including GOProud, the conservative gay organization (because the Log Cabin Republicans were more Gay than Republican, GOProud emerged as the more Republican than Gay alternative).   
Now, I am not a Republican.  But I am very happy to see the mainstream conservative groups sponsoring CPAC are ever-so-slightly more modern less medieval than the [predominately] church-based groups that have refused to share their Big Tent with fellow conservatives who agree with them on better than 90% of their agenda… but who love their fellow men a bit more literally than the bible-bangers can stomach.
The New York Times story focuses on the “Divisions On The Right”, but really, the “divisions” are very meaningfully different.  And this is good news (sorta–bear with me here).  Yes, conservative Christian Pinheads are Homophobic Assholes.  This is Not News.  What is news, though, is that a Gay group is a co-sponsor of the Conservative Political Action Conference.  Yes, it should have happened with the Log Cabin Republicans, and yes, it should not have required even that.   But movement is movement, even if it makes plate tectonics look like speed dating. 

Strange Bedfellows at CPAC

A group of gay Republicans
Would tell the truth, they vowed;
These honest, gay, conservatives
Became the GOProud
They would not live life closeted,
Nor with the liberal crowd;
They bravely blazed a different trail—
They were the GOProud
With insight and intelligence
These gay men were endowed;
Their work insured Republicans
Respected GOProud
Conservatives are gathering
To celebrate out loud;
Among the groups responsible,
The mighty GOProud
But there are some conservatives
Who’d keep their brethren cowed;
They will not share the conference with
The sinful GOProud
Some say they pitch a giant tent—
Well, gays are not allowed—
The GOP has bigots, too,
Who shun the GOProud.
Their thoughts are fixed on heaven,
So their heads are in a cloud;
They’d rather miss the conference than
Accept the GOProud
So let the Christian Right demand
Their party wear a shroud;
I’m glad the mainstream GOP
Embraces GOProud.
In the “strange bedfellows” department, the Conservative Political Action Conference (next month, in DC), “the conservative movement’s largest gathering of the year” (NY Times) has lots of daddies.  Including GOProud, the conservative gay organization (because the Log Cabin Republicans were more Gay than Republican, GOProud emerged as the more Republican than Gay alternative).   
Now, I am not a Republican.  But I am very happy to see the mainstream conservative groups sponsoring CPAC are ever-so-slightly more modern less medieval than the [predominately] church-based groups that have refused to share their Big Tent with fellow conservatives who agree with them on better than 90% of their agenda… but who love their fellow men a bit more literally than the bible-bangers can stomach.
The New York Times story focuses on the “Divisions On The Right”, but really, the “divisions” are very meaningfully different.  And this is good news (sorta–bear with me here).  Yes, conservative Christian Pinheads are Homophobic Assholes.  This is Not News.  What is news, though, is that a Gay group is a co-sponsor of the Conservative Political Action Conference.  Yes, it should have happened with the Log Cabin Republicans, and yes, it should not have required even that.   But movement is movement, even if it makes plate tectonics look like speed dating. 

Congress(7)woman Bachman

A forefather-fetish gets Bachman all wettish,
And frightfully warm in her bloomers
She’s all hot and bothered and “ooh, founding father”ed;
She wants to dispel all the rumors
That the founders she craves were the type to own slaves
And to hold fellow humans in chains
In defense of her crushes her brain turns to mush,
As it quite understandably strains
In this instance we find that love truly is blind
And she really believes what she’s sighing
But when push comes to shove, though it may be true love,
The other true thing is—she’s lying.

By now you have likely seen Congresswoman Michelle Bachman’s Tea Party reaction to the State of the Union Address. And probably some of the reaction to her brand of revisionist history. If not, the couple of videos here will get you up to speed.

I think I have the whole thing figured out. Bachman has a crush on the founding fathers. She’s got a journal somewhere where she has written “Michelle Adams”, “Michelle Madison”, “Michelle Jefferson” and “Michelle Washington” over and over and over… you can tell she gets excited by the way her quill pen sometimes runs out of ink when she forgets to re-dip it, and the exquisitely curled script becomes illegible. I suspect she ran for Congress when she saw definition 7 while looking for definition 1:

Congress(7)woman Bachman

A forefather-fetish gets Bachman all wettish,
And frightfully warm in her bloomers
She’s all hot and bothered and “ooh, founding father”ed;
She wants to dispel all the rumors
That the founders she craves were the type to own slaves
And to hold fellow humans in chains
In defense of her crushes her brain turns to mush,
As it quite understandably strains
In this instance we find that love truly is blind
And she really believes what she’s sighing
But when push comes to shove, though it may be true love,
The other true thing is—she’s lying.

By now you have likely seen Congresswoman Michelle Bachman’s Tea Party reaction to the State of the Union Address. And probably some of the reaction to her brand of revisionist history. If not, the couple of videos here will get you up to speed.

I think I have the whole thing figured out. Bachman has a crush on the founding fathers. She’s got a journal somewhere where she has written “Michelle Adams”, “Michelle Madison”, “Michelle Jefferson” and “Michelle Washington” over and over and over… you can tell she gets excited by the way her quill pen sometimes runs out of ink when she forgets to re-dip it, and the exquisitely curled script becomes illegible. I suspect she ran for Congress when she saw definition 7 while looking for definition 1:

AAAAAAaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrghghghghgh!

I’ve had broken bones
And kidney stones;
Had migraines wrack my brain
I’ve been cut; I’ve been burned,
And eventually learned
That it doesn’t help much to complain.
I’ve got scars I can trace
Where a dog bit my face
(Well, there’s really no good place to bite us)
Ah, but son of a bitch,
I just can’t stand the itch
Of this damned contact dermatitis!

In the “true tales from the life of Cuttlefish” files, I am going nuts! My hands are shaking with the effort of not scratching (which effort fails miserably), and I can think of nothing but the itching. I want to take a belt sander to my torso, and I think amputating my arms at the shoulder is worth considering. Yes, I’ve called the doctor.

Oh, and all the stuff in the verse is true. The dog was a german shepherd, and it was going for my throat while its owner pulled it back, so it only bit my face. Sitting here, itching, that seems like the good old days.

AAAAAAaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrghghghghgh!

I’ve had broken bones
And kidney stones;
Had migraines wrack my brain
I’ve been cut; I’ve been burned,
And eventually learned
That it doesn’t help much to complain.
I’ve got scars I can trace
Where a dog bit my face
(Well, there’s really no good place to bite us)
Ah, but son of a bitch,
I just can’t stand the itch
Of this damned contact dermatitis!

In the “true tales from the life of Cuttlefish” files, I am going nuts! My hands are shaking with the effort of not scratching (which effort fails miserably), and I can think of nothing but the itching. I want to take a belt sander to my torso, and I think amputating my arms at the shoulder is worth considering. Yes, I’ve called the doctor.

Oh, and all the stuff in the verse is true. The dog was a german shepherd, and it was going for my throat while its owner pulled it back, so it only bit my face. Sitting here, itching, that seems like the good old days.