*Cough cough*

(My card for KAF TCG. )

NOOOOOO!!!!!

I just died quite a bit inside.

I hope, I really, really hope that they don't ruin any of the series. I can't see a company like Disney putting out something like, oh say, The Trial of Thor or Deadpool. I'll grant that they probably won't make major cuts or changes to storylines, but if they do go ahead with any of the movies that Marvel was going to make, they're going to bastardise them beyond recognition. ( Thor isn't exactly PG-rated, you know.) I can see all of Marvel's characters, or at least the more famous ones being pimped to death in one of Disney's many over-expensive, craptastic theme parks. Oh, and that above is'nt how I'm feeling about this.
What I'm feeling is more akin to THIS.

At least this reminded me what I can spend my birthday money on.

Happy Feast day!

This Raymund is commonly called Nonnatus, or Unborn, because his was one of the rare cases in which the child is not brought into the world in the course of nature, but by a surgical operation after the death of the mother. He was the son of godly and noble parents, at Portel in Catalonia. The tokens of his holy after-life appeared even in his childhood. The things that delight children, and the attractions of the world, had no charm for him. He was so earnest in godliness that all men marvelled at his habits of premature old age. As he grew older, he gave himself to the study of letters, but, at the command of his father, turned to farming. He went often to the Chapel of St. Nicholas, in the suburbs of Portel, to visit the sacred image of the Mother of God, which is still sought with great tenderness by the faithful. There he poured forth his soul in prayer, and earnestly entreated the Mother of God herself to be pleased to take him for her son, to shew him the way wherein it should be safe for him to walk, and to teach him the science of the Saints.

And the most gracious Maiden was not deaf to his prayers. From her he understood that it would please her right well, if he would join the Religious Order which had just been founded at her own inspiration, styled Of Ransom or Of Mercy, for buying up and freeing slaves. As soon as he had received this intimation from her, he went to Barcelona, and entered the Institute so nobly dedicated to love for our neighbour. Once enlisted in the Regular Army, he guarded unspotted for ever the virginity which he had already consecrated to the Blessed Virgin for ever. But he was a bright and shining light of all other good words and works, especially of tender compassion for Christians who were passing a life of grievous bondage in the possession of unbelieving masters. To free such he was sent into Africa, and delivered many. But his money ran short, and as there were still many in imminent danger of denying the faith, he pawned himself. He was enkindled with a most vehement longing for the salvation of souls, and by his exhortations brought divers Muslims to Christ. The Moors therefore threw him into close prison, and put him to divers tortures, at last making holes through his lips and locking them together with an iron padlock, which horrid cruelty he long endured.

On account of these, and other brave things that he did, he got the name of a Saint far and wide. Gregory IX was moved thereby to make Raymund a Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church, but in this place of honour the man of God shrank from all outward shew, and clung ever tightly to the lowliness that beseemeth a Religious man. He had started for Rome, but had only got as far as Cardona, when he was seized with his last illness, and earnestly called for the strengthening Sacraments of the Church. But his position became critical, and the Priest had not arrived. Then Angels came unto him, clad in the habit of his own Order, and ministered unto him the wholesome Provision for the last journey. When he had taken it, he gave God thanks, and departed hence to be ever with the Lord. It was the last Lord's Day in August 1240. After his death there was some dispute arose as to where his body should be buried ; so they shut it up in a box, and laid it upon a blind mule, and the beast was guided by God to carry it to the chapel of St. Nicholas, that he might be buried where he had laid the foundations of his nobler life. There was built there a Convent of his Order, and the faithful come together thither from all parts of Catalonia to honour him, and he is famous for divers signs and wonders.

Ant: Well done, good and faithful servant: * thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter into the joy of thy Lord.
V. The Lord guided the righteous in right paths.
R. And shewed him the kingdom of God.
Prayer:
O God, who didst endue thy blessed Confessor Saint Raymund with wondrous powers for the deliverance from the capitívity of the infidel: grant that, by his intercession ; we may be delivered from the bonds of all our iniquities, and perform those things that are acceptable unto thee with perfect freedom. Through.

(You know, seeing how totally un-PC he is, im not surprised his feast was removed from the general calendar. Anyway, due to a loophole in the General instruction of the Liturgy of the Hours, I'll be able to sing vespers tonight.)

Apologetics Fail.

LULZ.

You know, proving the validity of one of your opponents two sources of evidence (Which evidence is sometimes used as evidence of the validity of their first source of evidence) is Probably Not a good way to try to support your own arguments.
I'm just sayin'....

I Nearly Forgot.

It's S.Augustine's feast day.

Happy feast day to all those in the Augustinian family!

Well, it's certainly true, right.

Left Coast Rebel observes how most conservatives are Old, White, Southern, Republican males who are racists and not too smart. It's true! I mean, look at your scribe, He's, um, well, actually....
Well, I'm male. That part applies.
See! I fit the stereotype!!111!One!!!!!Eleventy-Two!!!!!

On a more serious note, I can't see how insulting your opponents and painting them with a wide brush of generalisations could in any way further intelligent debate. Not that the conduct of angry screaming people in town halls has helped the debate or our image. I think it's needs to be said that honest criticism or not, that kind of conduct is plaiting the rope to hang ourselves with.
Despite that, the Dems have only shown themselves to be what they despise when they applied braod-brush fallacies, simply dismissing their opponents on terms that don't make or break a logical argument whatever. Even if conservatives were bunch of angry, gun toting white rednecks, it does'nt invalidate their claims. I can't accept that anyone got a college education without learning of logical no-noes like personal attacks. So I guess I'll have to come up with another reason.

I had another muder dream.

So, in this week's installment of dreams-where-someone-kills-Joe, My mom sends me downtown to get some things form the store, and I don't feel like walking, so I takes the trolley. The trolley makes a sudden turn on a street that I heretofore did not know existed, called Nguyen Avenue. So the lady is calling out stops, and I ask what happenned to Market street (The street the trolley usual runs on.)She ignores me and tells me to get off the next stop, so I do.
When I get off, there's a crowd and some guy yelling at a cop. I decide to get away from them, and I see the guy put a gun against the cop's head. She gets free and tries to restrain him, but he gets free and runs over to me to put me in a headlock with the gun against my head. I try to act calm, but he's still arguing with the cop, and eventually, BOOM. Dead. Brains splattered about the sidewalk. Some lady yells "OH MY GOD!" and then I woke up.
It was so real. I even remember arguing with myself whether or not I should take the trolley, and then complaining that this was all because some people I had to have a specific brand of soda that they only sell halfway across the city so I have to get it.

*Does something slightly illegal*

Click to read the music!

Please, please spread the word about this. I have about six more of these chant-based mass settings for the new, soon to come translations for the mass. I'll only have them long enough to scan them and hopefully someday, print a copy for my private use. They'll all be gone on September 8th, so after that, You'll have to contact me by e-mail to get a copy of any of these settings. I'm also going to put up Lodewidjk de Vocht's Missa in Honerem S.Ioseph, probably on Wednesday. So yeah, copy and download these scans for the time being, 'cause I can't give the originals, and I've never found these anywhere else.
*Hides from the Government.*

S-l-o-o-o-w...

That's how my composing is going. At today's hour-and-a-half of organ practice, I got exactly three measures written. And I take back what I said about the style. While the first part of the kyrie is polyphony-influenced, from there it turns into a Rheinberger/Widor-esque choral work. I Finished the kyrie eleison, now I'm moving onto the Christe Eleison. This is where you get the neccesary dratic touch. I'm going to do the choral parts forte and unaccompanied, with organo pleno chords between the choir's singing. At the end of the Christe, I might go down to flutes and strings with unison choir for the second Kyrie eleison, then something contrapunctal .
But this it planning ahead. At this rate, this mass will take me months to a year, seeing as how it takes one hour per measure. D:
Maybe when I get a USB chord, I'll make a video so that you all can see what it sounds like and tell me what you think.

Im swamped.

I took too many commissions. I started and finished this one last night, and it was due today.I have another for someone who has one of those extremely cluttered avis. She also changed hers minutes after I took her commission, so I probably won't get all the details. My good friend is also having a contest for people who draw hers. There's a great prize, and I've entered, but I don't know if I'll be done in time.

What's up with Shonen Jump?

Seriously? I get a year subscription for Christmas, only to find out that the service is.....rather erratic.
I never got January's issue, and February's came in March along with March's issue. Since then, they've been coming late, until today when I got October's issue.
Yes.
October.
And it's August right now, right?
I wonder what will happen come September? Will I get September's along with August and November?
That's not all. They claim that your account gives you free access to the SJ Sub Club with free manga and wallpapers and all that stuff, only for me to find out upon trying to access my account that "Your account number is invalid. This account has been terminated." How can it be terminated? I'm still getting issues, and they still have my account number with the stupid "You can use dis for to go to special club lololololololo.lol!!!!11!!!!Twenty-four!!!1!!oNe!!1!"
If I was'nt addicted, you know I'd cut this in a flash.
You Know it.

It's an acquired taste.

It is.
One of Dupre's Toccatas, (Please fast-forward to 5:30 and onwards to hear the good part.) and his wonderful Prelude and Fugue in B. Here's a toccata by Durufle, played by.....Virgil Fox.* I don't listen much to is music, but his prelude, adagio and fugue on 'Veni Creator Spiritus' Is some really great stuff. Of course, Nothing whatever could be more of an acquired taste than Messien. Olivier Messien. Even Dieu Parmi Nous, the only ting he wrote that I could recomend people to listen to is full of all sorts of dissonance and seeming dead-ends. To scholastics, he's apprently some kind of genius. To casual listeners like me, the only coll (Get it? Coll? Cool? I'm sorry, it was a Nerd Moment) things are the reeds and flues.
And speaking of reeds, I really, really wanted to Die after I heard this.
Please turn your sound all the way up.
Please fast-foreward to 4:10 and listen all the way up to 4:50
Listen.
Repeat.
When I go to my eternal rest, I want those exact notes played the minute I get there.
Because it's totally awesome.
It's totally underutilized too . I don't think the shrine ever actually uses that 32'. D;

*I actually Like Virgil Fox.

It's me new sig!

For KAF.

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I've Really got to get back to reading Reborn! Last I read, Shouichi was actually on their side, the whole plan was a clever ruse, but he was found out and they only have a week to save their future selves. Wow.
Anyway, I'm hoping that someone on KAF will make me a sig. I don't have one, you know.

I like this post.

READ IT. It's about the economics of Healthcare reform. What I do not like, however, is this comment:
"Terminally ill patients should not be given expensive and/or experimental care. It is estimated that nearly 30% of all healthcare dollars go to terminally ill cancer patients. This must stop. It’s a waste of money. We must also stop the excesses of care to the elderly. President Obama’s 88 year old grandmother, who was terminally ill, received a hip replacement. Utterly ridiculous. She died a few months later. There are drugs that can increase a terminaly ill patient’s life by 6 months, but at a cost of nearly $100,000. We must say no to these exhorbitant treatments. We must more wisely spend our healthcare dollars on proven, cost-effective treatments."No person should receive better access, better coverage or better treatment than another person.

Okay sir. Maybe you could say that in a way that's less acerbic/eugenic/discriminatory/flagrantly immoral? I think your tone makes it hard for people to accept your thought.

Unfortunately, I've seen this sort of cognitive dissonance all around. Complain that healthcare is discriminatory, then discriminate against the weak. Complain that no one should ever profit from health insurance, and then bring up the loss of profit from treating terminally ill patients as a reason to avoid doing so. Really now? "No person should receive better access, better coverage or better treatment than another person" Yeah, except old people, dying people, and whoever else's life I've decided isn't worth sustaining!The doctors at Cold Spring would be ever so proud of modern Americans. Unfortunately as well, I don't think I can totally agree that healthcare is a right. By that, I mean that I do not beleive that any person can claim an absolute moral right to anyone's goods or services. The care of the sick if a Work of Mercy, and certainly it is true that no one should ever be left uncared for or made to suffer. But that's a perfect society. We don't live in a perfect society. We don't have hordes of chariable people willing to care for the sick and the dying for their own sake, as they deserved to be cared for, just as we don't have hordes of people willing to dive their last cent for education. Those services which people are not willing to do freely can and should be done by people who are willing to do them for profession. Yet it's just that, profession.
To claim out of fairness that healthcare is a human right and that you are entitled to it's services no matter what is akin to walking into Shopright and stealing four carts of groceries for yourself. Tell the police that food is a human right and see how far you go. It's akin to walking into the University of Penn and demanding a roster, because education is a right. It's akin to walking into a random stranger's home and demanding that they give you a room for the night, because shelter is a human right.
If you follow my logic, what I say is that I don't beleive that your have a right to have something neccesarily means that you have the right to obtain it by any means whatever. To try and obtain something like schooling, or housing, or even healthcare by force is to claim the right to have use of someone elses's goods and services. Worse yet, there are even some who, pointing to the extravagancies of many in the healthcare industry, beleive that they ought to have use of such services without the payment of the people providing them!
If I recall correctly, did'nt the government at one time feel that everyone had a right to house. Because of that, they made it possible for banks throw around mortgages like free cosplay gear at Comicon?
How did that turn out by the way? I suspect it turned out quite well.Deus, qui humánae redemptiónis opus per Unigéniti tui paschále mystérium implevísti, concéde propítius, ut, qui Christi mortem et resurrectiónem in sacramentórum signis annuntiámus fidénter, salvatiónis tuae contínuum experiámur augméntum. Per Dóminum.