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Showing posts from 2007

The Platypus Reads Part XI

The recent flap over "The Golden Compass" has set me to thinking: what makes for an excellent piece of Science Fiction/Fantasy. In the case of "His Dark Materials" and "The Chronicles of Narnia," both series have been criticized as propaganda pieces for the author's respective world-views; Atheism and Christianity. Some opponents of the works, if I understand them correctly, claim that the artistry of these books is diminished or the enjoyment of them poisoned by the authors' attempts to use them as platforms for communicating their ideas/beliefs. This seems puzzling to me. After all, each book that comes out of an author's head carries in it the image of the author that produced it. The author may ignore them, or try deliberately to hide them, but his/her core beliefs and ideas are going to come through in some form. Beyond that, many authors intend for their ideas to come through in their work as a way of dialogging with their audie...

Platypus Update

The holiday season seems to be a hard time for me to keep up on the old blog this year. There have been plenty of assignments to grade, I'm on my third T.A. this semester, I've had a tooth drilled and ground, just to name a little of what's been going on. There's been plenty to read too: N.T. Wright, Dune , the Harry Potter books, UnChristian , etc. Not much time for writing, video games, or nostalgia. I'm really looking forward to that two-week break. It'll be a good chance to get back to blogging!

Deku Platypus

A little strangeness always helps.

The Legend of Platypus

I've been sick for the past two weeks and the thought level on my blog has dipped accordingly. It turns out I caught a very severe case of the flu along with a secondary bronchitis infection. Being sick, however, left me with a lot of time on my hands and the capacity to do very little with it. It's hard to read N.T. Wright's "The Resurrection of the Son of God" when you might barf any second and all you've been able to eat for the past two days has been ginger ale and crackers. That left me wracking my brain for what I used to do when I was this sick 15 years ago (Yes, I have not been this sick in the last 15 years!). The answer was what any boy my age did: play video games. So I fished around in the storage closet and brought out my old Super Nintendo. In went the "The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past;" quite possibly the best video game ever made. The ensuing journey into my childhood explains all the art on my blog recently. Th...

The Platypus Heals at +1

Back in the Game Again!

The Platypus Replays

The Legend of Zelda: best fifty dollars my parents ever spent. After 15 years, it still holds all its charm. Here's to the glory days, Nintendo!

Sick Platypus

Battling a cold these past two days.

Weekend Platypus

The mad dash to get to the weekend has begun! For the next twenty-four hours, I'm keeping off the highway...

Tests, Parent-Teachers, Phone calls home and the Platypus

Because Life Feels Like This Today!

The Platypus Reads Part X

There's always something heart-breaking in seeing or hearing about a place you love but can't get back to. -of realizing that life goes on without you there. It's human nature to expect time to stand still, even when we know that it doesn't. Something peculiar strikes me every time I finish reading the Oresteia . Three quarters of the way through the final act, Orestes has left the building and the play keeps going. All this time we've been concerned with Orestes, and we're suddenly reminded that he's not what the story was really about. Thus the play goes on without him. Aeschylus teaches us an important lesson in this: we are not the center of our own play. Since each of us views life through the prism of self, it comes naturally that we suppose that we are the central characters of our life. After all, man is Homo Narratio as well as Homo Sapiens. We construct narratives wherever we go, even if they're as simple as "one plus one equ...

Acting Platypus

While we're on the topic of theater, does anyone remember where I left my magic mask?

Somewhere Deep Down Inside

He's Still There...

The Platypus Reads Part IX

This is what was on the other side of the hill. -just hop the stone wall in Pratt's back yard. How much of life is an attempt to reconcile past and present? How much of ourselves has already been defined, and how much is open to us to change? These are questions I find myself asking. Most of the time it's about other people. - sometimes it's about me. In Aeschylus' Oresteia , past and present meet and reconcile. Through the sufferings of the House of Atreus, we come to learn that our history and our future are inseparable, and therefore present with us every moment of our existence. Far from being things to be escaped or desired, rushed on to or gotten over with, they are a unity that we must accept with wisdom. Apollo, the eternal youth, attempts to use brute strength to destroy the past, in the form of the Furies, and force the future, in the form of Orestes, and fails. Athena, goddess of wisdom, accepts both and succeeds, bringing renewal and balance ...

Platypus Pastimes

Some days just feel like this.

The Platypus Reads Part VIII

Autumn and spring are the seasons for theater. They are times of transition, when we become more aware of the changes in our lives. On the stage, we see the seasons of life acted out, and walk away with a new sense of the wholeness and unity of existence. For Aeschylus, theater's primary role is to mediate change. In Aeschylus' mind, change is a vital part of life. Hence his repeated use of the thematic "Time refines all things that age with time" in his Oresteia . In other words, all things are ever becoming more and more what they are. The refining process is often gradual; so gradual that we don't even realize that it's going on. Occasionally, however, the inward process breaks out in our lives in startling color. It is those moments that drama deals with. They can be occasions for joy or terror, laughter or sorrow. Each of these is caught up and presented to us with crystal clarity by drama. We put on our performance of the Oresteia in the...

The Platypus Reads Part VII

All literature reflects. Drama is unique, however, in that the characters as presented by the actors are immediately present with us during the performance. The images we see are as real as possible since they are neither words, nor images, but living, breathing human flesh. The moment I lighted on Cassandra's first lines, I knew that I had to see the Oresteia on stage. The story of Cassandra is one that has haunted me since I first read those excerpted lines in high school. Since then, the Trojan prophetess has been there at the boarders of my consciousness as both archetype and muse. Whenever I write, inevitably she creeps in; stealing softly through the portals of imagination to take her stand by the altar. It didn't surprise me, then, when I took up the pencil and started drawing one night. Line followed line with unusual precision until a perfect image was formed: a girl, slight, with long dark hair, downcast eyes, wrapped in an German officer's coat and seat...

The Platypus Reads Part VI

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In this series of posts, I've found myself creating what could be called a spiritual geography; charting the landscape of my psyche with my favorite authors as a guide. Since my wife and I have finished our tour of Tolkien's completed works and started work on the Oresteia , I've decided to continue the project. The story of the House of Atreus has appealed to me ever since I stumbled upon the references to it in Watership Down . The book opens with a quote from the Agamemnon : "Chorus: Why do you cry out as at some sight of horror? Cassandra: The hall is wet with the smell of dripping blood. Chrous: How so? 'tis but the scent of the altar of sacrifice. Cassandra: The stench of it is like the breath from a tomb. The lines struck me much the same way, I suspect, that "Balder the beautiful is dead, is dead" struck Lewis. New vistas opened up for me with sights that I only dimly understood. A few months later, we read the Odyssey, and a little ...

Back to School Platypus

Coming to grips with the school year. Week 2 is almost over.

The Platypus Reads Part V

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Knowledge plays a key role in J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings . Eomer troubles over questions of moral knowledge, to which Aragorn replies: "Good and evil have not changed since yesteryear, nor are they one thing among elves ... and another among men." Gandalf puts his skills in archival research to use in Gondor where he discovers the scroll containing the description of the One Ring. The Council of Elrond fills a whole chapter with historical narrative and debate. The desire for knowledge leads both Saruman and Denethor to use the Palantiri to their doom. Frodo discovers the limits of knowledge in Gandalf's admonishment: "... do not be too hasty to deal out death in judgment. For even the very wise cannot see all ends." After living for nine years in Southern California, I can say with some confidence that people in Connecticut place a higher value on knowledge and education (Southern California has its own virtues that Conn. lacks and co...

The Platypus Reads Part IV

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When he was pressed with the question "what is The Lord of the Rings about," J.R.R. Tolkien usually stated that it was not about anything. On one occasion, however, he gave a different answer. He said that, if it was about anything, it was about death. This can be seen, as I mentioned in the previous post , in the fact that much of Middle Earth is in terminal (or at least advanced) decline when we are introduced to it at the end of the Third Age. The return of King Elessar does bring hope, but it is a limited one. The elves do not remain in Middle Earth to share it, nor does Frodo. As a survivor of childhood cancer, I was introduced to death at an early age. In fact, the life I live is one given by grace. One might say "on borrowed time" (as if each of our lives isn't just that). I might have died in '91. The interval, short or long, I live in is the gift of God. Mortality. It means giving up life upon this Middle Earth; the joy and the ...

The Platpus Reads Part III

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I grew up in Shelton, Connecticut; a small, rural town straddling the Housatonic River. It was a land of forests, rolling hills, and quiet rivers. Thus, imagining J.R.R. Tolkien's Shire was never very hard for me. I often felt as though I lived in it. Being on the East Coast, there was a lovely sense of history to Shelton; though it pales in comparison with that of Tolkien's England. Main Street was still dominated by the shells of the old mills and the J.P. Morgan Restaurant; from a time when the great robber-baron himself had high hopes for the town. The Plumb Memorial Library still sported its quaint Victorian exterior, my friend lived in a 200 year old converted farm-house, many of the churches were at least that old, and crisscrossing the woods were miles and miles of stone walls, stone foundations, and little old cemeteries. Quaint. Charming. But I never thought then what all this beauty meant. Shelton is part of a dying civilization. You can tell from the...

The Platypus Reads Part II

As I continue to process our grand trek through The Lord of the Rings , I thought that I'd share some helpful resources for those interested in delving deeper into Tolkien's world. The first is the indispensable biography by Humphrey Carpenter: J.R.R. Tolkien: A Biography . To date, this is the only "authorized" biography, and it is the best of any that I am aware of. Carpenter explores his subject with care and dignity. He makes no attempts to sensationalize a rather mundane(for his generation) life, while avoiding a sort of "hagiography" devoid of any mention of Tolkien's quirks and struggles. The portrait that emerges is of a middle class college professor, quiet, friendly, incurably nerdy, highly intelligent, a bit thin-skinned, often melancholy, devoted to his family, and completely unremarkable where it not for the fact that out of his ordinary life came the most extraordinary work of the 20th century. The second book is the equally indispe...

Platypus Observant Part II

My wife and I have been reading through J. P. Moreland's "Kingdom Triangle" over the past month. As a spiritual discipline, Moreland suggests writing down and recording answers to prayers, as well as asking God for signs to demonstrate His presence in our lives. (Note: these are spiritual disciplines that are meant to go along with an active life of the mind, participation in Christian duties, etc. We are not meant to be "sign-chasers," or "those who put God to the test.) So I thought while reading these things yesterday, ok Lord, let's give it a try. Response I: I don't typically pray with my wife for short car trips in town. On setting out to run a few errands yesterday afternoon I was stuck by a sensation that we really needed to pray on this trip. I suggested it to Sharon, and we did. Five minutes later, we barely escaped a nasty accident that we could have done nothing to prevent or escape from. We staid to help the people in the two ca...

The Platypus Reads

My wife and I have just finished reading The Lord of the Rings together. We started with the Silmarillion and then moved on to The Hobbit and so on. It's a journey that has taken us some eight months to complete. All this has put into my mind the importance of having favorite books; books that you turn to again and again over the years for insight, guidance, challenge, and comfort. My personal top three are, in chronological order (not order of preference): The Oresteia by Aeschylus: Aeschylus, as the greatest poet of the old tragedies in Athens, presents us with a struggle between conflicting claims of love, loyalty, and honor in a world doomed to destruction apart from a divine intervener and a human atonement. The Idylls of the King by Alfred, Lord Tennyson: Tennyson, poet laureate to Queen Victoria, uses the Arthur legends as the backdrop for an elegy of the Victorian age; a civilization undone by its failure to live up to, and grasp the threat to the intellectual ...

Platypus Observant

I teach high-schoolers. It's a rewarding, but difficult job. High-schoolers' minds haven't calcified yet, so they're frank, open, and teachable at their best. However, their personalities haven't hardened either, nor are they fully mature or socialized. It's a lot easier to get forty year olds to hide their boredom in public. High-schoolers let you know when they're bored in the most blatantly rude and obnoxious ways. So it was of great interest to me to be able sit in on several sessions of Wheatstone Academy this week. At Wheatstone, high-schoolers are subjected to hour long, highly technical lectures given by distinguished college professors, visit a world-class art museum (The Getty), listen to 16th and 17th century church music (which they gave a standing ovation), attend community theater, and read and discuss four dialogs from Plato. Their reaction? Unbridled enthusiasm, wrapped attention, and excellent questions! So it was a week, and no...

The Platypus vs. the Conqueror Worm

So, for anyone who's read " Hellboy: Conqueror Worm " out there: do you think there are any references/similarities to Lewis' " That Hideous Strength? " I know the main inspiration is Edgar Allen Poe's poem of the same name , but just think: macro-beings who want to destroy mankind, neo-fascists, floating head-in-a-jar , attempts to breed a new race of men, evil scientists trying to contact said macro-beings in space via a collection of severed heads in a cabinet hooked up to machines, the veneration of a space-worm with weird chanting ... At least we get spared "Fairy Hardcastle," and we do get a homunculus ! (P.S. -hope the links are helpful and not a superfluous annoyance!)

The Return of "Thus Spoke the Platypus" Part IX

As Utnapishtim stood at the crossroads, a man came by driving an ass. Now it chanced that, because of the rains, the ass became stuck in the mud. The man drew out a stick and began beating the ass and it cried after the manner of an ass: "yeah! yeah!" As it was beaten, the ass struggled forward, nor would the man for an instant let the animal back up or himself lead it back, and so it sank deeper and deeper into the mud. Even as the mud rose above its shoulders and filled its nostrils the man continued to beat it and the ass continued his cry of "yeah! yeah!" The sun traveled across the sky, and at last the ass was overcome with exhaustion and died. Utnapishtim spoke to the man and said: "Surely, if you had led the animal back or around or had given it its own head it would have lived!" At these words, the man grew incensed and struck Utnapishtim with his stick saying: "It cannot go backward! It shall not go backward!" Then the man went of...

The Return of "Thus Spoke the Platypus" Part VIII

News of how Utnapishtim had received Bera, Priest of the City, spread far and wide and came to the ears of Birsha, Priest of the Forest, as he walked among his beloved cedars. When Birsha had heard how Utnapishtim had rejected Bera and his crooked ways, he girded up his loins and went up to the crossroads. Thirty-nine days he traveled, and on the fortieth he came to Utnapishtim. When Birsha saw Utnapishtim with the people gathered about him, he cried out in a loud voice: "Utnapishtim, friend, colleague, wisest of men! Rightly have you spoken out against Bera, Priest of the City. Now show your wisdom and speak out against the City! Well do these people know of its oppressions. They wait only for one who can guide their wrath; one such as Utnapishtim!" Utnapishtim heard these words, and saw what was in the heart of Birsha, Priest of the Forest: that he hated man and would sacrifice all men but himself for the idea of his sacred groves. So he replied: "You viper! Y...

Platypus' Quest IV

It's summer vacation; a time for rest and frivolity. A time to go back and beat all those annoying video games that thwarted you when you were in college. Oh how they thwarted you! The shame! The unending shame!!!! Yes, well, my wife and I have decided that such shame shall no longer besmirch the name of our fair household. We wish to inform you that we now stand victors in the field over all the tyrannies and frustration of "Peasant's Quest." We have earned ye honour of a Trogdor burnination! Bring forth the laurels, sound the trumpets, and let all the land know of our most glorious triumph.

The Platypus Buys Comics

At long last, "Hellboy: Volume 7" is here! It's almost as wonderful as the thought that "Samurai Jack: Volume 4" is just around the corner in August! What new secrets will be revealed? Will Gruagach get his war? What of Hecate and the witches? Is the END truly at hand!?!!!! Ok, so if you've been buying up the individual issues as they come out, you already know... but I don't... So, yeah, I'm excited. "Fafrhd and the Grey Mouser" was just enough to wet my appetite, and now I'm craving a main course of "Comic Noir." Oh how wonderful and excellent a thing is a Borders gift card!

Platypus Review

This review is expanded from a response to a friend's request for my thoughts on "300." Giving a just review of the film would take volumes, and so I have had to be selective in this post. In the main, I have tried not to cover territory that has already been covered by my betters. The closest approximation to my thoughts would be to take the reviews of Dr. Touraj Daryaee, Dr. John-Mark Reynolds, and Dr. Paul Cartledge, put them in a blender and hit "frappe." I have posted the links to all three reviews in previous posts. Naturally, with a movie as controversial as "300" I understand that this review cannot hope to please at each point. Critics may wish that my condemnation of historical inaccuracies and negative images of the Persians were more forceful and dilatory, while supporters may wish for a more strident defense of the movie's strengths. Both have been done by my betters, and I would refer you to them. As always, those that ...

Last Day of Skool Platypus

Hey, hey, hey.... they're playin' our song! All I need is a cigar and a REALLY big gun.

Swashbuckling Platypus

You ever get this sort of feeling at the end of the skool year?

The Return of "Thus Spoke the Platypus" Part VII

When it became known that Utnapishtim had taken up his place at the crossroads, all the princes of the people were greatly concerned. “He will send our people into a frenzy,” they said. “And then Og will come and destroy us all!” So they sent unto Utnapishtim Bera the priest; for he was cunning in all the ways of the city. “Surely Bera will make him see reason,” they said. “Surely Bera will turn the people's hearts toward us once more!” So Bera took up his robes and his staff, and went up from the city to the crossroads where Utnapishtim stood. There he found the people gathered about Utnapishtim, though they did not understand his words, for he was a new thing to them. Then Bera opened his mouth and spoke: “Hail Utnapishtim, friend, colleague, wisest of men! What is this that you are doing? Why are you throwing these good people into confusion? Let us draw aside and talk a while, you and I!” “You snake!” Utnapishtim cried. “You have walked forty days and forty nigh...

The Return of "Thus Spoke the Platypus" Part VI

The people gathered around Utnapishtim as he stood by the crossroads and they called out to him: "Teach us a new thing!" But Utnapishtim replied: "What new thing shall I teach you? Already, you know all that Utnapishtim has to say: do not lie, do not steal, do not murder! That which you do not wish to be done unto you, do not do to another! But these teachings you do not keep. How then shall Utnapishtim teach you a new thing? Behold, even if Wisdom should become a man and speak with you in the flesh you would not marvel." When the crowds heard these words, they scoffed at him. "Og shows us new things," they said. "Each day he brings forth new marvels." But Utnapishtim replied: "Yet you still crave more. Seven marvels cannot not satisfy you, and seventy times seven marvels lose their splendor like the grass. Paltry indeed must be the marvels of Og, King of Bashan, if he must bring new ones forth each day to please you. If you seek m...

Counter-Revolutionary Platypus

Right about now, I feel like a Romanov in 1916.... At least each time I approach the lectern and begin to teach...

Poirot Platypus

The seniors decided to stage a murder mystery for the prom. Who'd they get to put it on? The teachers, of course! So I spent six hours this Saturday speaking in a Belgian accent. The beard had to go too...

The Platypus and the 300 Part II

One of my favorite contemporary historians of ancient Greece is Paul Cartledge . I had the misfortune to disagree with him on some points about Homer in my thesis; benighted fool that I am! That's beside the point. I also happened to site Frank Miller's "300" in my footnotes a year before the movie was released; and I must say I'm quite pleased to see that my predictions regarding it have come true. So I was fascinated to find that Paul Cartledge had written a review of the movie that can be found here . Check out Wikipedia for quite a few more. Sooner or later I'll try and commit my own thoughts to the web, but they're proving remarkably elusive.

The Platypus and the 300

A tale of two professors and two reviews: http://www.payvand.com/news/07/mar/1251.html http://www.scriptoriumdaily.com/2007/03/14/the -300-must-we-celebrate-war-to-fight

The Return of "Thus Spoke the Platypus" Part V

One morning, the disciple of Utnipishtim came to him and said: "Oh my master, last night I had a dream; while I was on my bed, a vision came to me! I saw your animals, the raven and the dove, descend from heaven and lift you up and they bore you away. Then a voice came from the clouds and proclaimed: 'My words shall not be hidden! Speak Utnipishtim! Speak from the wisdom that I have given you!'" When Utnipishtim heard this he raised his face toward heaven and cried out: "It is Time! It is Time! It is indeed Time!" Then Utnipishtim turned to his disciple and spoke, saying: "Oh my faithful follower, I must leave you. Who knows whether you will see Utnipishtim again? But fear not! My animals will care for you. They will bring you food from afar. For drink, there is the stream that runs from the mountain to my lake." When he had said these words, Utnipishtim departed. After many days and nights, he came to a great crossroads, where the road...

Strange Platypus(es) Part XI

In my dream, we came to another part of the wood where the trees grew thinner and the path broadened into a paved way. From further up the road, the sound of groaning came to meet my ears. We hastened on, and soon discovered it source. In the ditch that flanked the road lay a woman in the throws of a terrible illness. Her muddied garments were soaked in sweat and soars and lesions of all sorts covered her skin. In the ditch she lay, covered by the filth that ran down it, but there was no strength in her to move. I turned to my guide and asked him how it was that no one helped the woman out of the ditch and brought her to a place where her sickness might be mended. My guide, who held in his hand an object that was now a scroll, and now a sharp sword, pointed across the road to where a great dragon was slithering out of the trees. Its body was covered in slime and filth, but its face was that of a woman, and upon its flanks and side were written blasphemous names. A great host of l...

The Return of "Thus Spoke the Platypus" Part IV

Now this is the song of Utnapishtim that he sang at the rising of the sun between the mountain and the lake: Out of the past does Wisdom speak, and out of the wasteland does it sing! Seek ye the ancient way, for daylight is coming and will show the path. O leave man's city and go out with anxious feet, for Wisdom comes with the dayspring . The font of all our yesterdays, the font of our tomorrows: out of the same ocean do they spring! Now Utnapishtim will take a wife and father children, For the Hope of men will come! O that Wisdom would become a Man and speak with me! For I love you, O Wisdom. For I love you, O Wisdom. Utnapishtim does not crown himself. Nay! He will fling his crown away! For what can compare with Wisdom, who possesses us, and not we Wisdom? Utnapishtim makes his crown an offering though it is but a paltry thing. A coronet made all of thistles and water rushes, with faded water lilies ! Now Utnapishtim will take a wife and father children, For the Hope of me...

Prayer Request

Hi all, just to let you know, I need prayer. I've come down with a ferocious allergy/head-cold even though I'm still finishing up the medicine from the last one. Bad news is that I've got a mountain of stuff to do at work tomorrow since I'll be heading out for Washington D.C. with my seniors early Sunday morning. Please pray for a speedy recovery and strength to do all the tasks that remain!

Stange Platypus(es) Part X

In my dream, I came to a light and pleasant wood set amid hills of rolling green; and everywhere was the sound of water. Then I perceived that there was a host of men moving in ordered company along a forest path. Their hats were tall like church steeples and they were armed with gear of war that shone bright in the mid-morning sun. Across each silver breastplate was a crimson sash, and they sang gaily a song of new Jerusalem. I spoke to the one who was with me, the one who was covered in eyes as a fish is covered in mail: "Where are these men bound, and why do they bear such harness of war and yet sing so gaily?" The one who was with me answered; and his voice was like water passing over stones. "They are on a pilgrimage to seek the Holy City; therefore do they sing so gaily. Many trials and battles yet lay before them; and therefore go they armed. The Lord of the City shall see that not a one of those He called is lost. " My heart was swiftly lifted and I sp...

The Return of "Thus Spoke the Platypus" Part III

Utnipishtim sat by the waters of his lake, and many heard of his great wisdom, and they came to him seeking the knowledge of the time before the flood. He taught them day and night, and there was great joy in the heart of Utnipishtim. Now Og, King of Bashan, heard that many even of his own people were going up to hear the words of Utnipishtim; and his heart was full of wrath. And Og said to his heart: "I will go with my armies and destroy Utnipishtim and all his followers. I will blot out the wisdom of the time before the flood." And Og took his army and went up. Utnipishtim arose one morning with his followers, and they saw that all the valley was filled with the armies of Og, King of Bashan. And Utnipishtim called out in a loud voice: "Turn back, O armies of Og. Turn back, that you may live and not go down to death." But the hearts of the followers of Utnipishtim quaked, for none had ever turned aside the armies of Og. When Og saw that Utnipishtim was come f...

The Return of "Thus Spoke the Platypus" Part II

Utnipishtim returned to his home in the north, under the shadow of the great mountain, and sat beside the waters of his lake. And the wisdom within him cried out to be spoken; the wisdom of the time before the flood. When they saw that he was returned, the animals of Utnipishtim came to him; the Raven and the Dove. The Raven spoke to Utnipishtim: "Utnipishtim! Wisest of men! Are you troubled because a dog has mocked you? Are you troubled because you saw a dead dog by the side of the road? Be glad, then, that you may be alone with your wisdom. For what need have you, O wisest of men, to teach?" Utnipishtim smiled, and he replied: "There speaks my raven, there speaks my contemplative one, whose delight is in the journey, not the return. I did not meet a dog, nor did I see a dead dog. I went to pass on my wisdom to men, for it burns within me, and must be released. And I found no one to listen. Therefore I am grieved." Then the Dove, the active one, whose d...

Historical Platypus

My kids decided in class yesterday that I look like Oliver Cromwell. Take that as you will.

The Platypus Reads a New Trilogy

Introducing: The Integrated Evangelical trilogy Jesus Is My Homie an' He's Hangin' Out Under the Host: An Evangelical's Guide to Sacramental Theology A Fashionable Game of Diachronic Tag: The Evangelical Quasi-Sophisticate's Guide to Apostolic Succession and Ecclesiology Potpourri in my Closet: Real-Life Confessions of the Catholically Challenged

Platypus Scholar

On American Scholarship: The British think we're too French in temperament and the French return the compliment. Saying that were just a bunch of Anglo-philes, Or maybe we've just got our own odd style. Nuts.

Platypus vs. the Fridge

Sadu -Hem lives in the back of my fridge. It's something like this: *Unidentified pieces of contorted meat tumbling out of the fridge.* Sharon: what is it? Me: *holds a hand spread wide over a suspect piece* Impossible to say. Wait! Nooo !!!!! meat: I was once a great creature.... For untold ages have I slumbered.... but now I arise to wreck terror on the living as I did in days long ago!!! Sharon: What should we do?!? Me: Burn it! Burn it!!!! *After 30 minutes kitchen prep, mushrooms, orange, rice, soy sauce, plus 40 minutes cooking time...* Me: Mmmmmm . Tasty evil.....

Tet Platypus

Happy Tet everyone! We've just come back from ringing in the new year Vietnamese style. Boy, am I stuffed....

The Return of "Thus Spoke the Platypus"

In those days, Utnapishtim went forth into the world and sought to make disciples; and to pass on to men the wisdom of the time before the flood. But the people refused to listen, and caught up in their own cares they said: "Who made Utnapishtim, the old gray-beard, lord over us? What use can his wisdom be? His sermons are too long! Lo, the flower passes from bud to fruit! Lo, the butterfly is in the meadow! These things call to us. We will pick the fruit while it is ripe. We will chase the butterfly in the meadow." Then Utnapishtim was angry. He looked down at the Unnim which was in his right hand; the world-destroying power. He looked down at the Annim in his left hand; the soul destroying power. But neither of these things could proclaim wisdom. So Untapishtim was silent, and the heart within him was angry. Then came Og, King of Bashan, and laughed at him, saying, "Old gray-beard, why do you think that the people will listen to you out of respect for your ...

More Platypus Updates

Finals are over, and with them the first half of the year. I've had to pick up an extra class along with the other upper school teachers since we haven't been able to fill the slot left by a teacher we lost earlier in the year. It's a pass/fail course for eighth-graders called "High-School Prep." The video series we're using is excellent, so it's definitely worth the kids time. In other news, I've finished Machiavelli and plowed through Voltaire's "Candide. Both worth the read as two of the giants of emergent secularism. I'll be incorporating a survey them into my lectures. Right now I'm toying with a trip through Boswell's "Life of Samuel Johnson" or "The Diary of Samuel Pepys." Then again, maybe those can wait... The added stress of an extra class has kept me from posting any deeper musings. Once I adjust, we'll hopefully get some. The Platypus' musings are always deep.

The Platypus Posts Again

Hi all, It's been a while since I last managed a post. This have been busy around here, but not in a bad way. The Platypus, as ever, has been speaking Truth and assisting me in my pondering. So what's new? Urbana went well. My wife and I had a blast with the team and recruiting (even though I never worked for the company!). I definitely like the way World Team does business, and it was a pleasure to help out. We learned all about "St. Louis Style" pizza: thin crust, large toppings, and something like a layer of cheese whiz under the normal cheese. Very interesting... School is going well as we approach finals. The kids have gotten down to business, and the worst of the discipline problems seem to be past. We'll see what happens when Summer Vacation gets closer, but for now I'm enjoying the break from "controlled chaos." Speaking of education, I'm still working my way through "Guns, Germs, and Steal," a masterful, yet ...

Strange Platypus(es) Part IX

My Wife in a burkha. My wife wore a burkha with veil on Saturday. It was interesting, to say the least. Beneath that black column of rich and delicate cloth, my wife disappeared and lost all trace of personality. People avoided eye-contact. They would not address her. I became my wife's window on the world, her keeper. -until she spoke. Only her voice could break through that spell of anonymity and convert that still and terrible black column into flesh and blood once more. It was an act worthy of Pygmallion or Phantasties . As a choice, there is awesome and noble power in that veil, as Orual knew only too well. For one to take it up not out of their own free will; I can think of few tyrannies more absolute. More on this later...