Suicide Smocks

Suicide Smocks
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

I'm still thinking about the Future of Peacebang, but meanwhile I thought you should see this. An alert Peacebanger (who happens to be related by blood) alerted me to a website for a company that manufactures these smocks for suicidal prisoners.

Really, I don't WANT to laugh. I don't think it's a bit funny in the true sense of the word.
Perhaps what I feel gurgling in my throat is that existential kind of laughter, where we think fondly of the day we will be released from this extended absurdist performance called Life. Or perhaps it's due to the unintentionally hilarious smock models, who look for all the world like Noah and his wife upon disembarking from the Ark.

This text lifted directly from one of the pages on the website, at http://www.preventsuicide.com/:

Clothe Your Suicidal Inmates
and Save Money

Medical Expenses
Clothing prevents the need for treatment of hypothermia
Warmth reduces the likelihood of illness, particularly upper respiratory diseases
Risk of Personal Injury Suits
Removal of clothing from particularly vulnerable inmates such as females and youth puts a facility at risk
Providing clothing protects your facility against a suit for harm caused by hypothermia
Staff members, the "patient", and other inmates are more likely to report suicidality or implement necessary precautions knowing that the interventions do not include stripping (particularly in borderline cases and difficult judgment calls).
Demands on Staff
Inmate's comfort and reduced anxiety means less harassment of staff
Overseeing naked inmates is uncomfortable for staff
A clothed inmate can be more readily moved
Staff gets a break from noise and demands when inmate sleeps
Duration of Suicide Watches
Clothing decreases the inmate's sense of being punished or "treated like an animal"
A clothed inmate is better able to sleep which allows:
The bloodstream to be cleared of drugs
The therapeutic effects of sleep
An opportunity for a new beginning upon awakening

By God, the parousia can't come fast enough.

Peacebang On Self-Imposed Time-Out

I just googled myself and found SIX pages of links to Peacebang, this li'l ole blog that I started right at the turn of the new year without one single-dingle consideration for what I was doing, what purpose I had in posting, and what kind of persona I would be putting out over the Internet.

I found that Peacebang is linked lots of places, and that way more people than I thought are noticing it and commenting on it. People I don't even personally know! Yikes! Who knew? I thought my site meter was mostly reflecting about nine readers who click in a few times a day. To be honest, I don't have the site meter programmed in correctly and I have no idea how many people are visiting.

My google search revealed that I have posted with impunity on lots of other people's blogs, making incredibly snarky remarks and sometimes even using cuss words. Bad ones too, Pa.

On this blog, I've thrown in some fun stuff, some serious stuff, and some puppies and lambs for good measure.

I've created a monster! A monster I actually really like, but a monster nonetheless.

I need to take a little time off and think about what this monster should be, if this monster wants to stop writing anonymously (in which case I would adopt another, very secret persona for the sole purpose of writing bitchy things on the celebrity gossip blogs), if this monster wants to be more thoughtful and responsible about what she posts and says, etc.

The ethics of blogging: what are they?
If Peacebang disappeared, would you be sad?

Hmmm....

And I Am Convicted

Thanks, Peacebangers, for all your cool comments. Nice to see some new names. By the way, I just discovered Jess's Blog, and you might want to see her sad commentary on the state of some belligerently anti-Christian UU seminarians here: http://home.uchicago.edu/~cullinan/blogger.html
Is there anything more unintentionally comical than a worship service where the idea of Communion is discussed and dissected, but no one actually takes communion? Stop the madness.

I finished my essay this afternoon and toned down some of my inflammatory comments, trying to infuse my criticism with the genuine love I have for my co-religionists. I'd like to share with you some of what I submitted for the Skinner House anthology of writings by UU Christians. I call the essay, "And I Am Convicted" (I mean that in the evangelical way, not the criminal way):

"I remained a closeted Christian for several years, reading and thinking and teaching myself how to pray, discovering and respecting the troubled sibling relationship between Judaism and Christianity, and giving my heart and soul over to Christ as both man and spirit. I explored some Christian churches but was turned off by their literalism, their supercessionist treatment of Jewish religion, or their lack of commitment to social justice causes that were widely supported among my Unitarian Universalists. I began to have more affection for Unitarian Universalism, now that I could see it within the larger context of American religious life.

But where was Jesus in our UU worship life? I had never once questioned his absence in my childhood church, but I now began to wonder: since Jesus’ radical inclusivity, love of humanity, and passion for justice was so harmonious with all the “good news” I was hearing in our congregations, why did our ministers and congregants so assiduously avoid the gospels? I found it comical on some Sundays, depressing other Sundays, and consistently baffling. I could not understand why UUs would allow the perversions of the religious right to define the word “Christian” (or “religious,” for that matter), why they would concede religious language to the conservatives, and why they would go out of their way to construct a religion intentionally bereft of theology, rendering themselves a quasi-religion and many of their churches temples of denial and hypocrisy, where every spiritual path but the Christian path was considered valid, and where all evidence of a Christian past was removed, revised, and painted over.

It took me over ten more years of committed Unitarian Universalist life to consider that perhaps my dear UUs were the most strangely faithful Christians of all: having either intuitively or consciously embraced Jesus’ gospel of love, service and justice, they could not stand to affiliate with any so-called faithful who claimed to have received their inspiration for discrimination, exclusion, superstition, and damnation from the same source. The well, for too many UUs, had been irrevocably poisoned, and they would thereafter drink of the living waters from another source. Any other source, it seemed, but the Christian well. I felt called to abide with my religious community, to remain patient with my own sense of religious difference among them, and to pursue the ministry."

I continue later:

"I call myself a Christian because I am a disciple of Jesus Christ; not just Jesus-that-great-guy-and-teacher-with-the-long-hair-and-sandals, but Jesus the living avatar of the great God, and Jesus the Christ of Easter morning. I have always said that I am a mystic at heart, and that if I had been born in pre-Christian times I would have been a devotee of the mystery religion of that time and place; perhaps the Eleusinian or Orphic rites. Christianity is the mystery religion of my time and place, and I am a devotee of it.

This last point, of course, distresses my rationalist Unitarian Universalist friends to no end, and I understand and accept that with affection and forbearance. But when we say that our living tradition draws from “direct experience of that transcending mystery and wonder, affirmed in all cultures, which moves us to a renewal of the spirit and an openness to the forces that create and uphold life,” I think of that original community of disciples, who had a direct experience of the risen Christ which I revere and respect. It matters not at all whether I believe a dead man can be brought back to life or not, and although I used to research this question with some energy at the beginning of my Christian journey, today I have lost interest in exploring the scientific or historic “what’s, when’s and how’s” of the first Easter. Do I believe, then, in the Resurrection? I believe that the original community of disciples had a direct experience of one who was truly dead, and who soon thereafter experienced his appearance among them to send them out to love the world, to serve, to heal, and to overcome the forces of hatred and oppression.
And I am convicted.


So, Sari, we do discuss theology sometimes, although not often enough in our congregations -- out of a misguided pandering to the religiously wounded among us, which causes us to avoid many of the conversations and much of the theological education that could most heal the angry, ex-Somethings who join our congregations. We discuss theology on our blogs now, I suppose, and that's going to have to do for a start. You should know that the average UU blogger is not representative of the average Unitarian Universalist, many of whom proudly sport a "Famous UUs" T-shirt while they drink Fair Exchange coffee of a Sunday morning, and most of whom will never give a good hee-haw about what year the First Parish in Quincy officially transitioned from Calvinist Congregationalism to Unitarianism.

Inflammatory Comments R Us!

I am working on an article for our publishing house on why I am a Unitarian Universalist Christian. This thing is very overdue, and my friend and colleague K. is being very kind to accept it from me tomorrow morning as opposed to three freaking weeks ago.

Anyway, it has been very hard to write, as the whole story is really a book and who has time to write a book, and who in the world wants to read a book about me? No one. Okay, maybe my mom.

At one point in the essay I ask why Unitarian Universalists would "go out of their way to construct a religion intentionally bereft of theology, rendering themselves a quasi-religion and many of their churches temples of denial, hypocrisy and crimes against memory."

Ouch. Them's fighting words. I 've been chewing my cud on them for some long minutes now, and I think, well that's what I mean, so that's what I think I'm going to say. I don't know how else to put it. What do I mean by "bereft of theology?" Well, I mean exactly that. I mean no theological discussion allowed. Not even a lively and mutually respectful inquiry about what we might mean by "God," why many of us reject "that" God, and why some have no God concept and all. No God allowed, period. It's gotten better, but for much of my growin' up years, this was the norm everywhere I went. We were the great project in non-theistic religion -- which might not have been a disaster -- but we did it with such arrogance, such certainty that secularism was the wave of the future and baby, we were hanging TEN! Religion was OUT!

Wasn't THAT prophetic!

What do I mean by a "quasi-religion?" I mean, again, the "we meet on Sunday mornings, we sing hymns and hear a sermon and take an offering, and we're tax-exempt, but we're THE RELIGION FOR THE NON-RELIGIOUS."
Isn't *that* cute? That was actually -- I'm not making this up -- the title of a very popular brochure we actually used to provide to NEW MEMBERS.

What do I mean by "temples of denial, hypocrisy and crimes against memory?"
Just this: "We're the non-religious religion -- we don't have a creed, we're theologically open, we really accept everyone, and ... excuse me? Did you say 'Christian?" Did you say 'Bible?' Oh, well that was something some of us did a long time ago, but those who did mostly approached the Bible with a pair of scissors*, and we've never observed traditional Christian practices in our church."

Pardon me, ma'am, may I show you the archives of your very own congregation's orders of worship? Was that a lapse in knowledge, or an intentional obfuscation of a past that makes you distinctly itchy?

And I'm sure you want to revise that "welcome and affirming" spiel. I think what you mean to say is, "We welcome and affirm you if you're willing to speak our language, conform to our politics, and share a sneering distaste for anything that could be vaguely described as traditional religion."

Disclaimer: I haven't seen nearly so much of this behavior lately, and this is in no way a reflection or report of conditions in my current congregation which is perfectineveryway.

*= P.S. Despite what you have heard or seen on any number of T-shirts, Thomas Jefferson was NOT a Unitarian!! He said he thought it would become a very popular religion for thoughtful lads and lasses in America someday, but he was not one himself. Practically speaking, for God's sake, there was no such formal denominational designation in his lifetime. He was theologically unitarian. And a Deist. 'Taint the same thing.

Little Compton Goes Home

Amy and Little Compton
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

So I went backstage to get the lamb yesterday, and then A. showed up to take her home. When she walked through the door she got tears in her eyes and we all knew it was Meant To Be. Not a dry eye in the house.

The lamb, whose name is Little Compton, is officially living happily ever after now, and I am hoping that she will come to church to be the central message for my Easter sermon, which I am right now writing in my mind. Do you think it would be too irreverent to have her walk down the center aisle while the organ plays "Let Me Entertain You?"

The Lamb Meets The Stripper

The Lamb Meets The Stripper
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

Picture the lamb leaping *straight* in the air and almost giving S. a hoof in the mouth (hoof-and-mouth disease?). I had no idea those little critters could get so VERTICAL! (That's why S. is totally cracking up.)

Immediately after this photo was taken, S. opened the door and the lamb knocked her way past her and went bleating out into the hall while S. and I ran after her, trying not to scream and laugh too loudy and disturb the show. The trainer tackled and subdued her outside the lobby and brought her back to her little pen.

People, it was a total scene.

P.S. S.O. isn't REALLY a stripper -- she was just playing one in "Gypsy." And I know she's bodacious and fabulous and all, but she has a boyfriend.

Conference Bike! The Wonder Ball Of the 00's!

This absolutely wins my first prize for "Fun Ways To Get Into a Car Accident."

Please. See this. Make sure your volume is on.

http://www.conferencebike.com/web.mov

OR, for the longer version with the puppy,

http://www.conferencebike.com/cobiclip.mov

And please.... explain it to me.

(From new favorite web site, www.blacktable.com, referred by Peacebang's web-savviest sis, who has patiently taken at least three phone calls this morning from a hysterical Peacebang laughing about ConferenceBike).

Lunch With Philocrites

I had some business on Beacon Hill today and had the unexpected pleasure of stealing dear Philocrites (www.Philocrites.com) away for lunch at a charming nearby bistro. Having just endured a really harrowing business meeting, I had a Bloody Mary with my soup, and he had a sandwich and Freedom fries.

He is such a gift to Unitarian Universalism and we're really so grateful to have imported him East from Utah. Mitt Romney, you can have.

As I was walking down the Common to the "T" (if you're not a Bostonian, that's okay, you can figure it out), two reporters from Fox TV asked me, on camera, what I would nominate for the official Rodent of Massachusetts. I wanted to say "Mitt Romney" but I stuck with the good old field mouse, three of whom I found floating in my olive oil back in December. You remember that, don't you?

It's snowing again. Please, South Beach Diet Gods, give me the strength not to turn to buttered popcorn and chocolate for solace.

The Pieta of Michaelangelo

The Pieta of Michaelangelo
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

Another story from my trip to Italy: we were spending the morning at St. Peter's, which is really, for my money, THE knock-down architectural wonder and holy-ghost-power dwelling place of the Most High. Anyway. A lady still occasionally needs to freshen up, so after some jaw-gaping appreciation of the larger cathedral I went off to find the powder room, and almost fell out when I happened upon the Pieta in the hallway, just sitting there in all its silent numinosity.

I approached it with baited breath and practically on tip-toe, and stood there plucking at my shirt buttons and trying not to sob. A minute or so later I was distracted by the sound of footsteps, and turned to see a kind of doofusy American tourist (trucker hat, big camera around the neck, windbreaker)catch sight of Michaelangelo's Mary and Jesus. He stopped dead in his tracks, pulled his cap from his head and began to weep. I moved aside and he approached, and just stood there with his face in his hands and cried.
(damn, there goes my mascara just remembering it)

I am teaching a class at church this spring called "The Creative Spirit," which invites all the participants to share art, literature or music that has a particularly powerful spiritual impact on them.
What would *you* bring to the first session?

And, for the record, I find a lot more miraculous in Michaelangelo's gifts, and not so much miraclulous about the honey-mustard Rold Gold pretzel version of Mama and Jesu.

BabyJesusPretzel

BabyJesusPretzel
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

This item is on auction on e-Bay. It's an apparition of the Virgin and Child incarnate in a mustard-flavored Rold-Gold pretzel. Do you see it? Can you see it? Isn't it tender and luminous? I mean, for a carbohydrate?
According to the seller, they all experienced a feeling of warmth and spiritual well-being when holding the pretzel.

Last time I checked, bidding was up around $11,000. Glory.

A Lamb of the Stage

Yittle Yam
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

I went to see "Gypsy" last weekend at a local community theatre, and was just as charmed as everyone else when a real,live lamb was pushed onto the stage to appear in Louise's birthday scene. The lamb was wearing a diaper, and pulled at its harness and baaa'd plaintively throughout most of the song that was sung to it (appropriately called "Little Lamb" -- one of the dumbest, throw-away tunes of the musical theatre... clearly composed so that the leading lady could go make a costume change).

As it turns out, our little fleecy friend was obtained from a local slaughterhouse and was scheduled to be returned to it after the run of the show.

My heavens. Just because a guy makes a few mistakes on stage doesn't mean he ought to wind up on a plate with a side of mint jelly!

Peacebang took it upon herself to find a home for the little starlet, and is happy to tell you that he (or she) will be living at a farm very nearby, courtesy of some wonderful, warm-hearted neighbors. The lamb's new name, by the way, is "Little Compton."
But Peacebang will always think of him as "Gypsy."

You may make your Paschal lamb/Agnus Dei joke here.

Michael Dearest, and BTK

Michael Dearest
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

No comment on the photo. Courtesy of PageSixSixSix.com.

I'm avoiding the Michael Jackson trial but watching the BTK situation with some interest. There is something bone-chillingly creepy about a sadistic murdering psycho giving himself a moniker that sounds like a fast-food franchise. A reliable source tells me that the pastor of the accused, days after publicly affirming that his maniacal congregant is part of the body of Christ, has had a nervous breakdown.

My Reliable Source asked me what I would do if one of my own dearly beloved congregants turned out to be a serial killer. I'll have to think about that. We talk about the "inherent worth and dignity" of all human beings but of course "inherent" is not the same as "inviolate."

I certainly don't think I'd be using that "Body of Christ" line in public, that's for sure. I'd be talking about the victims, and our compassion for them, and keeping my mouth pretty much shut about my relationship with the accused. That's what pastoral privilege is all about.

I am well aware that, given the opportunities and plenty of time in the Big House, even the most heinous of evil-doers are capable of true repentance, spiritual growth and evolution of character. I've seen it with my own eyes. When that happens, it is very difficult for the loved ones of victims to appreciate the reformation of that individual. After all, they got a chance to move into another phase of life; an opportunity not granted the dead. When the families and loved ones can recognize the goodness in change, reconciliation can occur. When they can't, the perpetrator lives with the knowledge of that permanent hatred and resentment as best he or she can.

I do not generally support the death penalty. I say generally, because when there's a true sadist among us, my heart gets very cold and very unchristian. I want that person off the planet. They are living (or have lived) too far beyond the Pale of the basic human covenant, and they incarnate evil, which I believe is an absolute. So it's not a question of "eye for an eye" but of the kind of spiritual harm and danger represented by the truly unrepentant sadist.

But then... I remember the Hasidic saying: We should love the wicked, too, because as long as we do not love in this way, the Messiah will not come.

Justice is the most difficult human work.

Santa Francesca Of the Dogs

Assisi Cloister
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

What I remember about Assisi was how I would walk out onto our balcony every morning and the valley below was shrouded in fog. Everything had a kind of pinkish glow, and huge flocks of birds would suddenly lift off from one rooftop and fly in swooping, Busby Berkley-esque formations to the next rooftop. I got to see the Giotto frescoes before the big earthquake that destroyed them, and the whole few days was one big swoon. We went in January (golly, that was 9 years ago already - I was turning 30) and there was no one around but the occasional nice little group of Japanese tourists.

So I can imagine myself there this summer, even with that weird "who am I without my church" summer malaise I always get into, just soaking in some Jungian theory and happy to simply be there in that medieval setting.

Assisi is the one place in the world that I think is equally romantic whether you're totally solo or totally in love. You feel like a lover of life in Assisi. Go ahead and laff. But Virginia's not for lovers. Virginia's for right-wing nut jobs and really nice magnolia blossoms in the spring. ASSISI is for lovers, man. You're not at all surprised to learn that two major saints came from there, as you think it you only spent a few more days, you might score a major mystical vision or two yourself.

I'm seriously thinking of taking the course, although it's expensive and I've already been there, and there's that whole country called SPAIN that I'm dying to see...

I forgot to tell you how I was walking up this big hill to the Rocco Maggiore when I was there, chatting away to this little raggedy stray dog who walked the whole way with me (I have photos of him that I should post sometime). A group of schoolboys were following my progress from the bushes, shouting that I was crazy and calling me "St. Francesca of the Dogs." I know enough Italian that I could tell what they were saying.

It's my favorite nickname ever. Oh, in case you didn't know: the two saints from Assisi are St. Francis and Saint Claire.

Are You Brushin' With Me, Jesus?

Dental Jesus
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

M. went to the dentist and got a partial crown the other day, which kind of traumatized him although he was able to eat a salad before the novocaine wore off without chewing his lip off by accident.
I am positively dental-phobic and M. and I share a horror of the smell of vaporizing tooth enamel going up the nose, and the sound of the drill. I wish M. had had this picture with him when he went to the dentist. I'm sure it would have helped -- just like the time he stopped by church for a special traveling blessing before leaving the country.

Send Your Condolences

As you have heard by now, Judge Joan Humphrey Lefkow has suffered the murder of both her mother, 89- year old Donna Humphrey, and her husband, Michael Lefkow. They were shot in the basement of her home, and the authorities have every reason to believe that this was the work of white supremacists whom the good Judge had prosecuted in the past.

You may want to send a note of condolence, support, prayers, etc. to Judge Lefkow care of her church, St. Luke's Episcopal Church in Evanston, IL. She is currently in protective custody and preparing for the funerals.

St. Luke's Episcopal Church
939 Hinman Street
Evanston, IL 60202

We pray for their souls.

"I remembered you, O God, and I groaned:
I mused, and my spirit grew faint." - Psalm 77, N.I.V.

My Earlobes Are Stretching Just Thinking About It

Biggest Earrings Award
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

No win for Best Supporting Actress, but Miss Madsen did take honors for biggest earrings.

Go Ahead, Make My Bread

Go Ahead, Make My Bread
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

According to Page Six, the gossip section of the craptastic New York Post:

"March 1, 2005 -- EVERYONE knew where Clint Eastwood was going after his "Million Dollar Baby" won four Oscars: to Dani Janssen's Century City apartment. The widow of "The Fugitive" star, David Janssen, has known Eastwood since she was 16 and they were contract players at Universal. Eastwood never misses Janssen's Oscar party if he's in town. Dani, who does all the cooking herself, including her famous "monkey bread," limits the guest list to close friends like Jack Nicholson and Shirley MacLaine."



I just know you have a church potluck to go to one of these days, and I just know that you will want to bring along some monkey bread, so here's the recipe, dear Peacebangers:

MONKEY BREAD
3 packages of buttermilk biscuit tubes
1 cup sugar (divided)
2 tsp cinnamon
1 cup butter
1/2 cup brown sugar

Take 3 packages of buttermilk biscuit tubes (10 per roll) and cut each roll into 4 pieces. Drop roll pieces into 1 cup sugar and 2 tsp. cinnamon. drop sugar coated pieces into a well buttered bundt pan (don't squish roll pieces when placing them in the bundt pan).
Put 1/2 cup of the left over sugar/cinnamon mix and 1/2 cup packed brown sugar and 1 cup of butter (2 sticks) into small sauce pan.
Bring this mixture just to a boil, take off heat right away. Carefully drizzle over the roll pieces.
Bake at 350 degrees for 30 min.
Cool slightly in an upright position, then tip pan over onto a plate to remove monkey pull-apart bread.
Tear apart with hands, screech and lope around the room while eating. Smear butter on self. Screech some more.

His Grandma Whupped Him

His Grandma Whupped Him
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

Jamie Foxx, you were great in "Ray." I just wish your Oscar acceptance speech (which I liked better the first time, as your Golden Globe acceptance speech) wasn't such a celebration of corporal punishment. I know you love your grandma, and I know she whipped you. Apparently a lot. I'm glad it worked for you, because it sounds really awful to me.

Two Teenie Weenie Suggestions, Miss B

Eye Cream Alert
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

To adorable Drew Barrymore: I have two bits of advice for you. (1) You're an American acting legacy, dear heart. Time to hire a voice coach to help rid you of that lingering Valley Girl dialect that so limits your choice of roles. "Rrround tones, Miss Lamont, round tones!"
(2)Philosophy makes a wonderful eye cream called "Eye Believe." Eye believe you need some. Heavens, you're so wealthy you can afford Caudelie, which has grape seed extract in it. Send your assistant out for some, dear. Until you achieve the acting chops of an Annette Bening or an Imelda Staunton, we're counting on you to be smashingly adorable at all times. Crow's feet just won't do.

Sartorial TMI

pelvic bones
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

Ladies and gentlemen, for your consideration: two gorgeous stars of the silver screen in high fashion for the Oscars 2005, but sharing just a little bit too much information about the exact state of their physiques for my comfort level. Miss Berry, I should not be able to see your pelvic bones jut out -- one after the other in undulating regularity- when you walk onstage. And Miz Swank, swanky as you are, you are nevertheless coming so dangerously close to sporting derriere cleavage as to give me a case of the vapors.

Sartorial TMI, Exhibit 2

Oh mi gawd
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

77th Annual Oscars

The. Worst. Ever.

Chris Rock: well, he said "s^&s" and "a**" in the first three minutes of his opening monologue, and I couldn't agree more. I'm too much of a lady to say it, but I appreciate that he said it for me.
He was a disastrously bad host. Out of place, stiff, terrible material, nothing witty about him. See you back at HBO where you belong, Chris.

Technical errors and ill-conceived directorial decisions abounded. This wasn't a case of "somebody's gonna lose their job." This was more like, "None of the people involved in this travesty should ever work again." WHOSE idea was it to drag all the nominees onto the stage like a black tie version of "The Weakest Link" again? Fire him first.

Worst gowns ever. It was the year of Zombie Skin Grey. Did you see yummy young thing Natalie Portman looking like something off the side of a Grecian urn, only more stiff? The color scheme was beyond dreary, and Beyonce's glittery black eyeshadow would scare even Celine Dion (she of the perpetually Black Buttered Eyelids). And ladies, no more yellow, I beg you. PLEASE. Renee Zellwegger got away with it a few years ago because it was a cheery vintage shade. That should have been the end of that. I'm telling you, it's not doing any of you any favors. Not even you, Miss Cate Blanchett, but you looked beautiful anyway.

You can blame Jennifer Lopez for the ubiquitous "flesh-colored lips" shade of lipstick that washes out even the likes of Selma Hayek (in ridiculous choppy bangs) and Penelope Cruz (Ay, Dios! Not a beehive!!) Let me make it really clear, girls, since you obviously weren't listening to me last year: You can only wear that color lipstick if you're blessed with the dewiest skin and your make-up artist has given you petal pink cheeks. You cannot rock that look if you're haggard and emaciated, and you really shouldn't attempt it if you're over 50, no matter how good your facialist is. Helen Mirren, I'm talking to you, luv. Elegant and stunning at any age, but m'lady, rouge and lipstick are your friends.

Vanessa Paradis just sat there with her dishy French self, smirking in her bright red lipstick. Vanessa is Womanhood Personified. She lives with Johnny Depp and bears his love children. You wouldn't *catch* her in flesh-colored lipstick. He, on the other hand, was so badly dressed as to cause my mother to keep murmuring "Oh, just look at that." Peacebang and her mother always watch the Oscars together on the phone.

Annette Benning, darling, they already cast "Finding Neverland" and you didn't get the part of Peter Pan. That spiky quasi-punk boyish haircut is so out, honey. Please. It's more OUT than Barbra Streisand's molto grande tummy, which La Babs vainly tried to cover with "creative" chiffon sleeves. Isn't it good to see La Babs chunky and happy?

And I don't care... I'm still not interested in seeing "Million Dollar Baby." I feel so sorry for Martin Scorcese I can hardly stand it.

Little "Flava"

DSCN1298
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

I was saying to R. that I haven't found much new music that really rocked my world lately, and asking her if she had any favorites she thought I might like (I am doing this with everyone lately -- H. and R. came through with Madeleine Peyroux so I'm taking more suggestions). She said, in all seriousness, "Let me put some flava in your ear."

LET ME PUT SOME FLAVA' IN YOUR EAR.

This from a diminutive feminist Catholic urban goddess theologian who walks around in this crazy Hobbit hat we got some years ago from a Tibetan lady on the Upper West Side. God, I wish you'd been there.

Peacebang at the Gates

DSCN1306
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

Oh no, I just "outed" myself as a short, chunky woman in a blue hat!

But seriously, folks... hope you had a good time while I was gone. I saw a new musical by Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty (the same team who did "Ragtime" and "Once On This Island") called "Dessa Rose," starring LaChanze and Rachel York. I cried a lot, but remained lukewarm about it in general. As J. suggested, "maybe slavery just isn't a great topic for the musical theatre." Also, P. and I saw "Being Julia" and absolutely adored it madly. It is a celebration of the neurotic neediness of The Diva, and features a gorgeously aging Annette Bening affectionately murmuring such lines as "You're a revolting hag." She has WON my heart, as has her creation Julia, and I hope she takes home a big, fat Oscar tomorrow night.

P.S. Hank, I blame YOU for getting everyone going on polyamory, you rascally rabbit.

Sad Little Doll

It seems that Paris Hilton's PDA (some upscale little techno-item called a Sidekick) has been hacked, and her private little world revealed for all to see. So if you want to get Ashlee Simpson or Christina Aguilera or Gael Garcia Bernal's phone number (and who doesn't?), now's your chance. I actually considered calling Christina from the church line to express my congratulations on her recent engagement but I lost interest. It would have been funny, though. "Christina Aguilera? Hello dear, this is Reverend Peacebang. We want to extend our most sincere wishes here at HomeTown Unitarian Church for a most beautiful wedding and blessed marriage, and we affirm your right to be beautiful in oh so many ways, no matter what they say."

The extreme fame of this little Hilton creature fascinates me. She is so gorgeous and plastic and profoundly moronic it's actually kind of endearing; I cannot imagine inhabiting her life for even one minute. At least, unlike another pathologically famous blonde with the initials MM, Ms. Hilton seems to have a sense of humor and fun and irony about her, and so far she hasn't expressed any desire to be, gods forbid, "taken seriously." The world is consuming her and she's consuming right back. As despicable a spectacle as it can be, I'd rather that than watch her die of self-loathing and barbituates. Mark my words -- we're going to be seeing that mocking sneer for many years to come.

But I finally watched about 20 seconds of Paris Hilton's famous porn tape this evening and wanted to bang my head against my desk for despair. The girl has such a body and she doesn't know how to use it! She doesn't inhabit it! I thought about that wonderful scene in the movie "Antonia's Line," when all manner of real, extremely unplastic men and women are making love through a long Scandinavian night, and how much more spirit and delight and authenticity they shared, even as actors portraying real people having sex.

And I thought, Paris dear Paris... when they said that there are some things money can't buy, they must have had you in mind.

Saffron Is The New Pink!

The Gates (But Not Bill)
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

I am hopping on that little Chinatown bus to NYC on Thursday morning to see these large napkins by Christo and -- what's his wife's name? Gigi? Jeananne? Cher? Divine? Zsa-Zsa?

It's terribly pretentious, of course, but I just have to go cast my vote for extravagant gestures of hope and beauty. My friend P. and I will probably wind up holding hands and running among the banners releasing primal screams all the while.

He got me to agree to meet him there by quoting the little dead twins from "The Shining:" Come play with us... forever!

How could I resist?

My New Boyfriend Michael Zelnaronok

frMichaelZelnaronok
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

I have no idea who this is but he's hot AND religious. Scott Wells (Boy In the Bands) sent him to me a few weeks ago with a comment that still makes me giggle. If you ask BITB really nicely maybe he'll blog about him. I'm too tired tonight to google.

You know how you sometimes think back on the people you've been dating and you compare them to the kind of person you should be dating and then your head explodes? Yea, me too.

Maria Full of Fierce

Catalina Sandino Moreno
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

The best thing about the film "Maria Full of Grace" is that it is totally bereft of the usual sentimentality that characterizes so many other similar films about po' girls of color trying to escape their lives of boredom and poverty.
Catalina Sandino Moreno she is fierce, mami. Thank Dios that the writer/director insisted on shooting this film about Colombian drug mules (those who ingest drugs before smuggling them to the U.S.)in Spanish, and using unknowns. I kept thinking, "God, he could have cast, like, Claire Danes or something. And she would have had bad black hair dye like Winona Ryder in "House of the Spirits" and loads of mascara.

(Wait! I just saw a production of "South Pacific" where the girl playing the young Tonkinese beauty had this really obvious hair-piece, which my friend Michael described as "totally dry bad snap-on hair!")

I'm so glad that Maria didn't have totally dry bad snap-on hair.

There's a great scene where (spoiler alert!!)Maria tells her boyfriend she's pregnant and they just sit in hostile awkardness sniping at each other, until it just comes right out that they don't love each other. I loved this scene. I loved its honesty, and I LOVED that there was no reconciliation later. None. No mention of the guy. Just like in REAL. LIFE.

It was a good film -- interesting, engaging, moving at times, but not approaching "harrowing," which is how one critic described it. I'm going right now to watch the commentary track to see how they filmed the scenes where Maria swallows dozens of pellets of balloon-wrapped heroin. I was getting acid reflux just watching it.