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trawnapandaFlorence Foster Jenkins is famous, even infamous, for her singing, or perhaps in spite of it. Here is an article from Coronet Magazine in 1957 which will tell you almost everything you wanted, or feared, to know about the Diva of Din.
Oct. 2nd, 2007
As y'all know, I've been having trouble with my ISP. Briefly, the DNS server connection was continuously being lost, and just this weekend I could not set up a VPN that I had bought and paid for. I asked BT for a Migration Access Code and got one, with a request to call them to see if they could help.
I was put on to a rather incompetent call centre droid from India who did not understand what a DNS was and continued to insist that my line had not gone down for years. I asked for someone who was competent (not in those words) and got someone who gave me the global DNS address. I entered this as the lookup address and, lo and behold, I lost the ability to control my router from the desktop interface. I decided to try going back to the router I had previously.
Well, folks, it was the router. Once I changed routers, I was able to connect to the VPN first time, and the DNS lookup problem seems to have disappeared (I hope).
I am now listening to KKSF San Francisco over the Web for the first time in more than a year, since Comcast cut off service internationally for copyright reasons (the VPN has a US IP address).
O frabjous day! Calloo, callay!
I'm chortling in my joy!
I was put on to a rather incompetent call centre droid from India who did not understand what a DNS was and continued to insist that my line had not gone down for years. I asked for someone who was competent (not in those words) and got someone who gave me the global DNS address. I entered this as the lookup address and, lo and behold, I lost the ability to control my router from the desktop interface. I decided to try going back to the router I had previously.
Well, folks, it was the router. Once I changed routers, I was able to connect to the VPN first time, and the DNS lookup problem seems to have disappeared (I hope).
I am now listening to KKSF San Francisco over the Web for the first time in more than a year, since Comcast cut off service internationally for copyright reasons (the VPN has a US IP address).
O frabjous day! Calloo, callay!
I'm chortling in my joy!
I spoke too soon...
Oct. 2nd, 2007 09:09 pm...of course, as soon as I started listening to KKSF, I accidentally downloaded some spyware and it took an hour and £21 to clean my computer. Wotta pain!
This is the first time I've ever done this, so I suppose I've had my lesson. Now can we stop doing these kinds of things?
This is the first time I've ever done this, so I suppose I've had my lesson. Now can we stop doing these kinds of things?
Last Sunday's Sermon, as promised
Oct. 2nd, 2007 09:28 pm30 September 2007
Sermon delivered at St. Anne’s Thorburn Square: Back-to-Church Sunday
Reading: Luke 16: 19-end
In the name of God, the one, the Undivided Trinity. AMEN.
A woman burst into a GP’s office with her husband and said, “Doctor, doctor, you have to help me. My husband thinks he’s a moth.” The doctor looked at her and said, “I’m a GP, not a psychiatrist. Why did you bring him to me if he thinks he’s a moth?” The man said, “Your light was on.”
I think that we’ve all seen lights that were surrounded by moths, flies, and bugs of every description. Somehow these little creatures are attracted to the light given off by a light bulb.
Light attracts all manner of things. People too are attracted to light. If you’re given a choice of walking down a street that is well-lit by street-lamps, or a street that is dark and forbidding, with no light or only what comes from the moon and the stars, which one would you walk down? That’s a no-brainer.
Light reveals things that are good as well as things that are bad. It illuminates dark corners, gives the evildoer pause, lends confidence to the weak.
The concept of “light” is used in a more imaginative way. Invariably, if I were reading in a room that was partly dark, and my father came in, he’d turn on a lamp and say, “Let’s shed some light on the subject.” When a comic character finally twigs that something is happening, or gets a bright idea, the artist draws a lightbulb over the character’s head and draws the character’s mouth in a smile. The light has dawned.
Even one of the Biblical names for the devil, Lucifer, means “light bearer”, alluding to his origin as an angel on the side of the good, rather than an evil being.
What does Jesus say about light? He talks quite a bit about light. “You are the light of the world,” and again, “No one lights a lamp and then puts it under a bushel basket.” The seven wise virgins bring enough lamp oil with them to light their lamps for the bridegroom; the seven foolish ones do not. At the Transfiguration we read that Jesus’s clothing became dazzling white, and his face shone like the sun.
And again, we are reminded of Jesus as the light of the world when at the crucifixion darkness fell from noon until three, when he died.
So light is a constant theme throughout the Scriptures; we could be here for hours while I discussed the various way in which light is described in the Bible. That’s not only impractical but also insensitive.
For a moment, let’s think of St. Anne’s Church as a light. We are a community of believers, part of the Deanery of Bermondsey, the Archdeaconry of Southwark, the Woolwich Episcopal Area, the Diocese of Southwark, the Province of Canterbury, the Church of England, and the Anglican Communion. All of those things, and more. But we are also a light shining in the heart of Bermondsey.
We bear the light of the Scriptures not only to ourselves, but to every living soul in this parish. John says it best in the first chapter of his gospel: Jesus was “the true light, which enlightens everyone,” and Jesus is here, in St. Anne’s Church. We are all “lucifers” (with a small-L): bearers of the light of Christ in our lives to those whom we meet. But, one source of that light is here, right in this building.
Where “two or three” are gathered together, Christ says that he is in the midst of them. The Christ-light is here, when we gather to worship and praise, and especially when we break the bread of the Eucharist together.
This building is not only the “beating heart of Bermondsey”, as our new publicity says, but also the powerhouse that brings the light of Christ to this little corner of a very dark world.
Just as a lightbulb cannot light unless there is a source of electricity and wires to carry the power from the source to the bulb, this building, this powerhouse of the light of Christ, needs a way to conduct that light to every household in the parish.
That way is each and every one of you.
If the light is hidden under a bushel basket, what good is that? If there is no way to let the power source out of the powerhouse, what good is that?
I realise that I’ve stretched a little metaphor about light quite a long way, but I think it’s an important one to contemplate and bear in our hearts.
Christ Jesus is the most powerful man who ever lived, as well as God Incarnate. But, now that He has ascended into heaven, and left his church to carry on the work he started, there is only one way to accomplish his work here on earth.
It is only through you that the work of worship, witness, healing, friendship, and so many other things, beginning and ending with love, can be accomplished. You all bear the light of Christ from this place out into Bermondsey and the wider world.
When the Companions in Mission first arrived at St. Anne’s in March (it seems like ages ago now), one of the things that everyone told us and took for granted was that the church was hidden away and unknown to most people in this part of the world.
It seems to me that, really, your attraction as a worshiping and witnessing community will overcome the disadvantages of being tucked away in Thorburn Square. Like moths to a light, those who live in the parish of St. Anne’s will, in time, feel an attraction towards the community of faith in this building that will not be resistable.
For those of you who may be here for the first time, or for the first time in a long time, you are in a powerhouse of prayer and witness, and you are welcome at every service that goes on here. Besides being God’s house, this is a house of prayer for all people, you are welcome to come to this source of light to gain illumination, warmth, and wisdom.
We are not like the GP in the story with which I began this sermon: we do not turn away anyone in need of help, or even just light in their personal darkness. Our light is on, we are not hiding away, and we trust we will be here for generations to come, just offering a little light to shine into the darkness. AMEN
Sermon delivered at St. Anne’s Thorburn Square: Back-to-Church Sunday
Reading: Luke 16: 19-end
In the name of God, the one, the Undivided Trinity. AMEN.
A woman burst into a GP’s office with her husband and said, “Doctor, doctor, you have to help me. My husband thinks he’s a moth.” The doctor looked at her and said, “I’m a GP, not a psychiatrist. Why did you bring him to me if he thinks he’s a moth?” The man said, “Your light was on.”
I think that we’ve all seen lights that were surrounded by moths, flies, and bugs of every description. Somehow these little creatures are attracted to the light given off by a light bulb.
Light attracts all manner of things. People too are attracted to light. If you’re given a choice of walking down a street that is well-lit by street-lamps, or a street that is dark and forbidding, with no light or only what comes from the moon and the stars, which one would you walk down? That’s a no-brainer.
Light reveals things that are good as well as things that are bad. It illuminates dark corners, gives the evildoer pause, lends confidence to the weak.
The concept of “light” is used in a more imaginative way. Invariably, if I were reading in a room that was partly dark, and my father came in, he’d turn on a lamp and say, “Let’s shed some light on the subject.” When a comic character finally twigs that something is happening, or gets a bright idea, the artist draws a lightbulb over the character’s head and draws the character’s mouth in a smile. The light has dawned.
Even one of the Biblical names for the devil, Lucifer, means “light bearer”, alluding to his origin as an angel on the side of the good, rather than an evil being.
What does Jesus say about light? He talks quite a bit about light. “You are the light of the world,” and again, “No one lights a lamp and then puts it under a bushel basket.” The seven wise virgins bring enough lamp oil with them to light their lamps for the bridegroom; the seven foolish ones do not. At the Transfiguration we read that Jesus’s clothing became dazzling white, and his face shone like the sun.
And again, we are reminded of Jesus as the light of the world when at the crucifixion darkness fell from noon until three, when he died.
So light is a constant theme throughout the Scriptures; we could be here for hours while I discussed the various way in which light is described in the Bible. That’s not only impractical but also insensitive.
For a moment, let’s think of St. Anne’s Church as a light. We are a community of believers, part of the Deanery of Bermondsey, the Archdeaconry of Southwark, the Woolwich Episcopal Area, the Diocese of Southwark, the Province of Canterbury, the Church of England, and the Anglican Communion. All of those things, and more. But we are also a light shining in the heart of Bermondsey.
We bear the light of the Scriptures not only to ourselves, but to every living soul in this parish. John says it best in the first chapter of his gospel: Jesus was “the true light, which enlightens everyone,” and Jesus is here, in St. Anne’s Church. We are all “lucifers” (with a small-L): bearers of the light of Christ in our lives to those whom we meet. But, one source of that light is here, right in this building.
Where “two or three” are gathered together, Christ says that he is in the midst of them. The Christ-light is here, when we gather to worship and praise, and especially when we break the bread of the Eucharist together.
This building is not only the “beating heart of Bermondsey”, as our new publicity says, but also the powerhouse that brings the light of Christ to this little corner of a very dark world.
Just as a lightbulb cannot light unless there is a source of electricity and wires to carry the power from the source to the bulb, this building, this powerhouse of the light of Christ, needs a way to conduct that light to every household in the parish.
That way is each and every one of you.
If the light is hidden under a bushel basket, what good is that? If there is no way to let the power source out of the powerhouse, what good is that?
I realise that I’ve stretched a little metaphor about light quite a long way, but I think it’s an important one to contemplate and bear in our hearts.
Christ Jesus is the most powerful man who ever lived, as well as God Incarnate. But, now that He has ascended into heaven, and left his church to carry on the work he started, there is only one way to accomplish his work here on earth.
It is only through you that the work of worship, witness, healing, friendship, and so many other things, beginning and ending with love, can be accomplished. You all bear the light of Christ from this place out into Bermondsey and the wider world.
When the Companions in Mission first arrived at St. Anne’s in March (it seems like ages ago now), one of the things that everyone told us and took for granted was that the church was hidden away and unknown to most people in this part of the world.
It seems to me that, really, your attraction as a worshiping and witnessing community will overcome the disadvantages of being tucked away in Thorburn Square. Like moths to a light, those who live in the parish of St. Anne’s will, in time, feel an attraction towards the community of faith in this building that will not be resistable.
For those of you who may be here for the first time, or for the first time in a long time, you are in a powerhouse of prayer and witness, and you are welcome at every service that goes on here. Besides being God’s house, this is a house of prayer for all people, you are welcome to come to this source of light to gain illumination, warmth, and wisdom.
We are not like the GP in the story with which I began this sermon: we do not turn away anyone in need of help, or even just light in their personal darkness. Our light is on, we are not hiding away, and we trust we will be here for generations to come, just offering a little light to shine into the darkness. AMEN