The Eighth Deadly Sin

Posted on by under Generic Rant

Most people can rattle off a few of the classic “seven deadly sins”, although few can name them all. According to Wikipedia, that Font of All Imperfect Knowledge (or FAIK), they were codified by Pope Gregory I in 590 AD. They are:

  • Pride
  • Greed (or my preferred rendering: Avarice)
  • Wrath
  • Envy
  • Lust
  • Gluttony
  • Sloth

It’s been said that envy is the only one in the list that has no upside. The others can be kind of fun to wallow in, for a little while anyway. That’s one problem with the list. The other, more troubling one, is that it no longer resembles a list of faults or transgressions. Rather, it reads like a job description for POTUS. (Seriously, look at that list and make the comparison yourself. It’s one thing to perpetrate those transgressions. It’s a whole ‘nother to brag about them.)

For a very long time, I’ve believed the list to be incomplete. There’s one I fall victim to as do most people I know, to our and society’s detriment.

Fear

Yup, I think fear might be the deadliest sin. For those who, like me, take their standards from the Christian Bible, you’ll find the pages there replete with exhortations to overcome fear or avoid it altogether. Here are a few:

  • “Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.” Jehovah, as recorded in Joshua 1:9
  • “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.” Jesus, in John 14:27
  • “…for God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control.” St. Paul, in 2 Timothy 1:7
  • “There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love.” St. John, the Beloved Disciple, in 1 John 4:18

And the grandaddy of them all, Psalm 23:

  • “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil…”

In fact, I once did an audit of the entire Bible in order to determine what the most common command in Scripture is. I can’t remember the exact order, but “fear not”, or some variation thereof, was first or second.*

Here are a few more excellent quotes that affirm the truth of the above:

  • “Everything you’ve ever wanted is sitting on the other side of fear.” – George Addair
  • “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.” – Marianne Williamson (not Nelson Mandela, as some claim)
  • “I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.” – this one is Nelson Mandela
  • “There are two basic motivating forces: fear and love. When we are afraid, we pull back from life.” – John Lennon (I wonder if he knew he was merely paraphrasing St. John.)
  • “We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light.” – Plato

Avoid this deadly sin, probably your elected leader’s greatest one, and the rest of the list becomes a whole lot easier. And less frightening.

Fear not…

* For the curious among you, the other charge was some form of “Go.” Combine those and you have something to think about. And do.

Those crazy Austrians!

Posted on by under photos

A BlogSnax© post

(I’ve been doing a lot of these easy, photo-based posts lately. Perhaps I’m lazy. Or maybe I’ve lately come across an abundance of bizarre stuff worthy of further exposure. Or maybe it’s a little of both. More likely, it’s a lot of both. Here’s today’s slothful submission.)

A friend of mine recently returned from a trip to Austria. Gentleman that he is, he brought me back a souvenir in the form of a bar of Austrian chocolate. As a big fan of the dark brown delicacy, I was immensely grateful.

Until I looked closely at the wrapper, reproduced below, at which point my appetite disappeared. What do you think?

Which caused me to ask myself, “Who thought that photo was a good idea?”

More pronunciation woes!

Posted on by under photos

It was a mere two weeks ago that I confessed my own food pronunciation fail. Today I’m back to point the finger of accusation at someone else. This sign was prominently displayed at a local mall food court.

This is another example of confusion of pronunciation between languages. Last time it was “poke”, which is Hawaiian. This time we’re dealing with Vietnamese. For the unenlightened, “pho” (yet another food I don’t eat) is pronounced “fuh”, not “foe”. For this name to be the rhyming wordplay they clearly intended, the establishment would have to be called “Pho and Duh”.

Which actually would be entirely appropriate in this case!

Having a Fit… or not

Posted on by under Generic Rant, photos

Last week at this time I was bemoaning the sad state of car purchasing when I related the story of trying to replace my (now it can be told) Honda Fit. Like most small, roomy, gas-conserving, inexpensive cars, it was discontinued by its manufacturer. The motivation is either collusion with the Oil Oligarchy or simply a cynical attempt to drop low margin cars in favor of high margin gas-guzzling SUV’s that are purchased by people whose only off-road driving is accidentally rolling across a corner of their lawn while backing out of their driveway.

The Fit was the perfect car for me. It got great gas mileage, routinely more than 40 MPG, which fits my budget. My bike fit in the back along with two weeks of vacation packing. (Yes, I did it.) And it fit in the smallest of parking spaces, even those encroached upon by aforementioned behemoth SUV’s.

Do you see the recurring theme? The Fit fit my lifestyle to the proverbial “T”. It also lends itself to some cool vanity plates, two of which I’ve seen being “HISSY” and “2B TIED”. The only improvement would be if it carried the same moniker as its European counterpart: Jazz. Now, that’s a cool name.

No more. The geniuses at Honda decided no one wants them anymore. This in spite of the fact that the market for used Fits is through the roof, along with the prices. There seemed to be no hope for me.

Then I found this local business where I’m sure I can pick up a brand new one:

Who knew? A Fit factory right nearby! Can’t wait to check it out. Wish me luck.

What Will Set Us Free Now?

Posted on by under Generic Rant

Recently, I was searching for information about cars. There was a car I was interested in that had been discontinued by its manufacturer back in 2020. (I won’t mention any names, but it’s the Honda Fit.) I searched to see if the model might be back some time. Other cars have made a return, e.g. Mustang, Honda Prelude, and VW Bus (or Buzz, as it’s called now) so why not that Fit, er, that unnamed car?

I was thrilled to find a couple of websites announcing a 2026 version of the car. They had video presentations of the design and various features. It looked great!

But something smelled funny about these sites. First of all, they weren’t from Honda, that is, the manufacturer. Just a brief examination made it obvious the websites were fraudulent. The videos and photos had been created by AI. That’s when it hit me. Nothing can be trusted anymore, especially on the Internet.

When MAGA came along and began its assault on truth with its “alternate facts” and other such nonsense, I thought it was just a blip on the lie radar. Nope. They never let up their onslaught. Now they’re joined by a far more sophisticated and pernicious purveyor of deceit: AI.

There have always been lies and liars. (Remember Lyndon Larouche, Bernie Madoff, Frank Abagnale, Rosie Ruiz, the Tobacco Institute, Richard Nixon, and all the other Trump forerunners?) AI makes them all look like amateurs. Anyone can tell anyone anything anytime and it’s almost impossible to discern the truth because AI excels at camouflaging lies. That’s what it does best.

Jesus once famously and accurately said, “The truth will set you free.” With truth now held hostage by sleazy power brokers, ruthless criminals, vicious bullies, amoral techies, and other ne’er-do-wells, where do we turn to be set free? Personally, I throw my lot in with the Originator of that maxim.

Quotes#4

Posted on by under Books, Generic Rant, Original writing

Back in the day, when I was writing another blog (q.v. Limping in the Light) I had a few series of posts, such as things I’m thankful for, lies we believe, spiritual disciplines of the modern world, among others. One abbreviated series I ran was of meaningful quotes. There were only three such posts in that blog. (If you’re interested, you can find them here, here, and here.) That’s a shame because I collect and save such quotes at an alarming rate. The file in which I record them contains a few hundred.

Such a waste! To relieve my conscience, I think I’ll share a couple here.

I just finished reading Maya Angelou’s “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings”. Not only was it a wonderful book, it was a treasure trove of wisdom. Here are a couple of nuggets.

Here’s a statement of the human condition which sadly has been so for all recorded time.

People whose history and future were threatened each day by extinction considered that it was only by divine intervention that they were able to live at all. I find it interesting that the meanest life, the poorest existence, is attributed to God’s will, but as human beings become more affluent, as their living standard and style begin to ascend the material scale, God descends the scale of responsibility at a commensurate speed.

Although her book was published in 1969, Ms. Angelou prophetically characterizes certain current national figures with this analysis:

In order to be profoundly dishonest, a person must have one of two qualities: either he is unscrupulously ambitious, or he is unswervingly egocentric. He must believe that for his ends to be served all things and people can justifiably be shifted about, or that he is the center not only of his own world but of the worlds which others inhabit.

I’ve never seen a more precise description of a certain despicable scoundrel who is even now tearing down everything we cherish.

Happy Birthday, Lew

Posted on by under About writing, Movies

Lew Hunter was one-of-a-kind.

I don’t have many acquaintances who are listed in Wikipedia. Lew was one of them, and deservedly so. After a successful stint as a TV network executive, he became one of the premier screenwriting instructors in the industry. Lew taught at UCLA for many years before becoming chairman of the school’s screenwriting department, an honor he held in Emeritus after his retirement. The aforementioned Wikipedia article quotes none other than Steven Spielberg as calling him, “the best screenwriting teacher going.”

Lew was recognized not only as one of the best teachers of the art but as one of the most positive and approachable people in the industry. One of the professors on his staff told me, “Lew is my friend, my father, my brother, my colleague—the greatest!” It was after his “retirement” that I had the opportunity to learn under his tutelage. (He could never truly retire because he loved his work and students so much.) For a while, he and his wife traveled the country in their van holding screenwriting seminars wherever he was wanted. That’s when I met him and he became, whether he knew it or not, my mentor in screenwriting and writing in general. He ended every communication with his admonition to “Write on!” He made anyone who worked with him want to do so.

He also held what he called “screenwriting colonies” at his Nebraska home. I had the privilege and honor of attending one of those and spending significant time with the man and his family. In a business where “cutthroat” and “sleazy” are commonly used adjectives to describe people in that community, he was an anomaly. A truly loving, inspirational figure that people flocked to, not just for his expertise but for his optimism and spirit. He was a one man cheering section.

We last spoke in 2020. As usual, he was gracious, helpful, and inspiring. He died of Covid in 2023. I miss him, his assistance, his sense of humor, and his encouragement more than I can say. Today is his birthday. What can I do to honor him except to…

Write on!