Virtual Methodist

I love Christmas cards... I know they are not environmentally friendly, and that the charity varieties are a very bad way to give to good causes, but I still love them. However, the numbers of cards recieved this year were definitely down, with greater numbers opting for electronic versions... And I have resorted to the same, especially for trans-atlantic friends due to the fact that I am so badly organised and invariably miss the last posting date. This isn't quite the same however, as you can't stick an e-card on the wall, to remind you of the great array of friends and family that surround you... However, this year, in some strange way, in a year of some particularly encouraging cards, my favourite Christmas greeting was this one... Dear Friends, The Mosques & Imams National Advisory Board wishes you a Merry Christmas with the gift of love, peace and happiness. May all these and more be yours at Christmas. Sending warmest thoughts and best wishes for a prosperous 2011. M...

Just a quickie with one eye on the preceding title and another on my previous rants re carols. Whilst I am not averse to altering the last line of "Once in Royal David's City" to remove the image of a colourless eternity of waiting around, I generally object to faffing around with perfectly good hymns for the purposes of making them comprehensible to "the unchurched" or "young people" or whoever else we think are too thick to work out what the words mean for themselves, or even worse, because of the all-pervading spectre of political correctness and a cock-eyed attempt at inclusion. Well over on "Ship of Fools" they are voting for the most annoying word changes in carols. Click on over and get voting. Cheers

In a truly momentous week, what has tickled my fancy in the blogosphere? Regarding the big news story (something about a new President of the USA incase you missed it) the blog that summed up the momentous nature of it all was Crookedshore's identification of the quote of the night. McCain's gracious concession speech and the inspiring words of Obama's acceptance, also caught the imagination of Crookedshore and others. William Crawley has posted the full text and visuals of the latter here. This is also the first week of NaBloPoMo 2008, or National Blog Posting Month, for the uninitiated, and a lot of the posting has been to do with the presidential campaign, but Marramgrass , who introduced me to the whole NaBloPoMo thang has to get the prize for one of the most feeble first posts.... But at least he admits it! Of course we're now rapidly heading towards season of Winterval, or whatever the loony leftwing halfwits want to call it this year, and the resultant waves of i...