BilikFamily.com

There's not much to write about domestically today. The usual weekly events are still going on. Claire has clarinet and piano lessons. The girls have gymnastics on Saturday. CCD lessons on Thursday. Michelle teaches a step class today. There is a two hour school start delay this morning because of the rain we're having this morning as temperatures hover around freezing. Next week the girls each start a program at the Milford Boys and Girls Club. Claire takes a class in cooking. Abby takes a class in "seasonal crafts".

Mass gaffes - Since there's not much going on at home, I thought I'd write a bit about two interesting things I'd come across on the web yesterday. First was a weblog entry by Amy Welborn about gaffes heard at Mass. Although I haven't lectored in a couple of years, one of my biggest worries was making a faux pas like those mentioned in the hundreds of followup comments she got. I'm still working my way through them, but it was one of the more enjoyable weblog threads I'd come across in months.

Crunchy Cons - About three years ago I had read about a political category called “Crunchy Cons” (cons == conservative). It was a new expression started by Rod Dreher in this article at National Review. After a few months I thought it had died out as a classification but I was wrong. It turns out he is about to release a book: “Crunchy Cons” next month. (Amazon link) Here's an excerpt from the first chapter.

I think it was best summarized in what has been known as the “Crunchy Con Manifesto”:

1. We are conservatives who stand outside the conservative mainstream; therefore, we can see things that matter more clearly.
2. Modern conservatism has become too focused on money, power, and the accumulation of stuff, and insufficiently concerned with the content of our individual and social character.
3. Big business deserves as much skepticism as big government.
4. Culture is more important than politics and economics.
5. A conservatism that does not practice restraint, humility, and good stewardship—especially of the natural world—is not fundamentally conservative.
6. Small, Local, Old, and Particular are almost always better than Big, Global, New, and Abstract.
7. Beauty is more important than efficiency.
8. The relentlessness of media-driven pop culture deadens our senses to authentic truth, beauty, and wisdom.
9. We share Russell Kirk’s conviction that “the institution most essential to conserve is the family.”

It'll be interesting to see whether this movement has any inertia to help bring the politics of the right back onto social issues that have tended to be glossed over in favor of emphasis on economic and security issues. I'm thinking of pre-ordering the book, but my backlog is deep enough. I'd love for it to be an audiobook to listen to on commutes.

Television - I'd mentioned that Lazytown had become a recent favorite of our kids. Another new show that the boys have really taken to is the Disney Little Einsteins series. Whereas Lazytown encourages healthy habits like exercise, rest, and eating well, Little Einsteins does a lot to expose young children to art and concepts in music. The other day when I was video taping the kids on their motorcycles, there was one take I didn't use where Daniel is leading the charge while shouting "crescendo!". Michelle and I are just hoping the show doesn't suffer the fate of Go Diego Go, where the network keeps showing the same 6-8 shows.