Out and About

"The Pope (dramatic pause) is Catholic." Over at Get Religion, Terry Mattingly assesses the typically ill-informed media "analysis" of the Pope's recent statement regarding the true Church.

I enjoy Tim Burke's blog, Easily Distracted. I mean no disrespect to Professor Burke, however, when I confess that one of the reasons I have kept returning to Easily Distracted was to read the comments of Withywindle, who frequently engages Professor Burke in lively and always civil debate. I have often wished that Withywindle would start a blog of his own. Well, wishes do come true. Withywindle and his co-blogger, Alpheus, are now blogging at Athens and Jerusalem, which has been added to our blogroll.

Jim Kunstler rants about the way that young males present themselves in public nowadays.

Here's Kunstler's take on the current, endlessly irritating, tattoo craze:

Tattoos used to be pretty much the sole fashion statement of merchant seamen or people who have served in the armed forces (or people who live in jungles). Now they are common among career girls. The tattooed guys I see down at the gym are ordinary young men who work in cubicles. Tattoos on sailors used to celebrate places they had been or people they had loved. The tattoos I see now are meant to convey fierce and barbaric statements of superhuman power: look at me, I'm a Power Ranger! It's understandable that someone who spends most of his waking hours in a cubicle wearing a telephone headset in order to swindle old people out of their savings might fantasize about rising above all that. But the tragic thing, of course, is that getting tattooed is not quite the same as accomplishing something with your life. In the end, you're just another loser with a grandiose and ridiculous tattoo.

(Hat tip: Michael Blowhard)

Ratatouille. Pro. Con, sort of.