October 2003 Archives

Suppose a new drug were being evaluated for approval, but the FDA thought maybe a few restrictions were in order. Those restrictions being:

1. The doctors must be able to handle complications which would be expected in 5 - 8% of patients,
2. The doctors must be trained in identifying a certain medical condition which would make it dangerous for the patient to take the drug,
3. The doctors must be trained in providing follow-up care in case something went wrong with the drug, and should have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital.

Sound fair?

Or do they sound like "draconian restrictions"?

If you're Senator Barbara Boxer (Duh, CA), these are "barriers," and she and the other Congressional D's successfully insisted upon their removal.

Of course, if these were actuall MPAA ratings, it would probably be PG-13, and apparently it's clean enough for Network television.

"I have two teenage boys and it terrifies me that they are exposed to hard-c0re p0rnography on the Internet before their first kiss," he continued. "At the same time, I'm a writer and I abhor the idea of censorship."

That, my friends, is a truly weasely statement.

This particular weasel is Jim Leonard, creator of the new NETWORK PRIME TIME SERIES "Skin" which is about the P*RNOGRAPHY INDUSTRY.

I know I ought not expect Hollywood writers to be knowledgeable about the first amendment and/or sincere in their representation of it, but this statement is ridiculous.

First of all, this filth does not belong on the air, but the FCC being spineless as it is, there are specific channels and specific timeslots into which p0rnography has been relegated. Any show portraying the p0rnography industry, even in a non-graphic way, belongs there. This of course does not deal with news reports, which might talk about something adult-entertainment related - but even then, there is a responsibility to be non-graphic and to be sensitive to the audience which generally views television in certain time slots.

By this man's reasoning, there's nothing to stop them from airing this Saturday morning between Transformers and G.I. Joe. (Man did I just date myself).

To prepare for his part, Mr. Silver said, he did extensive research, meeting with pornography business executives like Larry Flynt and performers like Jenna Jameson; reading magazines and watching videos. There is also a pornographic-film director as a consultant on the set. "This is fun," Mr. Silver said, "because it's different from anything else I've done."

Mr. Silver said he hoped the show would prompt a more open discussion of sexuality. "While we have been liberated in a certain way," he said, "we still have that puritan strain."

Oh right, let's believe that there are Puritan elements in our culture. Right, let's run some google searches and see puritanism. Let's turn on premium cable, basic cable, and now prime-time network television and see how Puritan we are.

It's pretty sad that somebody can look at efforts to protect children and families from smut and see "Puritanism."

On a less tragic level, Mr. Leonard said, "Skin" is about "two kids in love caught between two warring families" -- Goldman's 16-year-old Jewish daughter, Jewel, played by Olivia Wilde, and Roam's 17-year-old Mexican-Irish son, Adam, played by D.J. Cotrona. Because of their fathers' feuding, the two are forbidden to see each other.

It was this that attracted Mr. Bruckheimer to the project in the first place. "I just love 'Romeo and Juliet,'" he said.

OK, IQ check - the less tragic level is the Romeo and Juliet subplot. Right, you know Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare's great comedy in which the wacky Capulets try to outmatch the outrageous antics of the circus family Montague.

These people give me a headache! Unfortunately the article is not on the New York Times website... wait, that's probably best.

This post was originally posted to a blog which is now defunct. I wanted to salvage it, so I'm moving it over here.

I'm dating it with the original date, but it may appear as a new post to those of you who use RSS to read this blog. I'm basically putting this disclaimer in so that nobody reads this and thinks we're pregnant again. :)

Anyway, what follows is the original post

I know I said I was going to post a long time ago, and believe me, I've wanted to. But I suspect that the reason many wedding blogs die after the wedding is that, frankly, the couples have better things to do. Like be married. So that is pretty much what J-Lu and I have been up to. And now I'd like to take a moment and to share with those of you who couldn't be there some of the highlights of our wedding day.

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It all started with the rehearsal. I myself was about 10 minutes late to the Mass for the Assumption which preceded the rehearsal. After Mass, I looked around and realized that none of my family was there yet. Neither were the greater part of my groomsmen. As rehearsal time came around they still hadn't arrived. I was hot under the collar and placed a few panick-stricken calls to some cell phones and got no answer. We improvised as best we could with some stand-ins until I got a call back saying that there was a huge wreck on I-55 between Chicago and Peoria, and that traffic had stopped for over 45 minutes. Just about everybody coming from my side was going to be late.

As my friends and family did start trickling in, we also found out that the directions we printed on the back of our invitations were incorrect. The exit listed coming from I-74 East listed the right exit name, but the wrong number. Whoops.

Apart from that, the rehearsal was splendid. Families from Jenny's parish cooked up a sumptuous feast, and we were able to serve some of the 4 cases of wine we had originally bought for the reception before we found out we couldn't serve our own. My side all finally arrived and in the end, nobody was missing in action. What a relief.

The day of the wedding, the first thing I did was go downtown with my sister to pick up the Jaguar she had rented for us. I wish I could say I remember what kind it was, but all I really remember is that it was old-man beige. No matter, though, 'cuz boy could she fly!

I got to the church and hung around in the basement with my groomsmen. What a great bunch they were! Old friends and newer friends, and my brother. All good men whom I had known for years and who had supported me and been with me through very high highs and not so high lows.

Then came the first mistake. The choir director came and asked me if it would be time to start the preludes. I took this to mean that everybody else was ready and they just needed to know if my crew was. I knew I was ready, and all my fellas were there, so I gave the OK. Little did I know that my mother had yet to leave the hotel.

About 15 minutes later (we had some lengthy preludes), we were called up and proceeded to the top, there were all of the servers and bridesmaids and my soon-to-be-wife. Things were a bit disorganized, but I didn't really think too much of it as I was very much caught up in the moment. All of a sudden, I was shaken out of this trance by my about-to-be mother-in-law.

"Isn't this the procession song?"

"Yeah," I replied, completely missing the point.

I soon realized what she was getting at, the mothers had not been seated. I quickly grabbed an usher and told him to start seating some mothers. Then I was slapped with the realization that my mom wasn't there yet.

Down the aisle our priest quickly advanced to cut off the organist. Out came the cell phones. Where were they? Well of course they were coming straight to the church following our handy misprinted directions.

Our MC proceeded to make an announcement to those gathered that there was a problem with the mother of the bride. Another oops: straight to the vestibule shot my future aunt-in-law to inquire about her sister. No, no, no, we meant the mother of the groom. In the meantime, our priest was discussing the situation with the choir, and soon afterwards, we heard our preludes repeated.

Finally, the car with my mom pulled up and we were in business. Mothers were seated, and the procession was begun. From there on, the entire day went without a hitch.

Six servers and thirteen attendants processed, and then I approached the altar with my bride-to-be, clothed in white: her dress was chapel-length, classic, elegant, modest and simple. Her face - which I knew would be radiant - covered with a veil she made herself: also chapel-length, with 7 satin roses affixed to the top.

There's so much to say about the ceremony, I can't get into it all. First and foremost, it was a Mass. But it was such a Mass! Our choir was wonderful and well, we picked all of our music of course. It was truly perfect. After the final blessing we processed out to the Marian garden between the church and rectory. There we knelt before a statue of our Blessed Mother and asked her to pray for our family and along with our family and friends chanted the Salve Regina. This really was perfect, because at this point we were all outside and could chat it up with our family and friends without making a ruckus inside the Church. Then we all split up and Jenny and I jumped in the Jag and sped off to the reception.

I won't bother you with too many details, but here are some reception highlights:

First dance: The Best is Yet to Come sung by Sinatra. The only problem was I was exceedingly nervous, and couldn't dance a lick that night.

Our ring bearer and his little buddy running around swiping the bubble gum cigars which were one of our favors from various tables. Also, same ring bearer strutting around in his Mission: Impossible sunglasses with a toy pistol in his coat. He was positively opposed to bearing rings until we told him he'd be wearing a tuxedo like James Bond.

The cake: gorgeous and sumptious. Also, our flower girl had forgotten her flowers for the ceremony, so we brought them to the reception and she threw them for us while we were cutting the cake. It made for some really neat pictures.

A dance floor full of children from our friends and families dancing it up!

Knocking back Guinesses and puffing on real cigars with our friends and family in the back of the hall.

So there you have it folks! I must say there's little I regret about the day. Our hall was a little shady with the meal in that we were told we would have "dinner rolls" and we ended up with "Wonder bread." We weren't too thrilled with that, but there wasn't much we could do about it. The only other thing I wish is that we could have made it around to all of the tables to greet people. We got halfway through and we had to move on to something else and never got to go back. I know we got to at least greet almost everybody, but I know there are some we missed. C'est la vie, I know, but still...

From everybody we've talked to, we've heard only the best things about the wedding. We've received so many compliments about how beautiful the liturgy and the music were - and those were things that were important to us. Additionally, people really had fun at the reception. They ate and drank and smoked and were merry. It was truly a first-rate celebration of life and of love.

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Well, that's pretty much a wrap on the wedding day. I guess I'd like to share a bit about our life since, but in order to do that I have to go back to the beginning: that is, to our wedding day.

One part of the ceremony that we've received a great deal of compliments on is the homily. It's main themes were love and fruitfulness, but there was also a good deal about joy and mystery and thanksgiving. We were fortunate enough to see a tape of the ceremony recently and hear the homily all over again. It struck me then and it strikes me again now that the homily hit every nail directly on the head. Our wedding has been first and foremost about love and fruitfulness. A love which we express every day and a fruitfulness which has shown forth in our growing love and in Jenny's growing belly where our baby has developed for six months. Building up and coming forth from that love and fruitfulness have been joy and mystery and thanksgiving; each day produces more opportunities for each.

I think this is why it's hard to maintain a wedding blog - at least in our case, I can't speak for others. A great part of our life together has been mystery. I wish I could share more of it, but it's inexpressible. I do promise to give glimpses as often as I can. Now that I've gotten this post done - which I've been trying to find time for for quite some time, I think it'll be easier to blog those little moments that we've wanted to share. If nothing else, you have a new experience to share with Monika and Kevin. And if any other couples would like to be a part of the blog, please do let us know. I think Jenny and I were tremendously blessed in our coming together, but we're not the only ones. We know that many of our friends are experiencing similar joys, and we also know what it's like to want to share those joys with others. We'd be happy to have more of our friends share their joys through this weblog.

Finally, I'd like to thank all who took part in the wedding. There's our families of course who provided so much love and financial support. Then there were our servers, ushers, attendants, lectors and angelic choir. Lastly, there were our priests, without whom the day could not have been what it was.

This has been a lengthy post, I know. But it's been a long time in coming, and I hope I've given some of you more noisy types what you've been waiting for. :) To close, I'd like to leave you with a picture of a baby. It's not our baby, but it's about what he or she looks like right now, in our 25th week.

That's all for now! I hope to be back with more, especially as little Matthew or little Maria is ready to make a first appearance!