Odds and Ends

It's been too busy to collect much for a blog post the past week. So here is a little mish-mash of things that have been blowing through my head but never took off to become blog posts:

The movies
One of the best things about Thanksgiving weekend is that it's an opportunity to sink low into the couch and watch movies until your muscles start turning to sugar.
I'm always reading how extended laughing is a cure for all sorts of things, as well as good exercise. If that's true, I've discovered a cure for cancer and a possible substitute for ultra-marathon training in Troll II.
My eldest son brought this over to watch after the big meal. I can't remember laughing so hard at anything in...oh...nine months or so. This was released as a completely straight-faced horror movie, but since has become known as one of the worst movies ever made. It is hilarious. Seriously, my gut hurt afterward from the helpless laughter. Here's a clip:




I understand there's now a documentary out about the making of Troll II, called Best Worst Movie. Unfortunately, it is not playing in Kansas City yet.
A less funny (though somewhat cheesy) film we saw on TCM was The Devil and Daniel Webster, circa 1941. This is a black and white bit of fluff about a down-on-his-luck farmer (Jabez Stone) who sells his soul to the Old Scratch in return for seven years of prosperity--after which time he would be expected to pay up by going quietly to hell.
I don't want to spoil it for anybody so I won't tell the plot. But it had one moment that spoke to me.
Shortly after Stone got his gold from the devil, he strutted in to see the bank officer who held his loan. When the smug banker started to make noises about how he couldn't give Stone another break, the farmer started flicking pieces of gold at him. Take this. And this. How do you like me now, sucka?
And I caught myself thinking, "Gee, it might be worth selling your soul to the devil to be able to do that just once."

Prayer and meditation
The name of the farmer in the movie above reminded me of The Prayer of Jabez, an inspirational book by Dr. Bruce Wilkinson. I read this a few years ago, at the urging of a friend who, I guess, noticed that I needed a bit more spiritual vitality. For a while, this book was all the rage, and also a little controversial. It cites a somewhat obscure prayer (1 Chronicles 4:9-10) of a man named Jabez asking God to bless him and keep him from evil. Wilkinson made self-help prominence by urging people to pray this every day and watch God's power transform their lives.
This little book generated miles and miles of type (here's an example) from people worried about one thing or another. Wilkinson degraded the verse and turned the prayer into a superstitious chant. And isn't it bad and dangerous to pray for our own blessing? Shouldn't we be praying instead for others? Etc, etc.
Which is why I don't go in so much for prayer any more. It's all the self editing and worrying that I'm not doing the right form. Did I ask according to God's will? In Jesus' name? How can I be sure my prayer isn't just selfishness?
Bleah.
I'd much rather meditate, as I have been doing lately, on things I'd like to change but have no control over. It's nice to be able to just run good outcomes of these various problems through my mind and let myself feel the warmth and comfort. It probably doesn't do any good at all.
Or does it? I have to say that, shortly after I started this, two--no, make that three--good things have happened. And these are things that I had no hand in doing.
So maybe it's worth it.
Or again, maybe that's just old Scratch playing a trick on me.

Running
I've been working on changing the way I run, after reading Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superatheletes, and the Greatest Race the World has Never Seen, by Christopher McDougall. McDougall writes about a Mexican tribe of long distance runners (50-mile, 100-mile runs) and how their gait differs from that of modern runners in expensive running shoes. The shoes, in fact, can cause more harm than good, he claims.
But it's more than just a book about running. McDougall makes a case that the running done by this tribe also brings about a sense of joy, equality, peace and good health.
So, okay. I'm game. I can't afford the fancy "foot glove" running shoes, but I can try and change my gait. The last two times out, I've tried to run the first mile more on the front of my food and not my heel, concentrating on kicking my feet backwards rather than reaching forward heel first.
After a couple of days of very sore calves, today was just a great day. I felt I was flying around that hated indoor track. It was even euphoric, for just a couple of laps.
So maybe there's something to it.
Now to find some chia seeds.