Walked and ran my two miles this morning, warming back into shape. I walked more than five miles a day while in Brussels, but a first-thing-in-the-morning run is a different beast, and I’m not going to force my creaky joints into a full-on run right away. Back to work, too, with … | Continue reading
We had a great time in Brussels, doing what we most enjoy doing on holiday*: visiting churches, resting, and eating. (I also enjoy hunting in second-hand bookshops, and looking for fountain pens and holy cards.) We devoted long stops to the Cathedral of St Michael and St Gudula, … | Continue reading
Laptop will be packed most of the day. No big plans, so meandering and shopping. Home tonight. We had a lovely time, and will testify that the Motel One is a commendable compromise of price, convenience, and comfort. | Continue reading
Amazing tour of the excavated undercity in the royal district, a fabulous lunch there (above ground in the museum restaurant, not in the subterranean streets), a visit to Notre-Dame de la Chapelle, then Margaret and I parted ways and she went off to a truffle-making workshop whil … | Continue reading
Yesterday before Mass at Our Lady of the Victories (at Sablon), Margaret and I went to the Musée Magritte. It was a great visit — I knew many of the images, but the presentation (in conjunction with works of Jean-Michel Folon) worked effectively to contextualise his works and to … | Continue reading
Yesterday morning I visited the Musée des Bandes Déssinée, then Margaret and I met up and walked to the Église de Notre-Dame de Bon Secours, then to the Église Saint Jean Baptiste au Béguinage, and last to Ste Cathérine d’Alexandrie. We would also have stopped in at the Église No … | Continue reading
Steve and Melinda are gone, Si and Laura, Thomas and Lydia are gone, and Margaret and I woke up to a very warm day, with a hotel breakfast. I’ve been reading and chasing hares and remembering how good it feels to work (in the Foucauldian sense of ‘trying to think something differ … | Continue reading
The days passed so rapidly, and so intensely! I will post some pictures shortly, but tomorrow the Harris-Adams return to Indiana, and Margaret and I will begin a full-on, only-the-two-of-us holiday for a week. I hear those are really good things. | Continue reading
We’ve been all over the place for the past few days. I hgave run my two miles every morning, but very little else has been regular or normal. Laura, Si, Thomas and Lydia have been an inexpressible delight. | Continue reading
Two miles each of the past two days, pleasant weather, yesterday to the Didcot Railway Centre, this morning probably to the Abbey Grounds in Abingdon, much to do, all is lovely and well. Fantastic to spend some time with Laura, Si, Thomas, and Lydia — and that’s just after two da … | Continue reading
Squeezed in two miles this morning despite the weather forecast’s confidence that it was actually raining on me while I ran, cup of coffee with smaller dog curled up in my lap, will shower shortly and prepare the bid farewell to Steve and Melinda and Welcome! to Si, Laura, Thomas … | Continue reading
The rain has decided to back off for a while, so I ran my two miles, had a cup of coffee and a banana, cleaned up and dressed, and will shortly head to town for more coffee and perhaps Morning Prayer with the clergy staff. | Continue reading
Two miles, this morning, for the first time in days, and quite possibly for the last time in days due toa protracted rainy spell from last Friday till… possibly Sunday next? Busy days preparing the house for Steve and Melinda, then Si, Laura, Thomas, and (recently bipedal) Lydia. … | Continue reading
Prayers and solemn memories on this nineteenth year since the terrorist attacks on London, the Tube and the buses. May we learn someday to banish terror with generosity, violence with peace, fear and power-lust with grace and steadfast faith. | Continue reading
A second day of rain, so again no morning run. Hot breakfast, sermon work, cleaning-up and reordering in anticipation to Steve and Melinda’s visit. More sermon work. I suppose my favourite moment from Labour’s electoral victory so far (apart from so many Tory front-benchers losin … | Continue reading
So, I didn’t run this morning because it was raining. I had my fruit and coffee breakfast, then went to Morning Prayer; but a school assembly was on-going in the church (no one told me!), so we prayed in the parish office. Then home, odds and ends involving utility tables, lunch, … | Continue reading
Two slightly chilly miles this morning, coffee and fruit, shower, Morning Prayer, obtained a table at Sue Ryder and carried it home, then a whirlwind of paperwork searching and printing. A pleasant farewell lunch for an Abingdon clergy colleague at the King’s Head and Bell (The B … | Continue reading
Two miles in light rain, coffee, hot breakfast, showered and dressed, Morning Prayer, a short break and then back to the Parish Centre for a staff meeting, this time with the Area Dean with specific regard to the responsibilities that will fall to the rest of the clergy staff whe … | Continue reading
We made a flash trip out to Exeter and back for our friend and former student Alex Honey’s ordination to the diaconate. It was a lovely service in a lovely church, with plenty of friends supporting parishioners; all went famously although I extended myself too much with too littl … | Continue reading
Two miles, coffee and fruit, then off to drop the dogs with their overnight sitters, then to Exeter for an ordination. | Continue reading
Two miles (including a morning stop-off at the office, since I forgot to check the phone message machine on which we still rely), coffee, and will make a hot breakfast in a few minutes. Yesterday we devoted much of our time to working toward making the spare rooms viable for visi … | Continue reading
Two miles at a decent pace, fruit and coffee, shower, Morning Prayer, some work, a trip to Waitrose, lunch, some housework… and it’s Friday, why should I have to do more? | Continue reading
Didn’t do much writing yesterday, though I had plenty of other things to accomplish. Today I ran (15° and breezy and distinctly humid), coffee and fruit for breakfast, cleaned up, Morning Prayer, came in to town for my second cup at Throwing Buns, and hence to the library (cos it … | Continue reading
Two hot miles, hot coffee, hot breakfast, hot shower, then to Morning Prayer (usual temperature), Wednesday Mass, and home (weary) for the afternoon. Rest, then back to the Parish Centre for marriage prep. | Continue reading
Two miles this morning, in the second consecutive day warm enough to run without my hoodie. I was making pretty good time till something in my right Achilles tendon tweaked, just a little, but I didn’t force the issue and limped, then walked plainly home. It hasn’t bothered me si … | Continue reading
At the end of this post, I’ll add the sermon I preached for a dear former student of mine’s First Mass, on St John’s Day — that’s the rationale for the title. Otherwise, a pleasant enough start to the day: two miles in the warmest early-morning temperatures of the year, fruit and … | Continue reading
Got up, grudgingly, to run my miles and have a fruit and coffee breakfast. Said the Morning Office at home, fine-tuned today’s sermon a bit, cleaned up, and meandered down to St Helen’s for the first Mass in a couple of months, I think. After checking through the liturgical patte … | Continue reading
Two miles, coffee and (at home) Morning Prayer, and hard at work grinding and polishing tomorrow’s sermon. It’s raining, which threatens the Abingdon Passion Play, but there’s three hours till the first showing, and a long day ahead before the late show, for the sky and grounds t … | Continue reading
I’m a long-time fan of Kant’s The Conflict of the Faculties, which I’m now revisiting for an essay, and I find the standard English translation/edition extremely irritating. Mary Gregor translated it in 1979 in an adequate German/English version (I’d tweak it here or there; I’m p … | Continue reading
Two miles, fruit and coffee, now it’s time for me to clean up and get ready for Morning Prayer; then time to work on Sunday’s sermon. Since interest in right-wing US politicians are once again indulging their fixation on imposing their imagined Ten Commandments on schoolchildren … | Continue reading
Two miles, fruit and coffee, clean-up and Morning Prayer, and public-facing coffee ministry at The Missing Bean as I work toward Sunday’s sermon. In answer to yesterday’s question, two of my four correspondents remembered the incident — which I’m counting as sufficient evidence t … | Continue reading
For years — thirty-eight or so years — I’ve had a certain phrase in my head, a phrase for which I get no Google results. It arises from the context of Duke basketball, and the expectation that my mates and I would watch televised games together during our graduate studies in Durh … | Continue reading
Ran my morning route (mildly frustrated that my new, more ambitious pace hasn’t just become routine for sore muscles), coffee and hot breakfast, cleaned up, Morning Prayer, emails and admin, Staff Meeting, more email, a break for reading and napping, dinner, and shortly the paris … | Continue reading
Two frustratingly stiff and short-winded miles; coffee and fruit breakfast; cleaned up and got ready for Morning Prayer, to which I’ll go next. Yesterday I cleared almost all my email, hallelujah, and began reading again — some time spent reading Don Camillo and the Prodigal Son, … | Continue reading
Two miles, fruit breakfast and coffee, clean up, go to Morning Prayer — then (I whisper this) my week looks as if I won’t be manically busy. Maybe I’ll even make progress on the two essays on which I’m criminally late… | Continue reading
‘The days of etymology are over,’ Peppone told him. ‘Every word is making a fresh start.’ — Giovanni Guareschi, Don Camillo and the Prodigal Son (otherwise titled Don Camillo and His Flock). Trans. Frances Frenaye. London: The Camelot Press, 1952, p. 51. | Continue reading
Another morning, another two miles, another fruit breakfast with coffee, another shower, another Mass and sermon, then another Confirmation Class, and just finished writing another column for the parish newspaper. The sermon went down well; Confirmation Class was fine; and now it … | Continue reading
I was up late last night for the Finalists’ Dinner at Oriel, so I was not inclined to run this morning. On the other hand, I made my way downstairs in good time, and was drawn out by the gorgeous morning light, and (knowing that dark skies and rain were due for the afternoon) mos … | Continue reading
Two miles, fruit breakfast, clean up, Morning Prayer, then to Oxford for my last tutorial of the academic year. After lunch, I’ll drift home and prepare for the PCC meeting tonight. Margaret is still home, thank heaven. | Continue reading
My colleague clergy and I were talking at staff meeting about how fast time passes; for instance, I’ve lived in Abingdon for seven months now, after three months in Headington, after ten months in our second home in Oxford. We’re beginning to feel cautiously secure after months o … | Continue reading
Ran my two miles (at my new pace, my legs complain a bit more, but I do get home sooner, so that’s jolly), coffee, cleaned up and had a hot breakfast, and prayed the Morning Office at home because I’m expecting the plumber. Sometime after the plumber arrives — and I hope, after h … | Continue reading
I ran my miles, had my coffee and fruit, and will shortly clean up and go to Morning Prayer. I am hoping to take up no other immediate job-related work today, to soak up some measure of rest. We will see… | Continue reading
Alomost didn’t run, since it was raining cats and dogs at about 4:30 — but it was calm by 6:00, so I ran my two miles, coffee, cleaned up, Morning Prayer and a quick trip to the Cooperative, then a care home Communion at Cygnet Court, lunch, then home Communion for a retired prie … | Continue reading
Had a wee lie-in this morning so that my run would coincide with the opening of the Cooperative at 7:00; I needed eggs for my Saturday hot breakfast, so after sprinting in to town on my daily route, I paused to purchase eggs, then walked the rest of the way, since I thought it un … | Continue reading
Two miles, coffee and fruit breakfast, cleaned up, preached and celebrated at St Michael’s, taught the confirmation class at St Helen’s and did the washing-up after, strolled home and ate lunch, fed the dogs, walked the dogs, fell asleep during the Mets-Phillies game at London (w … | Continue reading
I nearly forgot Si and Laura’s fifteenth wedding anniversary, but at the last minute (before I fell asleep) (British Summer Time, plenty of time left US Central Daylight Time) I pulled myself together and wished Si (and through him, Laura) a very happy anniversary. Well done, and … | Continue reading
Had a wee lie-in this morning, but woke in time to run my two miles. Fruit and coffee breakfast, cleaned up, Morning Prayer, the X3 bus to Oxford, coffee, next-to-last tutorial of the year, lunch at Oriel, home to the ladies, whom I fed. On my walk to Oriel, I had a moment of fru … | Continue reading
Two miles in the morning, hot breakfast, cleaned up, Morning Prayer, handwrote a couple of notes, marked tomorrow’s essay, walked the dogs, went to my GP for my ‘NHS Health Check’ which in the younger country we call a plain old check-up, looked in at the Abingdon County Hall Mus … | Continue reading