the unlikely orange

getting back to my list of my 15 favorite albums, here is perhaps the most obscure of all. but just because it is obscure doesn't mean it isn't awesome. trust me. it's awesome. i first heard this album on casette tape when a guy named rob hanak with some connection to wheaton college gave me a dubbed copy in high school. i fell in love right from the first notes of 'blue sky morning .' i wore that tape out. so i researched and researched until i found a company out of illinois that was selling the cd. i bought it. i believe i have purchased at least 10 copies of this album since then, as gifts. when i was in college, i became an evangelist for the folky duo, telling everyone i knew about them, and lending cd's like a library. but it paid off, because soon grove city college became a sort of haven of harrod and funck fans, so the concert committee, which i was a part of, decided to try and bring them to campus. and they came! i invited everyone i knew, and they l...

happy birthday to our beloved dog, max milinovich. if you've never met him, you should know that he's a english bulldog, a huge steeler fan, and an avid drooler. he suffers from narcolepsy. he weighs in at about 60 pounds, and can pack a pretty mean punch if you are standing between him and something that resembles food. other than that, though, he is a wimp to the greatest degree. he is scared of cats and squirrels. he just prefers to be left alone. and sleep. today he turns 8, which is actually a pretty good lifetime for a bulldog, who are particularly prone to several different health issues (not that we haven't had our fair share of those with him). in the 7 years we've had him, he has definitely become an adored part of our family. as he is a frequent reader on the blog, please feel free to wish him a happy birthday in the comments section.

i had a great ecumenical moment yesterday. i just hope that the pope isn't mad at me about it. i might have just landed myself on the vatican's "10 most wanted" list. let me tell you what happened. yesterday afternoon, after a noontime ash wednesday service, i headed over to new brunswick to visit a teenager in the hospital. as he was in tutoring when i got there, i ended up spending a good bit of time with his mother and aunt. i realized that they would all like to experience the imposition of ashes for the beginning of their own lenten journeys, so i headed down to the chapel to see if the hospital had ashes. before i left the room they told me that the tvs in the rooms have a channel that shows the chapel, so i told them to look for me and i would make faces at them. unfortunately, when i found the chapel, someone was in there praying fervently, so i tried to wave and make faces as discreetly as possible. but there were no ashes there. so i got directions ...

"ash wednesday, 2009" mixed media collage on book board gregory a. milinovich i hope you have a truly blessed ash wednesday today; one in which you tangibly touch your own brokenness and mortality as you begin this paschal journey towards wholeness and eternal life. grace and peace to you. greg.

i am currently in the process of facilitating a tuesday night discussion group based on the tv's the simpsons , a show which i absolutely love. each week we watch an episode and then discuss it in terms of what it has to say to us, as well as what it might be saying about us. in the episode we watched last week one scene finds bart and lisa in their sunday school class. the teacher is describing just how awful hell will be, and then tells them the children that there is really only one way to avoid eternal damnation, and that is to abide by the ten commandments, which she says are, "ten simple rules that are easy to follow." part of our discussion centered around this teacher's dismissive denial of the reality of the difficulty of living a disciplined, obedient life. in reality it is hard to follow the law sometimes, and perhaps even harder to follow Christ's law of loving God and others. there are, of course, times when it comes easier than others, but oft...

- next on my list is an album by coldplay , their 2002 album a rush of blood to the head. this is much more mainstream than anything on my list so far, so many of you have heard of this, i hope. in fact, some of you are probably thinking that i've gone and 'sold out' or something, picking an album as pop-oriented as this one, but i just can't help it. ever since i first heard coldplay, on mtv of all places, singing 'yellow,' i was mesmerized. there is just something about this british band that lures me in everytime. shannon and i saw them in concert this fall and i wrote about it here. so, if you are a coldplay hater, sorry. but i am most certainly not. in spite of their mass appeal, i am a fan. - interestingly enough, this album doesn't even contain any of my top three favorite coldplay songs ("fix you," "yellow" and "viva la vida," in that order), but it is the album that i first got my hands on and the one that initiated m...

"the music" paper collage gregory a. milinovich here's a collage i made yesterday. i've had the idea for it bouncing around in my head for awhile, but used my day off yesterday as a chance to finally nail it down. i love it when i have time on a day off to collage. it is so rewarding for me. hope you have a great friday. peace.