Life Perspective: Reviews & More

I've been busy! New Year's Content: 2009 New Year's Resolutions of Gospel Artists Featuring: DecembeRadio, Bob Halligan, Stephen Hinkle, Joanne Cash, Lyrycyst, Carried Away, Beloved, Kevin Levar, Mission Six, After Edmund, and Eliot Sloan (Blessid Union of Souls) By Kathryn E. Darden | Published 12/28/2008 | Top Ten Songs for New Year's Songs from Robert Burns, U2, Barry Manilo, Relient K, Dan Fogelburg, Stacy Orrico, Ella Fitzgerald, Sir Cliff Richards and more By Kathryn E. Darden | Published 12/6/2008 | Lord of the Rings Content: The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King - Complete Recordings Almost four hours of music on four CDs, containing the full score of the 2003 film, the final edition of the three complete recording releases of the film trilogy whose score earned with three Academy Awards, four Grammy Awards, etc By Kathryn E. Darden | Published 12/30/2008 | Nashville Symphony Scores with Lord of the Rings Led by guest cond...

I love good literature, and for that reason, I am on several discussion boards to discuss writers like C.S. Lewis and J.R.R.Tolkien . I was somewhat bemused that when people began to post their holiday greeting between December 21 and 25, 2007, the posts all had titles like: Happy Yule to All! Happy Holidays! Happy Hogswatch Night Happy Solstice In fact, I was the only person on two such lists to wish my fellow Tolkien and Lewis enthusiasts a Merry Christmas! The yule was a Germanic festival featuring a sacrificial feast some time in late December to early January on a date determined by the Germanic lunar calendar. The winter solstice is an actual astronomical event which occurs between December 20 and December 23 each year in the northern hemisphere. Hogswatch is a fictional holiday occuring on Dec, 31 and Dec. 32. None of them has anything to do with the celebration on December 25 which is known as Christmas unless the yule actually falls on December 25 by coincidence some year. The...

Yesterday (December 19) was my birthday and if you must ask, I was 29... again! I had a very nice day - it actually started last night when my older cousin invited me up for my birthday/Christmas and fixed me my favorite meal, curried chicken. She used the recipe my mother brought back from India, so this is curry the way I like it best. It was so good, and she sent me home a casserole dish full! Of course I ate too much! Then I gave her grandkids the presents I had brought up, and it was worth the one-hour trip up just to watch them having so much fun with their presents! Today some friends took me out for lunch downtown, and it was nice just catching up, and, yes, eating too much! It was Christmassy, too, with the decorations. Nashville is looking mighty festive! Then tonight I had a dinner meeting with sword swallower Dan Meyer who caught me up on his exciting career and treated me to a birthday dinner at California Pizza Kitchen. The food was delicious! Why, yes! I DID eat too muc...

Cookies for Kids will be hosting two holiday book signings for me in Nashville during the Christmas season to benefit the charity Special Spaces (Specialspaces.org). The organization has been given a storefront at Hickory Hollow Mall where they will sell gourmet cookies, do gift wrapping, and other special activities including my book signings! I will be signing copies of my books The Mayberry Poem - A Tribute to Mayberry and How to Promote Your Book on a Shoestring Budget on Wednesday night, December 17 at 5 PM, and on Monday afternoon, December 22 at 2PM. Cookies for Kids is located in the lower level of Hickory Hollow Mall near Sears in the "Real Estate" store front. Proceeds will benefit Special Spaces, a non-profit organization focused on making a difference in the lives of children with life threatening illnesses. The Mayberry Poem - A Tribute to Mayberry is a compilation of poetry about "The Andy Griffith Show." Each poem pays tribute to a character, episo...

'Twas the Night Before Christmas in an Iraqi Town Christmas in Iraq   is a poem written for a soldier and his troop I sponsored in Iraq in 2005. It is my hope that this poem and others like it will be forwarded to our military men and women during the Christmas season so they will know they are not forgotten during the holidays. 'Twas the night before Christmas in an Iraqi town; And our brave U.S. forces had all just hunkered down. Not a Humvee was moving, not a Jeep stirred the sand As troops dreamed of their homes, each and every man. Some longed for their sweethearts, other men missed their moms, Others missed sons and daughters not seen for so long. Sugarplums would be nice, but much nicer to be At home with their loved ones 'neath their own Christmas tree. When what to their wondering ears should be heard, But the faint sounds of carols, music and joyful words. At first heard so faintly, then the sound grew and grew -- The sound of your loved ones s...

Why do non-Christians think it is OK to mock our beliefs, parody Jesus, and insult Christianity? If we parodied Mohammad or Buddha like these B-list Hollywood types and their sycophants parody Jesus, why, we would be intolerant or hate mongering. But these actors and the morons who applaud them are guilty or the same kind of bigotry and hate speech they so gleefully accuse Christians of every time they spread the kind of intolerant idiocy featured in Jack Black's latest tastelessness. Actually, they are guilty of much worse, one, for their hypocrisy, and two, for their blasphemy. Perhaps you would think it equally funny if Jack Black portrayed someone you loved and respected - a religious leader, a parent -- and make a total mockery of what they stood for? Most of the people snickering at this are the same people who would be insulted if we insulted an animal or cut down a tree, but make fun of Jesus and what he stood for, well SURE! THAT'S OK! It's OK to offend Christians...

Christmas is my favorite holiday -- in fact, the holiday season is my favorite time of the year. I have always loved Christmas, and fondly recall our family traditions at this time of year. Even when my father was stationed in India and we lived there for three years during my childhood, family photos show my brother and me sitting amidst our presents under the Christmas tree which was some kind of Indian evergreen and looking much like any other Christmas tree but decorated with traditional Indian garlands of metallic cords and sequins as well as the decorations my mother brought with us. Our native housekeeper and his family piled traditional garlands of marigolds on our gifts and tables. Some of the metallic Indian garlands became part of our annual Christmas tree decorations. The marigold garlands, however, with their ties to Hinduism were left behind in India. There is some dispute among Christians as to how appropriate it is to put up a tree and celebrate a holiday which has its ...

According to a web tool called Typealyzer which is of the personality tests and theories genre, this blog belongs to a group called, "The Performers." Typealyzer Quote: The entertaining and friendly type. They are especially attuned to pleasure and beauty and like to fill their surroundings with soft fabrics, bright colors and sweet smells. They live in the present moment and don´t like to plan ahead - they are always in risk of exhausting themselves. They enjoy work that makes them able to help other people in a concrete and visible way. They tend to avoid conflicts and rarely initiate confrontation - qualities that can make it hard for them in management positions. Note: writing style on a blog may have little or nothing to do with a person´s self-percieved personality. While I do hope my blog is somewhat entertaining, I would say in this case, Typealyzer has fallen way short of the mark! What do you think?

When Sheriff Andy Taylor sent his young son Opie off to school, on at least one occasion his parting words (as in Ep. 34: "Barney's Replacement") were, "Do a good day's work and act like Somebody!" This may sound odd or even pretentious to the modern ear, but in the South in the 1960's, such an admonition simply meant: You are special. Act like it! So many times we get such tunnel vision about the problems in our lives that we lose sight of the fact that each of us is special - we are all Somebody. Read my full devotional at Act Like Somebody!

Thanksgiving Bracelet Encourages Gratitude and Thankfulness Thank You God, I am Grateful Message on New Bracelets Just in time for Thanksgiving: While the news media is often blamed for spinning the news to promote fear in these tough economic times, one television journalist has been doing the opposite. Toni Garbo, a managing news editor in Cleveland, is spreading gratefulness and hope with her new wristband,  "Thank You God, I am Grateful." Thank You Wristbands - Focus on the Positive Garbo says she was inspired to create the "Thank You" wristbands by watching televised celebrity awards shows, stating she is always touched when she hears a celebrity thank God in front of the world. She originally created the reminder wristband, which she compares to tying a string around your finger, for herself saying, "I needed a reminder to help me pause and reflect on the good and the positive found in the moment and throughout the day." Reminder Brace...

Mayberry was that small Southern town where everybody knew their neighbors and Sheriff Andy Taylor was everyone's father figure in a simpler time and place. Imagine what a Mayberry Thanksgiving might have been like! Thanksgiving in Mayberry T  hanksgiving in Mayberry -- H  elen and Ope home from school, A  ndy closes the Courthouse; N  ow Aunt Bee sets the rules, K  eeping everything just so, S  ets the table, cooks the food, G  iving each guest big helpings I  n the day's festive mood. V  ery soon all are seated I  n the Taylor's residence N   ow it's time for grace,  says Andy, G  ives thanks for God's providence. Previously published in  The Mayberry Poem - A Tribute to Mayberry. More Mayberry Articles More About Mayberry

On one of the first cold nights of November, at midnight on November 20th to be precise, I went to Bellevue Cinema 8 in Nashville for the midnight screening of the highly anticipated movie, Twilight . Did I say midnight screening? That's what we had been told, but the movie didn't actually start until 12:20 AM on November 21. There were 10 of us there when I arrived at midnight. Where were the screaming hoards of teen-age girls? I suppose wise parents had kept their young ones at home on a school night, a decision I applaud. By 12:20 there were 18 of us there (only 3 of them males), including two groups of giggling female teens - the target demographic of this movie about an eternally 17-year-old vampire and the girl who loves him. After 20 minutes of fidgitting in a very un-vampirelike fashion, the audience was more than ready for the movie to start. To read my review of Twilight , go to Twilight at Midnight Also see A Christian Take on Twilight

' T is the season - H olidays are upon us A s we gather together N ow with our loved ones K eeping family traditions S avoring, turkey, dressing, ham... G ive thanks to the One I n whose name we gather V ine from which all blessings grow I t is good to be thankful N ever forgetting G od is great, God is good...

Free Holiday Music Performances and Plays in and Around Nashville, Tennessee Nashville/Davidson County is a large Metropolitan area full of free things to do for the holidays (in fact, I once wrote a   poem   about it). One of my favorite free things to do is to walk around downtown Nashville, sauntering down Broadway, past all the decorated honky-tonks, making my way down to Riverfront Park which almost always has a large tree lit for the holidays. Then I turn left on 2nd Avenue, and stroll past the small stores in the historic district, admiring the decorations and wares. I usually end up eating at Old Spaghetti Factory, San Antonio Taco Company, or Demos' which is the only cost (except parking) to my free holiday night out. There are several parking garages downtown, and one is right between Demos' and San Antonio Taco Company. Another annual Christmas tradition of mine is Gaylord Opryland's "A Country Christmas," which started on November 14 and continu...

I have been wanting to post about Twilight, the book by Stephenie Meyer and the upcoming movie, but I have not have time to put my thoughts down until challenged by a Twitter follower to respond to her blog . So, after typing a few thoughts there, I thought I would post those thoughts here and expand on them a little. Twilight , the book by Mormon mom Meyer, is that rare phenomena - a sexy book about virtue, conscience, and good, old-fashioned morals and manners. If you enjoy old Bronte sisters and Jane Austin novels about brooding, noble, self-sacrificing heroes, this book is for you. Edward is an unexpected delight, a superhero who COULD easily be a demonic villain but makes a conscious decision to put aside his powerful drives and urges to be a better being. Edward has been around for over 100 years, but he is forever 17 (and played in the upcoming movie by 22-year-old Rob Pattinson). He falls in love with Bella while battling his overwhelming urge to kill her and drink her...

It's Christmas in Mayberry, the mountains are white Opie and his friends are all filled with delight. The town is lit up, wreaths are on every door Andy whistles the carols he's whistled before. Opie skips along Main Street to hear the Mayberry band, Leon lopes close behind him; what's that in his hand? No, it isn't a sandwich's sticky remains, It's Christmas and he clutches a new candy cane! They arrive at the band shell where they join Aunt Bee - She has a basket of goodies for the picnic, you see. An old man greets Bee; he's delighted to see her; The former town grump - our good friend Ben Weaver. Soon Floyd shows up, joined by Howard, Mike, Sam. Goober stops to say "Hey;" Gomer joins the band. The band strikes up some carols, then Barn starts to sing, But they unplugged his microphone so the harmonies ring. Aunt Bee spreads a blanket on the rather cold lawn, Folks are bundled up snug with their winter coats...

A Review of the Book "Finding God in the Lord of the Rings" by Kurt Bruner & Jim Ware I was first introduced to Bilbo Baggins when I was in the 6th grade. While I enjoyed the   The Hobbit,   I was not overwhelmed by it although I was interested in continuing the saga when she gave me   The Fellowship of the Ring   the summer before my seventh-grade year.   The Fellowship of the Ring   and the subsequent two books in   The Lord of the Rings   trilogy affected me profoundly and perhaps had more impact on me than any other books besides the Bible. If you have read some of my  poems , you may have an idea how much these books have influenced me! For many years I was hard pressed to explain why the books captivated me and why I returned to read them year after year. Certainly the plot was gripping and the characters were substantial. The world, people and languages of Middle Earth seemed real, with layer upon layer of history and myth. ...

A poem of encouragement for our military troops in Iraq and all over the world during the Christmas holidays, this poem was published on the old Associated Content/YCN site on 11-13-2008 where it garnered 4,529 page views before the site shut down in July 2014. "Christmas in Iraq" 'Twas the night before Christmas in an Iraqi town; And our brave U.S. forces had all just hunkered down. Not a Humvee was moving, not a Jeep stirred the sand As troops dreamed of their homes, each and every man... To read the entire poem, please go to "Christmas in Iraq" Feel free to forward this link to any military men and women during the holidays