In such a case, you wouldn’t be reading this, but I have to admit, I’ve been using the Internet for years and years, and complete outages have been rather rare. Site outages may come here or there, but a complete outage of the Internet? It’s been going for 30 years without such a case–a particular service may be down– and I remember AT&T sometimes being out, but overall, the Internet is designed to be hard to go completely “out of service.”
That being said, I’m ready with lots of VHS tapes and old records (including lots of 78s and wind up machines if there is no electricity). Will I need to use them?
I suspect at some point, but I definitely don’t know when.
Monthly Archives: February 2026
20 Years Ago – In Rome
I’m not sure how many times I visited Rome. My guess would be 7 or 8. Regardless, shortly after I was ordained I was in Rome for a meeting about the beatification of the founder of our community, St. Stanislaus Papczynski (obviously now a saint, since 2016).
The photo if from a second trip later in 2006, once again for a meeting on the beatification. My last trip was 2016 for the canonization. Since then, there has been no reason or opportunity, but even if I never get back there, I am grateful for all the visits I had to the Eternal City.
Whatever happened to Randolph Scott?
Fifty-three years ago, the Statler Brothers bemoaned the state of Hollywood with this song. Here are the opening lyrics…
Everybody knows when you go to the show
You can’t take the kids along
You’ve gotta read the paper and know the code
Of G, PG and R and X and
You gotta know what the movie’s about
Before you even go
Tex Ritter’s gone and Disney’s dead
And the screen is filled with sex
Later, they even say this:
Everbody’s tryin’ to make a comment
About our doubts and fears
True Grit’s the only movie
I’ve really understood in years
You gotta take your analyst along
To see if it’s fit to see
Whatever happened to Randolph Scott
Has happened to the industry
Yes, Hollywood was in a slump back then. New “B-movie” heroes would come about, but now, we can say “Whatever happened to my favorite IP?”
There are those who hate the “old days” and all that is “conservative,” and want to redefine just about anything you can think of. That’s kinda the way it was in the early 1970s. But, of course, they can never agree on just what is the proper progress to progress towards. Sure, things are a lot worse than 1973, but maybe a massive collapse of Hollywood is just what the doctor ordered.
Lent 2026
It’s here, and I decided to resurrect ye ol’ blog.
Lent is a time to “tune out” and “turn off,” as a certain generation used to say. Now people talk about “touching grass,” which isn’t all that hard to do, but it does require going outside.
There is a sense, perhaps even in the younger generation, that civilization is in decline. Children growing up with digital, digital and more digital media seem to be declining in social skills, education, and even understanding how to have a good time without a digital device.
The uber-progressive Denmark is regressing on the whole digital education scene, finding that students learn better with good ol’ textbooks.
Analog. We are analog. We are not digital.