A priest, a rabbi, and a minister walked in to an inauguration. Sounds like a joke, but this was the normal way of doing things at one point. Water down the religious elements so much that they would be palatable to the majority, and not very religious. It almost makes religion the joke.

Much was made about Rick Warren being the minister to deliver the invocation at Obama’s inauguration. He is against gay marriage and used the name of Jesus in the invocation. I think this was actually a good thing. I don’t agree with him; I don’t believe Jesus was the son of God and my rabbi permits gay marriage.

I think that we have actually improved the separation of church and state by recognizing that people of various faiths don’t have to agree on their religious beliefs, so long as we can all participate in our democracy.

A building of restaurants and a dry cleaners in the Fenway neighborhood of Boston burned down last night. Cheryl and I frequented these businesses when we were dating and first married and lived in that area.

In similar but far less tragic news, a trendy floor lamp that was one of our major home decorating purchases when we lived in that area came crashing down this morning. The joint between the base and the rest of the lamp gave out after years of use (although it probably wasn’t made strong enough to start).

All of this just after my daughter turned 5. So we are officially middle-aged, not young.

I am glad we put fairly large ceiling lights on dimmers in the kids rooms (where we most recently had that lamp) when we moved into the house. It was exactly for this eventuality – I didn’t want to rely on portable lamps that break, have cords that are a safety issue, etc., either to make the room bright enough, or to make it dim enough for putting kids to bed. This is not the first time I’ve had a floor lamp break in a similar manner.

I will try to add pictures and links later if I get to it.