Everyday Ritual I: The Phone Ritual

When you visit a museum that displays artifacts from the lives of Early Humans, has it ever struck you that an astounding percentage of these artifacts seem to be "for ritual purposes?"

I used to think this was probably just poor archaeology. But now I think that we still perform rituals constantly - we're just not as clear about what they are. My first example: the phone ritual.

Hannah makes a phone call.

Hannah: "Hi, X, this is Hannah. How are you?"
X: "Good! How are you?"
Hannah: "Good!"
X: "Good!"

Sometimes there are three people on the call. The ritual takes a lot longer.

Hannah: "Hi, X, this is Hannah and Y. How are you?"
X: "Good! How are you guys?"
Hannah: "Good!"
Y: "Good!"
X: "And how are you, Y?"
Y: "Good!"
X: "Good!"
X: "And your baby?"
Y: "Good!"
X: "Good!"

When this happens, I often get the urge to just say "Okay, good!" and hang up the phone before we go around any more times.

Fear Not The Gods on hiatus for food poisoning

Was very sick this week. I am better now. Back up and running soon.

Forewarned is...

I am visiting the Church of Scientology on Sunday. People seem to have a lot to say about this. Do you? Leave comments!

In the mean time, please enjoy its orientation video. It's blurry because someone was filming it secretly. It's a weird combination of goofball 50's educational video, science fiction (duh), and 60-minutes style documentary.

Religious Updates

Article today about how the door-to-door proselytizing has been going for Mormons on the Upper East Side. Since everyone has doormen, it's hard to go door to door. Instead they stand on the street and hand out hot chocolate and stuff.


Also, according to the AP, a bunch of rabbis in Israel have decided they'd like to start sacrificing animals on the Temple Mount again. Great idea, guys.