Logocentric (adj).Regarding words and language as a fundamental expression of an external reality (especially applied as a negative term to traditional Western thought by postmodernist critics).
Sometimes I just write whatever I feel like. Other times I respond to prompts, many taken from the following places:
I'm very fortunate to have met some practicing and humble Christians. Truly humble people seek to serve, not attain power and influence. The actions of many Christians make me run the opposite way... as fast as I can.
In his book, Sit, Walk, Stand, Watchman Nee states: "Nothing has done greater damage to our Christian testimony than our trying to be right and demanding right of others. We become preoccupied with what is and what is not right. We ask ourselves,' Have we been justly or unjustly treated?' and we think thus to vindicate our actions. But that is not our standard. The whole question for us is one of crossbearing".
Jeff, this is an excellent book. Perhaps one for your reading list?
I learned to cook from cookbooks (no such cooking happened when I was growing up...we were given McDonalds, or...nothing much at all). Once learning to cook, I used to, when my kids were growing up, cook Thanksgiving and Christmas meals completely from scratch. Now that they have grown, not so much is from Scratch.
I taught my husband what I know. We joke that he will be able to survive on his own, once I am gone. ;)
I would so love to learn the Art...and I am sure that it Is an Art, of cooking Asian dishes. Yummy! I am sure that I could learn, with much TIME and ERROR...sigh.
Annette, the movie that I co-wrote is called The Right Girl. It shows up from time to time on cable TV channels like Lifetime and Hallmark, and I think it's currently available on an off-brand streaming service as well.
Ours has a tendency to shut off halfway through baking potatoes....YES, we bake our potatoes in the microwave, as it Used to be quicker than other means.
Now, what with 5 minute intervals of it needing to shut off, every ten minutes...sigh.
It looks like we will soon be purchasing a New one that we will need to...Figure out how to navigate.
Prompt #20: Where is your favorite place in the whole world?
My favorite place in the whole world, geographically speaking, is either Crystal Cove (a stretch of beach along the Newport Coast in Orange County, between Newport Beach and Laguna Beach) or the Puget Sound/San Juan Islands area of the Pacific Northwest. There are a lot of places that I've never been to that could easily become favorites, but those are the two places I keep coming back to when I think of places I enjoy visiting.
Water in general (and rivers and the ocean specifically) have always been one of my favorite features of the natural world, so it's not surprising that my favorite places would be right on the water. And Crystal Cove is only about a 20-minute drive from where I live, so it's nice to be able to visit whenever I want. Sometimes I'll just drive along the coast on that section of the Pacific Coast Highway and enjoy the view and the breeze, and other times I'll stop at the Shake Shack. Not to be confused with Shake Shack the upscale burger chain, this is a little diner window with an attached deck for outdoor seating built right on top of the cliffside. You can sit there with a burger and a milkshake and enjoy incredible views of Crystal Cove and the Pacific Ocean beyond.
If you travel down a steep flight of stairs to the beach itself, you'll find another great restaurant called the Beachcomber, which is built right on the sand. You can have a meal and walk fifty yards and be in the ocean surf. Visit at sunset when the sky is vibrant orange and pink and purple and the sun is setting over the ocean and it might be the most perfect place in the world.
This one's a little harder for me because I like a lot of things, but possessions aren't generally super important to me. Even things that are particularly sentimental like our wedding photo album; at the end of the day, they're just things. Challenges like, "What are the three things you'd grab on your way out the door in the event of a fire" are always tough to answer because stuff doesn't really enter my head. I always think about those questions practically. Like, I'd probably grab the fireproof safe with all of our personal documents (passports, birth certificates, social security cards, etc.) because replacing those would be a pain. Or my computer so we can easily make all the arrangements we need for whatever the next steps are.
When I think about favorite possessions, I suppose I'd pick something sentimental. I have an Avengers: Infinity War poster on my wall that's signed by most of the cast, which Marvel gave to me as a "thank you" years ago. I have a framed photo of the first writing paycheck I ever received. And I have a signed copy of a book from Bruce Campbell with a really nice inscription from this one time I worked a book signing he was attending. Items like that are the things I think of fondly when it comes to personal possessions. I'm not sure I have a favorite so much as a collection of things I'm fond of, and would probably miss from time to time if they were suddenly gone.
January 21, 2026: What do you think is the hardest part of being a Christian?
I have two responses to the question of what the hardest thing is about being a Christian: a theological response and a more practical response.
From a theological standpoint, the hardest part about being a Christian is clearly living up to the example that Christ set, and the example he wants us to set for others. The tenets of Christianity are well known and oft repeated, but there are precious few people who can actually live up to turning the other cheek, extending mercy and radical forgiveness, and loving one's enemies. Most of us struggle with even the simple edicts of the religion, like setting aside ourselves and following Jesus with all our hearts.
The core theology of Christianity is incredibly countercultural, and nearly impossible to achieve even under ideal circumstances, to say nothing of the broken, sinful world we actually live in. It's quite literally impossible to live a sinless life like Jesus did, but the pursuit of and striving for that unattainable objective is the central thesis of the religion. So to the question of what the hardest part of the Christian religion is, it's ... *gestures at all of it*
From a practical standpoint, I think the hardest part about being a Christian in today's context - at least from my perspective as a nondenominational Christian in the Western world - is seeing others misrepresent Christianity to others, and seeing the damage it causes. Christianity has been co-opted by special interests who would use it as a justification (or excuse) for their own ends, and I include a lot of church organizations themselves in that accusation. Evangelical Christianity has become a political project for some, and a means of achieving wealth and status for others. And I've seen firsthand the kind of damage that has been done to people, especially the marginalized and downtrodden - you know, the type of people that Jesus was kind of famous for actually helping - in His name.
Whenever I see Christians identifying with the conservative right of the political spectrum, or the anti-LGBTQ+ movement, or even taking advantage of their tax exempt status for the purposes of financially benefiting their clergy, it makes me sad because I just know that it's reinforcing the worst stereotypes about Christians being insular hypocrites who want to behave badly while telling everyone else how to live their lives. And it worries me because it furthers the narrative that Christians are just like everyone else: seeking influence and wealth, and defining their success by how much power they can wield against their perceived enemies.
Christianity has always functioned most effectively when it's the underdog. When it's the response to a terrible status quo and offers a different, better way to live. Once Christianity becomes the default, once it becomes the status quo, it starts exerting power like the status quo and trying to protect that power. When you look at it like that, maybe I'm wrong about the practical response to this question. From a practical standpoint, maybe the hardest thing about being a Christian is continuing to live out the tenets of your Christian faith once you've attained the influence and power that you've been seeking.
I'm a little late posting this, but it's time for my annual accounting of all the reading and listening I've done over the course of 2025. Here's how this past year broke down in terms of titles and numbers:
According to Goodreads, my stats were: 14,880 pages read (down 3,728 words from last year), 292 average pages per book (down 40 pages from last year), the shortest book I read was 38 pages (up 8 pages from last year), and the longest book I read was 560 pages (down 285 pages from last year)
BOOKS
Fiction
3 Days, 9 Months, 27 Years by John Scalzi Artificial Condition by Martha Wells Bad Date by Ellery Lloyd City of Last Chances by Adrian Tchaikovsky A Court of Thorn and Roses by Sarah J. Maas Daggerheart Core Rulebook by Darrington Press D&D Monster Manual (2024) by Wizards of the Coast Eberron: Rising from the Last War by Wizards of the Coast Eerie Basin by Ivy Pochoda A Farewell to Arms by John Steinbeck Fog & Fury by Rachel Howzell Hall Full Dark, No Stars by Stephen King Gemini Blue by Kara Cavalli Heir to Atlantis by Chris Fox Hero of Metalhaven by G J Ogden I'll Follow You by Charlene Wang The Kidnapping of Alice Ingold by Cate Holahan The Magician's Nephew by C.S. Lewis The Magitech Chronicles Roleplaying Game by Chris Fox Murder Your Employer: The McMasters Guide to Homicide by Rupert Holmes One by One by Ruth Ware Only Way Out by Tod Goldberg The Shadow of the Gods by John Gwynne Something Under the Bed is Drooling by Bill Watterson The Starless Crown by James Rollins Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide by Wizards of the Coast Tal'Dorei Campaign Setting Reborn by Matthew Mercer The Undoing of Alejandro Velasco by Diego Boneta Voice Like a Hyacinth by Mallory Pearson What Happened to Lucy Vale by Lauren Oliver While the Dark Remains by Joanna Ruth Meyer Without Fail by Lee Child
Nonfiction
The 16 Undeniable Laws of Communication by Robert C. Maxwell Abundance by Ezra Klein & Derek Thompson American Black Widow by Gregg Olsen The Artful Edit by Susan Bell Atlas Obscura by Joshua Foer, et al Everybody Has a Podcast (Except You) by The McElroys Finding Your Voice as a Writer by C.A. Mason For Your Eyes Only: Ian Fleming & James Bond by Ben Macintyre The Game Master's Book of Astonishing Random Tables by Ben Egloff The Game Master's Handbook of Proactive Roleplaying by Jonah Fishel How to Be a Rockstar Screenwriter by David Silverman & Rogena Schuyler How to Read Nonfiction Like a Professor by Thomas C. Foster How to Sell 1,000 Books a Month by Susan U. Neal How to Write a Screenplay That Doesn't Suck & Will Actually Sell by Michael Rogan Open by Andre Agassi Poverty, by America by Matthew Desmond Steering the Craft by Ursula K. Le Guin The Ultimate RPG Character Backstory Guide (Expanded Genres Edition) by James D'Amato The Ultimate RPG Game Master's Guide by James D'Amato The Ultimate RPG Game Master's Worldbuilding Guide by James D'Amato
PODCASTS
Adventuring Academy — 22 episodes Ask NT Wright Anything — 53 episodes Dead Pilots Society — 13 episodes The Economics of Everyday Things — 48 episodes Explain It To Me — 48 episodes The Ezra Klein Show — 71 episodes Freakonomics — 49 episodes The Gray Area — 30 episodes How Did This Get Made? — 9 episodes How I Built This — 3 episodes Imaginary Worlds — 21 episodes Interesting Times (f.k.a. Matter of Opinion) — 37 episodes Not Another D&D Podcast — 11 episodes Offline with Jon Favreau — 50 episodes Pod Save America — 138 episodes Pod Save the World — 54 episodes Politix — 51 episodes Q&A — 17 episodes The Rewatchables — 25 episodes Runaway Country — 10 episodes Scriptnotes — 24 episodes The Slate Political Gabfest — 60 episodes Slow Burn — 14 episodes Strict Scrutiny — 15 episodes TED Radio Hour — 17 episodes Untitled Female Driven Podcast — 5 episodes What A Day — 224 episodes Worlds Beyond Number — 14 episodes Write On — 12 episodes Writer's Panel — 8 episodes
COMICS
Alien Paradiso — 4 issues Alien Romulus — 1 issue Aliens vs. Avengers — 1 issue All-New Venom — 4 issues Alligator Loki — 1 issue Amazing Spider-Man — 18 issues Avengers — 7 issues Avengers Assemble — 4 issues Blade — 4 issues Bloodhunters — 3 issues Cable: Love & Chrome — 3 issues Captain America — 5 issues Chasm: Curse of Kaine — 3 issues Conquest 2099 — 5 issues Crypt of Shadows — 1 issue Dazzler — 3 issues Daredevil — 7 issues Daredevil: Unleash Hell — 3 issues Daredevil: Woman Without Fear — 2 issues Deadpool — 9 issues Deadpool & Wolverine — 3 issues Eddie Brock: Carnage — 2 issues Exceptional X-Men — 6 issues Fantastic Four — 7 issues Fantastic Four: The Dinosaur Fantastic Four — 1 issue Get Fury — 1 issue Giant-Sized X-Men — 1 issue Hellhunters — 4 issues Hellverine — 4 issues Holiday Tales to Astonish — 1 issue Hulk — 1 issue Immortal Thor — 6 issues Incredible Hulk — 5 issues Insurgent Iron Man — 1 issues Infinity Watch — 2 issues Iron Man — 5 issues Kahhori — 1 issue Kid Venom — 2 issues Kidpool & Spider-Boy — 1 issue Laura Kinney: Wolverine — 3 issues Magik — 3 issues Marvel Must-Haves — 1 issue Marvel Mutts — 1 issue Marvel Zombies: Dawn of Decay — 3 issues Miles Morales: Spider-Man — 7 issues Moon Knight: Fist of Khonshu — 6 issues Mystique — 5 issues Namor — 6 issues Negasonic Teenage Warhead — 1 issue New Champions — 3 issues Nick Fury vs. Fin Fang Foom — 1 issue Nyx — 7 issues One World Under Doom — 11 issues Petpool: Pool Party — 1 issue Phases of the Moon Knight — 3 issues Phoenix — 7 issues Power Man: Timeless — 2 issues Predator vs. Black Panther — 3 issues Psylocke — 5 issues Robbie Reyes: Ghost Rider — 1 issues Rogue: Savage Land — 2 issues Sabretooth: The Dead Don't Talk — 4 issues Sam Wilson: Captain America — 3 issues Scarlet Witch — 6 issues Secret Wars — 2 issues Sentinels — 5 issues Spectacular Spider-Men — 6 issues Spider-Boy — 6 issues Spider-Gwen — 7 issues Spider-Man — 6 issues Spider Society — 2 issues Spidey and his Amazing Friends — 2 issues Spirits of Vengeance — 5 issues Star Wars — 30 issues Storm — 6 issues Timeslide — 1 issue TVA — 4 issues Ultimate Black Panther — 6 issues Ultimate Spider-Man — 6 issues Ultimate Wolverine — 2 issues Ultimate Universe — 1 issue Ultimate X-Men — 5 issues The Ultimates — 6 issues Ultraman x Avengers — 3 issues Uncanny X-Men — 13 issues Venom — 2 issues Venom War — 20 issues Web of Spider-Verse — 2 issues Werewolf by Night — 7 issues West Coast Avengers — 5 issues What If...? — 7 issues Wolverine — 13 issues Women of Marvel: She-Devils — 1 issue X-Factor — 4 issues X-Force — 7 issues X-Men — 10 issues Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man — 3 issues
SCRIPTS
THE 14TH FLOOR by Amy Reed & Brennan Scannell RICH DAN POOR DAN by John Enbom BUFFALO TENS (Episode 1 and 2) by Riki Lindhome & Natasha Leggero CAMP FRIENDS by Lauren Herstik LETTERS TO BEYONCE by Austen Earl HOW TO GET OVER BRYAN BYERS by Ilana Pena & Anne Sundell BLESSED AND HIGHLY FAVORED by Chris Marcil & Sam Johnson HERE SHE LIES by Gracie Glassmeyer CHEAP SEATS by David S. Rosenthal HUMANS OF THE AMERICAS by Jim Brandon & Brian Singleton DREAM by Lisa Muse Bryant GUY TEXT by Aaron Brownstein & Simon Ganz
To qualify for my Watch List every month, a title has to be something that I've watched that's new to me. It doesn't necessarily have to be a current show, but it can't be reruns or rewatches of something I've already seen. If I'm including it in this list, it means this month is the first time I've watched it.
I'll put "DNF" (Did Not Finish) next to anything that I stopped watching and have no immediate plans to finish.
If I'm watching an ongoing season of a series across multiple months, I'll try to only list it once.
Movies
Anaconda (2025) Avatar: Fire and Ash The Bad Guys: A Very Bad Holiday The Boss Baby: Christmas Bonus Eternity Hamnet The Housemaid Marty Supreme The Night Before Wake up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery Wicked: For Good
The movies that I didn't think were that great and I don't have much more to say about were Boss Baby: Christmas Bonus and The Night Before.
The movies that I thought were just okay or pretty good and I don't have much more to say about were Bad Guys: A Very Bad Holiday, Wicked: For Good, Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery, Marty Supreme, and Hamnet.
Going down the list of others, Anaconda was a surprisingly good spoof/remake of the franchise. Jack Black, Paul Rudd, and Steve Zahn are all hilarious, and there are just enough twists and references to the old franchise to keep it fun and interesting. It was probably my favorite movie of December from a pure enjoyment perspective; everyone in the theater was cracking up as we watched it.
Avatar: Fire and Ash was much better than the last installment, IMO, even if it felt repetitive from a storytelling perspective (oh no, the humans are converging all of their watercraft into one place where they'll have a climactic air and sea battle!). But Varang and her fire tribe were great antagonists, and the pacing of this one was much better.
Eternity was a great premise for a romantic movie (which I don't want to spoil), which felt a little slow to start, but got much better as it went on and the tension ratcheted up.
The Housemaid was a decent adaptation of the bestselling book. I thought Sydney Sweeney and Amanda Seyfried played really well off each other, and the film did a good job preserving the twists in the book. It was an entertaining domestic thriller.
Television
Black Rabbit The Franchise (Season 1) Industry (Season 2) Law & Order (Season 25) Law & Order SVU (Season 27) Only Murders in the Building (Season 4) Owning Manhattan (Season 2) St. Denis Medical (Season 1)
I don't have much to say about Law & Order and Law & Order SVU, and the second season of Industry was pretty dull expect for a few episodes toward the end. Same with the third season of Only Murders in the Building, which feels like it's getting further and further away from the magic of the first season.
The Franchise was pretty terrible, with the sole exception of Richard E. Grant's performance... I definitely understand why it was canceled after one season.
The second season of the reality series Owning Manhattan was pretty good; I like the fact that this season focused more on the challenges of growing his business rather than the drama of fame-hungry real estate agents. Ryan Serhant is an interesting guy and it's definitely entertaining reality television to watch him try to build his own brokerage into one that competes with the giants in the space.
The two shows that I really enjoyed this month were Black Rabbit and St. Denis Medical. The first is a Netflix limited series starring Jude Law and Jason Bateman as brothers who own a restaurant and get in over their head with debts that they owe, and the latter is a broadcast sitcom from the guy who created Superstore, which could probably best be described as "Superstore, but this time at a regional hospital." But the formula works and they got a great cast, so who am I to complain?
I was reading "Six Things About Me" from Šuŋgmánitu Tȟáŋkaand decided that I'd do the same. The following are six fun facts and bits of random trivia about me:
1. Although I've received dozens of screen credits on big budget studio movies for my work as a Marvel employee, the screen credit I'm proudest of is for a low-budget made-for-TV movie romantic comedy few people have seen, where I was credited as a co-writer.
2. Some of my more memorable celebrity encounters include helping Meg Ryan figure out how to use a microwave, firing an intern who fan-girled a little too hard over David Duchovny during an elevator ride we all shared, and personally delivering contraband merchandise to Quentin Tarantino at his house.
3. I am technically a third-degree brown belt in mixed martial arts (back in the day when it was truly a mix of disciplines like karate, tae kwon do, kung fu, etc. instead of just mostly Brazilian jujitsu and cage fighting). I quit just a few weeks short of my black belt test during my senior year in high school because a childhood friend of mine died of bacterial meningitis suddenly, and I had to write her obituary and interview her family for the school paper, which messed me up pretty bad at the time.
4. I once spent the night on Alcatraz, in solitary confinement. I should probably clarify this was during its National Park era and not it's "active federal prison" era.
5. Based on some amateur genealogy on the part of my uncle, it is believed that our family is distantly related to one of the early U.S Presidents. Unfortunately, it's John Tyler and not one of the cool ones.
6. When my wife and I were planning our wedding (a small-ish beach wedding with about 100 guests), my wife's parents were in the middle of an ugly divorce and we briefly had to consider hiring private security because certain family members were seriously threatening to show up uninvited to physically jump/beat up my wife's father.
It might be kind of interesting to make this an ongoing community activity, so I'm going to nominate three other people to do the same, and hope that they participate and nominate folks of their own. You know, just like one of those old school email chain letters, except without the threat of years of misfortune if you don't do it.
This Kelly Clarkson holiday song was one that I featured in a prior "Invalid Item" playlist back in 2022 (see: "Underneath the Tree" ). We didn't make tamales this year so the reference to playing it while family is around wasn't quite the same, but it did come up constantly on the holiday playlists we've had in the car at playing in the living room all season long.
Christmas this year was a pretty low-key affair. We went to a Christmas service at a church with friends, then spent Christmas Eve and Christmas together with just our family. We had dinner last night, opened presents this morning, and mostly just spent the past two days as a family. It was a modest haul of presents, we made cookies, and we called relatives and texted friends to wish them a Merry Christmas.
Next year, we'll probably do it up a little bigger, but every once in a while it's nice to have an easy, laid back holiday.
"All I Want for Christmas Is You"
by Fifth Harmony
On the Twelfth Day of Christmas, last but certainly not least, I had to include "All I Want for Christmas Is You," a perennial favorite of mine. In this case, I decided to feature the version by Fifth Harmony (pre-Camila Cabello departure), just to mix it up a little bit. I think the group does a pretty good job of covering the different range of notes that Mariah Carey hits in her original... if you can get past some of the blatant product placement in this video.
On the Eleventh Day of Christmas, I went with another Sabrina Carpenter song, this one of her own design. I really enjoy her music, especially the way she's unapologetically suggestive and sometimes even raunchy. I don't know anyone else who could make lines like, "I might change your contact to 'Has a Huge North Pole'" and, "When you're coming down the chimney, ooh, it feels so good / I need that Charles Dickens" actually work and sound lyrical.
This is definitely not a song you'd want to play at an all-ages Christmas party or family gathering (unless you enjoy watching your friends and loved ones' befuddled looks as they wonder whether they just heard what they thought they heard in the lyrics of this song ), but this is a great one to play when you're alone in the car or listening with your headphones.
"Winter Song"
by Sara Bareilles (feat. Ingrid Michaelson)
On the Tenth Day of Christmas, I picked a collaboration by two of my favorite indepdent female singer/songwriters. Ingrid Michaelson and Sara Bareilles are both incredible talents, and hearing them do a duet on a track is really incredible. I suppose this isn't technically a "holiday" song because "Winter" isn't a holiday and the song doesn't make any explicit reference to Christmas or any other holiday... but I'm including it anyway because it fits with the theme of the season and, well, I really like it.
On the Ninth Day of Christmas, I picked something from Bleachers, which is one of my favorite bands in recent years. Jack Antonoff is an incredibly talented music producer, and an unexpectedly good musical artist. Like yesterday's song, I like the alternative sound of this song and, while I wouldn't necessarily listen to this song on repeat over and over again like I would some other holiday classics, it does a great job of adding some texture and depth to a Christmas playlist that's also filled with more traditional Christmas songs.
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