• Christmas Day Sermon 2012

    Many of you will be aware that I recently have returned from a big sabbatical trip to churches in Canada and the United States.

    I was there to learn and reflect and grow and I did that by making contact with the most interesting folk I could find in church life on the other side of the North Atlantic.

    Inevitably I spent quite a lot of time poking around churches over there and coming from this cathedral, I was interested in what cathedrals over there were up to.

    Which is how I found myself in the National Cathedral in Washington DC just a day or two after the American Election in November.

    It is a mighty building. Far bigger than we are but when I saw it, it was not looking its best. Still recovering from an earthquake which wobbled all its stonework, they have netting strung all across the nave to catch falling fragments. So you stand in this enormous church unable to look up and appreciate the great spaces.

    Unable to look up, instead I went down. For underneath the nave is a maze of twisty passages which lead (more…)

4 responses to “Will no-one rid me of this turbulent plumber?”

  1.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    Re: Will no-one rid me of this turbulent plumber?
    Argh!

    Latest update.

    I seem to be living in a parallel universe. I have been captured by plumbing aliens and have been taken to planet plumber. Either that or I am the living embodiment of a plumber’s online adventure game.

    The latest is that there is a crack in the hot water tank between the heating coil and the tank containing domestic hot water. Thus the tank needs to be changed. No useable hot water until this is done next week.

    This means showers instead of baths. (When will I get to think?). Boiling washing up water. No use of the washing machine. Fortunately I still have the dishwasher, which comes off the cold water supply and also the heating, so the house is not cold.

    However it appears that most of next week will be spent waiting for plumbers as well.

  2.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    Re: Will no-one rid me of this turbulent plumber?
    Easy solution.  Do what I do –  take your washing to your mother!

    Sorted!!!!!!!!!

  3.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    Re: Will no-one rid me of this turbulent plumber?
    How I am supposed to be a mystic visionary with all this going on?
    *politely puts hand up*
    Um, aren’t mystic visionaries supposed to go without certain creature comforts in order to have such visions???? This will surely help, no?
    Alternatively, you could give up hot water for Lent.

  4.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    Re: Will no-one rid me of this turbulent plumber?
    Well, I don’t find it particularly difficult to imagine St Anthony making his way to the desert wadi looking for clear water, finding only muddy guck and crying: “How I am supposed to be a mystic visionary with all this going on?”

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Previous Posts

  • Provincial Conference

    I'm going to most of the Scottish Episcopal Church's Provincial Conference, which begins today. These things happen every four years or so. I didn't sign up until the last minute. The trouble is, I never could imagine that I would not be there.It is taking place at Herriot-Watt University – somewhere I have never been…

  • Zebra Dung Lion Rover

    The BBC reports that a remote-controlled vehicle carrying zebra dung is being used by a Stirling University student to study the behaviour of lions in captivity. And all this happening just down the road at Blairdrummond.The BBC have a picture of the lions, but not the zebra.

  • Social Software

    I know this is a bit geeky, but I wanted to point anyone interested to this article in Darwin Magazine o­n what is being called Social Software.I've long held that the internet is all about people and not about computers or technology at all, just as the telephone is all about conversation and communication rather than…

  • Sermon – 29 August 2004

    Hospitality I?m not sure what you think about Jesus. He certainly was not the perfect guest. Here he is in this week?s gospel causing all kinds of trouble. He notices where people are sitting and proceeds to give them a rather pious lecture on giving up their places to one another so that they won?t…