About this time last year I wrote a couple of posts, Save Your Christmas and Bring a Light, in which I suggested that if christians were really dissatisfied with the way the Christmas story was being told by our society, they wouldn’t waste time with protests, but instead tell a better story.

I also introduced readers to the Advent Conspiracy and the growing idea of opting out of Christmas Incorporated in favor of smaller, saner, and more personal expressions of love and community.

This year my friends at Lifelink Memphis have really embraced the concept, and together we are spending all month exploring Christmas and ways to make it more meaningful, enjoyable, and fulfilling.

I believe we are on the trail of a better story, not just one more worth telling, but one more worth living.

Oh, and I’m leading one of the classes.

So if you find yourself in Memphis this December, join me Sundays at 9:30 for a closer look at the ideas of Advent Conspiracy and stay for service at 10:15.

The story is just getting good.

Lifelink Memphis
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Those of you who have reading the Comma for any length of time will probably be aware of my reoccurring struggles with purpose and humor, and how I’ve never really been content to just make people laugh but instead have looked for ways to also inspire and teach and challenge the status quo.

It has taken a while, but with my new Mind Over Memphis project, I think I might finally be on the right track.

In this new video series, I have found a way to highlight social entrepreneurs, not people with start-ups, but rather people who are upstarts, individuals who look around at the people and the problems of the city and say, “What a minute, I see something I can do to help.”

And then do it.

People who penetrate the Someone Else’s Problem field and become someone else’s solution.

The beauty of it is that I believe all of us can be people like that, we often just lack inspiration.

This is where Doctor Toboggans comes in.

In his backwards, fumbling, painfully arrogant way, he illustrates that none of us really need a certificate or a title or a “mandate” to re-imagine our world, just an idea and the determination to see it through.

My DangerCouch partner Dan Baker has joined me on this project and, as always, is keeping production values in line with his high standards and unique vision.

We have started small, just a trailer and three pilot episodes featuring people that I know and trust me and are willing to help me prove the concept.

Once these first episodes air, I am hoping that more and more interesting characters, programs and charities will want to get on board and be interviewed as well, to share their vision and help spread the inspiration.

What I really, desperately need are two things: promotion and suggestions.

First, I need people to talk this up.  To blog about it, tweet about it, facebook-icate about it. (O.K. I made that word up, but do it anyway.) To Digg it, Stumble it, and email it to your grandma. Just get the word out.

If you want to talk about it, great. If you want to repost it, better. If you want to host it (cough cough Live From Memphis ) wonderful.

Click here to view the embedded video.

The Trailer

Second, I need suggestions, victims, and volunteers. People with a sense of humor preferably, who are engaged in doing good for the people of Memphis.

Talk them into it and please contact me.

Our schedule so far is:

Trailer  – released on Oct 7
Episode 1 – featuring Kevin Gaiman of Nightshade Manor – Oct 14
Episode 2 – featuring Ken Steorts of Visible School – Oct 28
Episode 3 – featuring Guy Cobb of the Tennessee Superlabs – Nov 11
Episode 4 – is up for grabs…

What I want to do here is huge, it’s way bigger than what I can pull off by myself, so I have no problem asking anyone with any sort of social connection for help.

Here it comes: “Help!”

This thing, I hope, is just getting started. I look for every aspect of it to get better and better as we go along.

Thank you for your time and your support.

-Brent Diggs

See all the episode as they occur on drtoboggans.com and on youtube.

Preparing for a wedding can be tricky, even if it’s not yours.

Especially if it’s not yours.

Especially if, to pick a purely and totally hypothetical case, the wedding in question belongs to your daughter, your baby, the one you didn’t just watch grow up, but actually grew up alongside of. The always changing, yet comfortingly consistent part of your adult life.

The preparations are tiring and time consuming. The task oriented part of your brain begins to look forward to the completion your labors, “Just seven weeks to go,” it says.

And the rest of the brain is comforted by the news…until the slower moving emotional part catches on:

That’s when she leaves.

That’s when everything changes.

You remember earlier challenging times: diapers, tantrums, naps, and the fuzzy, unfocused wish for her eventual autonomy.

But as the moment approaches you realize you didn’t mean it. You never meant it.

And you scrape together your sanity for the fifteenth time.

And you play captain to the undisciplined mess of your emotions, calming them with a confident sounding command:

“Steady as she goes boys,

steady as she goes…”

The first ever Ominous Comma Bad Idea of the Week award goes to the Tennessee State Legislature for their enthusiasm to allow concealed firearms into bars and restaurants.

It’s just hard to imagine any recipe that starts with “Add one part firearms to two parts alcohol…” that doesn’t somehow end with “…serve chilled at your favorite morgue.”

What’s your take?

Is the inebriated ignition of projectiles an inalienable right or a pub-brawling public hazard?

No related posts.

On April 24^th Doctor Harold Toboggans, a previously thought fictional figure, made a live appearance at the third annual Memphis Zombie Massacre to promote his latest therapy product Zombies Anonymous.

It was a big hit as far as these things go, breaking all approval rating records among the unreal as well as the undead.

The overall course of the evening was as follows:

He came

He saw

He cured

He also received a great deal of praise as a humanitarian. Mostly from himself:

Click here to view the embedded video.

However, upon meeting the brave souls of the Shelby Memphis Zombie Response Force, some ulterior motives were revealed:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Between bloodthirsty zombies and ruthless vigilantes, how Doctor Toboggans came out unscathed is a profoundly saddening mystery. The very worst part, at least for me, was this moment here when at last I thought I was rid of him….

Click here to view the embedded video.

Only to be denied.

I have lot’s more Memphis Zombie media hidden in safe locations across the internet, but you look like a trustworthy bunch so I’ll let you know it’s here, here, here, and here.

–update–

The good Doctor also gives his own account of this incident at
The Adventures of Doctor Harold Toboggans

Happy Friday

Photo credit JLR Photography Video credit Dan Baker

Who will prevail?

Find out Friday April 24.

On the the streets of Memphis.

Well…not all of them. But Beale street for sure, and Third street, and Second.

And quite a bit of Main.

Don’t miss your chance to see Doctor Toboggans in person. You’ll not regret it.

I write to you today to bring news of two brave independent Memphis filmmaker. Men of mystery, purveyors of pixel and cellulose who create tales of tear-bringing beauty for the big screen, little screen, and every screen between.

Both are men of unquestioned artistic vision, masters of the both the craft and jargon¹ of cinematography; one is none too shabby with an energy weapon.

I know what you’re thinking at this point, “Enough about these guys already. Weren’t you once in an independent Memphis film?”

Why yes. Yes I was indeed. It is just this sort of dedication to my personal accomplishments that so endears me to you as an audience. But enough about me, the men I refer to are none other than “Chiseled” Chris Pollock and our own “Danger” Dan Baker.

Chris and Dan have worked together on several local independent films including Danger Couch and the Tinsel of Doom, Plain Jane, and now John Gray.

It is this last cinematic creation that I wish to discuss with you today.

Co-written and co-directed by Baker and Pollock, and produced by Paul Skidmore, John Gray is a semi-finalist in the Doorpost Film Project national competition and has a chance to win some serious money for these hard working artists.

This is where you come in, but I’ll let Dan tell it:

I really can’t speak highly enough about this film. It is a beautiful steampunk romance that gives no hint of its two-months-from-concept-to finish-production pace.

Well enough stalling. You heard the man, get to viewing.

Keep up Dan’s ongoing adventures at Danwrotethis.com
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And keep your fingers crossed as Doctor Toboggans meets the undead at the Memphis Zombie Massacre April 24th. Hopefully he’ll be eaten.

Images courtesy of JLR Photography -see more production pics here and here.

Today we interrupt the near ceaseless flow of comic mayhem that normally clogs these portals to bring you exciting news of great relevance to the humor writing world.

My friend Bill Snodgrass is taking submissions for a book of faux-scientific ninja humor to be published under his imprint Double-Edged Publishing.

Better known in the speculative fiction genre, Double-Edged is looking to branch out a bit into humor and this means an opportunity for me…us.

I know what you’re thinking, “Brent, you had me at ninja…” but hold on there are a few stipulations:

You will not be paid for your story.

You will not receive a free copy of the book.

But on the other hand, if accepted, you will be a published author and can plug your blog or other writings in your piece, and you won’t have to bribe anyone to print your brilliant literary achievement (again).

Go to ninja.doubleedgedpublishing.com for further details.

And for your writing inspiration please enjoy this ninjastastic video masterpiece by my band DangerCouch, the first and last name in musical ninja throwing star related injury.

Click here to view the embedded video.

What are you waiting for? Get cracking.

Don’t be a selfish twit. Let everyone know about this great opportunity by voting the phlegm out of it on humor-blogs.com

Today I would like to bring to your attention an artist of the highest caliber. A creator not just of beauty, but of auditory magic. A musician of such talent and rhythmic audacity that I am humbled to even mention his name in print.

In fact, due to certain ancient customs and several international treaties, I am forbidden to mention his name in print and must refer to him instead by his state approved pseudonym of SPF-100.

SPF-100, or SpiffCent as I like to call him, is a legend in the underground music scene. He not only rocks the Kasbah and surrounding areas with shimming waves of melodic grandeur, he also has been known to rouse the comatose with testosterone-laden beats and spleen-pounding rhythms of pure joy.

In laymen terms, his chops have chops of their own.

The fact that I raised SPF from a cub in no way limits my unbiased objectivity and unquestioned capacity for music appreciation. If anything, my judgment of his compositional skill is too conservative, as attested to by the following track called Believer.

Click the triangle to release the magic.

Download the magic here.

I know what you are thinking; all 6.2 million of you currently traveling the internet at this moment, a track of such sublime inspiration must be a fluke. No one could continue to function at this level of creative geniusity. Oh, but you’re wrong. Feast your tympani upon this number called Underwater.

Click this second triangle to summon greatness once more.

Download here.

Of all the revelations revealed today, possibly the greatest news of all is that you can listen to SPF-100’s already respectable body of work all day long via your favorite web browser and the SpiffCent musical reservoir located at Last.fm or even the secondary reserve residing at MySpace.

It’s a lot to absorb I know, but just take it one song at a time and everything will be fine.

This time of year, it is not unusual to hear from crowds of Christians bemoaning the current state of Christmas and how secular, and selfish, and generally Christ-deficient it has become.

It is also not unusual to view these people as whiners and spoilsports, out to ruin the fun for everyone else who doesn’t believe exactly as they do.

A perception that is substantially aided by the tone with which they present their case.

Which is generally whiny and obnoxious.

Now I think that most everyone would agree that Christmas has become over-commercialized. All you have to do is listen to the economic reports to realize that Christmas is Very Big Business, and given our struggling economy, is seen as the last shot at salvation for retailers across the county and perhaps around the world.

But although there are aspects of Christmas that most people don’t like, no one truly becomes dissatisfied with Christmas as it exists now, until they stumble across a glimpse of what it could be.

For example, what if instead of a struggle, or fight, or at best a festive crisis to be endured, Christmas could be a time of peace and reflection and generosity?¹

What if?

I don’t think anyone would be against it. Even the giant corporations would sign off on it, if they could still somehow receive their truckloads of consumer cash.²

This is where the glimpse comes in.

Notice I don’t say vision, or blueprint, or High Definition streaming video documentary. That’s because I don’t know exactly what a fully transformed and refreshing Christmas would look like. I don’t even know entirely how to get there. But I think I’ve seen the first step, and it looks like this:

Click here to view the embedded video.

adventconspiracy.org

Now, I don’t know these people, but I like what they’re doing. Notice how refreshing it is to see action and encouragement rather that just protest and attitude.

Who knew christians had it in them?³

If you can, please contribute to the water fund, because it is ridiculous that today with all the miraculous technology of the twenty-first century, people are still dying from dirty water. But even if you can’t part with any cash right now, try to cut back on obligation and debt this year, and focus more on actually being there with your loved ones. Not only will they understand, they’ll love it.

It’s not too late to save your Christmas.

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Surprisingly still listed at alltop.com, humor-blogs.com, and now Blogerella.