Word: banality
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...devastating earthquakes in China, the Colorado flood, the mysterious ailment that struck the American Legionnaires in Philadelphia-all suggest a more fundamental, and realistic, perspective. It would be banal to say that such demonstrations of nature's awesome force restore man's humility. Still, it is worth repeating the thesis of French Biologist Jacques Monod that events -and mostly the event of life itself-are profoundly random...
Surprisingly Tart. In the circumstances, the on-camera people - excepting a resolutely benign BBC royalist named Frank Gillard - were surprisingly tart. Low-profile Anchor Man Robert MacNeil thought the toasts banal even by the dull standards pertaining to events of this sort; Cooking Expert Julia Child - her usual burbling self as she nibbled and chatted with White House Chef Henry Haller - let fly publicly at the undignified quality of the showfolks' contributions; and Upstairs, Downstairs' Jean Marsh took politely dim views of everything from American vegetables to the institution of monarchy. The PBS cameras, fighting through the longueurs...
...girl named Wendy insists that her life works. She's come straight from Transcendental Meditation, and she's just here to seek further enlightenment. Ron observes she is full of shit. He launches into a banal ten-hour lecture on est epistemology. Most of what we know consists of received ideas and secondhand experiences. We see the world through a glaze of beliefs and ideas. Thinking is crap-the yammering in the back of our heads. Ron wiggles his fingers behind his head to show us how foolish thinking...
Everyone in Council of Love shows a lot of skin, but excess is rarely titillating. The gold costumes of the bare-assed angels, their short aprons secured by thongs, don't need to be so banal. The Pope's Children, on the other hand, are artfully decked out in the bizarre and gaudy clothes of medieval Italy, and Alexander VI's cap is shoved raffishly and appropriately over his eyes...
...spectre of Hank Williams hangs most heavily over his son. Hank Jr. has been a country singer since his late teens, but only with the Friends album has he been able to break out of the pattern of bland and banal country tunes that marked his previous albums. Still, he is haunted by comparisons with a ghost he must feel hovers at his shoulder. The best song on Friends is "Living Proof," a testament to what it means to be the son of Hank Williams...