tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4265807702333607282009-11-24T19:47:12.435-05:00Boats, Music, Food, Faith, LifePaul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.comBlogger71125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-18269289012054195182009-11-24T17:38:00.006-05:002009-11-24T19:44:29.881-05:00

Last Sunday, I went to see Senator Joseph Lieberman to discuss healthcare. Of course, I wasn't alone. Five Hundred or so other people of faith, representing an unbelievably broad range of religious traditions, gathered at the high school across the street from Sen. Lieberman's condo and then marched over for a prayer vigil on the sidewalk. The event managed to grab a good bit of press and I

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-46340394726736042012009-10-01T00:01:00.000-04:002009-10-01T00:01:03.292-04:00

Last week, as I drove through the northwest corner of Connecticut, I noticed that the foliage up there was just beginning to turn colors. Yesterday, I looked out of my office window and saw a tree next door, covered with golden leaves. Walking out to my car after work, I noticed that the church's lawn was speckled with orange and brown leaves.In the spring of 2000, my family left Connecticut

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-30060585033864104332009-09-29T18:07:00.007-04:002009-09-29T21:57:36.227-04:00

Lately, I've been busy trying to make the most of the waning days of summer. I spent September 11-13 as part of the "Saints and Sinners Barbecue Team" competing in the Bar-B-Q Pit Competition at the Norwalk Oyster Festival (an event that had remarkably few oysters in evidence). This was the first time out for the team, which consisted of several members of the First Congregational Church of

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-6759978092529659762009-09-06T18:14:00.006-04:002009-09-06T20:33:38.596-04:00

In these waning days of summer, I've been grilling a lot. Part of it is because I'm going to be competing next weekend in the Norwalk Oyster Festival's Bar-B-Q Pit competition and partially because, well, it is pushing the end of summer and I figure that there's a lot of food out there that deserves to get grilled before the snow starts to fly.In peparation for the the Barbecue competition, I've

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-10838708333676643582009-08-24T18:38:00.002-04:002009-08-24T19:07:57.460-04:00

Perhaps you remember Jack Benny's classic schtick, here in a sketch with Grouch Marx... which reminds me of my son's first aquarium, where we named the fish after the Marx Brothers: Grouch, Harpo, Chico, Zeppo and Karl, but that's really not what I want to write about today...When I was growing up, Jack Benny (1894-1974) was already a thing of the past or, more accurately, he was a thing of the

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-39742923856436909832009-08-20T22:54:00.004-04:002009-08-24T18:38:15.258-04:00

Last week, the family piled into the station wagon and made a pilgrimage to America's second-most-visited national park: Acadia on Mount Desert Island. Over the years, we've been several times, camping in various campgrounds and coming to the conclusion that our absolute favorite one is Mount Desert Campground because it is right at the head of Somes Sound (said by some to be the only fjord on

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-51019513666812471242009-08-01T16:13:00.006-04:002009-08-01T18:21:56.191-04:00

Today, Kimberly and I traveled up to Sharon, CT, in the northwest corner of the state, to pick Ian up from summer camp. I've been driving to Sharon for years, first from the New Haven area when I was volunteering as a dean at Silver Lake, leading a conference on clowning, and then just as a camper's dad, driving from New Jersey, but this is the first year that I've made the trip up Rt. 22 from

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-1939614377061849192009-07-18T18:36:00.010-04:002009-07-31T14:09:10.308-04:00

"Time flies like the wind.Fruit flies like a banana." At least, that's what they say.Looking back, it is hard to believe that I've actually slacked off on writing a blog post for two entire months. In my defense, though, it has been an incredibly busy two months, especially the part where my laptop computer was stolen and I had to replace itWe've been settling into our new home, getting things

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-24974599450288316122009-07-28T22:06:00.007-04:002009-07-31T14:06:12.017-04:00

For the last couple weeks, I've been spending my Wednesday evenings doing what I love: sailing.One of my parishioners, Bob McGregor (pictured at the helm), knew of my addiction to boats and invited me to join his racing crew, so I've been going out with him and a collection of his friends each week and we've been racing his 34-foot C&C yacht, Scotch Flyer, out of Norwalk's Shore and Country Club.

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-70721198006503640762009-05-15T23:09:00.003-04:002009-05-15T23:25:07.614-04:00

My high-school classmate, Tripp Hudgins, and I were chatting back and forth on Facebook some time ago, discussing the possibility of him providing a posting on my (now defunct) cooking blog "Food in the Balance."In the run-up to Easter, life got very busy for Tripp (as a working pastor) and for me (as a temporarily "unencumbered" pastor who was working hard to get ready to pull up stakes and move

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-51185515196244283572009-05-15T17:04:00.004-04:002009-05-15T17:48:30.631-04:00

This Saturday marks the second week since my family moved to Norwalk, CT (and, yes, I'm only just now getting around to posting about it...).After picking up our U-Haul truck in Paterson, we brought it home and started the process of loading it with our worldly goods, a process which was greatly eased by the advance-work of our friends Evelyn and John, who had brought a truck and trailer down

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-90602915789440308182009-05-15T16:48:00.002-04:002009-05-15T16:52:07.465-04:00

I just came across this video produced by Amistad America about the Atlantic Freedom Tour. It opens with footage of the Great Chesapeake Bay Schooner Race and has some great shots of the schooner's construction and launch, as well as the footage of Amistad's time in Sierra Leone that is the focus of the video.

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-26727361176227540852009-04-17T16:08:00.003-04:002009-04-17T18:46:42.032-04:00

I began my new pastorate at the First Congregational Church, UCC, in Norwalk, CT on Palm Sunday, timing which is sort of the liturgical equivalent of taking a sip from a firehose. At the time, my big concern was that the excitement of my arrival would end up eclipsing the message of Palm Sunday, and I joked with several of the congregation's leaders that we needed to make sure that the church

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-2269283950227262922009-03-23T20:33:00.003-04:002009-03-23T22:14:47.266-04:00

My in-laws gave me a new cookbook for Christmas, The America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook. This cookbook, a revision of one that was first released in 2005, is produced by the same folks who publish Cooks Illustrated magazine. This loose-leaf (some assembly required) book offers recipes, product reviews, explanations and photos of techniques and, most interesting, results of tests that the

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-17845292530472156852009-03-21T10:06:00.007-04:002009-03-21T12:09:51.134-04:00

Last weekend was very busy. On Friday evening, friends from the River Edge church came over for dinner and were joined by my musical partner in crime, Eric Anderson. Eric stayed the night and, on Saturday, we performed at the Cresskill United Church of Christ, in a benefit concert for the church. Boys in Hats had been repeatedly advertised as a "country music duo," so, while we never perform

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-21262044474585809322009-03-08T21:48:00.002-04:002009-03-08T22:07:09.881-04:00

I spent this past weekend in Catonsville, Maryland, at my final meeting of the Board of Directors for the Central Atlantic Conference of the United Church of Christ, a group with a name that you shouldn't try to say five times really fast. I've been a member of the CAC's board for the last four years and have chaired the Mission, Vision & Communication working group of the board for the last two

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-78617538343501665232009-03-02T13:28:00.002-05:002009-03-02T14:23:09.823-05:00

It has been a quiet week here in River Edge, New Jersey.The dartboard that Ian had bought a few weeks ago began having serious scoring problems within only a day or two of our hanging it up in the basement, so he and I went back to Sears to return it this week. While wandering around the store, we noticed a bunch of dart boards up high on a shelf, away from the sporting goods section. Unlike the

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-4254798701557410882009-02-22T15:50:00.003-05:002009-02-22T15:59:37.613-05:00

The last few weeks have been a whirlwind of activity, with two Boys in Hats concerts, an ongoing adult education program at Trinity United Church in Warren, NJ, and a ski trip. The big news, however, is that yesterday and today were my candidating weekend at the First Congregational Church, United Church of Christ, of Norwalk, CT, and that, after worship this morning, the church called me to be

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-17248072334525029002009-02-13T10:18:00.003-05:002009-02-13T10:51:20.900-05:00

Yesterday, I wrote about Charles Darwin's 200th birthday, discussing the celebration in terms of the ongoing American kerfuffle about evolution v. creationism/intelligent design.Today, my high school classmate Tripp Hudgins, who is now a Baptist pastor, posted a fantastic article to his Facebook page that he gleaned from the New Scientist magazine website. It is about the Roman Catholic Church's

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-56859378547009379802009-02-12T17:39:00.005-05:002009-02-12T23:20:20.066-05:00

Today is the 200th birthday of Charles Darwin. I recently finished reading his travelogue, The Voyage of the Beagle, which I enjoyed immensely. As a consequence of having the book listed in my "What I'm Reading Now" section on this blog, I received an email from Peter McGrath, the director of the HMS Beagle Project. McGrath is working to build a replica of the HMS Beagle, which will "sail the

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-232665206392984342009-02-09T15:22:00.002-05:002009-02-09T15:28:18.079-05:00

It’s official. I'm old.I say this not because of my own advancing years, but because I have reached a secondary milestone in my life. As of today, I am the parent of a (gasp!!) teenager.It was 13 years ago today that my very roly-poly wife turned to me as I was getting ready to head off to work and told me, "The contractions have started." As we got ready to leave the house, Kimberly informed me

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-34247102077439930902009-02-03T09:44:00.000-05:002009-02-03T11:14:49.990-05:00

Back when I worked at the Congregational Church of Naugatuck, CT, in the 1990s, the music director, several members of the choir and I would regularly make a post-rehearsal pilgrimage to a corner bar in Union City. It was one of those dives with lots of character, a turn-of-the-century building, old and battered, with pressed-tin walls and ceilings and ornate plumbing in the restrooms. There were

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-7748087192552580212009-02-02T19:24:00.001-05:002009-02-02T19:55:31.511-05:00

This past Sunday, I was back at Trinity United Church in Warren, NJ, the church where I led an adult education program back in the early fall, From Amistad to Guantanamo: Justice Ministries in the United Church of Christ. This time, I was teaching the first installment of a three-part series about prophets.On Sunday, we went over what Biblical prophets were and what they weren't. (They were

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-33930431307288334012009-01-27T23:16:00.001-05:002009-01-28T02:35:34.102-05:00

While I was playing Scrabble on Facebook tonight, I was chatting with my friend, Ina. A native of Hawaii, Ina was lamenting her inability to find decent poi in New Jersey. Our conversation ran through some of the various cusine that we had sampled in our various travels and Ina asked me if I had heard of "The Omnivore's Hundred." I hadn't.At it turns out, "the Omnivore's Hundred" is a list of

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-426580770233360728.post-14420237446953092312008-08-17T16:26:00.000-04:002009-01-25T17:52:29.252-05:00

I am not a vegetarian.Though I have the deepest respect for vegetarians, I just couldn’t be one. While I certainly enjoy a nice salad, a diet consisting entirely of “rabbit food” has never had the least appeal to me and the whole genre of 1970s style “fake meat” recipes leaves me cold. As a Southern boy, something tells me that pulled tofu barbecue doesn’t even bear thinking about. Still, I’ve

Paul Bryant-Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11556323918280508217RevPaulUCC@gmail.com0