‘Calmer than you are …’:
GODSTUFF’s goin’ on vacation

Hiya friends,
God Girl here. After a marathon week of GODSTUFF columns, I didn’t want you to be whipsawed when they disappeared altogether for a little while.

Ya see, I’ve got this book to finish (in five weeks, but who’s countin’) and I’m taking a short sabbatical from the twice-weekly newspaper column to get ‘er done.

GODSTUFF will return mid-July.

In the meantime, I’ll be popping up in this space from time to time with random braindroppings about God and culture and stuff, while I immerse myself even further into the fantastical world that is the Coen Brothers’ oeuvre.

Sin Boldly: A Field Guide for Grace is off to the printer, and when GODSTUFF returns, it’ll be only a few weeks before SB hits a bookshelf near you.

And as for the Dude … The Dude Abides: The Gospel According to the Coen Brothers is still on schedule to be released in April ’09. I just gotta finish writing it.

Thank you for your prayers and support.
Enjoy your summer and remember: Grace (and sunscreen).

Big Smooches,
GG

Way out west there was this fella I wanna tell ya about. Fella by the name of Jeff Lebowski. At least that was the handle his loving parents gave him, but he never had much use for it himself. This Lebowski, he called himself The Dude. Now, “Dude”, there’s a name no one would self-apply where I come from. But then, there was a lot about the Dude that didn’t make a whole lot of sense to me. And a lot about where he lived, likewise. But then again, maybe that’s why I found the place so durned interestin’. They call Los Angeles the “City Of Angels”, but I didn’t find it to be that, exactly. But I’ll allow it as there are some nice folks there. ‘Course, I can’t say I seen London, and I never been to France. And I ain’t never seen no Queen in her damned undies, as a fella says. But I’ll tell you what… after seein’ Los Angeles, and this here story I’m about to unfold, well, I guess I seen somethin’ every bit as stupefyin’ as you’d see in any of them other places. And in English, too. So I can die with a smile on my face, without feelin’ like the good Lord gypped me. Now this here story I’m about to unfold took place back in the early ’90s – just about the time of our conflict with Saddam and the I-raqis. I only mention it because sometimes there’s a man… I won’t say a hero, ’cause what’s a hero? But sometimes, there’s a man – and I’m talkin’ about the Dude here – sometimes, there’s a man, well, he’s the man for his time and place. He fits right in there. And that’s the Dude. In Los Angeles. And even if he’s a lazy man – and the Dude was most certainly that. Quite possibly the laziest in Los Angeles County, which would place him high in the runnin’ for laziest worldwide – Sometimes there’s a man… Sometimes, there’s a man. Ah, I lost my train of thought here. But… aw, hell. I done introduced him enough.

— The Stranger