The Wordy Shipmates

... by Sarah Vowell.

Sarah Vowell covers the puritan roots of the U.S.A. In doing so, she touches on themes that shape America today.

She argues that many American splits, are similar, if not rooted in, to the events that shaped puritan America.

She covers separation of church and state and shows how this was necessary for two reasons; to keep the state out of the church and to keep one church from ruling. The puritans prevented the Catholics or Anglicans from ruling America by demanding separation of Church and State.

She argues that the anti elitism we see today is a logical extension of the puritan church-- which struggled to become not-Catholic, not hierarchical. Where each local church ran itself independently and mistrusted outside experts.

The Drowsy Chaperon

This is a decent comedy/musical. It's basically a few good songs, strung together by a thin plot, which it admits to and embraces.

The premise is that a man, puts on a record of an old musical. While he listens to the record, the musical happens in the back ground.

The man adds his commentary to the recording-- pointing out how weak the story is, skipping over bad scenes, repeating interesting points and pausing to explain details about the actors and the production.

The Drowsy Chaperon is good postmodern fun. It doesn't try to be deep or edgy. It just wants to be a lite and entertaining musical. At that it succeeds..