Tidbits, Odds, and Ends

1.  Started a food stock today.  Mostly canned goods, some pasta and rice.  Next week I'll get tomato sauce, tuna, peanut butter, more pasta.  Why?  For one, it really is reasonable to believe that since the rise in food prices outpaces the savings dividends of, say, several hundred dollars in a Money Market account, it would be money well invested.  For another, all those people that lived in the Depression and WWII always had huge stockpiles of food, even decades afterward.  It was a lesson they never forgot.  I tend to think it was a good one to hang onto.  Besides, you never know.  If nothing else, it will give you a resource if you ever see someone who really needs a hand feeding themselves or their families.  Just fill a bag or two and bring it to them.  You're prepared to help others as well as yourself.

2.  Plan on planting a garden, though it's probably too late this year.  I had one years ago, and it was great. 

3.  Starting to build up a stock of woodcraft items for sale.  I might see about getting a booth at the annual Pumpkin Festival across the river.  Might be nice to see a little bit of a return on my hobby, help pay for a few tools I'd like to get.  BTW, if there's been an item I've shown here that you might be interested in ordering, just message me and I'll try to come up with a fair price. 

4.  I'm one of the few who's not entirely angry about gas prices, at least on a personal level.  Since the company I work for sells items to the Railroads, with the cost of shipping leading many to turn to the railroads for freight delivery, and the possiblity of passenger rail making a comeback, all that extra traffic on the rails means a lot more maintenance and new trackage.  Which means lots of orders for us.  Which means job security for moi.  So my advice is:  get a job related to the Rail industry.

5.  I can name at least ten of the Fisher Price Little People.  I can sing the theme song by memory.  I can tell you the life stories of those little beings.  And so can my daughter.  Over and over and over...

6.  Here's hoping Miley Cyrus hits the billion dollar net worth mark and announces her official retirement.  Nice girl, disgusting marketing freak show.  I hate the tween business strategy (and that's exactly what it is.  A category created soley by business interests).  Hate it, hate it, hate it.

7.  Just because it's been so long since I've said anything about it (to the delight of a few, I'm sure):  Abortion is still manslaughter.  Abortion on demand is still a moral tragedy.  Roe v. Wade is still monumentally bad case law, internally inconsistent and constitutionally laughable.

8.  McCain's 'ties' to John Hagee are not the logical equivalent of Obama's ties to Rev. Wright, however one feels about Wright or Hagee.  Hagee simply endorsed McCain.  Wright baptised Obama and his children, and has been a close, personal friend for 20 years.  The ridiculous nature of the 'Wright controversy' is not reason to try and conjure some half-baked parallel with Hagee/McCain.  I heard this odd little piece of 'reasoning' on some progressive radio show yesterday.  The Randi Rhodes show, I believe.  The leftist equivalent to Hannity.  Just as useless.

9.  I'm debating whether or not our family should go to King's Island in Cincinnati, OH for Memorial Day weekend.  It will be a madhouse, I'm sure.  Do I really want to step into that insanity with a two-year old?  All comments welcome.

10.  Did you know that you're supposed to inflate the tires on your car according to the recommended PSI on the data plate on the inside of the driver's side door, NOT according to what the tire itself is rated on the sidewall?  I didn't.  Maybe that's why my 50K mile tires only lasted 30K...

Amen, Rev. Wright.

The general consensus in liberal circles, and the popular media, is that Rev. Wright's refusal to shut up and lay low is a case of poor judgment, that it will only serve to hinder the political prospects of a man that he himself supports and who advocates many of the political views (though supposedly not the most controversial ones) that Wright himself does.  In other words, by standing his ground and refusing to just 'go away', Wright is shooting himself in the foot politically, and not just his own foot, but that of the progressive movement and Barack supporters as well.

I could say a lot about Rev. Wright.  I could discuss where I agree and disagree with him.  I could discuss the Black Liberation theology he espouses, which I do not.  But I'll leave that along for now, and instead just say this:  for those of us of a conservative persuasion, the kind who would generally be more prone to listening to the likes of Glenn Beck, Limbaugh, and Fox News, we need to stop and remember something.  That something is that, in the simplest terms, what is happening here is that you have a preacher who is standing up and, at the risk of sabotaging his own political interests (by sabotaging the candidate most sympathetic to them.  Indeed, a member of his own church and a close friend), is unwilling to be quiet and allow the mass media to define what his message is.  Agree with him or not, he is willing to stand as a critical voice of a government that he believes is unjust and acting in contradiction to the biblical mandate given to all governments by God.  Whether or not it actually is is not the point here.  The point is that he is convinced that it is acting unjustly and outside the bounds of its divinely proscribed limits, and is therefore not willing to allow either massive media pressure or the interests of those in that government that are his own allies to keep him from fulfilling that duty which is the duty of all 'men of God', to act as a voice of conscience in the public square.

And I hear very few in conservative Christian circles who are either able or willing to acknowledge this. 

You better stop listening to the pundits that coddle and comfort you, and start listening to Scripture.  This man may be mistaken in some of his facts (though fewer than you think, and you better be careful which ones you take issue with, because he really is a very, very intelligent man), but he is not acting out of step with his calling.  On the contrary, he is fulfilling an aspect of that calling with the highest integrity and courage.

Oh, and one more thing:  anything the media machine can do to a pastor of the 'liberal' persuasion it can just as easily do to a pastor of the 'conservative' persuasion.  That includes your pastor.   Be careful what you cheer for.  Or you may find your chickens coming home to roost...

Think about it

The average American male probably can't:

-change a tire.  That's what AAA is for.

-change the oil in the car.  That's what Jiffy Lube is for

-build a fire.  Something kids used to be able to do by accident.

-tie a square knot.  "How do you get a square from a piece of rope, dude?"

-fix a dripping faucet.  That's what plumbers are for.  You think it's only women calling those handy man services these days?  Wrong.

-read a measuring tape beyond 1/4" increments.  Maybe because we don't have money called 'eighths'.  But that's okay.  Now we have talking tape measures and dummy tapes with all the little fractions right there on the tape.  Just watch a guy trying to measure something in 1/16ths or less.  The finger counting each tiny line is the give-away.

-wire a simple light fixture.  Again, call the 'handy man'.  Soon those guys will be making $50 an hour just like plumbers and electricians, for doing stuff grandma could do if she wasn't afraid of falling off the chair and breaking a hip.  Oh wait.  They do make $50 an hour already...

-whittle a toothpick.  Whittle?  Do you know anyone that whittles?  Go anywhere where there are at least a half dozen guys and try to even borrow a pocketknife.  Unless at least one of them is over forty, chances are you'll be out of luck.  And big street knives made for 'shanking' a 'banger are not what I'm talking about.  Why is that guys don't carry pocket knives today anyway?  I remember when every kid over six had one.  Oh yeah, that's right.  These days a kid with a two inch pocket knife in school ends up on the evening news flanked by guys in black jackets with SWAT in big white letters on the back and riot gear.  Guess I answered that one for myself. 

-sit in a quiet room for ten minutes with nothing but his own thoughts without going insane.  This is because he has no thoughts.  This is because there are no quiet rooms anymore.  This is because you're no longer allowed to use words like insane.  That would be insensitive.  Chances are, the only thing he would do is break something, deface something, or start yelling for the heck of it.  Kinda like a big gorilla in a cage.

-think of a good story to tell their kids at night before bed.  That's why we stick a t.v. and dvd player in their room instead.  There once was even a thing called Dial-A-Story, where a kid could call up and listen to a pre-recorded story before going to sleep.  Isn't that sweet?

-discipline his kids.  I just wanna be his buddy.  Besides, I'm too tired/drunk/busy to do anything more than either send them to mom or occasionally explode and dump three weeks of bottled-up aggression on the kid for the grand offense of spilling their juice cup or some other minor offense.

-seem to remember when baseball was getting as many other kids together as you could find in ten minutes, grabbing whatever kind of ball that approximated the size of a baseball, a few gloves, and a bat, and heading to the nearest open area.  Oh, heck no.  Where's the uniforms?  The shiny gear?  The four umpires?  The red-face coach who fantsizes that he's actually heading a MLB team?  The parents with .44 Magnums aimed at one of those four umpires for calling his kid out?  You mean, you can actually play ball and have fun without all that?  Surely not.  Besides, Joey from down the street isn't much of a reference on my son's college application.  When's the last time you even saw a 'sandlot' ballgame?  Nah.  They're inside getting fat pretending they're A-Rod or Dave Ortiz on the 52" Flat Screen.  At least they're safe there, right?

-see why carrying a 'nine' in their droopy pants doesn't make them tough at all.  Here's partly why: right now in Iraq there's a popular trend among the guys that actually have to go out and do the foot patrolling.  Tomahawks.  No, not the cruise missile.  Not those sponge things at Atlanta Braves games.  Real ones.  Wicked looked things.  Right out of some Lord of the Rings battle scene.  Guys are carrying them over there, and they keep them right out in full view.  And you know what?  They scare the bat snot out of the punks in the insurgent groups.  Know why?  Because even though they're punks, they've got one thing right that we don't.  Guns don't make you tough.  Spraying bullets from a distance, or calling in an air strike, are something anybody can do.  When you actually look a guy in the eye, when it's hand to hand, knife to knife - then you find out who's tough.  The guy that's willing to say, "Yeah, I'll get right up to you man.  Close enough to whisper": that's the guy you don't want to mess with. 

You want my personal theory on why so many guys still join the military?  Because it's one of the last places where the average American male feels he can prove to himself that he's a man.  I'm not just talking about chest-thumping machismo here.  I'm talking about being able to test yourself, where nobody's going to coddle you and have parades over mediocrity.  Where if you feel good about yourself it's because you've got a good reason to.  Where your actions matter.  Does the government use that to manipulate young men to unethical and immoral ends?  Yup.  And it's a real tragedy.  But unless we're willing to put a little risk back in life and teach boys how to actually live, then don't complain too much.  It may be that the ones that manage to survive and keep their sanity intact may be the only real leaders we've got left.

But, in the interest of egalitarianism, here's a list for the womyn:

The average American womun:

-can't sew a button back on.  There you go, right off the bat wanting to put women back on the frontier, in chains and pregnant.  Uh.  No.  I just mentioned a button.  Calm down.  It's just that guys never were all that good at it.  Women used to be.  It would be nice for at least one half of the race to remember just how to put them buggers back on.  Besides, I thought you were all about proving how you're just as smart as men?  So now in terms of buttonology, you're now just as dumb as we are.  Yeah, that's progress.

-freaks out when her kid cries.  I mean, go into a panic attack.  I get the whole mommy thing that favors the soft touch while dad supposedly is the one who says, "Oh quit crying and get up".  But now it's Call the Ambulance!  My kid has a bruise!  Call the doctor, he has a rash!  Gimme antibiotics!  Do an X-ray!  And why don't we have universal health care to pay for all of this because my poor baby is suffering!

There was a time when one of the ways you identified a kid was by all the scrapes on their legs.  I can remember climbing trees and getting into a few where I stopped and found myself thinking, "It didn't look this tall from the ground.  I think I should have stopped about five branches ago."  Now mom sees Johnny in that tree and dials 911 on the cell, screaming for a fire truck to come get her little baby down.

You got yourself up there kid.  Get yourself down.  You're failing science class because you don't pay attention or do your work, and you want me to tell the principle to move you to a different class because the teacher said something mean to you?  Shut up. Do your work.  Quit crying about it.  No, I am not going to be your lawyer pitted against your teacher.  You want a car/new shoes/X-box?  Get a job.  Go mow lawns.  Shovel snow.  Sell burgers.  Wash dishes.  I already clothe, feed, house, shuttle, and care for you in a thousand other ways you don't even know about.  $200 sneakers ain't listed under the list of my responsibilities as a parent.

-doesn't understand why unit prices are important when shopping.  For all your vaulted expertise in the area of consumerism, you still don't know what that second price on the shelf means.  Personally, I think this is the real reason grocery bills are going up these days.  Not ethanol. 

-thinks a nightclub is actually going to be the place to meet the man of her dreams.  See, unfortunately, the reverse actually is true.  Men probably can find the woman of their dreams there.  Pretty.  Shallow.  Low self-image, which makes here easy to control.  Desperate.  Willing to take her clothes off for virtually no commitment in return beyond a promise to use 'protection'.  So life if still unfair for you.  Which really is a shame.  But then again, you can't expect otherwise when you refuse to face the fact that a place where people go to get drunk and find sex  probably doesn't hold good odds of finding someone who won't do the same thing just because he has a ring on his hand.  But hey, you never know, right?

-can't shoot a gun.  Is afraid of guns.  There was a day in this nation where anybody dumb enough to trespass on the farm while the woman was home alone with the kids got a chestful of buckshot.  Now guns are icky, scary, evil, and "Gosh that thing is loud!  Don't they make them quieter?"

-can't think of a single lullaby to sing to their baby.  Don't worry, they sell neat little machines at WalMart that sing to them instead, and even project cute little pictures on the ceiling.

BTW, most of what is on these lists is interchangeable.  Okay, I'm done.  For now.

Decline-of-Western-Civilization Moment

1.  Apparently we now air the disgusting details of our collapsed marriages as a divorce tactic via YouTube.  Three cheers for the new media, eh?

Actually, in a way, I can sympathize with what she's doing.  She's at least partly trying to appeal to the public's sense of shame (or rather, her husband's).  But I've got news for her: it is the very act of Youtubeization (my phrase, a nickel every time you use it), and others of its kind that have helped eliminate the very concept of shame to begin with!  So in a sense, she's just picked up a shovel and joined in digging the ground out from beneath the very thing she's hoping will enable 'justice' to prevail.

Dig fast, lady.  Time's running out.

2.  I will be the first to defend the idea that trying to compartmentalize our humanity into physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual components, thinking that they aren't all part of an integrated whole, is dangerous and harmful on both a personal and community level.  The church is probably just as guilty of falling into that trap as anyone else.  But today I find this story:  The Biggest Loser: "I Am A Whole New Woman".

No.  You are partly 'new'.  Congratulations.  It's just a shame that we're all raving about your physical triumph, but left to wonder about whether you've invested much in what will actually still matter five minutes after that glorious new body is fertilizing grass.  But I won't blame you too much.  It's not easy for that t.v. camera to capture the beauty of a soul.  Boobs, butts, and abs make for much better viewing.

Major Project Completed

 Today I finally completed a project I started at least two months ago.  Most of that was waiting for the table top, which I had custom built and shipped to me.  It was the one phase of the project I didn't want to try my hand at.  But the rest was all built in shop (except the router of course, which I just got from Amazon).  For those who may not recognize what it is, this is a cabinet style router table.  To buy one outright like this would probably cost over $1000, without the router.  This one probably ran me around half that price.  And it was a ton of fun to build.  I still have a couple cosmetic touches to make, like putting a face veneer on the table frame support to hide the screws, but other than that, it's done and fully functional.  So here it is:

Detail of fence.  The faces in front are split and adjust by loosening four wing nuts in back to keep the bit as enclosed as possible, for safety reasons.  The fence itself clamps to the table top on either end.  Dust collection at the bit keeps everything neat.

Detail of dust collection in back.