Anyone who walks their dog or has a yard dog knows about the importance of the scoop. My husband brought one home about 3 weeks ago and gave it to me. He actually bought it for me. I was too cheap to buy one and remarked often enough that I would like to have one that he bought one for me. We have 6 dogs. They create a lot of stuff to scoop.
Now comes the fun part. All of you young people out there (everyone under 30) repeat after me.
"When I grow up and get married, some day I will be happy to have my spouse buy me a poop scoop for no reason at all except that I wanted it."
"When I grow old, I will be just like the other old people and discuss my surgeries, my aches and pains and exchange doctors' name with my friends."
"When I grow old, it won't matter if my spouse forgets my birthday or anniversary because I have probably forgotten it as well."
"When I grow old, I will do what my parents do now and embarrass my own children. I will pass gas in public and not seem to care. I will wear outdated and sometimes tattered clothes. I will speak my mind and say things that surprise, maybe even shock, my children."
Few, if any, will believe that you will do any of those retched things when you grow older. I know I did not. My husband and I are both in our sixties and the ravages of time march on. When we were young and in our prime, we thought that we could fend off those telltale signs of age. For a while, it appeared as though we were succeeding.
Then one day, I go to the doctor and when the nurse says the scale reads 170 I am in shock. I knew I had gained some weight, but not 20 pounds. I now would like to be as low as 170. My husband goes to the doctor and within 2 weeks is having open heart surgery. That was 3 years ago.
We cannot hold back time. It sprints past us regardless of what we do. We can only live life one day at a time. Those dreams of aging gracefully and never looking nor acting like "old people" are just that - dreams. Try as we might, we can only do so much. We can tuck, color, snip and suck in the exterior, but we are still aging. And in a society that practically worships youth and all its trappings, it is difficult to look upon the aging process as a good thing, but it is.
We learn as we age and sometimes it seems we have repeated the same error so many times that we are learning nothing, we have learned a great deal. We have also taught others, if only not to repeat the folly of our own disastrous decisions. What we learn, or should learn, is that if the heart is right, it matters not what the outside looks like anyway.
Shalom. Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem.
Friday, February 11, 2011
Mr. Travis Alford - He will Be Missed
Travis Alford, 83, died yesterday morning around 6:00 am serving his district. As he was clearing a tree from the road, a driver of a pick-up truck struck Mr. Travis killing him. Evidently the driver did not see Mr. Travis's truck with the hazard lights flashing and Mr. Travis could not hear the vehicle approaching with the chain saw running. Realizing they had struck someone, they stopped and tried to help.
Mr. Travis had been the supervisor for this district for 43 years and had full intention of running for office in the next election. Mr. Travis was a statesman, not a politician. He did what was right for his district. He helped everyone who asked and even those who did not.
The county expense reports are posted in our local paper from time to time and what I personally noticed was when the supervisors took a trip to Jackson for a meeting, while there were those who turned in amounts of $500.00 or more, Mr. Travis turned in what he would have spent had the trip been his personal trip and it was often less than $100.00. He was that kind of man. He was an anomaly in today's world - he was an honest man in public office.
He led a full life and died still giving to his community. At 83 he was still running a chainsaw and clearing trees for those of us in the county. I never heard him speak ill of anyone. He was always friendly and had a cheerful kind word for everyone.
He will be missed.
Shalom. Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem.
Mr. Travis had been the supervisor for this district for 43 years and had full intention of running for office in the next election. Mr. Travis was a statesman, not a politician. He did what was right for his district. He helped everyone who asked and even those who did not.
The county expense reports are posted in our local paper from time to time and what I personally noticed was when the supervisors took a trip to Jackson for a meeting, while there were those who turned in amounts of $500.00 or more, Mr. Travis turned in what he would have spent had the trip been his personal trip and it was often less than $100.00. He was that kind of man. He was an anomaly in today's world - he was an honest man in public office.
He led a full life and died still giving to his community. At 83 he was still running a chainsaw and clearing trees for those of us in the county. I never heard him speak ill of anyone. He was always friendly and had a cheerful kind word for everyone.
He will be missed.
Shalom. Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem.
The Nobel Prize - Peace and Economic Science?
It has often befuddled me as to why people win the Nobel Prize. I do understand the solid contributions in Physics, Chemistry and Medicine. Literature - some understanding.
The two areas that truly baffle me are the Nobel Peace Prize and the Prize in Economic Sciences (which is not a Nobel Prize but a prize in memory of Alfred Nobel through the central bank of Sweden).
The Nobel Peace Prize - really? I am truly dense, but do not see the results of the Peace Prize. All I see are more wars and rumors of wars, just like the Bible says. Whereas in Chemistry, Physics and Medicine I can truly see what has been done and how it has furthered the knowledge of mankind in general.
In current history all I have witnessed for peace are the grandiose attempts that politicians make to say they are promoting peace when in fact they are only promoting their own agenda. That is fine for them, but I do not see why they need to be awarded a prestigious prize for doing so.
And what is Economic Science? "Contributions in this category have dealt largely with the analytical structures of theoretical economic models, often highlighting the formal similarity of these structures, and clarifying the conditions for consistency, equilibrium, stability and efficiency of the economic system. Often, these contributions also have included important comparative static experiments, i.e., analyses of how equilibrium positions change in response to changes in various exogenous factors (parameters)." ["The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 1969-2007". Nobelprize.org. 11 Feb 2011http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/economics/articles/lindbeck/index.html].
Okay!? What really confounds the issue for me is, it is really simple. If you have funds, you can spend them. If you don't have funds, you can't spend them. But then there is credit and it is the idea that you can borrow money you do not have to pay for things that you do not need that gives rise to economic gobbledygook speak. I know this is a simplistic way of viewing the study of economics but, really? When the general public had the idea that banks only loaned money to those that had money, the economy was a bit more stable. As the government stepped in and made it almost mandatory that people who had low incomes be given the chance to go into debt well above their means, the mortgage holders started having problems that snowballed and everyone expects the government to bail them out. It was, after all, the government that pushed them into it. Right? Wrong. It was greed that pushed them into it and expecting to not have any repercussions as the result of bad business decisions.
The law of supply and demand has been usurped by the governments desire to make everyone equal and have no one lose money. When the boll weevil devastated cotton crops, the government would have stepped in and subsidized the cotton growers. Instead, the cotton growers found a new crop that made them more money and was hardier - the lowly peanut. People become industrious and creative when faced with poverty or hunger, if they know there is no one to bail them out when the going gets tough.
I am not saying that people should not help one another, I am saying that the government needs to let things go their course and quit propping up failing endeavors.
Families lived on budgets for thousands of years. Even during the famine in Egypt, there was no government handout. GOD provided by giving Joseph the knowledge of what was to come and how to avoid everyone starving. The grain did not go for free. When the inhabitants ran out of money, they turned over a portion of their land.
As far as peace goes, there will be no peace until THE LORD returns and sets things right.
Shalom. Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem.
The two areas that truly baffle me are the Nobel Peace Prize and the Prize in Economic Sciences (which is not a Nobel Prize but a prize in memory of Alfred Nobel through the central bank of Sweden).
The Nobel Peace Prize - really? I am truly dense, but do not see the results of the Peace Prize. All I see are more wars and rumors of wars, just like the Bible says. Whereas in Chemistry, Physics and Medicine I can truly see what has been done and how it has furthered the knowledge of mankind in general.
In current history all I have witnessed for peace are the grandiose attempts that politicians make to say they are promoting peace when in fact they are only promoting their own agenda. That is fine for them, but I do not see why they need to be awarded a prestigious prize for doing so.
And what is Economic Science? "Contributions in this category have dealt largely with the analytical structures of theoretical economic models, often highlighting the formal similarity of these structures, and clarifying the conditions for consistency, equilibrium, stability and efficiency of the economic system. Often, these contributions also have included important comparative static experiments, i.e., analyses of how equilibrium positions change in response to changes in various exogenous factors (parameters)." ["The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 1969-2007". Nobelprize.org. 11 Feb 2011http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/economics/articles/lindbeck/index.html].
Okay!? What really confounds the issue for me is, it is really simple. If you have funds, you can spend them. If you don't have funds, you can't spend them. But then there is credit and it is the idea that you can borrow money you do not have to pay for things that you do not need that gives rise to economic gobbledygook speak. I know this is a simplistic way of viewing the study of economics but, really? When the general public had the idea that banks only loaned money to those that had money, the economy was a bit more stable. As the government stepped in and made it almost mandatory that people who had low incomes be given the chance to go into debt well above their means, the mortgage holders started having problems that snowballed and everyone expects the government to bail them out. It was, after all, the government that pushed them into it. Right? Wrong. It was greed that pushed them into it and expecting to not have any repercussions as the result of bad business decisions.
The law of supply and demand has been usurped by the governments desire to make everyone equal and have no one lose money. When the boll weevil devastated cotton crops, the government would have stepped in and subsidized the cotton growers. Instead, the cotton growers found a new crop that made them more money and was hardier - the lowly peanut. People become industrious and creative when faced with poverty or hunger, if they know there is no one to bail them out when the going gets tough.
I am not saying that people should not help one another, I am saying that the government needs to let things go their course and quit propping up failing endeavors.
Families lived on budgets for thousands of years. Even during the famine in Egypt, there was no government handout. GOD provided by giving Joseph the knowledge of what was to come and how to avoid everyone starving. The grain did not go for free. When the inhabitants ran out of money, they turned over a portion of their land.
As far as peace goes, there will be no peace until THE LORD returns and sets things right.
Shalom. Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem.
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Can You Really Do ANYTHING You Want To Do?
I am a woman. There are things that I cannot do regardless of how much I want to do them. Part of the reason that I cannot do some things is because I am a woman. That is just the way it is. It is reality. Deal with it.
When I was six, I wanted to be a dancer, so Mom took me to ballet class. The teacher, during one of her less intelligent moments, told me that I could never be a ballerina because I was too tall. I never went back to class. She evidently did not realize the benefits of simply taking lessons and had never heard of the Radio City Music Hall Rockettes.
I could have been a dancer in spite of Miss Twit. At six, I liked the idea of the Prima Ballerina, but had no heart for the occupation at that point. That was one of the first of those well-intentioned put-downs. While my mother was telling me I could be anything I wanted to be, the world and others were continually telling me that it just was not going to happen.
I wanted to be a stewardess, but was, again, too tall. I wanted to sing, but was told at age 12 that I could not carry a tune in a bucket. I did keep on singing every chance I got but never pursued it seriously. Now, I realize that I should have.
The media, in the 1960's started telling women that they could do anything, be anything, have anything all without benefit of a man. Women's Liberation became all the rage and we women were liberated. It is still baffling as to what exactly we were liberated from. Possibly the liberation was from moral restraints which only served to bind us to our flesh without regard to the consequences. Equal pay for equal work was a good thing and it served to bind us to our occupations, give us heartburn and torment us with the burden of failure to give that time to our families. Burning bras and wanton sex was only liberating for the moment. Gravity got us back to the bra while venereal disease (now nicely known as STD's) showed us why wanton sexual conduct is a bad idea. We now have more types of VD than we did before our liberation. Most of those new diseases affect women only and are transmitted by men.
Women can now play sports that were once reserved for men. Women can now walk into a male locker room as a reporter. Women can openly treat men as playthings and adornments. Women can now give their children to their husbands, run off and find themselves. We gained the advantage of being able to talk trash, get no respect because of our womanhood, have sex with whomever, whenever and live empty lives without fear of societal retribution because we are liberated. We can legally kill our babies in the womb, but God forgive us if we kill them after they are born, after all killing a baby is wrong. Yes, that is a contradiction.
Yes, we can do anything we want to do, but believe me when I say there are consequences for everything we do whether it be for bad or for good. Could I be brain surgeon? Sure with 12 additional years of school/training. I drove an 18 wheeler, so why not be a brain surgeon?
Speaking of driving a big rig, it was an interesting experience. I originally learned to drive a truck in order to drive with my ex-husband. When I quit my cushy job as an office manager to drive a truck, he told me he did not want to go back to driving and that I was out there on my own, hence the ex. While I was out there, many men were highly resentful of my presence and had the idea that I took a man's job away from him. It is a good job. It is a tough job and it is not a job for just anyone - male or female.
Can we do anything? Maybe, but first we need to know that it is the area that we have a talent for, something that we have a burning desire to do, something that is right for us in the eyes of GOD. Many paths are fraught with difficulties and trials particularly the paths that are right for us. GOD will give us the talents, the desires and the means to travel the path HE has laid out for us. HE will be with us through the fire and the storm.
So, before we do anything we want to do, we aught to check with HIM to make sure it is what HE has planned for us. HE will give us the desire of our heart when we choose to follow HIM.
Shalom. Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem!
When I was six, I wanted to be a dancer, so Mom took me to ballet class. The teacher, during one of her less intelligent moments, told me that I could never be a ballerina because I was too tall. I never went back to class. She evidently did not realize the benefits of simply taking lessons and had never heard of the Radio City Music Hall Rockettes.
I could have been a dancer in spite of Miss Twit. At six, I liked the idea of the Prima Ballerina, but had no heart for the occupation at that point. That was one of the first of those well-intentioned put-downs. While my mother was telling me I could be anything I wanted to be, the world and others were continually telling me that it just was not going to happen.
I wanted to be a stewardess, but was, again, too tall. I wanted to sing, but was told at age 12 that I could not carry a tune in a bucket. I did keep on singing every chance I got but never pursued it seriously. Now, I realize that I should have.
The media, in the 1960's started telling women that they could do anything, be anything, have anything all without benefit of a man. Women's Liberation became all the rage and we women were liberated. It is still baffling as to what exactly we were liberated from. Possibly the liberation was from moral restraints which only served to bind us to our flesh without regard to the consequences. Equal pay for equal work was a good thing and it served to bind us to our occupations, give us heartburn and torment us with the burden of failure to give that time to our families. Burning bras and wanton sex was only liberating for the moment. Gravity got us back to the bra while venereal disease (now nicely known as STD's) showed us why wanton sexual conduct is a bad idea. We now have more types of VD than we did before our liberation. Most of those new diseases affect women only and are transmitted by men.
Women can now play sports that were once reserved for men. Women can now walk into a male locker room as a reporter. Women can openly treat men as playthings and adornments. Women can now give their children to their husbands, run off and find themselves. We gained the advantage of being able to talk trash, get no respect because of our womanhood, have sex with whomever, whenever and live empty lives without fear of societal retribution because we are liberated. We can legally kill our babies in the womb, but God forgive us if we kill them after they are born, after all killing a baby is wrong. Yes, that is a contradiction.
Yes, we can do anything we want to do, but believe me when I say there are consequences for everything we do whether it be for bad or for good. Could I be brain surgeon? Sure with 12 additional years of school/training. I drove an 18 wheeler, so why not be a brain surgeon?
Speaking of driving a big rig, it was an interesting experience. I originally learned to drive a truck in order to drive with my ex-husband. When I quit my cushy job as an office manager to drive a truck, he told me he did not want to go back to driving and that I was out there on my own, hence the ex. While I was out there, many men were highly resentful of my presence and had the idea that I took a man's job away from him. It is a good job. It is a tough job and it is not a job for just anyone - male or female.
Can we do anything? Maybe, but first we need to know that it is the area that we have a talent for, something that we have a burning desire to do, something that is right for us in the eyes of GOD. Many paths are fraught with difficulties and trials particularly the paths that are right for us. GOD will give us the talents, the desires and the means to travel the path HE has laid out for us. HE will be with us through the fire and the storm.
So, before we do anything we want to do, we aught to check with HIM to make sure it is what HE has planned for us. HE will give us the desire of our heart when we choose to follow HIM.
Shalom. Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem!
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Women, Are You Fulfilling Your Calling?
I have not written for a while due to a number of reasons. Basically, I got discouraged when Google canceled my Adsense account because there were too many clicks on the ads that produced no results, which is why I prefer the ads that pay commission when someone buys something. That makes more sense anyway and you have total control over what ads are show on your sight and where they actually go. I had not earned enough money to be paid anyway, so it was not a big deal. It was, however, discouraging.
That being said, there were other less compelling reasons that I have not written but I will not get into them at this time. Back to the subject which today is women and their roles in the workplace.
Let us start with GOD. HE made us women. HE took a part of the first man, Adam, and fashioned Eve. Men and women, it seems are incomplete without one another and for good reason. We were made that way. Anyone who has been single and then gotten married knows what it feels like to be "complete" in every sense of the word.
I started thinking about this subject due to an article I read written by a brilliant young woman. The article touched upon the reasons for women not either wanting to get into the sciences particularly the research end due to the heavy requirements of time that take away from family life.
I have to admit that I was a bit amused by the comments on the article. Evidently few have studied the life of Marie Sklodowska Curie born in 1867 in Warsaw, Poland. She was a two time Nobel Prize winner (the first woman to receive it) and discovered two elements, radium and polonium.
After she graduated from high school in Poland, because women were forbidden to attend the University of Warsaw, she went to a "floating university" where other women were taught and classes were at night to avoid detection. She then decided that the only way to get a formal education was to go where women were accepted. Marie worked as a governess to teach children and in her spare time taught children of Polish peasant workers, knowing if she were caught she risked punishment.
Poles were forbidden to teach laboratory science, but there were chemists and others who secretly disobeyed the law and Marie studied wherever she could.
She was 24 before she earned enough money to leave for Paris to study at the university. She left Poland promising to return after finishing her studies.
She completed her Masters Degrees in Physics and in Math in only three years. Because or in spite of being a mere woman, Marie Curie managed to make discoveries that lacking today's sophisticated equipment and monetary endowments were nothing short of amazing, even earth shattering.
Marie Curie was not noted for her abilities as a woman but those of a scientist. She was a wife and a mother and a scientist that worked long hours and was consumed with her work. In spite of their discoveries and their contribution to the scientific world, the Curies had problems covering their living expenses.
It was not until 1903 when Pierre and Marie Curie were awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics that their lives became easier and life seemed to be looking more positive. During the studies of uranium and other radioactive elements, both felt tired and ill much of the time. In retrospect, we can assume that their illnesses could have been the result of radiation poisoning. Pierre died in 1906 after falling in front of a horse drawn wagon. Only one day after his funeral, Marie went back to work. Within a month, the Sorbonne made her its first woman professor.
When the war broke out in 1914, Marie helped by equipping cars with x-ray equipment in order to help the doctors and medical staff on the front lines to reveal shrapnel and broken bones. She helped equip a fleet of 20 mobile and 200 stationary x-ray stations.
In 1934, Marie Curie died of aplastic anemia, which we now know is caused by over-exposure to radiation. Her daughter, Irene and her husband Frederic Joliot-Curie received the Nobel Prize for their discovery of artificial radioactivity.
Although she was a bit short-sighted and refused to believe that the radiation she studied so laboriously was at all harmful, it was her drive and determination that pushed her forward regardless of feeling ill, regardless of raising 2 daughters, regardless of having a husband.
She worked side by side with her husband. She contributed to the raising of her children and encouraged them to work with her. The one thing that I did not find in any biography of her was that she settled for anything. She did not whine about the law not letting her study. She did not whine about woman's rights. She did not whine about how everything was working against her. She just did it.
We now have polls, focus study groups, opinions, statistical analysis and talking heads of all sorts telling us what to feel, why we should feel a certain way and ignoring one vital thing. If you have a burning desire to accomplish something, go for it. To heck with funding. To heck with opinion polls and to heck with people's opinions. If someone does not give you funding, work and save for it. If you are meant to do it, the LORD will provide a way.
Women are only inhibited by their own desires. In the Bible there was Ruth and Esther and others. Throughout history there have been women who have changed the course of human events. Those women are still out there today. They are not rock stars or movie stars. Some are simply doing the most important job of all - raising children to become productive members of society and they are doing it sometimes alone, sometimes with the benefit of a husband. That last job is not to be taken lightly nor looked upon with disdain.
Choose your path carefully and give it everything you have to give but take care to include those around you.
Shalom. Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem!
That being said, there were other less compelling reasons that I have not written but I will not get into them at this time. Back to the subject which today is women and their roles in the workplace.
Let us start with GOD. HE made us women. HE took a part of the first man, Adam, and fashioned Eve. Men and women, it seems are incomplete without one another and for good reason. We were made that way. Anyone who has been single and then gotten married knows what it feels like to be "complete" in every sense of the word.
I started thinking about this subject due to an article I read written by a brilliant young woman. The article touched upon the reasons for women not either wanting to get into the sciences particularly the research end due to the heavy requirements of time that take away from family life.
I have to admit that I was a bit amused by the comments on the article. Evidently few have studied the life of Marie Sklodowska Curie born in 1867 in Warsaw, Poland. She was a two time Nobel Prize winner (the first woman to receive it) and discovered two elements, radium and polonium.
After she graduated from high school in Poland, because women were forbidden to attend the University of Warsaw, she went to a "floating university" where other women were taught and classes were at night to avoid detection. She then decided that the only way to get a formal education was to go where women were accepted. Marie worked as a governess to teach children and in her spare time taught children of Polish peasant workers, knowing if she were caught she risked punishment.
Poles were forbidden to teach laboratory science, but there were chemists and others who secretly disobeyed the law and Marie studied wherever she could.
She was 24 before she earned enough money to leave for Paris to study at the university. She left Poland promising to return after finishing her studies.
She completed her Masters Degrees in Physics and in Math in only three years. Because or in spite of being a mere woman, Marie Curie managed to make discoveries that lacking today's sophisticated equipment and monetary endowments were nothing short of amazing, even earth shattering.
Marie Curie was not noted for her abilities as a woman but those of a scientist. She was a wife and a mother and a scientist that worked long hours and was consumed with her work. In spite of their discoveries and their contribution to the scientific world, the Curies had problems covering their living expenses.
It was not until 1903 when Pierre and Marie Curie were awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics that their lives became easier and life seemed to be looking more positive. During the studies of uranium and other radioactive elements, both felt tired and ill much of the time. In retrospect, we can assume that their illnesses could have been the result of radiation poisoning. Pierre died in 1906 after falling in front of a horse drawn wagon. Only one day after his funeral, Marie went back to work. Within a month, the Sorbonne made her its first woman professor.
When the war broke out in 1914, Marie helped by equipping cars with x-ray equipment in order to help the doctors and medical staff on the front lines to reveal shrapnel and broken bones. She helped equip a fleet of 20 mobile and 200 stationary x-ray stations.
In 1934, Marie Curie died of aplastic anemia, which we now know is caused by over-exposure to radiation. Her daughter, Irene and her husband Frederic Joliot-Curie received the Nobel Prize for their discovery of artificial radioactivity.
Although she was a bit short-sighted and refused to believe that the radiation she studied so laboriously was at all harmful, it was her drive and determination that pushed her forward regardless of feeling ill, regardless of raising 2 daughters, regardless of having a husband.
She worked side by side with her husband. She contributed to the raising of her children and encouraged them to work with her. The one thing that I did not find in any biography of her was that she settled for anything. She did not whine about the law not letting her study. She did not whine about woman's rights. She did not whine about how everything was working against her. She just did it.
We now have polls, focus study groups, opinions, statistical analysis and talking heads of all sorts telling us what to feel, why we should feel a certain way and ignoring one vital thing. If you have a burning desire to accomplish something, go for it. To heck with funding. To heck with opinion polls and to heck with people's opinions. If someone does not give you funding, work and save for it. If you are meant to do it, the LORD will provide a way.
Women are only inhibited by their own desires. In the Bible there was Ruth and Esther and others. Throughout history there have been women who have changed the course of human events. Those women are still out there today. They are not rock stars or movie stars. Some are simply doing the most important job of all - raising children to become productive members of society and they are doing it sometimes alone, sometimes with the benefit of a husband. That last job is not to be taken lightly nor looked upon with disdain.
Choose your path carefully and give it everything you have to give but take care to include those around you.
Shalom. Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem!
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