Today, Tuesday, November 16, is my husband's birthday.
He loves the Lord and is a child of God.
He is a wonderful husband.
He cooks for me.
He does not use foul language.
He remembers my birthday.
He is thrifty.
He works hard at whatever he does.
He is a bargain hunter.
He loves me.
He is a really good man.
He no longer smokes.
He does not drink.
He likes animals.
He likes yard work.
He is creative.
He likes to build things.
He is handy around the house.
He is helpful.
He is generous.
He is faithful.
He grows great tomatoes.
The list could go on and on, but you understand.
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
Monday, November 15, 2010
ENTITLEMENT
According to the online Merriam-Webster Dictionary the meaning of the word is exactly what it sounds like.
And I quote,
And I quote,
Definition of ENTITLEMENT
b : a right to benefits specified especially by law or contract
2 : a government program providing benefits to members of a specified group; also : funds supporting or distributed by such a program
3 : belief that one is deserving of or entitled to certain privileges
Examples of ENTITLEMENT
- my entitlement to a refund
- celebrities who have an arrogant sense of entitlement
- entitlements such as medical aid for the elderly and poor
First Known Use of ENTITLEMENT
1942
End of quote.
Since 1942 we have grown accustomed to being entitled. To what? Our share of the pie? Or, maybe a bigger share of the pie? Something we did not work for? That is more like it. We, us arrogant, celebrated United States citizenry feel we are entitled to someone else's stuff.
Is it just me? Am I the only one seeing that the money we want back does not grow when it gets to Washington DC? Of course I am not the only one who sees it. A variety of people have been screaming about it for years (And YHWH said, "I have 7,000 out there just like you." [loosely translated]). BUT, until the politicians started getting voted out of office, they kept on spending and spending and spending. AND if the people do not maintain due diligence in watching the ones that are in government, it will revert within days and become worse than before.
Instead of the government taking our money and then sending it back, why don't they just leave our paychecks alone and let us keep more of our money? Why don't they just take 10% across the board and leave the rest alone? The state could have 5% or reverse that. The Feds could get 5% and the States could take 10% and take care of its own citizens. They could raise their own pigs and deal with their own pork.
The House, the Senate, the Government Accounting Office and the Office of the President cannot get together to even set up a budget without adding trillions to our debt. So why do we keep voting in charlatans and out of work frauds? How does anyone who has to balance their own budget expect the government to function on diminishing returns? And yes the funds are diminishing because by the time it goes through all those fingers only about 10% of it is left. They still spend 100% and more if they think we aren't paying attention. Often we don't pay attention.
The next time you vote for someone based upon what you are going to get from the government, remember they play "elevator" really well and you will always end up getting the shaft. They keep the car and it is full of our money.
Remember this. We cannot just keep printing money. It cannot go on much longer piling up debt. There will be a straw. The camel's back will break and we will all end up paying in the end.
Father God never intended for us to be ENTITLED to anything from the government.
Science Fiction - a Tool Misused
When I was in high school, my desire was to be a nuclear physicist. I read all the science and science fiction books that were in both the school and public library. What science fiction did for me was give me glimpses of possibilities.
H. G. Wells and others provided a fertile field for my imagination. Isaac Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke, like so many fiction writers, were in fact serious scientists. Robert A. Heinlein worked in aeronautical engineering and had taken graduate classes in physics and mathematics. His desire was to be involved in politics, but I believe that his far left leanings prevented serious accomplishments in that area at that time.
Because the majority of science fiction does have a basis in fact (if only a small one), it has the ability to not only to alter one's view of science but of social mores as well. It is within this genre that all types of societies and odd social structures can be put forth as viable alternatives to our current reality.
I preferred reading was science that was fictionalized and not what is now fantasy and horror. Nuclear physics, which is primarily dedicated to studying the building blocks and interactions of the atomic nuclei, was what piqued my interest at an early age. Rocket fuel, the intense power released by splitting atoms and the sun itself fascinated me and my reading fueled my already open imagination. MIT was what I aspired to but I never got close.
I read voraciously and would often become "lost" in the story. I wanted to be in the lab making discoveries that would give us the ability to travel to distant planets. I wanted to be in that rocket ship that left earth never to return. It was my escape. I was the ship that sang. I was deterred by the cost and was told that nuclear physics was not worth spending money on when I would probably wind up married with children and all that education would be wasted.
Instead, I got swept away with the aspect of social change. Far from reaching to the stars, I remained not only earth bound but bound by the flesh and those desires.
Much of the science fiction was filled with the lack of marriage. The futuristic story lines were formulated to make marriage seem obsolete. Inter-species relationships were growing while families were only necessary if that was chosen as a way of life and then only as a social structure for colonization of some other world. Marriage became an archaic requirement of a past society.
Ridding society of marriage was just the beginning. The choice of partners was now open to whatever was acceptable in one's own eyes. Like a moth laying eggs on butter bean plants or a green horned tomato worm, the seeds of corruption were planted in abundance and proceeded to eat away at the moral infrastructure of our society. Like a brush fire, the cancer of moral disruption consumed America.
Science fiction was not totally responsible for the decline of morals in America. It was just one of the many factors that made it easy for an influx of social dis-ease. It was one of the prominent peddlers of reasons to dismiss the idea of God. When God was portrayed it was simply the way a social structure was defined and a crutch for simple ignorant cultures to define more advanced aliens. The one aspect of God and all of Creation that science fiction cannot effectively portray is creation. Stories speak of advanced races planting civilizations on various planets, but they never say where the planters come from.
Perhaps if I had grown up with Christian parents and a fierce knowledge of who I was in relationship to God, I would not have been so mislead by the fascination of science fiction. Science is not the antithesis Christianity but, as has been discovered, science actually supports Christianity. The Bible in all its wonder and knowledge knew that the earth was round before scientific discoveries proved it so.
H. G. Wells and others provided a fertile field for my imagination. Isaac Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke, like so many fiction writers, were in fact serious scientists. Robert A. Heinlein worked in aeronautical engineering and had taken graduate classes in physics and mathematics. His desire was to be involved in politics, but I believe that his far left leanings prevented serious accomplishments in that area at that time.
Because the majority of science fiction does have a basis in fact (if only a small one), it has the ability to not only to alter one's view of science but of social mores as well. It is within this genre that all types of societies and odd social structures can be put forth as viable alternatives to our current reality.
I preferred reading was science that was fictionalized and not what is now fantasy and horror. Nuclear physics, which is primarily dedicated to studying the building blocks and interactions of the atomic nuclei, was what piqued my interest at an early age. Rocket fuel, the intense power released by splitting atoms and the sun itself fascinated me and my reading fueled my already open imagination. MIT was what I aspired to but I never got close.
I read voraciously and would often become "lost" in the story. I wanted to be in the lab making discoveries that would give us the ability to travel to distant planets. I wanted to be in that rocket ship that left earth never to return. It was my escape. I was the ship that sang. I was deterred by the cost and was told that nuclear physics was not worth spending money on when I would probably wind up married with children and all that education would be wasted.
Instead, I got swept away with the aspect of social change. Far from reaching to the stars, I remained not only earth bound but bound by the flesh and those desires.
Much of the science fiction was filled with the lack of marriage. The futuristic story lines were formulated to make marriage seem obsolete. Inter-species relationships were growing while families were only necessary if that was chosen as a way of life and then only as a social structure for colonization of some other world. Marriage became an archaic requirement of a past society.
Ridding society of marriage was just the beginning. The choice of partners was now open to whatever was acceptable in one's own eyes. Like a moth laying eggs on butter bean plants or a green horned tomato worm, the seeds of corruption were planted in abundance and proceeded to eat away at the moral infrastructure of our society. Like a brush fire, the cancer of moral disruption consumed America.
Science fiction was not totally responsible for the decline of morals in America. It was just one of the many factors that made it easy for an influx of social dis-ease. It was one of the prominent peddlers of reasons to dismiss the idea of God. When God was portrayed it was simply the way a social structure was defined and a crutch for simple ignorant cultures to define more advanced aliens. The one aspect of God and all of Creation that science fiction cannot effectively portray is creation. Stories speak of advanced races planting civilizations on various planets, but they never say where the planters come from.
Perhaps if I had grown up with Christian parents and a fierce knowledge of who I was in relationship to God, I would not have been so mislead by the fascination of science fiction. Science is not the antithesis Christianity but, as has been discovered, science actually supports Christianity. The Bible in all its wonder and knowledge knew that the earth was round before scientific discoveries proved it so.
Friendship is an Odd Thing
Friends are what you have left when everything else is gone. Too many so-called "friends" are there when the times are good and you are easy to get along with. Let something happen and you see them fall by the wayside.
If you get sick with something like cancer or some other dread disease, they still talk to you but they really do not know what to say. That is understandable. I have had friends with terminal illness and what I have found is you ask them what is okay to talk about. People who are dying often want to talk, but others around them find the subject disturbing. They do not want to consider the fact that they will have to say good-bye.
Divorce is a friend dividing experience as well. When you get a divorce, you know which ones will never speak to you again for fear of offending your ex. Then there are the ones you wish would go away because they keep bringing the ex-spouse into the picture trying to "fix" it. There are friends that you will miss because they felt they had to choose sides. There are the others that dumped you both and will seldom speak to either of you.
It really does not matter how long you have known someone. That is the peculiar thing about friendship. You can form close ties very quickly and some will last for years. With any good friendship, you can pick up where you left off in spite of distance or time.
A true friend can tell you when you are wrong in spite of your anger. They will tell you when your choice of attire really is not becoming to you. They will tell you to apologize to your spouse. They will not talk about you behind your back unless they are arranging a surprise party. They remember your birthday. They send you pictures of their family. They call you from time to time. They are there when everyone else has gone because the situation is too difficult.
There are those times when you leave a job and you are cut off from all of your former co-workers. Suddenly, all those people that you talked with everyday, the ones that you shared your life with have abruptly become uncommunicative. Those chats you had in the hall are no more. The arms that gave you comfort when there was a death in the family are gone. The ones that you gave a word of encouragement to no longer respond to calls and emails. No one comes to you with questions. With all but two, it is like you never worked there. It appears that you have made so little positive impact that it might have been just as well that you had never been there.
Your importance to the company was brought to zero in a heartbeat and it appears that no one cared. Any attempt at some sort of affirmation is met with silence. What you thought was a vital contribution has been determined to be a waste of company resources and of no importance to anyone. You helped no one. You left no positive influence upon anyone. No one misses you and no one cares that you are gone.
Your life, once dependent upon the capriciousness of an ill-tempered boss and his minions, now needs to be redefined. Your affirmation must no longer be based upon "a job well done" or what you can do to make sure things at the office run smoothly. It no longer matters to any of them, nor should it to you. Unfortunately, to you, it still does. There is that part of you that would like to think that in 15 years you were able to contribute something meaningful and lasting to an apparently ungrateful company.
The sad fact is that you should never have given that much of yourself to the job anyway. It only provided an avenue for you to be taken advantage of and thrown away like so much shredded paper. The job thrived at the expense of your family and your own health.
The supposed friendships were nothing more than job-related. It is time to move on and put all that behind you. If you were the unfortunate one who actually thought any of those friendships would survive leaving, my prayers are with you. It is a painful process to know you spent so much time with people who never really cared beyond asking you about your weekend.
Next time, spend that time with The Lord. He really does care. HE is the Friend who never leaves you.
If you get sick with something like cancer or some other dread disease, they still talk to you but they really do not know what to say. That is understandable. I have had friends with terminal illness and what I have found is you ask them what is okay to talk about. People who are dying often want to talk, but others around them find the subject disturbing. They do not want to consider the fact that they will have to say good-bye.
Divorce is a friend dividing experience as well. When you get a divorce, you know which ones will never speak to you again for fear of offending your ex. Then there are the ones you wish would go away because they keep bringing the ex-spouse into the picture trying to "fix" it. There are friends that you will miss because they felt they had to choose sides. There are the others that dumped you both and will seldom speak to either of you.
It really does not matter how long you have known someone. That is the peculiar thing about friendship. You can form close ties very quickly and some will last for years. With any good friendship, you can pick up where you left off in spite of distance or time.
A true friend can tell you when you are wrong in spite of your anger. They will tell you when your choice of attire really is not becoming to you. They will tell you to apologize to your spouse. They will not talk about you behind your back unless they are arranging a surprise party. They remember your birthday. They send you pictures of their family. They call you from time to time. They are there when everyone else has gone because the situation is too difficult.
There are those times when you leave a job and you are cut off from all of your former co-workers. Suddenly, all those people that you talked with everyday, the ones that you shared your life with have abruptly become uncommunicative. Those chats you had in the hall are no more. The arms that gave you comfort when there was a death in the family are gone. The ones that you gave a word of encouragement to no longer respond to calls and emails. No one comes to you with questions. With all but two, it is like you never worked there. It appears that you have made so little positive impact that it might have been just as well that you had never been there.
Your importance to the company was brought to zero in a heartbeat and it appears that no one cared. Any attempt at some sort of affirmation is met with silence. What you thought was a vital contribution has been determined to be a waste of company resources and of no importance to anyone. You helped no one. You left no positive influence upon anyone. No one misses you and no one cares that you are gone.
Your life, once dependent upon the capriciousness of an ill-tempered boss and his minions, now needs to be redefined. Your affirmation must no longer be based upon "a job well done" or what you can do to make sure things at the office run smoothly. It no longer matters to any of them, nor should it to you. Unfortunately, to you, it still does. There is that part of you that would like to think that in 15 years you were able to contribute something meaningful and lasting to an apparently ungrateful company.
The sad fact is that you should never have given that much of yourself to the job anyway. It only provided an avenue for you to be taken advantage of and thrown away like so much shredded paper. The job thrived at the expense of your family and your own health.
The supposed friendships were nothing more than job-related. It is time to move on and put all that behind you. If you were the unfortunate one who actually thought any of those friendships would survive leaving, my prayers are with you. It is a painful process to know you spent so much time with people who never really cared beyond asking you about your weekend.
Next time, spend that time with The Lord. He really does care. HE is the Friend who never leaves you.
Sunday, November 14, 2010
Why Women Do Not Need to Teach a Man
We have a long hair chihuahua named Raymond. He should not weigh more than 9 pounds. About 18 months ago, Raymond started having difficulty breathing. It started during the night and gradually it became constant. He had trouble getting up and down steps. He got to the point where he was having problems even walking,
I suspected what the problem was with the little dog. The dog was suffering from hip dysplasia and he was fat. So, in all my wisdom, I told my husband what the dog's problem was. He did think that Raymond weighed a little too much but he did not believe that I knew what I was talking about. I have learned that pressing the issue is worthless. All we end up doing when I chose that route is bickering.
I waited and sure enough, my husband got concerned about Raymond's health and took him to a new male veterinarian. After charging a total of more than a week's pay, the veterinarian told my husband and I that Raymond was 50% heavier than he should be. He had hip dysplasia which was being aggravated by the excess weight. He weighed 14 pounds and should have weighed no more than 9 pounds. The veterinarian prescribed a strict diet with NO treats and pain medication for a short time for the hip pain.
The dog now weighs 9 pounds. He runs and plays like he did before the weight. The only thing that I could not do is prescribe the correct dog food. It took 3 months to get that weight down.
Then there is the garden. I do natural organic style of gardening while my husband gets out the tractor, the tiller and any other machinery plus the 13-13-13 fertilizer. I build up the soil with stuff like humus, sawdust and compost. My garden has always been small and quite productive. His is productive but takes a lot of effort.
One day a man stopped by and told my husband about organic gardening and he has been using more organic methods ever since.
There are many other examples but I really think these 2 are sufficient to make the point. I have heard my husband talk to other men and say how intelligent I am so, why does he not follow my advice?
I think it is this way. Ever since Eve gave Adam the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, men have been inclined to turn a deaf ear to what a woman says. As women, there is nothing that we can do about it except have patience, keep our advice to ourselves (unless they ask for it) and pray for those men in our lives.
Ladies, it goes against everything that woman's liberation has told us and everything that worldly society says about a woman's place as well as defying all advertising, but we need to let men be men and encourage them, not nag them. Men need to be the head of the house because that is their place in life. Many men have abdicated that position because women are so Hell bent upon being the head of everything. They just don't want to wage that battle.
I know how difficult it is to stand by and watch while my husband leads because until this marriage I was in charge and emasculated each ex. I do know what to do wrong. God showed me the right way to go and this marriage has lasted almost 20 years. That is how to succeed. Let God show the proper way to go. Let Him lead so you both can follow a proper leader. It is not the easiest way but it is the right way. And God will give you the strength to remain silent when necessary.
I suspected what the problem was with the little dog. The dog was suffering from hip dysplasia and he was fat. So, in all my wisdom, I told my husband what the dog's problem was. He did think that Raymond weighed a little too much but he did not believe that I knew what I was talking about. I have learned that pressing the issue is worthless. All we end up doing when I chose that route is bickering.
I waited and sure enough, my husband got concerned about Raymond's health and took him to a new male veterinarian. After charging a total of more than a week's pay, the veterinarian told my husband and I that Raymond was 50% heavier than he should be. He had hip dysplasia which was being aggravated by the excess weight. He weighed 14 pounds and should have weighed no more than 9 pounds. The veterinarian prescribed a strict diet with NO treats and pain medication for a short time for the hip pain.
The dog now weighs 9 pounds. He runs and plays like he did before the weight. The only thing that I could not do is prescribe the correct dog food. It took 3 months to get that weight down.
Then there is the garden. I do natural organic style of gardening while my husband gets out the tractor, the tiller and any other machinery plus the 13-13-13 fertilizer. I build up the soil with stuff like humus, sawdust and compost. My garden has always been small and quite productive. His is productive but takes a lot of effort.
One day a man stopped by and told my husband about organic gardening and he has been using more organic methods ever since.
There are many other examples but I really think these 2 are sufficient to make the point. I have heard my husband talk to other men and say how intelligent I am so, why does he not follow my advice?
I think it is this way. Ever since Eve gave Adam the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, men have been inclined to turn a deaf ear to what a woman says. As women, there is nothing that we can do about it except have patience, keep our advice to ourselves (unless they ask for it) and pray for those men in our lives.
Ladies, it goes against everything that woman's liberation has told us and everything that worldly society says about a woman's place as well as defying all advertising, but we need to let men be men and encourage them, not nag them. Men need to be the head of the house because that is their place in life. Many men have abdicated that position because women are so Hell bent upon being the head of everything. They just don't want to wage that battle.
I know how difficult it is to stand by and watch while my husband leads because until this marriage I was in charge and emasculated each ex. I do know what to do wrong. God showed me the right way to go and this marriage has lasted almost 20 years. That is how to succeed. Let God show the proper way to go. Let Him lead so you both can follow a proper leader. It is not the easiest way but it is the right way. And God will give you the strength to remain silent when necessary.
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