Salute to William Penn

I just read a biography of William Penn.  It's a kids' book written by Elizabeth Janet Grey but well worth reading for all of that.  It's the kind of book that used to be written for young people, who were assumed to be literate and interested in the lives of great men.

The King of England gave him Pennsylvania as repayment for a debt owed to William's father.  Yes, one man owned and operated Pennsylvania--and Delaware and parts of New Jersey as well, at different times.

I knew who he was, of course, but not much more.  He was the son of an admiral who owned property in Ireland as well as England.  Given a first-class education,he was handsome and charming.  As a young man, he became a Quaker, against the wishes of his father.   It was a bad time for religious dissenters in England.  Dissent from the established church was a crime for which a man could be arrested.   Penn suffered arrest and imprisonment more than once, but  followed the dictates of his conscience and did not allow himself to be cowed or deprived of his rights.

Penn decided to visit his property in America with an eye to founding a Quaker colony and settling there .  He created a Charter of Government for the colony and granted complete  freedom of religion to its inhabitants.  He established cordial relations with the Indians.  He chose a piece of land on the banks of the Delaware to build a new city, which he called Philadelphia.   He named Broad Street and decided that the cross streets would be numbered.  In short, he had total power.

I don't know of any man in history who had so much power and exercised it so benevolently.  He had no desire to control other men, but wanted to live peacably with everyone.  The country is blessed to have such a founder.   And look at us now.  Is our luck running out?

A musical note

I went to the Delaware Symphony performance last night.  Very good, especially the New World Symphony.  Actually, it was all good, except for the soloist, a mandolin player named Chris Thile.  He was good too, no doubt, if you like mandolin playing.  Apparently a virtuoso on this instrument (!) he played a composition of his own, in which his mandolin playing was completely drowned out by the violins.  He then played a short solo piece, and we were able to hear the mandolin, which he played very well, for a mandolin.  Who would want to devote his life to such a tiny-voiced instrument, so low-key, so reticent?

Anyone who knows me knows I prefer not to hear music by composers who are living.  I like my composers underground, safely nailed into their coffins.  Just a whimsical preference of mine.  I'm not against young people composing music.  I actually realize such activity may be necessary.  I just don't want to hear them.  Especially I don't like to hear their work when they are standing in front of me, eagerly awaiting applause.

Halloween costumes for the seriously weird

Seriously, are they worth it?

The enormous Bush-bashing banana that was never built

Tim Blair brought the banana to my attention.

Here is the link to the fate of the banana. 

From the comments:

[T]his is like the usual weaselly government trick of: "The peasants have denied our tax increase that was going to fund our stupidly generous pensions and such. Fine! No more garbage collection and fire houses for them!"In this case government subsidies for things that I like get cut for punishing me for voting against the things I thought ludicrous & stupid.

This reminds me of the annual budget crisis in the municipality where I worked.  Everyone who did not have a union contract got a cut.  Since the library was .05 percent of the municipal budget, this did not help anything but made the citizenry mad (What do you mean, the library is closed every Monday!  That's the only time I can use the library!) and worry the part-time staff, whose hours would be cut.  When their hours got under a certain number, they would lose their health benefits.

The town solved this problem by cutting health benefits for all but full-time staff.  No more health benefits, no problem.  They would have cut pension contributions as well, but there was a state law mandating pension contributions for all employees who earned above a minimum amount.

So everybody concerned was annoyed big-time, except the mayor and council who amazingly kept their generous health benefits through every crisis.  Funny how that works.

Anyway, I think the banana money would have been well-spent as I personally would love to see a 300 meter banana in the sky.  That would be worth a lot of money, especially if it were Canadian money and not mine.

Respecting your elders

My mother told me that her mother and father never hugged or kissed her when she was a child. They weren't cold, just reserved. Apparently they never felt the need to make buddies of their children.

Bubbe and Zayde raised three children to adulthood and put up with no nonsense. They believed that the only occupation worth pursuing was medicine or law. Their children bowed to destiny and became doctors and a lawyer. Mother and Uncle Moe excelled at their studies, but Uncle Doc made a stab at being a black sheep and misbehaved some in school--what would be called boyish pranks nowadays. He and a friend released some white mice in the hallways in high school, among other things. He became a doctor anyway. Apparently his parents' will was stronger than his.

I've never seen parents more highly esteemed than these two were by their children. Their two sons and daughter, when they were grown up and had children of their own,  would literally do everything their parents requested, and were never summoned without showing up.

I wonder, did my mother whine when she was made to practice the piano instead of hanging out with her friends? Was Uncle Doc grounded when he misbehaved?  How about Uncle Moe, when he skipped school to go to a ball game? 

Or was it that they all pulled together to survive poverty and hunger, to grow and thrive?  I honestly don't know.

The ability to tell your kids what to do has apparently been lost over the years.

Better late than never

Only five years after retiring from my day-evening-and-weekend job as director of a library, I finally came up with the answer to the Gasbag's query:  "Do you know who I am?"

"Obviously you are nobody, because if you were someone I could be expected to recognise I would have recognized you."

Now I'll never get to say it.  Sigh.

The French call it l'esprit d'escalier, or staircase wit.  You think of the proper riposte on the way down the stairs, going home.

Irish poem for St Patrick's Day

Someone gave me a book of Irish poems once, and I discovered this poem, written in the ninth century, supposedly by a monk. The poem is deservedly famous; I in my ignorance of Irish literature, had never heard of it.

Pangur Ban

I and Pangur Ban, my cat,
'Tis a like task we are at;
Hunting mice is his delight,
Hunting words I sit all night.

Better far than praise of men
'Tis to sit with book and pen;
Pangur bears me no ill will;
He, too, plies his simple skill.

'Tis a merry thing to see
At our task how glad are we,
When at home we sit and find
Entertainment to our mind.

Oftentimes a mouse will stray
Into the hero Pangur's way;
Oftentimes my keen thought set
Takes a meaning in its net.

'Gainst the wall he sets his eye
Full and fierce and sharp and sly;
'Gainst the wall of knowledge I
All my little wisdom try.

When a mouse darts from its den.
O how glad is Pangur then!
O what gladness do I prove
When I solve the doubts I love!

So in peace our tasks we ply,
Pangur Ban, my cat and I;
In our arts we find our bliss,
I have mine, and he has his.

Practice every day has made
Pangur perfect in his trade ;
I get wisdom day and night,
Turning Darkness into light.'

Translation by Robin Flowers (we think)

I am indebted to vulpeslibris for the translation.

Filling out the census

Last week I got a letter from the Census Bureau warning me that they were going to send out a census form and urging me to fill it out and send it back.

Today the form came. I filled it out and put it out for the mailman. I felt a little queasy about answering the questions about race and ethnicity. For a moment I felt like declaring myself a member of the Hebrew race and describing Mr Charm as Hibernian, but at the last minute I couldn't bring myself to do it. Our family is part of the 1 percent of the American people who have to obey the law. Somebody in this great republic has to do it, and we have been chosen.

Otherwise the full majesty of the law is unleashed on us.

We're not like Tim Geithner who probably listed the family dog on his census form so wherever he comes from could show a larger population and deserve to have a new Congressional district handed to him.

Mr Charm and I only have one Congressperson anyway, and we're not likely to get another, being we live in Delaware. I personally would be willing to split my Congressperson with another small state. Half a Congress critter would be plenty for me. In fact, if this health insurance bill goes through without a vote I'd be quite willing to ditch the institution altogether.

Wait a minute! Didn't someone is U S history once make a fuss over Taxation without Representation? I believe it was some bunch of malcontents from Massachusetts or somewhere, but at present they are nothing but a group of dead white men, so nobody has to pay any attention to them.

Girl in surf

 

Everything you could possibly want to know about purple shoes

Maybe I have too much time on my hands.

Amusing.

Think about this.

Passover all over again

I can't improve on this:

When I was a child seders seemed to last for eons. All my mother's family, my parents, my two uncles and their wives and children were always present, because anything bubbe hosted was a command performance. The good linens, china, and silver made the table gleam under the light of bubbe's two candelabras.

We children were excited beyond hysteria until the ceremony began, and we were forced to come to the table and stop hanging upside down from the sofa, climbing the walls, and knocking down the furniture. I particularly enjoyed the presence of my cousins because I was an only child at the time, and lonely. My eldest cousin, three and a half years older than me, was a goddess of sophistication to me; her brothers were rowdy playmates. Uncle Doc's little girls were too young to play with but they were mighty cute and dressed to the nines.

Once the youngest child present had recited the four questions the prayer competition began. Both my uncles and my cousin Bernie read the haggadah aloud --individually--in Hebrew as quickly as they could. The conversation went like this:

Uncle I: It's time for the first (or second, third, or fourth) cup of wine.
Uncle II: I haven't gotten there yet. You read too fast.
Uncle I: It's a long service.
Uncle II: All right, all right. Come on everybody. Drink the fourth (or third, or second) cup. Where's the bottle? Pass me the wine, somebody.

They raced through the prayers and then had to stop and wait impatiently for the others to catch up. It was rather like riding in a car that alternately speeded up and stopped dead, causing you to lurch forward and back.

Meanwhile, my cousin Sam and sometimes one or two of the other children would drink too much wine and slip quietly to the floor. It taught me the meaning of drinking yourself under the table. After a brief nap the culprit would re-appear, refreshed.

The two little girls were too small to read, so they raced around the table fighting with each other until Uncle Doc started yelling at them and threatening to spank them. My aunt, his wife, would burst into tears because he had shouted at the girls. She would threaten to leave. They would yell some more until he calmed down and apologized to the girls and gave them some candy or gum he just happened to have in his pocket. The girls, of course, would stuff themselves with sweets and would not eat the festive meal when it appeared.

The festive meal! Chicken soup with matzoh balls. We called bubbe's matzoh balls cannon balls. They were heavy but nourishing. Then we had chicken. With the chicken came potato kugel and chopped liver. Gefilte fish. Someone probably slipped a green vegetable in there somewhere, but I don't remember it. Bubbe didn't hold with all this greenery anyway. Her idea of a salad was: take one cucumber; add pint of sour cream; eat. And we couldn't have that, this was a fleisheke meal.

Bubbe would heap each of the children's plates with massive portions of food and then bawl them out for not eating it all. We were starved and ate voraciously. If someone had thrown one of us into the river we would have plummeted to the bottom and sunk without a trace.


Dessert featured, but was not limited to, Manischevitz macaroons, served in the can. The featured wine was Mogen David.

After eating, there was a timeout while the children searched for the afikomen and the adults sat still and burped.

Since I was not used to staying up late, the remainder of the seder was one big blur to me, except for opening the door for Eliyahu hanovi. Then came Chad Gadya, which meant the end of the service and blessed release.

And then we did it again the next night.

(Recycled)

Slow motion in films

Deplorable.

Slow motion in films is no longer a novelty. It's a lazy person's way of making a film "authentic."

And furthermore, the use of hand-held cameras makes me seasick.

To those who send me nonsensical e-mails

Why do you engage in this futile endeavor? Even if these are spambots, someone has had to think them up and put them online. Then I have to waste my time looking at them and rejecting them.

I don't have enough time left to waste it on you.

As if you could kill time without injuring eternity. ~Henry David Thoreau

And furthermore, you are jerks. In any language you care to use.

Lack of teachers causes crime

It must be true, because someone said it on CNN.

So I was at the gym, walking on the treadmill, idly watching CNN, reading the captioning. They were talking about California, of course, and its financial plight.

Apparently the financial crisis is affecting school funding. One poor soul, no doubt a product of the California education system, said: "If they lay off teachers there will be more people in jail."

The first image that flashed into my brain was of a frenzied and desperate mob of pedagogues storming the finer retail establishments of the state. But I dismissed the idea.

However, I couldn't quite follow her reasoning. How could laying off teachers affect the prison population? Are they going to put the laid off teachers in jail?

Or will the absence of some teachers make the already miserable school system more ineffective than it already is in educating young people?

When my children were growing up, lots of their friends attended Catholic schools. Some of these children were in classes with more than fifty children. But they learned. Their test scores were higher than those of the kids in public school, year after year.

Now, after years of giving kids a better education and for less money, the Catholic Church is closing schools all over the country. Only in America! Apparently nothing fails like success.

We urgently need repairs to our roads, so highway money is being spent on bike paths while commuters sit in their cars spewing exhaust into the air. More money is being used to prop up passenger trains nobody uses. Coal and natural gas are available all over this country, but we are not allowed to use it. Instead, laws like cap and trade are passed to hobble business and ensure a continuing shortage of jobs.

Open your eyes, people! Why are we importing engineers and chemists from third world countries when we could be educating our own people for this important work? Our students are leaving college dumber than they were when they started. Yes, the colleges are able to extract common sense from the young and educate them in Grudge Studies. So, after graduation, while they fold clothes at the Gap, they can brood about the injustice visited upon them by Society.

Why are too many students attending law school and too few attending medical school? Weird how that works! The budding lawyers will soon join their Ethnic Studies peers in a career in retail. Meanwhile our hospitals will be filled with interns with incomprehensible accents.

And all because we laid off some teachers!

Good grief, I almost missed it!

National Poetry Month starts April 1!

What holy city?

American Thinker discusses whether to call Mohammed a prophet. Or The Prophet.

The Times, the AP, and Reuters all have style manuals setting forth their policies about usage for proper names like "Jesus." Both the Times and Reuters manuals explicitly caution against using the term "Christ" when referring to Jesus because it is a theological term, "a title non-Christians would not give him," as Reuters' handbook says.

Similarly, the New York Times Manual of Style and Usage does not list "Prophet Muhammad" as an acceptable usage. It says only: "Muhammad. Use this spelling for the name of the prophet of the Muslim religion." Both Reuters and the AP Stylebook identify Muhammad as "Prophet," but neither explicitly states whether "Prophet Muhammad" is a preferred, disfavored, or neutral usage.

[snip]
If the New York Times views Jesus as "undisputed and therefore preferred," its current practice regarding Muhammad does not meet the same standard. As a historical personage, Muhammad is, well, at least as "undisputed" as Jesus. Thus his name alone should presumably be preferred. But in fact the paper regularly refers to Muhammad by his religious title, "Prophet Muhammad."

A pet peeve of mine is the use of the term the holy city of Najav, (or any other currently "holy city" in some Arab country). Oh yeah? Holy to whom? Did Muhammad water his camels there, or something?

I don't hear anyone referring to Jerusalem as a holy city. Or Rome. I personally consider New York City a pretty sacred place, the undoubted center of the universe, where moreover you can get decent bagels, and I resent people bombing it.

So one person's holy city is another person's dump, and let's keep religion out of it.

Ht to Opinion Journal.

Listening to public radio

I love WRTI, a public radio station maintained by Temple University. Thank you, Temple. I put my money where my mouth is and paid my annual membership dues. I don't even mind when they have a pledge drive.

I listen to WRTI every time I am in the car, and have heard some lovely music and learned about more music previously not known to me. The also broadcast short pieces on astronomy which are really neat.

But when I turn on the radio, expecting music, and hear the humorless hectoring and pompous posturing of the Nag in Chief, it's like being slapped in the face with a wet fish.

Unpleasant.

By the way, tomorrow, Tuesday, March 10, WRTI will be playing the music of Samuel Barber in honor of his 100th birthday, which took place in West Chester, PA, not far from where I am now sitting.

Heroism

Just call it British pluck.

Being unfair to Captain Bligh

An American naval officer is called a female Captain Bligh.

Captain Bligh got a bum rap.

When the Bounty arrived in Tahiti in 1788, the breadfruit trees had to be seeded and grown into saplings large enough for transport, a process that would take at least six months. Contrary to popular opinion, Bligh was the sort of man who wanted his crew to be happy, so instead of sailing the South Pacific exploring and mapping, he decided to give his men six months of shore leave in paradise. In hindsight, it was the biggest mistake of his life.

Many, if not most, of the men had formed deep attachments with the islanders during their long layover, and were quite naturally reluctant to leave when the time came. The mutiny is well documented and even fictionalized extensively. The part of the story that few people know about is what happened after the Captain and his men were cast adrift. With nineteen men in a single longboat, very few supplies, his log books and navigational tools, Commander Lieutenant Bligh was able to navigate almost 6000 kilometres (3700 Miles) across the Pacific, to finally make landfall at the island of Timor. This staggering feat of precision navigation was accomplished with no loss of life....
Sir Joseph Banks defended William Bligh to the Admiralty, and believed in Bligh so much he insisted that the newly promoted Bligh lead the return expedition to Tahiti and finish what he had started.
[snip]

William Bligh went on to have a long and relatively distinguished career in the British Navy, despite the fact that the family of his former colleague, Fletcher Christian, did their level best to discredit him. In particular Edward Christian, Fletcher's brother, who went to great lengths to alter public opinion.

Ht to Instapundit.

Missing Charlie Rangel

Charlie Rangel isn't gone yet, and I already miss him.

Charlie was a good old boy, New York City division. He was sort of a crook--that's a given. He's a member of Congress, isn't he?

Now we will have a raving lunatic in his place:

Pete Stark is just a bully — a crass, tasteless, and stupid bully.


Thanks, Nancy.

Misty evening

 

Sketch in acrylics.

Bessie Coleman, first black woman aviator

 

I remembered Bessie Coleman too late to post her picture for Black History Month, so I am posting it for Women's History Month. This mosaic is in the Charleston SC airport, but I think it appears in other airports as well.

Paying off the deficit

Let's pay off the deficit!

It appears that George Soros is obscenely greedy, even greedier than those Wall Street banker who are getting "obscene" bonuses. Now he wants to bring down the euro!

Man who broke the Bank of England, George Soros, 'at centre of hedge funds plot to cash in on fall of the euro'

Clearly George has too much money. Every cent he makes after this ought to be confiscated and used to pay off the national debt. He won't miss it. He has "enough" money. After all, he earns more than $250,000.

After that, he can split his remaining wealth with the US Treasury. He'll have plenty left.

Ht to Instapundit.

Pensions in New Jersey

Everyone is grousing about the generous pensions being granted to public employees. Well, there are pensions, and there are pensions. Some pensions are more equal than others.

No permanent employee is exempt from participating in the pension system.

The most generous pensions are granted to police officers. Police in New Jersey are blessed by having the toughest union, the PBA, which is represented by the shrewdest and toughest lawyers. For a long time, police contracts were subjected to binding arbitration, a legalized form of three-card monte. I believe the practice has been stopped.

Home rule is very important to New Jersey. New Jersey has about 500 municipalities, and each is a little freestanding fiefdom, with its own library, sanitation department, and police department, etc. Each police departnemt has its own officers, including a chief. There are some exceptions to this, as municipalities strive to save themselves from financial disaster. Police officers retire in their fifties, on half pay after 25 years of service. Due to strong unions, retired policemen retire with free medical benefits for life for themselves and spouse. And every year there is a cost of living adjustment (COLA for short), whether the cost of living has gone up or not.

Retirees from the public schools, including clerks, secretaries, librarians, and maintenence crews, retire after 25 years on half pay, and they also get free health benefits for life for themselves and spouse and COLA.

Ordinary retirees, such as thee and me, also can retire after 25 years. I don't know what the age requirements are, if any. No health insurance for this crew.

When I started working in New Jersey, part of my salary was put toward my pension. This was matched by the State. You were vested in your pension after 10 years, according to federal law. During Christie Whitman's tenure, employee contributions were discontinued. In other years, the State saved money by postponing their annual contribution to the pension fund. The pension fund, of course, would keep growing in good times and bad. The stock market was booming, no worries. Until the market fell.

Governor Corzine didn't halp matter any by being deeply in thrall to the unions. The Civil Service rules didn't help either.

I don't see any way out of this mess, which is contractual and based on the full faith and credit of the State, whatever that means. So the onus will fall on new hires. But that will take a long time. I personally am not prepared to die to save money for the State.

Painting--red tulips

 

Shelters for abused women are jammed?

says who?

Harry ("The Iraq War is lost") Reid. Give me the statistics: spousal abuse, 1990 vs spousal abuse 2009. Is it up or down? I want to see the numbers before I accept his statement.

I haven't trusted phony numbers since the statistics showing an increase in violence against women during the Superbowl were proved to be false.

Glenn Reynolds reviews Gloria Allred's appearance on Hannity

He got the same impression I did:

WATCHING GLORIA ALLRED ON HANNITY, trying to make the argument in favor of her porn-actress client who had a 3-year affair with Tiger Woods. I thought she’d descended into total self-parody before, but I was wrong. She’s plumbing new depths now. Apparently, I’m not the only one who feels this way.

All I can add is, that the obnoxious yenta* rivaled Hannity in interrupting, which Hannity is a master of. It was fun to see that neither one of them would let the other speak.

Gloria seems to be looking for an apology, but I got the feeling that a cash settlement would sooth the young lady's feelings.

*Look it up.

Watching Tiger Woods' mea culpa

Did anyone else find Tiger Woods' public confession deeply embarassing?

It reminded me of the coerced confessions of convicted political prisoners in Stalinist Russia.

Why did this talented athlete have to throw mud all over himself? The consensus is that he did it to avoid losing endorsements. So, he did it for the money. Doesn't this multi-millionaire have enough money? Is he going to be on welfare any time soon?

Why not just keep mum? If I had his net worth, I would find myself an island and hang out there, with my private yacht parked outside the gate alongside the private jet in case I wanted to travel.

Tiger Woods doesn't owe me anything. He doesn't have to confess his sins. If he chooses to spend his time off with beautiful blondes with long legs and limited intelligence, that's between him and his wife.

Anyone feel the urge to paint their sneakers?

Here's how.

Forgive me for asking, I'm new to Delaware...

but who is responsible for removing snow from the roads and streets--in Delaware, I mean?

It appears to be "nobody."

The county doesn't do it.

The State doesn't do it.

There is some kind of arrangement that homeowners associations are supposed to pay for snow removal in sub-divisions and then the State will reimburse them for 75% of the cost.

Excuse me, aren't snow and ice public safety issues? Public safety affects all of us; it's not something you can contract out. Isn't this a legitimate function of government? Since when is a sub-division a political body authorized to remove snow?

The snow on the secondary streets in New Castle County is hazardous for drivers and even pedestrians. Fortunately the schools are closed, but when (and if) they re-open, no school bus will be able to navigate these streets.

Delaware, pray for warmer weather. Only God can help you.

Crazy comments

I keep getting these spam comments on my blog, some of them obviously written by someone whose first language is not English, if he or she has a first language. Some are in bad French or bad German, or some non-European language I don't recognize.

They are not good or bad, they are essentially pointless, and I wonder why anyone would waste their time and effort to send them. Much better to remain silent.

Memories of old songs

 

By chance, this movie was on Turner Classic Movies the other night and I watched it. Despite starring Tyrone Power, who performed with all the ardor of a cigar store Indian (but I don't want to insult Native Americans), it was well worth watching. It featured several songs by Irving Berlin, most of them winners.

Also featured was a young and very svelte Ethel Merman. I always remember her as looking as if she had a bolster stuffed into her girdle, but in this film she was quite slim. I only recognized her because of her voice, which even in her youth, apparently, provided tough competition for the trombones, not to mention the trumpets. No orchestra ever drowned her out.

It was a fun trip down memory lane. What made it unusual for me is the fact that I could remember the lyrics to all the songs, songs which were written before I was born. I not only know the tunes but the lyrics. In fact, whenever an old movie musical is shown I know the words to all the music.

I seem to know the words to all the songs in what Mark Steyn calls the Great American Songbook, but I knew them before there was a Great American Songbook. I learned these songs in my teen years, which I spent traveling all over Columbus, OH on buses to attend every revival of a musical ever made. Many of them were quite forgettable as films, but the music was usually very singable. And the stories all had happy endings. In those days, there were lots of second and third run movie theaters, some in seedy neighborhoods, and I knew the names and locations of all of them.

I made these bus trips as a teen because I was a miserable high school student who was younger than my classmates and unhappy in school. The thought of buckling down to my schoolwork and acing the SATs never occurred to me. Seeing all these movies was a way of getting the hell out of central Ohio for an evening. Getting better grades as a way out was a possibility I never considered.

I have a retentive memory for poems, especially when they are set to music, and what are lyrics if not poems?

So I developed this phenomenal memory bank which nobody knew about or would have valued if they had. I never made a nickel out of it nor did I get into the selective college of my father's choice. But I am pleasantly surprised when I hear these songs and remember their words, which have stayed with me all these years.

Neighborhood snowman

 

Snow

 

 

 

 

My latest painting

 

This is where the grill goes

 

You can't tell, but this is where we grill those awesome barbecues. It's my deck, under the snow. I wonder whether the snow will be gone by Memorial Day.

You Australians--now do you feel sorry for me?

This song really, really annoys me

but I wouldn't kill anyone for singing it.

However, if they sang New York, New York....

Campaign worker dies from lack of health insurance

or maybe not.

I've had five friends who have had breast cancer. All had insurance. All of them went to the doctor when they felt a lump.

Four of them died anyway. Health insurance doesn't guarantee results. It just guarantees treatment.

Life isn't fair.

This is what 24 inches looks like

 

 

Views from my upstairs windows.

John Edwards joins Michael Vick in unpopularity

hits terminally ill wife.

What next? Puppy stew? Stealing crutches from the disabled?

Two Americas! one for the normal people and the other for despicable ones like John Edwards.

My psychic experience

I never did get my palm (tealeaves, cards) read, but mother did have lots of friends who did. Once we visited a fortune teller with a couple of mother's friends--just for fun. Most of her friends after she got divorced were single or divorced women and I don't think the psychic had to be too psychic to figure out what they wanted to hear. I imagine that such people are pretty good backyard psychologists anyway, having heard the same story over and over and facing the same kind of clientele every day.

I know that we who worked in the library faced patrons whose problems we could anticipate before they opened their mouths, and I imagine the fortune tellers have the same experience.

My fortune-teller came at me from a different and somewhat circuitous route. I parked my beaten up old car in the supermarket parking lot one day, and when I came out a man offered to fix the car body in my driveway. I agreed, and he told me to order the part from a dealer, which I did. When the part came in, I called him.

The man could have been sent from central casting; he looked exactly as a gypsy is supposed to look: dark complexion, dark eyes, and wearing a lot of gold in the form of chains. He called me and asked me to come to his house, so I did. The house, on a formerly residential but now heavily traveled commercial street, had a big sign in front advertising a psychic. I had driven by it many times and often wondered about it.

He called me back with a price and suggested that cash would suit him fine. So I took my body part and went over. While he fixed my car, I sat in the kitchen with his wife. To pass the time, she offered to tell my fortune at a very reasonable price and I agreed, to pass the time. Her reading revealed nothing new or startling and I spent the remaining time watching her husband whack and bang my car back into shape.

I'm assuming they were gypsies; at least they lived up to the stereotype. So if they weren't, I offer my apologies. I paid the asking price in cash and never saw them again.

I will say that, gypsy or not, he fixed the car at a reasonable price and didn't overcharge me as various dealers have over the years. I can't feel too sad over the sad plight of said dealers, judging by the way they treated me. The gypsy was a pleasure to deal with, in comparison.

As I was driving home from the doctor's the other day

I noticed some boys skateboarding. They made it look easy and effortless, like sunfish sailing in the wind, except they weren't being driven by the wind, just moving by shifting their balance from side to side. They reminded me of birds, so smoothly did they soar.

I was filled with wistful envy, as I am whenever I see people performing with great skill, violinists perhaps, or dancers. I couldn't do something like that to save my life. It was all I could do to ride a bicycle as a child.

Homage to Tim Blair

I borrowed a lot of his readers. They brought (fictional but highly welcome) beer, wine, hard liquor, barbecue, flowers and chicken soup with the chicken still swimming in it.

It was greatly appreciated while it lasted.

I love Australia.

Not watching the SOTU

Not watching it drunk, not watching it sober. I actually settled down with a glass of seltzer and a couple of pain pills (post-surgery) to watch it. But then I started to notice Joe Biden's head going up and down like a hairplugged, toothcapped bobble doll. I gave up. Recovering from surgery should be easier than this.

I watched the assorted riffraff come in and take their seats. They were all maneuvering for face time with The One. I remembered the last SOTU I had watched, when the same parties struggled to be photographed with Bush and then went home and called him a war criminal. And worse. These Congresspersons are always either at your feet or at your throat.

Looking at all the crooks and liars standing and cheering, I realized that I had changed. I used to give these guys the benefit of the doubt, even a year ago. Good will to men (and women) was my mantra. Now the mask has been ripped off, and I see them for what they are. Crooks and liars, until proven otherwise.

Looking at this bunch makes you doubt the validity of the theory of evolution. Humanity has evolved into this?

Vindication for the National Inquirer

They nailed John Edwards.

Now how about getting something on Eric Holder?

Blogging for love

I once contributed my thoughts, such as they are, to s blog group which will remain nameless. I sent them my stuff, they published it, I got comments, everyone was happy. Then I started to write reviews. One or two were published in boston.com, which I admit was fun for me.

I sent in more reviews, generally of books. They published them for a while, then started critiquing my work, finding flaws and making suggestions. I complied at first. More criticism ensued. The editor seemed to think she was editing the high school year book at a school for the mentally challenged. She had an unpleasant way with words, combining pomposity with pretentiousness.

One particular sort of criticism caused me to re-think my position. I submitted a review which was, in the opinion of the editor, too brief. Too brief for who? I am a person of few words; when I've said my say, I have no more to say. Plus, and this was the clincher: they're not paying me! So I get to say what I want. If you pay me, you get to tell me how to write. Otherwise, not so much.

Nobody has to read my blog. So far as I know, no one has had my blog assigned as required reading by a teacher. It does not appear in any list of recommended fine writing.

I blog mostly for myself. Anyone who wants to come along for the ride is welcome.

Surgery tomorrow

So--I'm having surgery on my right arm tomorrow. Possibly I will be typing soon, probably not. I already know what to expect, if this is like any other surgery: pain, tedium, frustration, tedium, pills, blood leaking from bandages and trying to take a shower with one arm in a plastic bag. (It doesn't really work. The arm, or leg, or knee, or foot, gets wet anyway.) Sort of.

I've always wanted to do what Tim Blair does. Talk among yourselves, you readers. Please use English, good grammar, proper spelling, and all the political incorrectness you can muster.

Gee, the French like us much better

since Obama became president. Feel the love.

What if you bought a new car...

and a truck drove up to your house, leaving in your driveway...

a large box, which you had to get a neighbor to help you get into the garage, where with difficulty you could open it, to find:

Lots of cardboard, plus foam, and 1 steering wheel, two axles, four wheels, four tires, a transmission, a motor, a collection of body parts, and a box of nuts, bolts, hinges, screws, etc.

and a manual, in several languages, all of them badly translated from Japanese, and printed in very small type, with teeny-tiny illustrations, PLUS:

very poor directions for putting the thing together by yourself.

Imagine, further, that you had problems assembling the thing, and called or e-mailed the Whatsit Motors website, only to be informed that, for really helpful help, you had to pay.

Imagine, therefore, that you decided to pay someone to come to your house to assemble it, and it cost about one third of the purchase price of the car.

Would you feel frustrated?

Welcome to my cell phone world.

New cell phone

Let me back up a bit. My GPS got lost or stolen, and it costs $200 to replace, so I got a new cell phone with built-in GPS free. It also has internet, texting, and a camera that's not too bad.

I figured out the camera, not that I need another camera. I think I transferred my address book. But I haven't figured out how to set up the GPS or how to connect to the Bluetooth device I bought for the car. Or how to mount the phone in the car. So I have to read the manual(s).

I can't tell you how much I hate these manuals. The first page tells you what all the parts are--that I understand. After that promising beginning, confusion reigns. It's my fault--my mind does not work in a 21st century way, I'm stuck back in the 20th century. Maybe the 19th. Anyway, I approach these with trepidation, frustration and an overwhelming desire to lie down and have a long cool drink of something while placing an ice pack on my forehead.

A highly flattering view of Americans, from a Brit

It's nice of him to feel we are wonderful.

I love England myself. I think it belongs to us as Americans in a very special way. The United States is an outgrowth of English law and custom, and we Americans are more at home there than we are in other places in Europe. Another neat thing: they speak English.

I don't think the English are less friendly or polite than we are. They just have less room to move around. It's a crowded country, and the English have learned to protect their private space. They are awfully good at crowd control and at lining up in an orderly fashion.

We, on the other hand, have an enormous country to move around in. So we can afford to be expansive.

Harry Reid's racist remark

Pretty damn mild, for a racist remark.

I'm an ardent Reid non-supporter. I believe he's far from the sharpest knife in the drawer, but if this is as racist as he gets, I say we should forget about it. I sort of understand what he was trying to say, and so does everyone who has lived beyond the age of twelve. He did not express himself well, but then he never does.

I'm sick of all this petty stuff. Obama continues to play golf when an airplane is almost blown up. So what? He had a telephone and staff with him didn't he? If he needed to know something or decide something, he could do it. If he wanted to have a press conference or make a statement, he could do that.

Some things are important and speak to character. Ben Nelson's sellout of Nebraska was deplorable and reveals a lack of moral compass. That's important, and serious.

But the most deplorable action any American political figure has taken in my lifetime was Ted Kennedy's leaving a woman to die in Chappaquiddick. Liberals give him a pass because he did so much that was good for the country, in their eyes. But it was an indelible moral stain on his character. Other politicians have performed illegal actions and made idiotic remarks, and of course most of them are stealing us blind. That's a given. But no one died as a result.

Let's deplore what's really deplorable and forget about Michelle's clothes and Harry's remarks and whatever other gotcha moments that come up.

Rural post office

This story was featured in the Delaware newspaper and online:

I thought it had an offbeat charm.

All the blather about global warming/nuclear winter reminds me of this poem:

Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I've tasted of desire
I hold with those who favour fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.

Robert Frost

and while I have your attention, another poem by the same poet:

Provide, Provide




The witch that came (the withered hag)
To wash the steps with pail and rag,
Was once the beauty Abishag,

The picture pride of Hollywood.
Too many fall from great and good
For you to doubt the likelihood.

Die early and avoid the fate.
Or if predestined to die late,
Make up your mind to die in state.

Make the whole stock exchange your own!
If need be occupy a throne,
Where nobody can call you crone.

Some have relied on what they knew;
Others on simply being true.
What worked for them might work for you.

No memory of having starred
Atones for later disregard,
Or keeps the end from being hard.

Better to go down dignified
With boughten friendship at your side
Than none at all. Provide, provide!

Robert Frost

Inmates want to remain in Cuba

Looking out the window here, I must say Cuba is looking rather good right now.

It's not snowing there, right?

Amaryllis

We saw beautiful amaryllis at Longwood Gardens, in a splendid array of colors, and I was reminded of a song: either by Thomas Campion or by anonymous, depending on which source you believe, about sweet Amaryllis, a wanton country maid.

One of my peculiarities is that I remember the words to every song I've ever heard, if they are clearly enunciated. This one goes:
I care not for these ladies
That must be wooed and prayed,
Give me kind Amarillis
The wanton country maid,
Nature art disdaineth,
Her beauty is her owne,
For when we court and kiss,
She cries forsooth let go
But when we come where comfort is
She never will say no. (and so forth)

I wish I could figure out how to include a song in this post, but it's late at night, and I can't. However, if you click on the heading you will find a lot of o songs that are available for copying.

Amaryllis is a pretty, old-fashioned name. Along with Phyllis, it is featured in a lot of old songs, because it is a musical name and sounds pretty when sung.

Why are some names for children popular while others are not? Emma, for instance, is at the top of the list of girls' names. As a name, it's just okay, nothing special. Some old-fashioned names are making a comeback, like Phoebe and Olivia, others, like Mabel and Florence, not.

Then there are the truly awful names, among them Destiny. If Destiny, why not Epiphany? If Grace, why not Hope and Charity? If Brittany, why not Bethany?

Boys' names are not quite as fanciful. Baby boys born nowadays tend to have Irish-sounding names: Brian, Kevin, Aidan; or biblical: Adam, Benjamin, Jacob. Sometimes they have the names of English kings: Henry, James, Charles, Edward.

Solve your drip and drool problems

Honestly.

Frightening

It reminds me of the drunkenness problem in the 18th century:

The Gin Craze was a period in the first half of the 18th century when the consumption of gin became popular with the working classes in Britain - especially in London. There ensued an epidemic of extreme drunkenness that provoked moral outrage and a legislative backlash which some compare to the modern drug wars.

This was the direct inspiration for Hogarth's Gin Lane. A popular saying was: "Drunk for a penny, dead drunk for tuppence."





Binge drinking in the UK.

Go read it and look at the pictures.

Via Instapundit.

Airline security, part III

A very good discussion, which however contains the following sanctimonious remark:

Racial or religious profiling is morally wrong and likely to be counterproductive by radicalizing those subjected to it.

Oh yeah? Does this mean that every black man who can't get a taxi because of his skin color will become a terrorist? I don't think so. Ny New Jersey neighbor (black) told me his teen-age son was always being stopped by cops, but though he regretted it, he saw where the cops were coming from. My grandson, a young but dark man, has been stopped on more than one occasion but has not become embittered or radicalized.

As a minority myself, albeit not a readily recognizable one, I've heard remarks about Jews which I considered offensive. They were offensive. But all it caused me to do was lose respect for the person uttering the remark. You can't always react to every offense. Sometimes it's better to let it go.

Lose-lose proposition

I have been awfully cranky lately. Everything seems to be breaking. The washer, which cost about $400 a couple of years ago, broke. No sense repairing it, which would cost maybe $200. So I bought a new one. My computer! the non-functioning CD burner made it impossible to download the software for my new camera so I tried to get Nikon to download the drivers, but they couldn't do it, because the computer was 64 bits, apparently something which had not ever happened in the history of the Nikon company and they were sorry but it was getting late and customer service wanted to go out for a cigarette anyway, so I sent the camera back to Amazon. I must admit I felt a twinge of satisfaction when I got rid of it. Take that, Nikon!

The small television/DVD player that cost $300 and will not recognize a CD inserted in it any more is at the repair shop. It would cost too much to replace, as well as too much to fix. Heads you win. Tails I lose.

Did I mention the hinge on the dishwasher which is causing the door not to close properly unless you twist it to the left? Probably not. Another appliance that costs too much to fix and too much to replace, so that whatever I do--get a new one or fix this one--I feel like a sucker.

I'm not claiming that manufacturers are deliberately making things that are so shoddy they break down. It's not a conscious decision on their part; it's just the result of them all taking their I Don't Care pill every day upon arising. They're hoping it won't break, but if it does, so what? Not their problem--the warranty just ran out.

The rocky road to Dublin

Mr Charm has decided that he will no longer attend movies in theaters. He says the music, particularly in the previews, is way too loud.

I saw Sherlock Holmes on Christmas Day. The music was way too loud. There ought to be a ban on drum rolls in movies, along with cimbals, trumpets, and the little thing they hit with a stick. Does the guy who plays the little thing you hit with a stick have to audition? Just thought I'd ask.

I only liked one thing about the movie, the song The Rocky Road to Dublin.

It sounded like it was sung by Tommy Makem, but I could be wrong. And it was played way too loud.

Oh, and to be fair, London looked nice too, but awfully crowded, more like Calcutta than London.

Lower depths

So I am driving around downtown Wilmington, looking for a place to drop off my broken DVD/television, and I suddenly notice a complete change of neighborhood. I have stumbled into a rundown, treeless, charmless low rent industrial area. Broken sidewalks. Boarded-up stores. Signs in Spanish. Storefront churches. Polish Catholic schools. My first thought was: I'm in New Jersey! Delaware had morphed into some lowdown industrial area, say Paterson, New Jersey on a bad day.

It's not a bad neighborhood, necessarily. There are lots of businesses that appear to be going concerns, manufacturing or wholesaling some necessary but utilitarian product--floor tiles, maybe, or plumbing supplies. It's just an area totally bereft of charm, right off--of course--Martin Luther King Blvd.

It was interesting to see the seamy side of everyday Delaware. By this I mean the underpinning of society: the place where cars get new body parts, plumbers get pipes, homeowners get flooring. This is where it all comes from. Without this area, there would be no gardens, no historic houses, no big box stores. The beautiful parts of Delaware are just the surface.

Someone said I should put up a more recent picture of myself

So here goes:


In all fairness, my skin isn't really that green.

Potemkin flight security

Airline "security" doesn't work. Nor is it intended to. It isn't about security. It's a jobs program, and about pretending to do "something." The federal government is trying to hire every man, woman and hermaphrodite over the age of 18, who will then practice "security" on each other. This will make the economy work, the same as if everyone earned a living by taking in each others' laundry, only not as messy. And they all get a chance to be officious and come over all nannyish, which is lots of fun. Just ask Mayor Bloomberg.

I once flew to Italy and back with a box cutter in my purse. It was after September 11, 2001. My purse is full of odds and ends which I usually only clean out when I change purses.

I always carry a box cutter, because I can't open packages, for instance chewing gum, without one. I truly meant to get rid of it before coming to Rome, but I forgot, and only noticed I still had it when we arrived in Sorrento. Then I meant to put it in my suitcase for the trip home, but it totally slipped my mind. I believe this box cutter is made of such crummy metal that it doesn't set off the metal detector. I have a knife like that, which does not adhere to my magnetic knife rack. The box cutter, however, did contain a sharp razor blade.

However, in defense of Homeland Security, they did make me throw out a perfectly good tube of toothpaste once. I should have carried it in my crotch. No-one would have noticed.

If this went smoothly....

What would she characterize as "going roughly"?

Maybe this?

Non-denominational and subtly understated Christmas decorations

 

 

 

 

The snowflake is my favorite.

Your country has limited resources...

What activity would you prefer to have the government engage in, if you had to choose one: keep track of terrorists--or prevent the addition of caffeine to beer?

Remember, you can only choose one.

Have a holly jolly Christmas

 

Too many people work for the government...

if it is someone's job to ban caffeine in alcoholic drinks.

Which it apparently is.

After the snow

 

I couldn't resist showing this picture of a typical day in Upstate New York.

New developments at Duke

concerning the 88 professors who rushed to judgment:

[N]one of the 88 guilt-presuming professors has publicly apologized.... Many of the faculty signers -- a majority of whom are white -- have expressed pride in their rush to judgment. None was dismissed, demoted, or publicly rebuked. Two were glorified this month in Duke's in-house organ as pioneers of "diversity," with no reference to their roles in signing the ad. Three others have won prestigious positions at Cornell, Vanderbilt, and the University of Chicago.

Actually, signing this document was the most astute career move any of them could have made:

Among the most prominent signers of both the ad and the letter were Karla Holloway, an English professor, and Paula McClain, a political science professor. They also slimed the lacrosse players in opaquely worded, academic-jargon-filled individual statements full of innuendo.

This disgraceful behavior apparently did not trouble Duke's Academic Council, which in February 2007 made McClain its next chairwoman -- the highest elected position for a faculty member.

Three of them moved on to better jobs:

The three Group of 88 signers hired away by other leading universities are Houston Baker, Grant Farred, and Charles Payne.

Vanderbilt was so proud to have signed up Baker, a professor of English and African and African-American studies at Duke, in April 2006 that it prominently featured a photo of him on its website for months. This was shortly after Baker had issued a March 29, 2006, public letter pressuring the Duke administration to dismiss the lacrosse players....

If you eat right, don't smoke, wear your seat belt, and watch your weight....

you will live forever, right? Wrong. Well, at least you'll live longer--right? Yes, but--the race is not always to the swift, or the battle to the strong, nor is good health something you can assure by rational behavior. But the theory of "preventive care," which our President seems to think will actually prevent illness is actually just that--a theory.

A member of my family died not too long ago of Lou Gehrig's disease at the age of 51. He ate properly, rode a bicycle to work, blah blah. Died anyway. No-one knows why.

Having lived a long time already, I know that our bodies have a sell-by date. I am not the person I was at 25. I am less.

We are genetically programmed to wear out and die. Some of our illness can be prevented, some can be alleviated. Doctors and other health professionals work very hard to put off the inevitable, and that is as it should be. But the idea that annual checkups will catch disease in its earliest stage--that you can "take the blue pill" and be all right--is simplistic garbage.

Me

 

Getting to know the Sheridans

We changed our phone number recently. For one reason, we kept getting calls for the Pattersons. Some of the callers even got surly about it and thought we were covering up for the Pattersons. Honestly, no. We would have gladly put any and all Pattersons on the phone, had they been handy.

So we got a new phone number. All was peace and harmony for a long time. We received calls only from Happy Harry telling us our prescription was ready to be picked up and the occasional chat from Rep Mike Castle.

Then the Sheridans entered our lives. I don't really want to discuss them, having been worn out by the Pattersons' wide circle of friends and relations. However, if your name is Vicky Sheridan, you'd better start paying back your student loan!

Happy holidays from Joe Biden

brought to you by the Teamsters.

Scaredy cat

 

That's me as a kid. Looking back from my currrent viewpoint, I must have been a bit of a trial. I was scared of everything. I was scared of the merry-go-round. The ferris wheel--I don't think I went on that until I was twenty. I was scared of dogs, especially if they were bigger than me, which most of them were. I was scared of the animals in the zoo. I was too timid to go to a birthday party.

I think I can attribute this to a sense of impending doom, which I have noticed also in my brother the genius. He used to drive around Columbus, OH in a crash helmet. We bullied him out of it, but I think deep down he still would like to wear one if no-one were looking.

Friday the 13th took place on Sunday this year

but it was still horrible. Frustration with loading the software on the new camera, as the CD drive does not work. Tried to download software, but couldn't. I figured it was me, called tech support. The first "customer service rep" was downright rude and hung up on me. Customer service! The second told me that the software wouldn't download because I have a 64-bit computer, which I understand is the equivalent of wearing brown shoes with a tuxedo. However, she informed me my card reader would download the stuff anyway.

I asked her, why bother with the CD, then? She answered none too pleasantly. So...Nikon goes back in box, returned to sender. Another company boycotted.

I know my little private boycotts don't work. What does Dell care? Not at all. They are actually in the loan shark business with a computer company on the side. Nikon aren't losing any sleep either. But it makes me feel better. Consider it a placebo.

Next, went to a party last night. Beautiful house, with woodsmoke and two obese cats. The woodsmoke touched off my allergies, my friend--and driver--was allergic to the cats. Beautiful house, though. We got out of there after 45 minutes, just ahead of anaphylactic shock. Sneezed and coughed all the way home.

When I got home, I discovered that I had left my unbrella at the host's house. That's okay, because I only bring umbrellas with me for show. I never open them, it's not worth the trouble, except in London. When I got home, I discovered that I had left my gloves in my friend's car. Thought briefly about what an idiot I am, shedding my possessions as I move through life. So, what could I do.

Went to bed.

Michael Dell is the second richest man in America?

Or so I read somewhere. This happened, I believe, because his company made really good computers back in the day. Now, not so much.

My latest, purchased just a bit over a year ago, has some kind of problem with sound. Dell, of course, gives no customer service. You bought it, you took it out of the box, you're on your own.

The first time it ceased to produce sound, I took the speakers back to Best Buy. They tested them and declared them good. Dell, of course, was silent on the subject--as silent as my computer. But I did manage to find a bit of advice online somewhere: just restore the computer to an earlier point. I did, and the computer spoke again.

Lately, I have had to restore it on an average of every two weeks. But there is a new problem. I bought a new camera and tried to download the software. The CD drive doesn't work. I went to the Dell website and tried to download new drivers for it, but no success.

The damn computer is not two years old yet, so I don't want to replace it. It's too expensive to discard, but it costs too much to fix it. Mr Charm's new computer, on the other hand, is inaccessible because a password and username are needed to access it, and he has forgotten them, understandably, as he has been hospitalized or rehabbed for six months.

My family has had about eight Dell computers in the last 5-7 years. Small beer for some, I know, but for us, impressive. Now I am going to switch to HP for my computer needs, because they have good customer support. For now.

The situation reminds me of what happened to domestic cars a couple of decades ago. American auto companies got complacent and decided they could fob off any old thing on the public. They had a rude surprise when people started buying Japanese cars.

I sense a niche market here, for an idiot-proof computer. Surely there are more idiots like me around than there are techies?

I am wondering whether I am seriously weird...

I have a serious problem wearing socks that don't match. I found myself frantically looking for a matching pair of socks to wear, even though I was going to wear knee-high boots and no-one would see my socks.

As I fumbled through the drawer, I was scolding myself for this stupid attitude. It does not matter whether socks match or not. Stop this! You're wasting time!

Is this an offshoot of the idea that people must wear clean underwear in case they are in an automobile accident and someone in the hospital might see their underwear?

I finally found a pair that matched. What a relief!

carnations

 

Fried peppers

 

Is there such a thing as "Ameritrash"?

No doubt both of them--or the third one whose picture I don't have--were honor graduates from very selective institutions of higher learning and volunteered their time to care for the homeless as well as coaching softball for underprivileged girls.