4:9, #600: Patience

I think the fact that this is post #600 shows that patience is one of those things you might actually have even when you think you don't and show it over the course of time. In fact, for all you Born Agains out there reading this here dohicky, PLEASE DON'T EVER PRAY 'FOR PATIENCE!!!' You've already GOT it as part of the Fruit of the Spirit listed in Galatians 5:22-23, "Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control." When you say, 'Lord give me patience' the actual translation of the mental email is...'please give me one or more of those trials James 1:2-4 talks about that will make me use the patience I've already got in a way that it'll mature me in the faith!!' For all you Bible scholars who passed through Camp Cornelius at one time or another, that would be my 'dynamic equivalent' translation in the Newly Annotated Sexton Bible, should I ever get around to getting one in print among all the various English translations.

Of course, then the question arises whether or not mine would actually be 'an English translation' or would it more accurately/linguistically be considered 'an American translation,' considering we're two peoples separated by the same language...or something like that, as I recall.

I'm including the public domain picture above as yet another good example of patience...in this class by artist Spitzweg. Click on that photo and check out the incredible detail in the whole thing. I've currently got it on my desktop since I think it's cool, and I have a feeling that it might show up in Whatever Happened to Ishmael? sometime down the road, once Old Pappy Ishmael hits land. Oh, and for those of you who may have clicked on the link to WHTI? and have not told me to 'abandon ship' with my noveling, tankewberrymuch. If you've thought about it...Stifle it, Edith! as Archie Bunker was wont to say on the TV show "All In the Family."

Oh, another good use of patience is playing 'Glory of Rome' on Facebook...man, it takes time to do stuff! But, hey, that gives us addictive personality gamers a chance to multitask with another blogging opportunity while waiting for our palace to be upgraded or a report to come back from our scouts telling us we'll get our butts kicked if we try and go up against whatever region's being scouted. Hey, that reminds me...if any of you Friends want to play the game...it's somewhat of a variant of Age of Empires combined with Heroes of Might and Magic...join the game and let me know so I can offer you a cohort-ship and make you a general of your very own legion!

Well, I'm hungry in the real world, so I'm off to the Grey Havens for something that's waiting for me in the fridge that will take NO patience to eat!
Got end of the year resolutions?

4:8, #599: Snow

Well, here it is, the first major snow fall of winter 2010-2011. It's shaping up to be a pip as it started out coming up the East coast with a curling motion that's turned it into a classic Nor'easter! Yippee, Skippee! By the way, the pic is from last year's 'snowicane.'

Since it's the first one, and I have the plow on the truck already and the truck down by the Grey Havens in position to begin plowing at the appropriate time, and since there is no pressure to get anything cleared away except perhaps Carriage House Hill...yes, WTSers of past days...the Student Center is now The Carriage House and Bookstore Hill is renamed, too, in my little part of the planet; SNOW is not currently a four-letter word. Get back to me towards mid-February and I might have a different opinion, but for now we're copacetic!

Speaking of that, I guess I'd better take a walk outside to change my position here at the computer where I've been composing more of What Ever Happened to Ishmael? and perhaps enjoy the joys of tobacco; which, fyi was 'created good' there in Genesis 1!!
Got a light?

4:7, #598: In Praise of Fat

Back in the 80s I was talking to a guy who was a diesel truck mechanic who dressed out around 300lbs. He told the story of working on a truck with the cab tilted forward while it was snowing and the truck was broken down on the road.

He didn't realize that the fuel pump kept pumping fuel over top of him from a broken fuel line and a spark ignited the fuel; which set him on fire for a time. Someone extinguished the fire, called the paramedics, and when the guy was stabilized in the hospital, the doctors told him the excess amount of fat he had actually had protected his internal organs from burning, saving his life.

He vowed never to worry about his weight again. He pointed out that the experience 'burned like Hell' and I pointed out to him that it probably did not, exactly, and shared the gospel with him. Don't know what happened from that, but added him to my on-going Salvation List.
Guess eternity will tell the tale of what came later...

4:6, #597: Names

Great, great grandmother must have had a premonition about her youngest child even while he was still floating around in the amniotic fluid of his first nine-month habitation. Our family Bible which has come down to me indicates that she was a staunch Calvinist who chose to attend a Presbyterian congregation her entire life after she had 'seen the light' as a young girl, as she was wont to say, according to the stories handed down through the years. She was also a prolific writer...which might explain from whence my proclivities come...and had carefully written comments and notes throughout the large volume she apparently read daily for more than 60 years.

There were all sorts of dates throughout the Old Book that indicate that she was in the habit of reading it from Genesis to Revelation about every 18 months or so; which is significant when we realize that Pappy Ishmael was born on the very day she read the story of Hagar's departure with her son of the same name. As I said, she believed her youngest was going to be a wild one even as she carried him, as many mothers down through the ages have anticipated behavior, both good and bad, of their yet unborn offspring. None of the relatives on either side of our clans had had the name of Ishmael and there were no financial supporters to flatter, so her choice of 'Ishmael' can only be explained by providence, fate, or perhaps the fact that she screamed the name repeatedly while pushing the baby out and prior to one of those incantations the doctor asked, "What will the child be named?"

In any event, Ishmael it was. Fortunately for him, he was born in an age when Biblical names were popular, so his 'brand' was not as heinous as that of Cain's. From what we can piece together, however, he would have adequately defended himself had the local New Yawkers of similar age chided him for his mother's choice of names under somewhat stressful circumstances. The question arises, of course, as to why great great grandfather did not alter the naming process; turns out he was thinking of the same name before the birth event and was delighted to hear his wife not only acquiesce, but advocate the name.

As William Cowper, whose works also adorned great great grandmother's shelves, so adequately wrote long before the blessed event, 'God moves in a mysterious way'...children to be born.

4:5, #596: Whatever Happened to Ismael?

Queequeg's coffin had kept great grandfather Ishmael afloat. As he put it when he retold the tale to Mr. Melville, "the unharming sharks...glided by as if with padlocks on their mouths..." implying they were without appetite in the same fashion as the lions in Daniel's story told in the Old Book. He even had a bit of one-upmanship in his detail, adding that 'the savage sea-hawks sailed with sheathed beaks." Family tradition has it that great grandfather's flair for language only got more pronounced as he waxed eloquent about his adventures...frequently accompanied by hearty doses of grog or some other palatable liquid!

Well, you've possibly read that the Rachel picked great grandfather up as yet another orphan of the sea with the mostly satisfying 'Finis' as the last word of the story. It was not the last word, let me tell you. Mr. Melville recounted Ishmael's story in 1851 Anno Domini when great grandfather was still a young man in his prime, with the inevitable 'Novembers of the soul' following in the cycle of the spiritual year that all mankind encounters. Not surprisingly, given the Providence of his rescue from a Hell-bound voyage, Pappy, as he came to be known later in life, encountered many more adventures and actually lived to a ripe old age.

But more of that later...

4:4, #595: The Dickens, You Say

Well, I finished A Christmas Carol a bit ago and have a few more things to say. The scene is Ebenezer and Christmas Present overhearing this conversation about Tiny Tim's church going behavior:

'As good as gold,' said Bob, 'and better. Somehow he gets thoughtful, sitting by himself so much, and thinks the strangest things you ever heard. He told me, coming home, that he hoped the people saw him in the church, because he was a cripple, and it might be pleasant to them to remember upon Christmas Day, who made lame beggars walk, and blind men see.' (My italics again.)

Then, in discussing Tim's possible demise, the Spirit reminds Eb of his harsh phrase, "If they're to die, let them do so and decrease the surplus population. This response is even edited out of the 1951 version:

'Man,' said the Ghost, 'if man you be in heart, not adamant, forbear that wicked cant until you have discovered What the surplus is, and Where it is. Will you decide what men shall live, what men shall die? It may be, that in the sight of Heaven, you are more worthless and less fit to live than millions like this poor man's child. Oh God! to hear the Insect on the leaf pronouncing on the too much life among his hungry brothers in the dust.'

Finally, when Christmas Future's got him, they see the Cratchits once again, hearing just this phrase read 'from a book' by young Peter Cratchit:

'And he took a child, and set him in the midst of them.'

Where had Scrooge heard those words? He had not dreamed them. The boy must have read them out, as he and the Spirit crossed the threshold. Why did he not go on?

The answer to Dickens' narrator's question: Matthew 18:1-3, “At the same time came the disciples unto Jesus, saying, Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven? And Jesus called a little child unto him, and set him in the midst of them, And said, Verily I say unto you, Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven."

So, for those who aver that Dickens was only writing a social gospel story, I would contest... Avaunt, Thee, rump fed runions!! (Tip of the hat to Willie Shakespeare!)

Got hot gin punch?

4:3, #594: Unknown Dickens

I'm sitting here reading A Christmas Carol online...let's hear it for technology this time...after watching the Alistair Sims' classic, 'Scrooge,' last night on the 167th anniversary of the publishing of this classic, and have discovered some things not usually made public in or about the Dickens' classic. For instance, in the first chapter when Marley confronts Ebby with the call to Christian evangelism:
'At this time of the rolling year,' the spectre said, 'I suffer most. Why did I walk through crowds of fellow-beings with my eyes turned down, and never raise them to that blessed Star which led the Wise Men to a poor abode? Were there no poor homes to which its light would have conducted me?' (My italics.)

Then, when the Ghost of Christmas Present shows up, Scrooge attacks Christian Sabbatarian behavior and is reproved thusly:
'Spirit?' said Scrooge, after a moment's thought, 'I wonder you, of all the beings in the many worlds about us, should desire to cramp these people's opportunities of innocent enjoyment.'

'I!' cried the Spirit.

'You would deprive them of their means of dining every seventh day, often the only day on which they can be said to dine at all,' said Scrooge. 'Wouldn't you?'

'I!' cried the Spirit.

'You seek to close these places on the Seventh Day,' said Scrooge. 'And it comes to the same thing.'

'I seek!' exclaimed the Spirit.

'Forgive me if I am wrong. It has been done in your name, or at least in that of your family,' said Scrooge.

'There are some upon this earth of yours,' returned the Spirit, 'who lay claim to know us, and who do their deeds of passion, pride, ill-will, hatred, envy, bigotry, and selfishness in our name, who are as strange to us and all our kith and kin, as if they had never lived. Remember that, and charge their doings on themselves, not us.'

I don't like long posts, so I'll wrap this one here.

Source:[ http://etext.virginia.edu/toc/modeng/public/DicChri.html]

4:2, #593: The Necessary

Being descended from two plumbers, I seem to have a natural curiosity concerning Things Necessary...no, not the 'necessary' that Jesus talks about in Luke 10:42 which comes supernaturally, although for the last 30 years I have had that gift, too. Today it's the derivation of the various names given to the facility that we all use, indoors or out. 'The Necessary' is the name I picked up from the movie '1776.' That particular outhouse was located just down the street from Independence Hall and would have been the 18th century equivalent, I guess, of the Jiffy Johns I've used on construction sights 'back in the day;' which in my case was the 1970s.

Which brings me to 'john,' 'crapper,' and 'loo;' all of which are adequately detailed at [http://didyouknow.org/toilets/]. By the way, Google gave me 12,500,000 sites in .29 seconds for 'why the toilet is called john.' I like the idea that old Tom Crapper was a plumber, if you believe the article, even though he didn't invent it. The question then becomes, just what did a plumber do in the 18th century? Yick! ;p And those FRENCH...Mon Dieu!!

For those of you familiar with the term 'head,' well, if you look at the front end...the bow...of a square-rigged ship, down there 'a-head of the wind' that would be blowing from the stern or back end usually, was the place to recycle last night's ship board meal and grog ration! Ironically, on a lot of ships, there was a head carved into the ship as part of the decoration. I guess on land there was the outhouse, aboard ship the REALLY out house! ;p

Well, 'inner room' or 'throne room' are still my preferred nomenclatures. As I've said before, Matthew 6:6 tells us to 'go into your inner room and shut the door' even though it was written before the advent of indoor plumbing and 'pray to your Father who is in secret,' so you're essentially entering His throne room of grace by being in the head/loo/necessary/throne room. OK, that's enough...time to open up some buildings for those who get here early with a long car ride and large cup of coffee! ;)
Got prayer requests?

4:1, #592: Thoughts On Being Four

Yessirree, Bob...four years ago to the day (thank you Frodo) I began this emptying of my twisted thinking onto the Internet.
Thirty years ago to the day, I started my prayer journals which now have 198,062 answers in them.
One hunnerd and forty-eight years ago to the day, great grandpappy Jacob Antes was 'supporting artillery' south of Fredericksburg as Stonewall Jackson shelled the Sixth Corps of which the 119th Pennsylvania volunteers were a part...which explains my somewhat whacked view of things if I got Post Traumatic Stress from 'being in my great grandfather's loins' on that fateful day in American History!! ;P

One of my Facebrook friends once wondered why I ask so many questions on my posts, much as a five year old would. Well, on thinking about it, I always was a precocious child, so I figure I must have started asking questions at least by four, back in 1955, that is. Sheesh, how much water has flowed under the bridge...or pontoons at Fredericksburg... since then?

OH, LOOK...I spelled it 'Facebrook'...must have been a psychological slip of the fingers as a result of crossing the Potomac that wintry day with Pappy Jake that caused the slip...it was icy cold that day, you know! BRRRRRRR!! FYI, I've also called the medium Farcebook, so the unstrategic misplacement of the letter 'r' (coincidentally the first letter in my birth certificate name) provides us with a smidge (thank you, Shannon) of humor. It also sums up my more Scrooge-like view of Facebook; which also is a smidge of why I named this blog as I did, figuring EVERYBODY'S blog was self indulgent b.s...it's just that mine's official!!

Let's see, 4 into 59 equals 14.75...I wonder if that would mean I'm only four in giant tortoise years? Well, why shouldn't we have a standard like that, given that we're often comparing ages to 'dog years?!!' At the other end of the spectrum, a mayfly lasts 30 minutes to one day, depending on the species. So, 1 day = 70 years, 59 x 365=21,535 + 14 leap years + 28 Very Merry Unbirthdays since 11/15; means I'm 21,577 years old in 'mayfly years.' Methuselah eat your heart out!!

Well, I hear some joint compound calling me...NO, not 'joint' as in Marijuana Doobie Brothers, but as in 'smear this goop on the joints of drywall to make a smooth surface to paint!!' Guess I'd better get off vacation time and get back on the clock...would that be in dog years, mayfly years, or giant tortoise years?
Got calculator?

3:97, #591: Three and Thirty

Well, here it is, the end of another year on my particular calendar...this time 3 years that I've been Self Indulging and 30 that I've been tracking part of God's work in my prayer journals. Providentially as I start this entry, 'Child of God' is playing on my computer...one of my favorite anthems from days gone by in my walk along the Narrow Road. Well, here at this maybe mystical conjunction of 3s when I finished reading the Old Testament for the 23rd time and began Matthew at the time of the Christmas Season are some thoughts generated this morning:

If you doze off for a brief nap while reading the Bible, are you truly 'resting in the Lord?'

If Peter had a wife, deduced from the fact that Jesus healed his mother-in-law in Mark 1:30-34...howcome the Popes are supposed to be celibate bachelors? Oh, and what ever happened to Mrs. Saint Pete and her Mom? Did they become part of the Early Church's 'woman's auxiliary' who helped support Jesus in his three year walkabout?

When Jesus sent out the Twelve in Luke 9:1-10, how did he match them up? For years, I figured it would be Simon the Zealot with Matthew the Tax Collector just to teach them how to get along, given their opposite political views. So, I thought it through a bit this morning and came up with these combos: Simon Peter 'the stone'/Judas Iscariot 'the heart of stone,' John the Beloved/Thomas the Doubter, James son of Thunder who wanted to blast folks/Andrew Go Get Them who told people of Christ, Philip the Thick (who didn't realize Jesus and the Father are one in John 14)/Bartholomew (who is always pared up in the lists of the Apostles with Phil), & James son of Alphaeus/Thaddeus a.k.a. Judas son of James...basically because they are who are left.

This process made me wonder just who the 70 Sent Out were in Luke 10, but I don't think 70 others are mentioned by name, so I was not going to hurt my brain over this one. I guess we can find out in Heaven, if it's necessary.

Now, since it's The Noting of Jesus' Birth Season, it is significant that He was born 'on the wrong side of the tracks' in Israel....the only problem is that He was born long before the invention of railroads, so would that phrase have been valid, considering that Roman roads were full of chariot tracks? Just wondering...

When Satan took Jesus to the Temple pinnacle and to a high mountain in Matthew 4 to tempt Him, did they walk/climb or did His Infernal Majesty use some occult levitation powers to impress the One who made him in the first place? Oh, the point of that chapter, by the way, is not to answer my question, but to show Jesus' Divinity and sinlessness!!

Well, I think this is a long enough entry for the end of year #3 of Self Indulgent B.S....talk to you in Year #4!
Got questions?

3:96, #590: Inception's Dreaming

Last night, we of the Grey Havens watched "Inception," the movie that's supposed to be so FABULOUS, according to critics. Well, my rule of thumb has been 'if the critics love it, I won't and if the critics hate it, I'll watch it a coupla dozen times!!' Thumbs down on this one, Gang! Here's the scoop that will spoil it for you if you haven't seen it yet and are planning so to do:

The keys are 1.) the dradle is still spinning when the movie goes black at the end, 2.) the scene where Leo D. says, 'We did grow old together' and you see two gnarly hands holding, & 3.) Ariadne was the girl in X-men who could run through walls. Let me explain...

The dradle is the token that's supposedly the way Leo is supposed to know if he's dreaming or awake. If it stops spinning, he's awake, if not, he's dreaming. At the end of the movie, even though there's a moment's hesitation, it is still spinning when they go black...IT WAS ALL A DREAM!! ;P

In the midst of all the multi-level dreaming and actually pretty decent action scenes, near the end when he is talking to his dead wife at level 4 of the dream world, he tells her they did grow old together as he promised when they married. That tipped me off to the fact that the whole movie is an old man's dream about the life he never lived, his guilt for perhaps letting the old girl commit suicide and/or his euthanasia based help he gave her, and that this was the way he was dealing with the death of his life long partner.

Not only was Ariadne the girl who could run through walls in 'X-men,' which I guess prepared her to run through various levels of dreaming, but Mal was Johnny Depp's moll in 'Public Enemies,' and Arthur was the Cobra scienterific geek in 'G.I.Joe.'...not that those pieces make any difference in the plot of the movie.

Bottom line: Old guy can't handle the death of his wife...CHICK FLICK!
Got Isaiah 46:4, "Even to your old age, I shall be the same, And even to your graying years I shall bear you! I have done it, and I shall carry you; And I shall bear you, and I shall deliver you?"

3:95, #589: Book Worm's 12 Days of Christmas

I've heard various versions of 'The Twelve Days of Christmas' and decided to write one of my own, letting you bookworms get a wish list gathered:

On the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me The Partridge Family. Holey Moley, Andy, Amazon tells me there are at least 14 in the series!!! ;P

On the second day of Christmas my true love gave to me two Lonesome Doves and another Partridge Family!

On the third day of Christmas my true love gave to me The Three Musketeers, Two For The Dough, and The Partridge Family.

On the fourth day of Christmas my true love gave to me The Four Hour Body, Three Cups of Tea, Two of Everything, and another Partridge Family!! ;p

On the fifth day of Christmas my true love gave to me THE LORD OF THE RINGS!!!...Boxed edition of course...The Rule of Four, Hull Zero Three, Tragedy at Two, and...yes, you guessed it, another Partridge Family!

On the sixth day of Christmas my true love gave to me six Keeping Ducks & Geese (you're getting them as gifts next year!), FIVE YU-ENG-LINGS!!! (to drink while reading!!)...Four so-called BIRDS, three French cookbooks, two Turkey Calls and Calling, and one more Partridge Family!

On the seventh day of Christmas my true love gave to me seven Swimsuit issues, six Domestic Geese, THE LORD OF THE RINGS!!! (in Elvish, no less), The Sign of Four, Three Amigos, Two Gentlemen of Verona, and...AGGGGHHH...IT'S THE PARTRIDGE FAMILY!!!

On the eighth day of Christmas my true love gave to me eight packs of Old Maids (the card game for when I got bored with the books), seven Wild Swans (another give away), a six pack of goose grease (guess for the seven swans a swimming to cross the English Channel!), FIVE BATHTUB RINGS!!! (how'd they keep their shape?!!), four calling cards (embossed with a bookworm), Warriors: Power of Three, Two-Way Street, and The Partridge Family... WHAT ELSE?!!

On the ninth day of Christmas my true love gave to me nine Ballroom Dancings, eight Morning Milkings, seven Swan Thieves, six Mother Goose-ez (gotta keep the meter), FIVE DECODER RINGS!!! ...four Backyard Birds, Three French Hens (yeah, there's actually a book of that name), two Snow White Turtle Doves, and yeah, I know...The Partridge Family!!

On the tenth day of Christmas my true love gave to me ten Lord of the Flies (Ebay, here I come), nine Ladies Home Journals (different issues), eight of The Untold Story of Milk, seven Swan Songs, six Duck and Goose-ez, FIVE OF SATURNS RINGS!!! (lotta gas, if you ask me!), I Am the Number Four, The Tale of Three Trees, A Tale of Two Cities, and The Partridge Family!!!

On the eleventh day of Christmas my true love gave to me (I feel a psychotic episode may have sparked this unheard of gift giving, frankly)...Eleven books by John Piper, ten Lords of Flatbush,
nine Painted Ladies, eight Maids of Misfortune, seven Mastering Swimming, six goose down jackets (to keep me warm while reading outside?), FIVE LORD OF THE RINGS!!! (Director's Cut DVDs)...four The Art of Pishing: How to Attract Birds by Mimicking Their Calls (OK, so we blew the meter!!), three French Revolutions, two turtles in love (to supplement my reading hobby), and...I'm going to type it, believe it or not...The Partridge Family!!

On the twelfth day of Christmas my true love gave to me, Drums Along the Mohawk, eleven pipes and tobacco (for smoking outside while wearing the goose down jackets and drinking the Yuenglings), ten Lords of Finance, nine Lady Chatterlys, eight Maid of Honors, seven Swans In The World, a six pack of Yuengling, FIVE MORE YUENGLINGS!!!!!!!!!, four bird callers, three French horns, two Dove bars, AND OMG IT'S FINALLY OVER..........THE PARTRIDGE FAMILY COMPLETE COLLECTION!!!
Got time to read or shop on Ebay?

3:94, #588: Rhymers vs. Knucklers

Here we are at the end of November and I'm listening to "Road Kill Christmas" as I write...just to keep me in the right frame of mind, I guess....hmmm, if you frame your mind, is that how you picture things in your head? Anyway...

When you are trying to figure how many days are in a particular month, are you a Rhymer or a Knuckler? I'm betting most of you are Rhymers who say:

Thirty days hath September, April, June, and November,
All the rest have thirty-one, excepting February,
Which has 28...when Leap Year gives it 29.

Now, you few and far between Knucklers will simply put up your hand as in the illustration above, start counting at the index finger knuckle, and note that the months falling in the 'web' between the knuckle have 30 or 28 days (excepting Leap Year, of course) while those on top of the knuckles have 31. Note, too, how it works out that July hits at the little finger knuckle and August hits back at the index finger since they're the only months consecutively 31-counters!

My point? Hey, it's that 30th day of November!!
Got brain storm of your own?!!

3:93, #587: Captain Bob and Jonah

This morning I read the book of Jonah with my beige flaky cereal while at the same time in my life I'm reading Moby Dick...howzzat for providential coincidence?!! Anyway, didja ever wonder what happened to the guys in the boat after they chucked Jonah into Davey Jones' locker? The Bible says in Jonah 1:15-16, "So they picked up Jonah, threw him into the sea, and the sea stopped its raging. Then the men feared the LORD greatly, and they offered a sacrifice to the LORD and made vows."

This 'feared the LORD greatly'...was it only 'scared witless' or 'scared witless and reverently in awe of' the Lord? In their Old Testament way, it looks to me that they may very well have had a viable 'conversion experience' which resulted in the sacrifice and vows. Granted, they may simply have just been doing obeisance to placate and show a tip of the hat to one more god in the panoply of their polytheistic world, but what, exactly did they 'vow?' It just could be that they vowed to follow only the Living and True God of Jonah who had made the earth and the seas.

Think of it, that could possibly mean they sailed on to Tarshish and did some personal evangelism akin to what the woman at the well did when she went back to her town in John 4 of the New Testament; which, of course would have the twin results of converting some and hardening the rest, based on God's election of the Tarshishians!! After all, the original reason Jonah was ship-bound for Tarshish was that he didn't want to evangelize the pagans in Nineveh; which he knew would work to their repenting and becoming true believers even though they were UNCIRCUMCISED GENTILES... what's the original Hebrew for 'yick?!!' ;p

Well, this is another one of those Bob Wonders deals that will have to be answered on the 'other side of the river as we sit under the shade of the trees'...like, was the Captain's name 'Bob?'
I wonder...

3:92, #586: Thankful Thoughts

I earlier posted on Facebook that I'm thankful for flush toilets, space heaters, and the fact that God created the guys who invented all the stuff we take for granted. Since today is Thanksgiving, I thought I'd express a few more Thankful Thoughts:

I'm glad our nostrils don't point up...think of the trouble we'd have during heavy rains with water getting up our noses! :P

I'm glad humans can flatulate, unlike rodents which will internally explode if they drink carbonated beverages...think of the impact this would have on the soda and beer, not to mention Alka Seltzer, industries!! Think of all the fun that would not have occurred down through millenia as guys burned off their self-produced methane gas in twisted male sports contests!! ;P

Music and all its permutations is another big item on my Thanks List. Even though I appreciate silence every once in a while, cranking good tunes is part of why we were made in the image of God...to 'make a joyful NOISE unto the Lord!!'

I'm also thankful for the creative way the Lord used a rib back in Eden, with all its subsequent varieties down through the years...'Nuff Said!

To counter balance the above...I'm also glad guys are like we are, prototyped from the Original Dirtball, with all those permutations available to us!!

Well, this could go on, but brevity is the soul of wit, so I guess that makes long winded writers and talkers witless?
Got Thank Thoughts of your own??

3:91, #585: Books I'd Recommend

I've just looked over the list of the BBC Top 100 books list again from a friend's Facebook account and am convinced whoever compiled the list was one of the 'effete intellectual snobs' now-dead V.P. Spiro T. Agnew might have accosted with that phrase during Nixon's Administration. I tallied 28 books & another 10 from movies watched. Well, here are some books/short stories/poems I have read (pronounced 'red' not 'reed' for you American-Is-My-Second-Language Folks) which I would actually suggest you read ...no particular order after #1:

1. The Bible (22 times through it so far), One Author, several writers
2. Lord of the Rings (7 reads on this one), J.R.R.Tolkien (28 times on the movie!)
3. Shakespeare: Hamlet, MacBeth, Othello, Henry V, Midsummer's Night Dream, Much Ado About Nothing...all the rest as you feel up to it! ;) (Ken Branaugh does excellent versions)
4. Sherlock Holmes: All of them, Arthur Conan Doyle (Robert Downey's the man!)
5. Poe's 'Raven,' 'Tell Tale Heart,' 'Pit and the Pendulum,' "Masque of the Red Death,' & 'A Cask of Amontillado.'
6. Journey to the Center of the Earth, Jules Verne (James Mason beats Brendan Frazier)
7. Moby Dick, Herman Melville (Greg Peck/Richard Baseheart version)
8. Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, William Shirer
9. Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Edward Gibbon
10. Quo Vadis, Henryk Sienkiewicz
11. Ben Hur: A Tale of the Christ, Union General Lew Wallace (You go, Chuck Heston!!)
12. Robinson Crusoe (unabridged with a gospel presentation), Daniel Defoe
13. Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury
14. Horatio Hornblower series, C.S. Forester
15. Brave New World, Aldous Huxley
16. 'Gunga Din,' Rudyard Kipling (1939 RKO flick with Cary Grant/Victor McGlaughlin/Sam Jaffee)
17. Treasure Island, Robert Lewis Stevenson (1950 version)
18. Battle Cry of Freedom, James M. McPherson
19. Band of Brothers, Stephen E. Ambrose (see the HBO series, too!!)
20. Les Miserables, Victor Hugo (Les Mis 10th anniversary concert's a gas!!)
21. Lord of the Flies, William Golding
22. Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Robert Pirsig
23. A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens
24. The Three Musketeers, Alexandre Dumas (Charley Sheen et al on dvd)
25. Tom Sawyer, Mark Twain
26. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain
27. Pilgrim's Progress, John Bunyan
28. Watership Down, Richard Adams
29. Gulliver's Travels, Jonathan Swift
30. The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne
31. The Crucible, Henry Miller
32. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Lewis Carroll (Supplement with Depp movie)
33. Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde, Robert Lewis Stevenson (see 'League of Extraordinary Gentlemen')
34. Wise Blood, Flannery O'Conner
35. To Kill A Mockingbird, Harper Lee (Greg Peck movie with Robert Duvall as Boo Radley!)
36. All Quiet On the Western Front, Erich Maria Remarque
37. Best Short Stories, O. Henry
38. The Sound and the Fury, William Faulkner
39. Dead Souls, Nikolai Gogol
40. 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, Jules Verne
41. God Caused the Civil War, Bob Sexton (Westminster ILL or get your own copy via email)

Got easy chair and coffee?

3:90, #584: Dirt Doodles

This week I've been reading part of John 8 in John MacArthur's Daily Readings from the Life of Christ, volume 2 (good devotional, by the way, for those of you looking for one) where Jesus stooped down and wrote something in the dirt while being confronted by Pharisees with an adulteress. Did you ever wonder what He wrote? One Christian comedian posited that it was the name of their buddy who was not dragged before Jesus, considering that 'she was caught in the act.' In any event, it got me thinking on how dirt is important to God.

Way back in Genesis 1 He took some dirt of the ground and made Adam; hence, my Bobism that my gender was prototyped by the Original Dirtball; explaining our behavior on more than one occasion. And, since we came from dirt we end up 'dust to dust' as Genesis 3:19 indicates, quoted in funerals down through the ages.

Then I recalled that in Exodus 8:16ff (OK, so I looked up the verses...so sue me!) Moses is to strike the dust of the earth so it becomes gnats as a plague on all of Egypt. Guess you could say that was some dirty business?! ;p

There's also the time In John 9:6 that Jesus healed the blind guy by taking dirt, spitting on it, smearing the mud on the guy's eyes, and then commanding him to wash it off for his blindness to be healed. Voila! He once was blind, but now he sees! (Tip of the hat to John Newton for 'Amazing Grace,' my favorite hymn.)

Then there's the home-schooling Mom's nightmare verse: Mark 7:1-2, "And the Pharisees and some of the scribes gathered together around Him when they had come from Jerusalem, and had seen that some of His disciples were eating their bread with impure hands, that is, unwashed." Jesus basically said washing the outside really didn't matter, but cleansing the inside of the human spirit was essential, since that's where evil originated to defile someone. Sooo... we probably won't be seeing this particular verse on the 'Memory Verse of the Week' Calendar very soon! ;p

Well, before this goes too far, this dirt person's going to sign off...but not go play with my toy cars in the dirt like I used to as a kid!! Now I use a John Deere instead!!
Got 'good dirt?'

3:89, #583: Fifty-nine Bob

Well, here it is 3:19pm, and I'm 13,426 days and 4 minutes old!! Yessirree, Bob...according to Mom years ago, it was one great pain, pushed out while yelling on the way, and the world's been dealing with me ever since...at least in my immediate vicinity. This calls for a celebration, if you're into that sort of thing; which I am in somewhat of an understated way.

Food, of course, always plays a role in the process as an already/not yet reflection of the Marriage Feast of the Lamb, so tonight is steak, baked yams, some veggie no doubt, and Dos Equis from the fridge!! AND...cherry pie/chocolate cake/caramel-drizzled apple crumb pie as the dessert offerings to top off the aforesaid blessings...with some good Boca Java coffee to wash it down.

So, what have I learned in 59 years? Let's see...

1) Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life; nobody gets to Heaven without Him...it's that simple!
2) To quote a country/western song, "God is great, beer is good, and people are crazy."
3) Things that really matter are not really things...they're people who you can usually trust, knowing full well that occasionally they'll let you down.
4) Rule #1 for the use of a sharp knife is 'Don't cut toward yourself.' Rule #2 for most carpenters is 'Ignore Rule #1!"
5) As a result of 4), always know someone who is good at stitching you up! ;p
6) When in doubt...DON'T!!!
7) I could go on and on, but that's already been done in the Bob-isms of my Self Indulgent B.S., now, hasn't it?!!
So, without further ado...just exactly what IS an 'ado?'
Got aging milestones?

3:88, #582: PUN-ishments

For some people, it makes perfect linguistic sense that 'pun' is the beginning of 'punishment.' :p I, on the other hand, relish them as condiments to the language buffet. Without further Ado About Nothing...
Do the French have Gaul bladders?
Are German livers wurst?
Do the English ale?
Does a Swiss Miss serve Danish at breakfast with hot chocolate?
Do communists only drink Red wine?
Did the Bolsheviks' enemies only drink White Russians?
In the War of the Roses, did Lancastrians only drink red wine and Yorkies white?
Is there a difference between California and European whines?

Roses are red,
Violets are blue,
If skunks had a college,
They'd call it P.U.!!

Got Pepto Abysmal?

3:87, #581: Sermon Nuggets I've Not Heard

Today I was reading Daniel 2-3 (note the public domain pic of Old Nebuchadnezzar) with my Quaker Instant Oatmeal and thought about some nuggets I'd like to see mentioned in sermons....that was at 7:30am E.S.T....known as "God's Time" to members of my family's earlier generations! ;) Anyhow...

One missionary family I know in Haiti asks that we pray for patience for folks rebuilding their lives. Well, for Christians, patience is part of the fruit of the Spirit listed in Galatians 5:22-23, so we don't really need to ask for it; we've already got it. What folks who 'pray for patience' are REALLY requesting are the trials James 1:2-5 talks about as being something to be received joyfully. SO... when you 'pray for patience' you might ask something like, "Hit me with a hammer, Lord!" ;p

Also, getting back to Daniel. Have you ever noticed that three Jewish guys (that would be Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah of Fiery Furnace fame) end up running Babylon Province as a result of their stand for their faith AND Old Danny Boy gets to be third ruler of the Babylonian Kingdom after he tells Belshazzar his number's up...that very night!! Since Babylon is talked about so negatively throughout the Bible, just what exact influence on the place did those four guys have in God's Providence?!!

That got me thinking about Joseph of Genesis fame (the Bible book, not the singing group). He, as a Jewish guy, after he interpreted Pharaoh's Seven Fat/Seven Lean Years dream, was elevated to run the Egyptian empire and actually set up the political machinery that enslaved his own people for the next 400+ years! What an ironic twist of God's Providence...HA! you thought I'd write 'Fate'...that turned out so that God could be glorified down the road by trashing Egypt and engineering The Exodus!

My last thought for this post has to do with The Word in Hebrews 4:12-13, "For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do." Didja notice that 'the word of God' is NOT referring to the written word in the Bible, but to the Lord Jesus, based on the follow up sentence in vs. 13?!! I wish I had a dollar for every time I've heard teachers/preachers use 4:12 to illustrate the efficacy of Scripture in breaking hearts! Would all 3 of you reading this please start getting it right?!! But I rant...

Speaking of breaking hearts...I get a little weary of hearing Christians ask that I pray for 'God to soften hearts' of non-Christians to get them converted. He's in the stone heart SMASHING business, not the softening line of work! Check out Ezekiel 36:26, 27 or Jeremiah 23:29 as examples of this rant of mine...

Well, thus endeth the lesson for the day.
Got Amazing Grace as the next hymn?

3:86, #580: Wonder Filled Friday

My brain's REALLY on overdrive this morning and I feel like a vacation day coming on; which is better than feeling like a cold coming on. But then, that makes me wonder if any of us have ever felt a cold going off...the linguistically logical opposite of the usual saying? And would that 'going off' be a gradual fading into the sunset or a mighty Big Bang Explosion? Well, Nevermind...a place I visit like Never Land...here goes with "Don't Stop" cranking down here in Stonewalled Charismatic Presbyterian Church!!

I WONDER:

1.) Have any of you ever actually READ the lyrics to "Don't Stop," that great, upbeat music by Fleetwood Mac?!! IT'S A STINKING DEAR-JOHN-CAN'T-WE-JUST-BE-FRIENDS letter written by Christine McVie!!!!!! Go ahead, check it out at [http://www.lyricsfreak.com/f/fleetwood+mac/dont+stop_20054276.html]...My favorite lines are, "If your life was bad to you, just think what tomorrow will do." Well, OK...it sucked then, it'll probably suck tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow as it creeps in its petty pace...a tale told by an idiot to rock and roll music!! (Tip of the hat and semi-apologies to Willy Shakespeare) The only people who can take these lyrics joyfully are them thar Born Agains who KNOW for absolute certain that 'tomorrow will take care of itself' because 'God CAUSES ALL things to work together for [their] good' and HEAVEN is on the other side of these years' vale of tears!!! "Dontcha Look Back" IS, however, good advice to you BACs, based on the fact that you're now perfect in Christ and the indwelling Spirit can clean up the crap that's STILL part of your personality!! OOORAH!!!

2.) Since there's a Ma-gog and a Gog mentioned in Ezekiel (yesterday's read whilst awaiting my buddy's surgery outcome), was there a Pa-gog to help Ma-gog create Gog? Were they drinking grog? Or was Grog from the 'B.C.' comic strip a distant cousin? Was Hamon-gog the previous incarnation to Hamon-rye? With Swiss? Before or after invading Israel for some Kosher dills to go with that deli delight?!!

3.) If any of you Old Testament scholars...WITHOUT TURNING TO DANIEL CHAPTER 1... can tell me the Jewish names of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego? OR...what was Old Danny Boy's pagan nom de plume? And does 'nom de plume' only count as true if you write with a quill pen?

4.) Why BACs who get told 'not to judge others'...i.e., don't hold anyone accountable for their sin... based on Matthew 7:1 by either fellow BACs or non-BACs ever point out, winsomely of course, that we are COMMANDED to 'judge righteously' in John 7:21-24 AND Matthew 7:15-16 tells us to 'beware of false prophets' and 'you will know them by their fruit;' which means you have to have a standard, measure them against it, and then JUDGE how they measure up WITHOUT being judgmental...check out Galatians 6:1-2 for the logical followup?!!

5.) If all those slices of Wonder Bread I ate as a kid are the reason I wonder so much? Oh, and in answer to "I wonder, wonder who ba-doo-oouu, who wrote the Book of Love?"...God, did, of course...not that stupid one the Monotones sang about back in 1958 (the year I started collecting baseball cards)...but the REAL one known as the Bible!!

6.) Speaking of bread...I REALLY wonder how 'Bimbo'...pronounced 'Beembo'...Bread can have the chutzpah to prostitute the word like that...pun obviously intended? Of course, maybe Hamon-rye with Swiss on Bimbo (pronounce it properly!!) with a Kosher dill would make a delightful lunch...washed down with that delicious beer made by those 'Chinese brothers' Mr. Yueng and Mr. Ling?
Got table for two?

3:85, #579: John Bell Hood Apology

Well, as a distant relative of the noted Confederate General told me by email back on September 23... didn't get to respond to him until today because I completely FORGOT I had a gmail account...it was not KNOWN that John Bell Hood used laudanum, as I mistakenly stated in my post 3:74, #568: Chickamauga. In fact, based on the Blue & Gray Magazine article of 1998 by Steve Davis that I've now seen, the statements of many historians and 'sources' regarding Hood's laudanum use are merely conjectures. Apparently nobody every actually saw General Hood dosing with the opiate.
SO...I APOLIGIZE for being the unwary repeater of just one more unsubstantiated Civil War rumor. I would also like to say that General Hood, like many other Civil War participants North and South, showed great fortitude in dealing with extremely difficult circumstances, both during the conflict and for the rest of his life as a result of being in the War. Given the fact that he was an Evangelical Christian..."During the War Generals Ewell, Pender, Hood...professed faith in Christ"(1)... somehow all the circumstances he encountered "worked together for his good" as Romans 8:28 declares.
And now, I can declare to anyone reading this article that General John Bell Hood is rejoicing in the presence of the Lord as are all the saints of all the ages who have professed faith in Jesus!! I'm actually looking forward to 'crossing the river to rest under the shade of the trees' so I can, hopefully, talk with guys like General Hood in between courses of the Marriage Feast of the Lamb!!
Got an 'amen'?!!

Source: J. William Jones, Christ In the Camp, Sprinkle Publications, Harrisonburg, Va., 1986, pg. 42.

3:84, #578: Things Thirteen

Today's A.D.D. post is brought to you by the assignment given Anonymous Man's little girl: report on Millard Fillmore. Turns out, now that I've Googled a bunch of stuff on a rainy day vacation spurt, that Old Millard was Thirteenth President of the U.S. (as the 1938 commemorative stamp indicates). I actually remember this whole series of stamps from my childhood (first one, that is) because I had a collection at the time. But, did you know:

The 13th President only got the job because Zach Taylor died of gastroenteritis in the middle of his term? Did you care? Hmmmm....
Interesting to me is the fact that Numero 13 Prez supported the Compromise of 1850 that was supposed to calm the country down regarding slavery but which really helped stoke the fires of secession over the next 10 years. So, President #13 could be said to have laid the groundwork for the American Civil War that eventually led to the Thirteenth Amendment which abolished slavery and indentured servitude!! I wonder if being #13 was considered to be unlucky at the time?

Also, with a first name of Millard and a body shape tending toward the portly, I wonder if he had to endure the nasty nickname among close associates and/or enemies of 'Lard?' When his Whig Party folded after his partial term as President, Milly ran on the American Native Party tab... also know to us history buffs as the No-Nothings. Bet he'd be a viable candidate these days! Maybe with the way politics is going, we could get another No Nothing Party and have Schultz from 'Hogan's Heroes' be the mascot with a video clip where he gives his classic line, "I NO NOTHING!"

Just out of curiosity, I Googled '13-cent stamps.' At this counting, there were 19 printed at various times; which makes me wonder, of course, if people afraid of the number 13 managed to put different stamps on their envelopes or if they simply did not mail anything back in those days when that was the cost of a letter?

Speaking of fear of 13...howcome folks only fear Friday the 13th? Yeah, I know...Good Friday, 13 Apostles, Crucifixion, etcetera...But why not simply extend that to Any Day the 13th? Seems to me if you're going to be phobic, BE PHOBIC!!

Oh, and is it significant that puberty with all its down sides comes to us roughly at age 13? Would it be extra unlucky to have 13 candles on your birthday cake at that age?

Should cigarettes come in packs of 13 these days, given all the Surgeon General's warnings and regulations of them?

Well, before I try to stretch this to 13 paragraphs...
Got 12 friends to evite to dinner?

3:83, #577: Moby Dick

Gil Grissom of CSI fame tells Sarah Sidle, his co-worker paramour at the end of one show at the end of one of the seasons that he'd like to know that he was dying, say of cancer, and that he'd like to have the chance to 'read Moby Dick again.' Well, I was somewhere in my teens lo these many decades ago when I read it...for fun, I think, not as an English assignment...but now that so much water has washed over the New Bedford shores, I really can't say with any discernment or certainty when exactly.

In any event, I was thinking of suggesting that my 'kids' get me a copy of it for my birthday so I could read it again, but came to the conclusion I'd better read it online first to see if I still would find it interesting. Well, I'm posting this because I'm already six chapters into it and Queequeg once again is my favorite character!!...Maybe I was a head hunting, harpoon throwing savage (well, I did play lacrosse defense man in this real life) in one of my former incarnations?!! In any event, I can already see that I'm going to get into this Whale's Tale yet not play Whale's Tails...if you get my drift...of Queequeg's coffin, so to speak.

It's especially appropriate that one of the characters is Peter Coffin, given the surname of one of the occupants of Grey Havens; which, now that I think of it could be a great name for a New England whalers' tavern in the 19th century where I might have been a ship's carpenter awaiting sailing orders on the Pequod in yet another one of my not-so-storied-incarnations; at least in my mind, as Eddie Izzard would say!

Oh, yeah, since it's time again for the World Series, the baseball connection to Moby Dick is the interaction between Jake Taylor and Lynn Wells over Queequeg's coffin...get the movie if you don't know that to which I refer!! ;p

Maybe I'll have to think about going a'whaling to at least spot the spermers if not hunt them, given the dearth of need for whale oil these days and the fact that Star Trek IV I think it is, reminds us that eliminating whales was going to get the planet eliminated, too. Besides, PETA and a bunch of others would not permit hunting whales any more any way. It would give me a good way to use up some of my vacation days...unless, of course I decide to take a Civil War Battlefields Trip starting at Fredericksburg! Fredericksburg! Fredericksburg!
Got harpoon, coffin, so you can march to the sound of gunfire?!!

3:82, #576: Smoke Gets In My Brain

This morning around 3:30am I came across the notion in my mind while shuffling through some of the paperwork kept there and wondered if fire fighters use smoke screens on their windows to keep out fire flies? I'm not sure wherein lies the genesis of the rest of this, but that never bothered me before, so why should it now?

Speaking of smoking...those anti-smoking-save-your-health-so-you-can-shrivel up-and-croak-at-95 folks...have forgotten something. Cigar smoke and pipe smoke, not so much that of cigareetes, I'll admit...are aroma therapy for those of us graciously gifted to be wise enough to realize it!! And for those of you who doubt my epiphany, here's AromaWeb's definition: "...the practice of using volatile plant oils, including essential oils, for psychological and physical well being." To quote the King in 'Amadeus,' "Well, there it is!" We ceegah smokers simply set the essential oils free with FIRE!! (Do you Old Heads hear music from the band Crazy World of Arthur Brown?!!)

I've often said, only with my tongue partially in my cheek, that the 'smoke of God's glory' that drove old Moses out of the Tabernacle was the Lord puffing on a good stogie!! So all you O.T. scholars prove me wrong!! ;p And by the way, do you realize how hard it is to talk properly with your tongue in your cheek?

I just got back from deporting squirrel #13 from Camp Cornelius...second one this morning...so in sports terminology 'I'm smoking them!'

Well, that's it for now...
If you got 'em, smoke 'em! --Elliot Ness, The Untouchables

3:81, #575: Doing Nothing

Have you ever sat still 'doing nothing' and thought about just how much you're actually doing during that 'down time?'
Breathing
Heart beating
Eyelids blinking
Blood flowing
Bladder filling
Brain synapses firing
Shaking your feet for some of us
Tapping your fingers for others
Sweating
Getting the chills and making little skin bumps
Growing hair
Hearing
And the ever popular thinking...
Got time?

3:80, #574: Ode to Other Birds

Well, I sort of warned you that I'd be continuing my tip of the hat to John Keats with two more odes based on his set of five, so here goes #4:

Ben Franklin-like, I rise early and oft retire the same,
I've never heard the nightingale her late night song proclaim.
I, opposed to Keats, do not bemoan my age or solitude,
But choose to write some lines you might think daft or mayhaps crude.

The pictures Heaven often sends through various types of birds,
Reflect the state of mankind's souls in all our various herds.
The first that comes to mind without much fuss or hurry
Is the Mount-spawned Sermon's sparrow wise, that trusts and does not worry.

Grey Havens is the name bestowed upon my current stone abode,
Where other birds than nightingale flock by providential code.
Where sparrow, wren, nuthatch and dove as well as chickadee
Can eat a meal and take a bath, instructing watchers without fee.

Like Jesus' illustrators, they've learned to anticipate
Feedings at set intervals, an expected daily rate.
They'll often hop close to their "Pop," our Francis of Assisi,
As much to say, "It's time today to drop a sugar cookie."

Our red tailed hawk, enjoys a gawk sitting on sassafras limb
At little birds that look like meals...at least they do to him.
He'll swoop and snatch at sparrows who assuredly will fall
According to God's perfect plan that covers one and all.

Your life no less than all these birds' is written in His book,
It's even grace when at future pages you're not allowed to look.
The little guys do hop and peck, take flight and tell a story.
If Bach were from New Jersey now, he'd write, "YO...sola Deo glory!!"

3:79, #573: Phobias

I came across yet another intellectually stimulating website today as I'm down once again with some sinus problems compounded by aching bones from a condition that 'back in the day' was called The Grippe...rightly or wrongly. In any event given my twisted view of things, here are some pertinent impertinent comments and a couple of public domain pictures:

Agoraphobia is the fear of open spaces, of being in crowded public places, or leaving a safe place. With a slight change, A-Gore-aphobia could be the fear that Al Gore is going to invent something else or possibly make another movie or you could be in an open space that becomes a crowded public place with him after leaving a safe place!! ;p

If arachnophobia is the fear of spiders, would webheadaphobia be the fear of Spider Man?

As I asked on Facebook earlier today, ataxiophobia...the fear of muscular incoordination...has always been called a teenager's first date, hasn't it?!!

Ablutophobia...the fear of washing or bathing...obviously stems from 'ablutions,' but A-Bluto-phobia would be the fear of some big fat hairy guy Popeye always beat up on, would it not?

Agateophobia...the fear of insanity...has a counterpart in lyssophobia...the fear of going insane; which if you dwell on too much will send you there or make you a writer along the lines of Edgar Allan Poe and his 'Tell Tale Heart.' Of course, once you went insane, you'd be in such a condition that the good news would be that you no longer feared getting OR being there...silver lining to a darkening cloud, I say!!

Just think, I haven't even begun to scratch the surface of available fears!
Got fear of what might come next?

3:78, #572: Bob's Wondering Away

My brain's on overdrive this morning; especially since I'm cranking on "It Happens" by Sugarland!! Here's what I wonder:

If humans go 'boo hoo' when we cry, do cows go 'moo hoo?!!'

Have YOU ever actually cried by saying 'boo hoo' or have you ever in all your born (or even your unborn) days heard someone else actually cry 'boo hoo?'

For that matter, as Eddie Izzard points out, have you ever actually slipped on a banana peel? Have you ever seen someone actually slip on a banana peel? Have you ever seen documentation of someone slipping on a banana peel...even on You Tube? (That would have been contrived, no doubt, so IT DON'T COUNT!!)

Why do we stick our lips out in an exaggerated kiss shape when we're shaking our booty to some cranking tunes we enjoy??

Will the Christian whiners (whingers, if you're of Brit extraction) be really ticked off in Heaven when there's nothing to whine/whinge about? Oh, I forgot, they'll be perfect too...MY BAD!! TRUE THAT? DUUUUUUUUDE!!!!

Got any wonders of yer own??

3:77, #571: Ode to Melancholy Babies

While sitting in a tub of stress and tension salts,
I mused on Melancholy and other human faults,
No raven black came rapping, tapping on my chamber door,
A-quothing and a-croaking, "Never, Nevermore!"

But, thought I...Keats and Poe were rather quite neurotic.
The darkness in their souls gave thoughts that neared psychotic.
A Mideast Carpenter once implied, while speaking of 'the eye,'
When 'bad' its darkness overwhelms the soul which cannot die.

John and Edgar embraced the darkness in the soul.
They walked Vader's 'dark side,' never able to be whole.
Night's Plutonian shore they walked, enslaved to human evil.
Satan bored into their lives as to cotton thrusts the weevil.

Poe wrote that Gilead contained no healing balm,
"An artist must serve Mammon," Keats said without a qualm.
Said Carpenter has made the Way by offering His best.
"Come to Me, you heavy laden, and I will give you rest."

Sources:
Poe: "The Raven"
Keats: Letter to Percy B. Shelley, 8/16/1820
Photos: Wikipedia common domain

3:76, #570: Owed to Indolence

Well, I'd have gotten around to writing this parody on Keat's Ode to Indolence, but I was too busy doing the work I so thoroughly enjoy here at Camp Cornelius! ;p In reality, I 'rest hard' in my attempt at indolence, usually smoking a good ceegah whilst contemplating my next literary outrage. Here's the result this time around:

Here I sit before computer screen with widening hips,
My brain transferring thoughts through active finger tips.
While Keats mused about Love, Ambition, and Poesy,
My Muses would be Blogs, Facebook, and Plain Lazy.

Here I sit, a sad misfit, with not a whit of...well, wit.
Poesy has sailed, Love has failed, and Ambition has bailed.
My Facebook friends make no amends...I think I've got the bends.
They wonder why, someone like I should search the sky for reasons 'WHY?'

But then, again, every now and then, I think...
Can I really be indolent if I'm writing this stupid poem?

3:75, #569: Ode on a Home D Pail

Yesterday I wondered why we don't have a Five Gallon Bucket Day to show the respect we have for one of the most versatile items in the construction worker's world next to Duct Tape. It dawned on me that, if John Keats can get famous writing 'Ode on a Grecian Urn' and four other odes, I can create a poem to Homer Paint Bucket, so here goes:

Forsooth, oh bright hued plastic pail,
Of orange made with stamped detail,
Borrowed name of Greek renown,
Your Odyssey is o'er all the town.

Had Agamemnon's fleet met gale,
Whilst approaching Troy for to assail,
Iliad's lines your name would hale,
As Achilles screamed, "Myrmidons, Bail!!"

Like Gunga Din of Kipling fame,
You carry water without shame,
Your 'lazarushun' plastic hide,
Holds rigid when kicked, covered, or tied.

Inverted, you become a seat,
On which your owner can justly meet
The needs of working sitting down
As earlier said o'er all the town.

Before this ode gets overdrawn,
And blog enthusiasts start to yawn,
I'll wrap this up with this to say,
"Got Homer's Bucket for today?!!"

3:74, #568: Chickamauga

Yesterday I caught up with my lack of attention for three years on the Battle of Antietam, the bloodiest one day in American history in general as well as the bloodiest one day battle of the Civil War. Today marks the 147th anniversary of the Battle of Chickamauga, Georgia in 1863, the bloodiest two day battle of the American Civil War.

If you want to find out the 'usual' approach to this particular battle, there are several excellent histories of the battle, including the Official Reports at [http://www.civilwarhome.com/chickama.htm] as well as books by Steven E. Woodworth, Six Armies in Tennessee, The Chickamauga and Chattanooga Campaigns and Freeman Cleaves' Rock of Chickamauga: The Life of General George H. Thomas. The Wiki article I just read suggests Peter Cozzens' book This Terrible Sound: The Battle of Chickamauga is excellent, though I've not read it. If you want to find out the unusual approach, keep reading.

It turns out that just at the moment the Confederates were about to take advantage of the gap in the Union line that Rosecrans mistakenly created, yellow jackets started stinging the Rebs and their officer's horses, making chaos the order of the hour and continuing their advance impossible. Gee, I guess the Lord used yellow jackets in Georgia much in the way He used hornets in Canaan when he drove the Canaanites out on behalf of Israel. Oh, my source is Bromfield L. Ridley, Battles and Sketches of the Army of Tennessee. He put it, "Added to the horror of the galling fire, the generals and staffs encountered a number of yellow jackets' nests and the kicking of the horses and their ungovernable actions came close to breaking up one of the lines. Blue jackets in front of us, yellow jackets upon us, and death missiles around and about us--oh, the fury of the battle, the fierceness of the struggle over Carnes' battery!!" (pg. 220)

One other important 'out of the way fact': General John Bell Hood lost his left leg to a minie ball at Chickamauga just two months after he lost the use of an arm at Gettysburg. As a result of these injuries, he was know to use laudanum to help manage his pain throughout the rest of the War; which many historians feel clouded his judgment in several following battles and helped destroy the Army of Tennessee in the battles of Franklin and Nashville after Hood took over command July 17, 1864.

The last oddball info piece: General A. P. Stewart who led the charge at Chickamauga, Bromfield Ridley who was part of his staff there, and John Bell Hood were all evangelical Christians who played integral roles in the conflict when God Caused the Civil War.
Notice how I got a plug in for my book again?!! ;p