On The Jews

I am currently reading Walter Russell Mead’s book God and Gold, subtitled Britain, America, and the Making of the Modern World. In this book, he discusses the role of religion as one of the forces in the making of the Western Enlightenment societies we have today. He says this about the Jews in today’s world:

Apart from the significance of Jewish experience to Jews, the survival of the Jews into modern times serves for billions of non-Jews as a kind of historical proof that the God of Abraham is powerful and real. God told Abraham that he would have descendants who would remember his name–and lo! there they are. That this unique people, returning almost miraculously against all probability to the land God promised Abraham would support his descendants, is a kind of bone in the throat of the world–a people and a state that can neither be spat out nor swallowed, unable to find rest at “home” or in exile–only further shows billions of Abrahamic believers just how powerful the narrative (or the God) remains after all these millennia. That world history remains convulsed by the struggles of the Jews to make a home, and that their ethical and military successes and failures reverberate to the ends of the earth, further reinforces the most powerful cultural force that human beings know.

I just love his phrase about the “bone in the throat of the world”, it just works. And the paragraph above supports what I have come to think of as the role of the Jewish People in the world.

The Jews are the Conscience of Humanity. You will know when the human race is well and truly doomed. When the last Jew is gone.

May the Jewish People live, and thrive, Forever. Amen.

This is really weird!

Just this week, at work we found out that our profit-sharing payout, based on last fiscal year’s performance, is going to be a nice percentage of our total salary. It got me to thinking about salary, and how mine has increased quite a bit this year. In January, in connection with my promotion, I received a 6% increase. In the ten years I’ve worked for my company, I have never had a promotion, and my biggest increase was about 2%, so that 6% was pretty amazing.

Then, about three months ago, my boss called me in, and told me that I was getting an additional 7% raise, totally out of the blue. I was flabbergasted, and very grateful. And lately, I have been thinking something that I have never, ever thought before. I said to myself, “I am earning enough”. Yes, hard to believe, I am now, after about 25 years of purchasing experience in a number of industries from health care to aerospace, I am getting paid what I think I’m worth. This is astonishing to me! This is about how I feel.

showered with money

I have told my husband before, that I basically have everything I need to lead a full life. Husband, fully-paid-for house, fully-paid-for car (10 years old), good job (getting better!), friends, and family, and a gorgeous black cat. There’s really nothing more I need. We both have enough vacation time saved up that we can take whatever vacation we want to.

I know that it’s bad form to tell your employer that you don’t need any more raises, and I won’t mention it. But when review time comes around in the next month or so, I’ll be treating any raise I receive as “gravy”, or the cherry on top of the milkshake; something I will like but really don’t need.

As I said before, this is WEIRD!

The Gosnell Story (abortion butchery) Will Stay Top of Mind Here Beware Graphic Images Below

[Author’s Note: October 14, 2018. A Movie has been made about this Butcher of Philadelphia. I urge ALL my followers and readers to see this movie. I especially urge my so-called “pro-choice” readers to see this movie. From comments that have appeared over at Ricochet.com, no one can see this movie without becoming emotional, so take your tissues if you see the movie. And, like below from 2013, the Drive-by Media (hat tip to Rush Limbaugh for the descriptor) is ignoring this phenomenon.]

This story has been totally ignored by the “mainstream media”, because it reflects badly on one of their favored groups, Abortion Supporters. Following is a link to the Grand Jury Findings in this butcher’s trial in Pennsylvania.

http://www.phila.gov/districtattorney/pdfs/grandjurywomensmedical.pdf

This evidence is not to be denied, or swept aside for any reason.

Found at Butcher Gosnell's "Clinic". — Found at Butcher Gosnell’s “Clinic”.

Zeal…I really DID build that!

In about 1975, my first husband and I had returned to Seattle from Minneapolis, and were living on a shoestring. He had found a job as a transformer winder at a company that made industrial transformers, and I, with my MA in psychology, was working as a pricing clerk in a hospital pharmacy. Now, Larry was ultra-handy. He could and did work on anything and everything around the house and the cars. He fixed anything that needed fixing. But when our stereo tuner bit the dust, that was something he couldn’t fix (“no user-serviceable parts inside”). So we were faced with needing a new tuner, and having little spare money lying around.

So we decided to get a Heathkit and build the tuner ourselves. We looked in the catalog (no internet in those dark ages), and picked out a model that did what we wanted at a reasonable price. We mailed away the order form, and waited for our tuner kit to arrive. In the meantime, we made a trip downtown to Radar Electric, a local firm that sold new and used electronic parts and tools. We both loved going there, just to see all the bins filled with interesting-looking stuff. We bought a soldering-iron, solder, and other assembly tools that we would need.

When the kit arrived, we unpacked everything, and set up an assembly area on Larry’s workbench. Then, he taught me how to solder, and together we worked through the initial instructions. It turned out that I just had so much fun doing this electronic assembly that I said I’d do it all. I literally kicked him out of his own workshop and proceeded to build the entire assembly all by myself. I followed all the instructions to the letter, and did all the operations in the correct order, with the correct parts and pieces. I thoroughly enjoyed watching that tuner take shape under my hands, and I had visible progress to show off every day. I worked on that tuner in every spare moment when I was not working, eating and sleeping. I remember at least one night when Larry had to drag me away to go to bed so I could get enough sleep to go to work in the morning.

Finally, after about a week, all the circuit boards were finished, and it was time to do the final assembly. We placed all the boards in the enclosure, hooked up the correct wires, closed it up and applied all the necessary knobs and labels for the various switches. We hooked up the power cable, took a deep breath, and plugged it in. And it worked! All the lights came on, we tuned in our favorite station, and sound came out! That simple Heathkit tuner did yeoman duty, and it lasted a good 15 years. I was so proud of myself for having completed that project with little help. I gained some very valuable skills, and learned a little about electronics in the process. I never would have thought that such a task would totally capture my imagination, but it did. And I think I gained from being able to finish what I had started and have it work from the minute it was finished. I was zealous in attention to every detail, reading each instruction twice to make sure I had it right. And thereafter, I could look at and listen to our tuner, and say to myself, “I built that!”.

[This essay was first posted over at Ricochet.com, where it has 21 “likes” and is under consideration to be promoted to the Main, public-facing, Feed]

Stock Market took a dive today!

StockMkt10-10-18

Do.Not.Panic. Hold on, do nothing, and whatever you do, do NOT sell anything! I intend to keep my eyes open for bargains.

Oh, yeah, and I found out that my company is being acquired by another company, and I am again in danger of being laid off. It might not be until next year, but it’s coming. I’ve been through this before, but not at my advanced age. Sigh…

A Not-so-modest Proposal to ameliorate some of the damage done to our National Forests by Smokey the Bear and his henchmen in the Environmental Movement

Ever since I can remember, Smokey the Bear has been telling us that only WE can prevent forest fires.

Smokey

So, who told Smokey that the Prime Directive was to Prevent Forest Fires? Well, since the 1940s, the US Department of Agriculture used him to prevent Human-caused fires. In later years, Environmental Wackos did their best to make sure that the National Forests remained in their pristine condition. They did this by basically putting the forestry profession as much out of business as possible, to “preserve” the National Forests for whatever endangered species they could find. Humans were considered destroyers of both forests and wildlife. So national policy discouraged logging in national forests for many years.

The result of this enlightened policy was entire regions decimated by the logging companies put out of business. On the Olympic Peninsula in Washington State, towns like Forks which had had thriving economies were deprived of their ability to support their people. Unfortunately, when evergreen forests are not thinned, and fires are prevented, they build up heavy loads of underbrush, which in summer are fire hazards. Another plague that has hit especially Western National Forests has been the pine bark beetle, which thrives on the wood of Ponderosa and other pine trees. The dead trees killed by the beetle remain dried-out, and standing among the live trees, just waiting for that bolt of lightning. Here is a picture of a forest in California. The red trees were killed by the beetles.

dead trees

And here is the slope of Mount Rushmore. See the dying trees?

So I have come up with a proposal that should be a win-win-win situation.

First, the Federal Government should hold regional auctions, covering portions of the National Forests. They would auction off, to the highest private-sector bidder, the rights to log their territory, ONLY removing dead or dying trees, and dry underbrush.

This type of auction would have many beneficial effects. First, it would bring in money to the government, to help it manage the National Forests. Second, it would improve the conditions in the forests, as dead and dying trees were removed and fire danger thus reduced, and the remaining trees would be healthier overall. And Third, it would create jobs in the forestry industry, allowing professional logging companies to get back to their work, and reviving the economies of Western towns that used to depend on logging for their livelihoods. Those loggers could sell their wood wherever they could find markets, and furniture-makers and others would have a large supply of wood with which to create products. So everyone, except maybe the Environmental Wackos, would benefit. Finally, society as a whole would benefit from the sight of forests that are greener and healthier.

Autumn Reflections

Autumn is my favorite season. Hot weather doesn’t agree with my body very much, and I always welcome the onset of autumn. The kids are back in school, the air is cool, and the sun still makes its appearance on most days. Here are some reflections of autumn that I have captured, mostly around home in the Pacific Northwest.

FallColors — Fall Colors on the Wenatchee River, west of Leavenworth, WA

Symmetry-boats — Calm reflections in the water of the Inner Harbour, Victoria, BC

My husband and I got married in October, and this year will be our 15th anniversary. We went to Victoria, BC on our honeymoon, and we return there often. Mostly we stay at the hotel where we stayed then, the Inn at Laurel Point. We love its location right on the Inner Harbour, and we try to get a room overlooking their peaceful garden and pond.

Laurel Point Garden Pond