It wasn't all just sleeping in, sipping dark roast, and reading...
First, there was a deck and railings to power wash, scrape, sand, repair, prime, paint, strip, brighten, stain, and re-stain wet.
Then there were ornamentals and stone. About it I wrote to my friend Jim yesterday:
Here is our latest completed project. It's been some time since I moved a
ton of gravel...by shovel and wheeled barrow. The tree is a
hydrangea, the evergreens are a low growing juniper, and the annuals at
the far end are mums. There's a slate paver between the flowers that
increased my total weight lifting by 50 pounds or so. Then I tuned the
irrigation system to treat its new charges properly. All this for a
house in which I no longer live and which we will likely sell before we
have time to witness any growth.
Jim, a retired Roman Catholic priest in his late 60s who planted a stand of oak seedlings just three years ago, replied:
"What is planting except belief in the future...that is not our own. We
are the planters; others will reap what we have sown." - Oscar Romero
I am not worthy of friends as wise as him...but I am grateful.
Some people do this for fun, others hire it done...
No, that wasn't an old root, it was the main irrigation line. Yes, that is a shovel inflicted gash just below the clamped splice. Ack! Thpppt!
Yes, it is good to live near a Home Depot. An hour later, I managed to break even and returned to prepping the front yard of the house where I no longer live for some shrubbery.
To paraphrase Greta Garbo, "I want to be in a condo!"
And more's the pity...
Irish poet and man of letters, Seamus Heaney translated my favorite edition of Beowulf. I made a gift of that translation to my late and much lamented friend Eric S.H. Ching one Christmas not so long ago. Heaney's passing also reminds me of my embarrassing, odd, and unrequited ambivalence about my Irish heritage.
Rest in peace, Seamus Heaney, aged only 74 years...gone too soon.
How soon the grave beckons, inexorable, regardless the quality of our contribution.
Brought to our attention by Arnold Bogis at Homeland Security Watch...
Thanks for bringing our attention to Erroll Southers’ new book Homegrown Violent Extremism
Coincidentally, Mr. Southers is currently working for Johnathan Tal, of TAL Global, an associate of mine from the Silicon Valley days. Southers has a blog where he discussed his book in a recent post in which he reminds us:
Absent a set of specific criteria, we will continue to direct the
vast majority of our national security efforts against only one violent
ideology (i.e., Muslim extremism).
The federal government has had a legal definition of terrorism for quite some time.
Title 22 of the U.S. Code, Section 2656f(d) defines terrorism as
“premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against
noncombatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents,
usually intended to influence an audience.”
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) defines terrorism as
“the unlawful use of force or violence against persons or property to
intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any
segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives.”
By that measure most (almost all) of the terrorism we have
experienced in the U.S. since 1865 has been the work of angry white men,
not transnational Islamist extremists. There was a time when the
federal government aggressively investigated the bombing of churches and
the assassination of civil rights workers without regard to the skin
color of the perpetrators or victims. Unfortunately, these days our
frightened neighbors and their political representatives are not much
interested in chasing anti-government extremists, white supremacists,
anti-semites, tax protesters, violent homophobes, or “right to life”
bombers and assassins, especially, it seems, if they happen to be white
and nominally Christian. There is some tolerance for tracking down the
tree-hugging arsonists, animal-loving vandals, balaclava-clad
anarchists, but they’re radical lefties and probably atheists after all.
I suppose it all depends on whose ox is gored, or what sort of news
coverage sells the most advertising.
I look forward to reading Mr. Southers’ book.
At good old iTunes U...
Got some serious drive-time coming up so I'm loading the iPhone 5 with my usual variety of courses from iTunes U.
Bibliology/Theology Proper
Knowing why Bible-believing Christians bestow upon their scriptures inspiration, inerrancy, and authority is interesting to me. Is there a practical difference between Biblicism and Bibliology as practiced by the fundamentalist? Perhaps I'll find out in the course of 51 episodes. So far Dr. David J. MacLeod - Dean for Biblical Studies and the Program Director for Biblical Studies, Bible Exposition and Theology at Emmaus Bible College, is earnest but not compelling.
Crass Plagiarism
Instead of Jewish authors cribbing foundation myths from their Babylonian captors, Dr. John Currid - professor of Old Testament at RTS, argues that Moses engaged in a polemical take-down of other Near Eastern theologies. Interesting spin from the Reformed tradition. Now where's that Occam's Razor?
Genesis Through Joshua
Dr. Richard P. Belcher, Jr. -Professor of Old Testament at RTS, engages in all the acrobatics necessary to explain a literal and inerrant Genesis (even without mentioning non-literal scholarship) without much success. Seems it helps to believe it before trying to make sense of it. UPDATE: Finished. It's not a bad course if a person wants to understand a literalist view of the Pentateuch from a Reformed perspective.
Colonial and Revolutionary America
Evolution
New Thinking: Advances in the Study of Human Cognitive Evolution
Thought and Experience
Philosophical Problems
Philosophy of Mind
Religion x3, check. History x1, check. Science x3, check. Philosophy x2, check.
Diet Coke and beef jerky? Oops, almost ready...
C'mon, open road!
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