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Below are the 13 most recent journal entries recorded in
paulcarp's LiveJournal:
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| Thursday, May 24th, 2012 | | 2:36 am |
| | Sunday, November 27th, 2011 | | 12:01 pm |
Biblical View of Marriage #121: They just keep getting younger and younger
He [Jehoram] was thirty-two years old when he began to reign, and he reigned eight years in Jerusalem. He conducted himself like the kings of Israel of the line of Ahab, since the sister of Ahab was his wife; and he did evil in the Lord's sight. (2 Kings 8:17-18, New American Bible)He [Ahaziah] was twenty-two years old when he began his reign, and he reigned one year in Jerusalem. His mother's name was Athaliah; she was the daughter of Omri, king of Israel. He conducted himself like the house of Ahab, doing evil in the Lord's sight as they did, since he was related to them by marriage. (2 Kings 8:26-27, New American Bible) | | Thursday, November 3rd, 2011 | | 8:57 am |
Mystery Book Shipment #13
Received: 1 carton of books and stuff from an anonymous sender. The Original The Poor Man's James Bond Vol. 1, credited to Kurt Saxon aka, The Poor Man's James Bond, aka The Original "Poor Man's James Bond"This book has millions of words, and doesn't seem to be designed to be read straight through. But that's what I did. Cover to cover. Part anarchy (arson by electronics), part military (hand-to-hand combat), part chemistry (making fireworks). Some of it is outdated, some of it is timeless. I think my favorite parts were about testing the stability of explosives (which I don't personally plan to ever do). Disjointed, this work may have been compiled by a schizophrenic sociopath. ( There is no James Bond in this book )Thanks (I think) ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif?v=92.1) flankleft ! Previously: Mystery Book Shipment #12 | | Thursday, October 20th, 2011 | | 12:12 am |
Cars, damned cars, and lies.
I've seen an a car on the side of the road every single day this week. And, by the side of the road, I mean on a freeway entrance or exit ramp. This includes one car blocking the only express lane (I-5 South) leaving downtown Seattle, backing up thousands of cars. (When I got there, a tow-truck was both helping and not helping the situation.) So I had this idea. It could be a coincidence, like how things group; if they didn't they wouldn't be random. But I don't think so. I think that, with the last couple of years and with end-times levels of unemployment, people are putting off car repairs and gas station visits. And after one or two years of this, the seams are beginning to show. As it gets colder, I think we'll see more and more disabled vehicles owned by folks who can least afford to have them towed and tended. And these vehicles will cause more traffic slowdowns and accidents. Which will result in more wear and tear on the running vehicles, more fuel consumption to do things like commute or shop, and more human agony with tardiness and road rage. Which will, of course, lead to more cars nearing their own demise. And more people less financially able to do something about it. I live in a city where multi-axel truck drivers often think that bicyclists should pay for the use of the road too. That's fine, I suppose; but drive around SoDo to see what trucks do to roads, and tell me that truckers shouldn't pay more than bicyclists. We'll reach a tipping point where more people need public and alternate transit at exactly the same time that our cost of service and tax revolt will prevent the availability of that transit. We haven't fixed roads. We haven't fixed job security. We haven't fixed automobile economy. We haven't fixed public transit. Oh, they're closing the viaduct for at least nine days. I think that means 40,000 more cars between me and my workplace. Even in the best of times, some of those are going to break down on a freeway ramp. | | Thursday, September 8th, 2011 | | 7:01 am |
| | Monday, August 29th, 2011 | | 8:28 pm |
Six years, and it's still red beans and rice.
Last month I was in New Orleans. When I mention this, I'm often asked how things are going there. It's been six years. I hope for a speedy recovery for all eastern seaboard flood and storm victims. And, six years later, I hope for a speedy recovery for the Gulf Coast. | | Wednesday, May 11th, 2011 | | 12:12 pm |
Biblical view of marriage #120: What will the neighbors think?
One day Elisha came to Shunem, where there was a woman of influence, who urged him to dine with her. Afterward, whenever he passed by, he used to stop there to dine. So she said to her husband, "I know that he is a holy man of God. Since he visits us often, let us arrange a little room on the roof and furnish it for him with a bed, table, chair, and lamp, so that when he comes to us he can stay there." Some time later Elisha arrived and stayed in the room overnight. Then he said to his servant Gehazi, "Call this Shunammite woman." He did so, and when she stood before Elisha, he told Gehazi, "Say to her, 'You have lavished all this care on us; what can we do for you? Can we say a good word for you to the king or to the commander of the army?'" She replied, "I am living among my own people." Later Elisha asked, "Can something be done for her?" "Yes!" Gehazi answered. "She has no son, and her husband is getting on in years." "Call her," said Elisha. When she had been called, and stood at the door, Elisha promised, "This time next year you will be fondling a baby son." "Please, my lord," she protested, "you are a man of God; do not deceive your servant." Yet the woman conceived, and by the same time the following year she had given birth to a son, as Elisha promised. (2 Kings 4:8-17, New American Bible) | | Tuesday, May 10th, 2011 | | 12:56 pm |
Biblical view of marriage #119: Big Oil
A certain woman, the widow of one of the guild prophets, complained to Elisha: "My husband, your servant, is dead. You know that he was a God-fearing man, yet now his creditor has come to take my two children as his slaves." "How can I help you?" Elisha answered her. "Tell me what you have in the house." "This servant of yours has nothing in the house but a jug of oil," she replied. "Go out," he said, "borrow vessels from all your neighbors -- as many empty vessels as you can. Then come back and close the door on yourself and your children; pour the oil into all the vessels, and as each is filled, set it aside." She went and did so, closing the door on herself and her children. As they handed her the vessels, she would pour in oil. When all the vessels were filled, she said to her son, "Bring me another vessel." "There is none left," he answered her. And then the oil stopped. She went and told the man of God, who said, "Go and sell the oil to pay off your creditor; with what remains, you and your children can live." (2 Kings 4:1-7, New American Bible) | | Thursday, April 28th, 2011 | | 4:29 pm |
Biblical view of marriage #118: Focus on the Family
Ahaziah, son of Ahab, began to reign over Israel in Samaria in the seventeenth year of Jehoshaphat, king of Judah; he reigned two years over Israel. He did evil in the sight of the Lord, behaving like his father, his mother, and Jeroboam, son of Nebat, who caused Israel to sin. (1 Kings 22:52-53, New American Bible)
| | Wednesday, April 27th, 2011 | | 4:10 pm |
How to solve a problem that doesn't exist: Add packaging!
I was an avid music CD buyer, listener, and collector from shortly after they came out until my CD stereo component stopped working. I still listen on the boombox or in the car, but I don't tend to buy them. I don't tend to burn them, preferring liner notes and royalties and those traditional things. Most people jumped to the next wave, say iTunes or the like, but I'm slow to adapt to new technologies. So, sometime maybe 10 years ago, the record industry perceived a problem with CDs. People were stealing them. People were copying them. People were pirating them. People were selling used copies as new, after shrink-wrapping them. (They were spoiled by the fact that vinyl records showed wear in cases that CDs do not, I suppose.) So they added this annoying sticker to the jewelbox that is impossible to remove, often splits into 17 pieces, getting under fingernails and into carpet, fragments of which adhere to the box, and the areas that don't stay on the box leave gummy, sludgy, sticky spots. I just received a brand new CD in the mail as a gift. It's kind of like a practical joke, having to deal with the sticker and the static electricity. It reminds me of my mom's medicine, and how I can't open it. She has arthritis and neuropathy, and has been given prescriptions that a normally-functioning pair of hands can't open. With a knife. And a can opener. And a blowtorch. Oh no, someone might put poisoned razor blades in our children's foods! Let's make Lunchables, with individually wrapped everything, in a plastic tray, in a non-recyclable coated box, wrapped in cellophane. Need a replacement cartridge for anything from your printer to your pen to your shaver? Here's the cartridge. Strapped to card with cable-ties. In a static resistant bag. Taped shut. Stapled through the tape. Inserted into a pair of form-fitting (and therefore useless) pieces of styrene. In another bag. In a box. Taped shut with security tape and factory seals. With a tab for opening, taped to yet another box that it's inside of. Taped closed. Oh, and those two pieces of cardboard that don't go with anything that came out of the box when you opened it? Keep those. They're part of the original packaging. You'll need them two years from now if you want their warranty to be honored. I think people should come in bags. I guess, eventually, we do. Current Mood: Superfluous. | | 7:44 am |
Biblical view of marriage #117: Cartoon double-take
He [Jehoshaphat] followed all the ways of his father Asa unswervingly, doing what was right in the Lord's sight. (1 Kings 22:43, New American Bible) He [Jesoshaphat] removed from the land the rest of the cult prostitutes who had remained in the reign of his father Asa. (1 Kings 22:47, New American Bible) | | Tuesday, April 26th, 2011 | | 3:54 pm |
Milton Bradley's The Game of Life
I grew up with a board game, as the side announced, "Heartily endorsed by Art Linkletter." I didn't know who Art Linkletter was when I first played Life, but I knew he was important because there, on the $100,000 bill, was his picture. Just like the one on the game box, only surrounded with dollar signs and a fake title, Esq., after his name. But this isn't really about Mr. Linkletter, nor his endorsement of the game. I awoke this morning wondering if I, or if any of my generation, who had played this game as a child -- or even just owned a family copy in their games collection -- had been conditioned to accept that the elements that "win" this board game caused how we perceived what decisions we should make for ourselves, and encourage in others. Particularly, I had this idea that the winning family (the one who gets to the last space, Millionaire Acres, with the most money) is just like the family the game is designed for. There are no single parents. There are no deaths. And despite the blue and pink people-post game pieces, no gays, no dating, no car-pooling. You started with a car. Then you chose a career or a good career. You picked up children along the way, like some mostly random hitchhikers, only you couldn't just leave them on the roadside. If you didn't get to Millionaire Acres, you could surrender to the Poor Farm. As I was looking at my life's successes and failures (currently the successes usually represent my past, and the failures mostly are in the present), I was trying to find what missing piece of education this game had to offer that I didn't get. I thought of two possibilities: one, that I understood the game, emulated it, and naively assumed that this would give me some advantage in my occupation, choices, and family; or two, that I never understood the game at all, and have always made poor choices because I have been measuring my life with the wrong socio-economic yardstick. I finally concluded that the Game of Life is about spinning a wheel. | | Wednesday, March 30th, 2011 | | 10:04 am |
Biblical view of marriage #116: Lucky dogs.
His wife Jezebel came to [Ahab] and said to him, "Why are you so angry that you will not eat?" He answered her, "Because I spoke to Naboth the Jezreelite and said to him, 'Sell me your vineyard, or, if you prefer, I will give you a vineyard in exchange.' But he refused to let me have his vineyard." "A fine ruler over Israel you are indeed!" his wife Jezebel said to him. "Get up. Eat and be cheerful. I will obtain the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite for you." So she wrote letters in Ahab's name and, having sealed them with his seal, sent them to the elders and to the nobles who lived in the same city with Naboth. This is what she wrote in the letters: "Proclaim a fast and set Naboth at the head of the people. Next, get two scoundrels to face him and accuse him of having cursed God and king. Then take him out and stone him to death." His fellow citizens -- the elders and the nobles who dwelt in his city -- did as Jezebel had ordered them in writing, through the letters she had sent them. They proclaimed a fast and placed Naboth at the head of the people. Two scoundrels came in and confronted him with the accusation, "Naboth has cursed God and king." And they led him out of the city and stoned him to death. Then they sent the information to Jezebel that Naboth had been stoned to death. When Jezebel learned that Naboth had been stoned to death, she said to Ahab, "Go on, take possession of the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite which he refused to sell you, because Naboth is not alive, but dead." On hearing that Naboth was dead, Ahab started off on his way down to the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite, to take possession of it. But the Lord said to Elijah the Tishbite: "Start down to meet Ahab, king of Israel, who rules in Samaria. He will be in the vineyard of Naboth, of which he has come to take possession. This is what you shall tell him, 'The Lord says: After murdering, do you also take possession? For this, the Lord says: In the place where the dogs licked up the blood of Naboth, the dogs shall lick up your blood, too.'" "Have you found me out, my enemy?" Ahab said to Elijah. "Yes," he answered. "Because you have given yourself up to doing evil in the Lord's sight, I am bringing evil upon you: I will destroy you and will cut off every male in Ahab's line, whether slave or freeman, in Israel. I will make your house like that of Jeroboam, son of Nebat, and like that of Baasha, son of Ahijah, because of how you have provoked me by leading Israel into sin." (Against Jezebel, too, the Lord declared, "The dogs shall devour Jezebel in the district of Jezreel.") "When one of Ahab's line dies in the city, dogs will devour him; when one of them dies in the field, the birds of the sky will devour him." Indeed, no one gave himself up to the doing of evil in the sight of the Lord as did Ahab, urged on by his wife Jezebel. (1 Kings 21:5-25, New American Bible) |
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