A Good Reminder On Evacuations

I followed with some interest this weekend the ongoing issues at the Oroville Dam in Oroville, California.  Oroville is not right where I grew up but I have been through there more than once.

I had been listening to the issue as background noise - there seems to be so much going on now - when suddenly the words "Emergency Evacuation" came out. That always gets one's attention - especially since it was tied to an Emergency Spillway failure within an hour of the evacuation order.

(Yes, I know, there is not a specific link.  Interweb "Oroville Dam" and you will get all you need).

It did get me thinking - again - about our own situation (not that we are in any danger of flooding:  we are on the uphill side of our Urban Area of Choice and if we have flooding, there are larger problems).  In other words, if we had to leave in short order, could we?  What would we take?  Would we know to take it? And where would we go?

So on the brighter side, we actually do in fact have something which may or may not resemble a bag to take with us in case of emergency.  I have gotten a little careless about fuel levels in cars - blame the fact our commute is much less than it used to be and I now have my "routine" of how much I use in a week and when I fill up (about three quarters of a tank and on Tuesday evenings, thank you very much).  

We are fortunate in our case that we live relatively close to the intersection of multiple freeways including a large Interstate - and, we live on the right side of town for the most likely disaster (flooding, in our case).  But where would we go in the event of such a need?  That is a little more concerning.  At best with a full tank I can make it to the next major urban area, about a 3 hour drive.  But that assumes an empty freeway and no traffic (neither of which would be true).  And even then, where would we go once we got there?

I do not have answers for everything - which bothers me as it should - but if nothing else this has been a useful reminder that bad things sometimes do happen - and to be ready for them.

A Letter To Snarkhorn

To:

J. Snarkhorn
Under Assistant, Research Unit

Sir:

It is with an intense relish that I have recently read your article "The Growth of The Physicality of Hell" for the publishing in this quarter's "Aspects of Damnation".  Your article, brought to my attention by the your supervisor Over Assistant Clawbeak (who unfortunately failed to present the article prior to getting my attention, thus ensuring his unfortunate unmaking) brings to light some interesting trends that, while I have also observed them first (as you were wise to note in your introduction), have been lost to the greater under-audience.

You are correct to start with that fool Alighieri's "representation" of Hell.  His vision of the Divine Underworld, its levels and suffering for sins, its inhabitants and their appearance (In some cases it seems almost as if he had been slipped confidential information, does it not?) ensured almost 700 years of a wasteland of progress in disbelief of the physical realities of Hell.  His picture of the demons and devils as all powerful in the Divine Darkness and that of the powerlessness of the human scum they torture riveted in the minds of thousands through the years the finality of Hell and the pointless existence of those exiled there by their disbelief:  stripped of the power of causality and the physicality of their form - Damned Amphibians! - they had nothing to do but endlessly suffer for their "sins" against the Enemy.

You are also correct to breeze over the next several hundred years.  Indeed, the disbelief in Hell (Ah, but how much we believe in them!) contributed to our advance on other fronts but scarcely denied Hell of its power:  that which does not exist cannot have the power to harm anyway.  What we needed was a belief in Hell but without the power of it.  The human scum are always so much easier to lull into inaction when something exists but not seen as a source of alarm.

Thanks be to Our Dark Master for the latter Twentieth Century.

The two biggest developments you point to, the arising of the thing called "Role Playing Games" and its attached development, the "Video Game" did endless "good" (How it burns to write that word!) to our cause.  In the "Role Playing Game", Hell simply became another place to visit amongst many.  One could attend to any number of the "666 levels" as if one was going on a vacation  (666 levels.  They are not even inventive.).  And the inhabitants of these levels, more importantly, were simply cast as additional beings living in a universe that were not all powerful and eternal but rather the infernal equivalent of grocers and craftsman, trying to to make their way in a place that was different only in location, not in substantive nature (Yes, I am aware these were cast as "evil", as if the amphibians knew what true Evil was).  It was if they were putting together a travel brochure, encouraging tourism.

Think on it, my young Snarkhorn:  within a short period of time (by eternal standards) we observed Hell going from being disbelieved in/ignored or an actual reality to someplace that existed, but was of no more power than the "real world" (Such a useful term, that.  How cleverly our propaganda department has captured it).  And then the spinoffs:  fantasy books written about characters going to Hell and returning (I should hope, by the by, you have not put into your other works that blasphemy of The Harrowing.  That is the sort of trite garbage that condemned your previous superior) or that delightful series "Heroes in Hell", where there is a chance that the damned can escape (How that always brings a tear of infernal joy to my eye.  Escape. As if.).

The second development was that great advancement in mindless and actionless entertainment, the "Video Game" and especially that extraordinary game "Doom".  You might not have been assigned to your current division and so not have seen it but I remember it well, having been recently assigned to the newly created Visual Electronic Arts Department.  In this game, the main character - a Space Marine, as I recall - found himself confronting the denizens of Hell with modern weapons on a space station and in some cases, actually in "Hell" itself.  How delightful!  Suddenly all things of the Underworld were physical, and could be defeated with the simple application of ammunition and grenades.  Humans were all powerful, the inhabitants of Hell merely fodder to be mowed down (Ironically, they never seemed to address where these slain "Demons" went.  Apparently we are as prone to disappearance as the scum upon our "death").

Thus, within one long generation we have created a circumstance where so many of the amphibians want to believe in the spiritual but believe in Hell as just another location on the map - and for most of them, not somewhere they themselves are headed towards.  And even if they are, their popular culture and their entertainment tells them that there always a chance they can duck out or fight their way out (Thankfully the negotiation tactic of the mid-nineteenth and early twentieth century seems to have gone into abeyance - as if that worked any better!) as "we" are nothing but cannon fodder, task masters set there more as place holders and security guards ready to be gunned down and our bodies jumped over in the glorious break for freedom.

How delicious it all is.

I have had the pleasure of speaking with some of the newly arrived inhabitants of this generation when they make their Downgoing.  They are always "so surprised" that things are so different from they led themselves to believe and "feel like" they simply ended up in the wrong line (Ah, emotions.  The great internally created narcotic fog of the Amphibians' souls.).  In some cases, the Tormentors are happy to let them engage in some of the role playing that sought so strongly in their previous lives.  The look on their faces when their opponents will not die and the exit they can almost touch - that magic hoop or mirror or door that will let them into the "real world" (Ah, that word again!) suddenly disappears and they are plunged into the Eternal Flame - I am compelled to tell you, dear Snarkhorn, that it is almost a magical moment.  Such moments almost - almost - make up for the general darkness and pain that has been foisted upon us by our Enemy.

In closing, we here in the Infernal Publishing Unit are always looking for bright young minds to join us - as a fellow soldier in our war or in other ways, as your unfortunate supervisor Clawbeak discovered.  Rest assured our eye is on you - constantly.

M. Hookgrinder
Executive Vice President
Infernal Publishing Department

Seeds Of Our Own Destruction

"Every civilization carries the seeds of its own destruction, and the same cycle shows in them all. The Republic is born, flourishes, decays into plutocracy, and is captured by the shoemaker whom the mercenaries and millionaires make into a king. The people invent their oppressors, and the oppressors serve the function for which they are invented." - Mark Twain

"If history teaches us anything, it is simply this:  every revolution carries within it the seeds of its own destruction. And empires that rise, will one day fall." - Princess Irulan, Dune (Mini-series)

I have come to wonder if the seeds of our own destruction lie within this thing called the Interweb.

We - at least in the United States - have always been a people of technology.  Within two years of the founding of the country, the cotton gin was patented by Eli Whitney - and before him, the polymath genius that was Benjamin Franklin brought us the Franklin Stove, bifocals, and the lightning rod .  We believe in technology, believe in the benefits of technology, and indirectly believe in the Utopian aspects of technology.

But we are the point that technology has given us the Interweb.  And suddenly, it seems, technology has threatened our own civilization.  Why?  Because we have apparently created a potential "bullet train" to civil war.

Ignore the ongoing rise of automation (which, for the record, is coming like it or not.  We are literally on the cusp of changes that are going to directly impact the concept and practice of work for millions of people throughout the world - with, I am willing to bet, not so good outcomes for the most of them.  Study the Luddites of 1811-1816 for more details).  Ignore the millions of way technology is making us more efficient at waging war and killing each other.  I am specifically speaking of the ability of the Interweb to completely divide us.

I heard of a poll from Reuters three days ago in which of ~6000 people polled, 16% had ended relationships because of the recent election.  Think of that - about 1 in 6 people were no longer talking to someone, family or friends, because of something they ultimately had little control over.  Yes, I know that the election was not solely run on the Interweb - but lots of words about it were put there.

And as I have ranted and raved, social media is doing us little favors in this arena.  We now have the ability to drop "opinion bombs" wherever and whenever we like with no context, no discussion, no thought of how it will be received.  In fact, I am increasingly convinced for a larger and larger portion of the population, they are doing intentionally to create as much ill will as they possibly can.

Technology now makes it possible to create lasting divisions more quickly and more deeply lasting than ever before.  The problem is that we are only in the opening stages of this: at some point (historical pendulum and all) these same folks taking a certain amount of pleasure in sowing discord will suddenly start crying out for unity and the ever-elusive "end" to such talk.  Only when we get there, I fear they will find that the casual words cast forth almost unthinkingly have become barriers which can no longer be climbed.

Technology is not the thing in and of itself that will destroy us.  It is, however, the vehicle that we have created that will allow us to do it.  Frankenstein's monster will have returned; how many will recognize him for that simple creature cobbled together with our own hands so long ago?

The Fiddler of Dooney

It strikes me that, in the general condition of the state, we occasionally need something that reminds of that the lighter things in life can be just as important as more weighty matters:

When I play my fiddle in Dooney,

Folk dance like a wave of the sea;

My cousin is a priest in Kilvarnet,

My brother in Mocharabuiee.

I passed my brother and cousin:

They read in their books of prayer;

I read in my book of songs

I bought at the Sligo fair.

When we come to the end of time

To Peter sitting in state,

He will smile on three old spirits,

But call me first through the gate;

For the good are always the merry,

Save for an evil chance,

And the merry love the fiddle,

And the merry love to dance:

And when the folk there spy me,

They will all come up to me,

With 'Here is the fiddler of Dooney!'

And dance like a wave of the sea.

         

- W. B Yeats (1865-1939)

On Details

Exodus 25 to 28 is some is seemingly some of the least interesting parts of the Bible.

I read ever year at this time (because this is how it always falls on my annual Bible reading plan).  If you recall - even hazily - from your memory, you will remember that this is the part of the Exodus where the Lord reveals to Moses about building the Tabernacle.  4 chapters of it.  It is very specific - and that is what creates the boredom.

The Lord, it seems, was quite concerned about how the Tabernacle was to look and to function.  Very concerned.  Witness Exodus 26: 15-25:

"And you shall make upright frames for the tabernacle of acacia wood.  Ten cubits shall be the length of a frame, and a cubit and a half the breadth of each frame.  There shall be two tenons in each frame, for fitting together; so shall you do for all the frames of the tabernacle.  You shall make the frames for the tabernacle: twenty frames for the south side; and four bases of silver you shall make under the twenty frames, two bases under one frame for its two tenons, and two bases under another frame for its two tenons; and for the second side of the tabernacle, on the north side twenty frames, and their forty bases of silver, two under one frame, and two bases under another frame; and for the rear of the tabernacle westward you shall make six frames.  And you shall make two frames for corners of the tabernacle in the rear; they shall be separate beneath, but joined at the top, at the first ring; thus shall it be with both of them; they shall form the two corners.  And there shall be eight frames, with their bases of silver, sixteen bases; two bases under one frame, and two bases under another frame."

And that is just the upright frames.  It does not include the bars and the veils for the frames.

Moreover, in Exodus chapters 37-39 the Israelites do all this.  It reads exactly - precisely - as the instructions in the earlier chapters.  If you did not know better, you would think Moses was repeating himself.

My big struggle - beyond just getting through this - is application to my life.  I have struggled for years trying to figure out how these precise execution of a portable building in the Sinai desert and its construction could have a meaning (beyond the sacredotal one) in my life.  It has been on the back of my mind for almost two weeks running.

And then today, it hit me:  it is about paying attention to detail.

God spelled out what He wanted -  in precise detail.  In excruciating detail.  Why?  Well, it was going to be the place where He communed with Moses.  It reflected Him.  And so He was very precise about what He wanted.

And the Israelites responded (somewhat surprising, given the Golden Calf incident in the middle of these two sections).  They get it right.  They did it exactly as God wanted it, with His exact level of detail. No excuses.  No mistakes.

Suddenly this spoke to me.

I am someone who is not good at detail.  Not because I cannot, but (more often than not) because I will not.  Detail is boring.  Detail is painstaking.  Detail means sitting in front of something for hours and hours before you pass it along.  You are the backstop for errors, not someone else.

And I hate it.

But the reality is for me - for any Christian - this is as much our calling as anything else we are called to.  We represent God.  And God commanded good (and detailed) work.  If we are to represent Him well, we need to pick up the details and run with them.

This does not make it any easier for me.  At all . But what it does do is give me a reason beyond "I have to".  My attention to detail reflects the One whom I represent and ultimately work for.

And He has pretty high expectations in this regard.

Quiet Change

Did you ever get the sense that God is changing up your life?

It is not in that usual dramatic sense that so many like to believe He operates with.  There are not burning bushes or brilliant lights, not even voices in the night or the "signs" that so many seem to spend an inordinate amount of time looking for.

No, it comes almost out of the corner of one's eye, in the gentle shifting of circumstances and people around you.  It is not that you seem to be doing anything different at all or are consciously changing anything; it is rather that these things seem to be happening in the background around you.

A friend you have fallen away from suddenly appears again while someone else that is currently important mysteriously slips away, a project that was consuming time energy comes to a halt just as something you had stopped working on years ago is brought back to the surface.  A door that was closed for months - years - suddenly opens at the least expected time.

In other words, you are at the center of a web of change without really seeming to do a thing.

The point of it is not for you, of course; it would be foolish to consider anything but God working ultimately for God's glory, not your convenience.  And yet at the same time, it is God being intimately involved in the details of our lives, making them different - for His glory.

It is exciting - and terrifying - at the same time. Exciting because you sense God here, terrifying because (if you are wise) you know very well that such things always turn out very differently than what we would have predicted.

Change is in the air, even if I cannot fully grasp it.  Best to pay attention so that the next step, when available, will be taken.

Dropping Out?

If you want to give your system a shock, drop out of the news cycle for about a week and then re-enter it.  It is enough to bring you to despair.

Dwelling in the cycle from day to day, I suppose that one gains some sort of immunity to it; it just becomes part of the background noise to our daily lives.  But step away for a time, focus on anything and forget that for the most part there is a world out there and come back in, and you find yourself horrified.

When did we become a civilization and a people defined by anger?  When did denouncing hating by hating become a thing?  When did rejoicing over the defeat of one's foe become not just a part of life but something to be ground into the dirt and celebrated?

Maybe most would find me to be not ready for the world and in many ways I am not:  I am simply not a debater nor an apologist.  I react poorly to criticism (take the whole thing personally) and would generally rather flee the room when anger is present.  I am in many ways ill-suited to begin with.

But I have to confess that confronting the barrage head on after being out for a bit was a shock I was not ready for.  And for the first time in a long time I asked the question:  "What if I just dropped out completely?"

There is in actuality very little I can change.  Yes, I can advocate for this or that in my family and perhaps a bit beyond that, but there my reach ends.  And maybe that's okay.  There are things to be ready for and things that do need to be reacted to - but by far they do not make up the plethora of anger and hatred I see before me.

If I completely dropped out, dropped away from following the world and its issues (all of immediate importance, of course), would I truly be any worse?  Yes, one would miss the occasional thing that really was important (which seems to be found out anyway), but one would miss the bulk of the things that matter not at all.

I have come to value silence and quiet.  And what see and hear leads not to that at all, but only the clamor of a humanity that seems determined to tear itself apart.

Making Greek Yogurt

I have not tried to make yogurt before.  This would be something of an actual difference in my life, as I eat about 1 container of plain fat free Greek yogurt (905 g) a week. So I hunted around on the Interweb and found what could be the easiest dairy recipe I have ever seen.

1)  Pour a gallon of milk into a Crockpot (I used 3 quarts as I was saving a bit to make cheese).

2)  Turn the Crockpot on High and raise the temperature to 188 F (this took about 4 hours).

3)  Cool the milk to 112 F (this took about 1 hour.  I opened the lid to cool the milk faster).

4)  Put your culture in the milk.  Cover with a lid and towel.

5) Let sit approximately 12 hours.  I let mine sit overnight.  The temperature dropped a bit so I turned the Crockpot on low for a bit in the morning to raise the temperature.

6) At this point you have yogurt.  I have turned the Crockpot a bit so you can see the edge of the cake and the whey:

7)  Greek yogurt is so much thicker because it is strained.  Cheesecloth in a colander (on a pan to catch the whey, of course!):

8)  Let it drain.  Here are two pictures, one early in the process and one about an hour later:

9)  When it is firm, scoop it out into a container.  You can add flavorings (syrups or fruit) at this point.  I just like mine plain:

10)  A by-product is whey, the milk and solids (proteins) in the milk.  People pay ridiculous amounts of money for dried whey.  I got four cups:

So how did I do?  House Greek Yogurt (905 g) in my neck of the woods starts at $3.78, with prices going up to $6.00 for the brand name flavored varieties.  I got 996+ g (our scale maxes out at 1000 g) from 3 quarts of milk.  A gallon of milk cost $2.48.  My yogurt culture packs cost $6.95 for 5 packs, so approximately $2.80 for two (from the super friendly folks at New England Cheesemaking Supply Company).  That brings us to around $5.20.

But wait, there is more.  I used the last quart of milk to make a soft cheese.  Add a minimum of $5.00 for that.  And I ended up with 8 cups of whey between the yogurt and the cheese.  907 g of powdered flavored whey will run $22.00 at a store.  Mine I got for free as a byproduct of something I will eat.

So cost-wise I am ahead (yes, I could go higher with organic milk but I bet I would break even with higher priced yogurts). 

More importantly, I have a skill that (in an urban area) is handy to have. I do not have a ready supply of milk except from the store - but right up to that point, I can transform milk into different products and products with longer lives (Hard cheese ages for example, and waxing cheese can help it keep for years).  Right up to the point of a collapse, even if things become rationed, I can make something more out of what I have available.

And what is the value of that?

Unraveling

I begin to wonder if we have reached the start of a great unraveling.

Nighean Ban had a falling out with a friend, a friend she has almost since we moved here 8 years ago.  She was involved in the fringe only  but the issue did not end there.  Things were said - stupid things, political things from what I understand (and that is what I know.  And I do not know that I need to know more).  Tempers were engaged.  People are not talking.

And then the overflow.  Suddenly the friend's mother - one of The Ravishing Mrs. TB's longest standing friends since we moved - felt  uncomfortable coming to an event we were all planning on attending because what had happened.  And during the weekend two weeks later, a lunch that was supposed to be planned never happened:  the friend who was going to contact The Ravishing Mrs. TB never called and The Ravishing Mrs. TB felt uncomfortable calling her to see what had happened.

It is a small thing some might say, a falling out such as might happen between any teenage girls and mothers not wanting to exacerbate a situation.  But something feels different this time, almost a sense of doubling down and hardening of opinions rather than an effort to resolve the issue.

Am I immune?  Not at all, Over the past two months I found my communication with others greatly decreasing: outside of my coworkers I regularly interact with 7-8 people on a weekly basis, and maybe twice that number on a biweekly basis.  Why?

More and more, I find myself unable to process the "how" of how we are speaking to others.  I find myself "Unfollowing" more and more on Facebook (think of it as a sort of invisible secret double detention where you no longer realize people do not see what you post) because their lives - at least their online lives (and one assumes their "real" lives) - have been consumed with 1) politics; and 2) mocking and castigating those that disagree with them not as "misguided" but as "wrong" and "stupid".  The same with most online discussion sites as well, which are turning more and more into tearing down anyone that disagrees with them rather than discussing the issues.  It is as if we had abandoned the color TV of variegated and muted colors and were left with the harsh glare of black and white in our rooms and in our lives, where more and more the totality of our relationships - and communication, the point of any relationship - is reduced to communicating only with those of like mind and the "others" are merely the caricatures of what we have created in our mind (or worse, allowed others to create for us).

And here lies a key - at least fore me - that we have have started an unraveling, a disintegration of our culture and way of life:  we are losing the desire to make the attempt to communicate with each other.

Too many now are quite willing to scream, shout and yell at each other.  Fewer and fewer seem to be interested in talking to each other.  The desire to be heard with the "correct" opinion outweighs the desire to have that opinion understood.  And more and more, ideological purity to "my" position is the standard that is being used to judge the worth of another.

Perhaps I am overstating the case?  I think a walk through every major historical war and societal breakdown at some level finds its in a loss of communication. Individuals do not communicate but judge others first on their agreement with their own ideas - and if they do not agree, it becomes easy enough to categorize them as a group that does not matter and can thus be treated badly because they are "stupid" or "reactionary" or "Alt-X".  Groups do not communicate but see others not as fellow citizens or inhabitants but rather as obstacles in the way of their progress. Countries do not communicate but verbal denigrate and use soft attacks to influence those who do not agree with their policies or way of life.  And countries not communicating eventually lead to war.

As the lights of communication slowly fade, the landscape becomes darker and darker.  Like huddles only with like, while the voices of understanding and reason  withdraw themselves from the discord and try to salvage whatever relationships they can, building smaller and smaller communities that huddle together in the physical and digital landscape as mobs roam the outside.

Like British Foreign Secretary Sir Edward Grey, I begin to wonder if I am seeing the lamps go out - not all over Europe this time, but somewhere else, somewhere closer to home.  And I begin wonder as well if I shall never see them lit again in my lifetime either.

The Civil War You Get Is Not The Civil War You Expect

No sane, reasonable person wants a civil war.

I think there two camps about what a civil war is like:  those that are currently violent and those that are quietly preparing.

For those that are currently violent, they mistake the times.  They think the acts of violence they practice in a society that has not yet converted to a truly civil conflict is what an actual civil war would be like.  They believe that violent acts perpetuated against people and things that are (on the whole) not fighting back is what the future would be like - only they would win when the "gloves" are removed and they can act without concern.  They forget that their ability to continue to perpetuate such violence in civil situation derives largely from the larger population's forbearance against such an event.   It is one thing to protest, yell a slogan or two, rush a helpless crowd, maybe throw a rock or even a Molotov cocktail, and then go home.  It is another thing to find the other side prefers to shoot rather than arrest and to flee home only to find your home and your family or friends have been destroyed.

For those that are quietly preparing, they mistake the impact.  They believe that they will be able to either weather the storm in place or come out ready to fight, not to receive.  What they fail to apprehend is that once the war has started it is very hard to end, often outlasting whatever preparations they have made.  They also forget that civil wars any more are seldom self contained events:  extra-national players are more than happy to intervene and while planning to face rioters with rocks and zip guns, they are faced with AK-47s and the latest in anti-personnel mines.

The final problem, of course, is that civil wars seldom end the way either side hoped or expected.  No matter who actually wins the situation is usually not better: there is always a loser and the winner is seldom in a generous mood towards the losers.  The cities and countryside are often destroyed, industry is ruined, entire cultures are decimated and sometimes never returned.  This discounts completely the loss of life and population displacement that inevitably occurs.  It can take states years, even decades to recover.

Civil wars are brutal, bloody events.  To pretend they are not is to engage in the sort of fantasy thinking of video games, where the simple flick of a button resets the game back to how it was.

Reality is not nearly so accommodating.

A Plumbing We Shall Go II

A short follow up to yesterday's post on the nature of self-economics.

I am not sure what a plumbing house call runs these days.  It cannot be less than $75 (That is what we paid when we had our home warranty).  That, of course, typically discounts any additional hourly work or parts.

Now to be fair, a plumber would have dealt with the issue much quicker than I did - after all, I sort of instinctively thought I knew how the parts went together, but I had to experiment a great deal. So let us say an hour of labor to disassemble and reassemble the sink - or at least, that is what I would have been charged for.

What is the hourly rate?  Not sure - but let us use that $75 number as I suspect it is closer to the truth than I would like to think.

Now parts.  I paid about $25 in parts.  There is always markup in parts - 20% is (I think) standard for the auto repair business, so we will use that.  That is $30.

So to recap:  to have it repaired could have cost in the area of $180.  In point of fact I paid $25.  That is (in case you are math challenged as I am) a savings of $155.

It did cost me three hours of my time.  So if I look at that number, it appears I "made" $51.66 an hour by do it myself. (This is the part that is always hard for me:  I never "make" that money, I just did not spend it.  I understand cost avoidance, it just never feels as satisfying actual cash).  That is not a bad hourly wage.

It helps -and it is something I need to get more in the habit of.  Work because not quite as boring or not engaging when you do it this way:  how much am I actually saving by doing this? How much money is not leaving my bank account because I surrendered 3 hours to refitting the sink?

And, of course, the self confidence - which is priceless.  I have actual abiding sense of competence at the moment.  I looked at something I had never done before and puzzled it out in a way that worked - and saved me money.

Not a bad return overall for three hours of labor.

A Plumbing We Shall Go

The Ravishing Mrs. TB catches me when I come in the door from work.  "My sink is not draining"  she said.  "Have you used any on it?"

Sigh. "Let me go give it a look".

I crawl down, and open up the cabinets and unscrewed the rings by the pea trap (one plastic, one metal)  in hopes that I can get a screwdriver up there and pull whatever nastiness is there back down.  The top one - the metal one - will not turn.  I keep working it but it will not release.  I start working the upper part of the pipe from the sink, but it torques the stopper.  I keep trying to turn the upper ring - until it breaks off.  Rusted through.

Great. Now I have a sink that empties directly onto the cabinet bottom.  I have never done this much plumbing in my life.  It looks like I need to replace the pipe dropping directly from the sink.  I have never done this before.

But I do not really want to pay plumber either.  Let us see what happens.

The pipe from the sink turns out not to be too difficult to disengage.  There is a brass nut which hasto releasee, which in turn releases the pressure on the rubber grommet above it to prevent leaks.  Removing the stopper is easy:  there is a smaller nut that feeds into the main pipe.  Unscrew it and it drops away.

I keep turning the pipe and it does not seem to be moving.  Hmm.  I finally figure out you have to hold the top part of the drain (that metal ring in the bottom of the sink) while you turn it.  Out it pops and down comes the main pipe.

I drag the parts with me to my local Large Big Box Supply Store.  I am matching pieces via diameter - fortunately, if you look long enough you will find it.  A new pea trap (just in case;  I will certainly need the rings), a new drain assembly, and a 10" Crescent Wrench (which I have needed for a while) equals $42.00 and I am on my way back.

Putting it back together is pretty much a reverse of the process.  Top of the assembly goes in and then the pipe screws into this - which takes me a while as you have to really bring the rubber grommet and brass ring down to get it up in the hole. The stopper assembly is (literally) like the old one - five minutes and I am done.  Putting the drain pipe into the pea trap turns out to be the biggest issue:  the plastic ring does not seem to seal as well as the metal one did.  Hmm.  I have two inner rings from the pea trap I got: I put one in the ring and reverse the other one in the pipe.  This seems to work.

I spend 15 minutes filling and then draining the sink, then tightening things, then draining the sink again.  I seem to have gotten nearly all of the leaks, but we are leaving the cabinet under the sink empty and monitored for a bit.

This was (obviously) not how I was expecting to spend my evening.  Total time was probably about three hours all told.  That said, I am pretty sure that I could not get that work done for what it cost me to do it.

And I found out I can do a little more plumbing than I thought.  Once again, trying to be self reliant is not a bad thing.

End of Month

Last Day of First Month:

The brown grass belies the fact

that Spring is coming.

Breaking Up A State: A Letter

To:  Lady Liberty
       Washington D.C.
        USA

Congratulations on your decision to divide your country in smaller countries!

We know that this has been a difficult decision for you - after all, any relationship which has been enduring through the years always creates pain when the relationship ends. But fear not - we here at Chaos, Catastrophe, and Unintended Consequences LLC (CCUC) have a great deal of experience in the matters and are looking forward to serving you and making the process as easy and non-emotional as possible.

I see here on your basic dossier you have elected to divide your country via a vote.  Overall an excellent choice - after all, where possible violence is should be avoided - but we do feel compelled to warn you that votes do not always go the way one hoped.  Within every geographic area there will be groups that feel they do not want to leave the larger unit.  Will you allow them to exercise their own voting rights, or do you intend to force them in - as they will point out, thus using the same argument your previous partners used on you?  This leads to either rather bothersome population relocation (our staff is looking into the India Partition and the unfortunate incident of East Pakistan) or the outbreak of fighting which in fact does often lead to a civil war (our publishing department is working on various methodologies in the event of this unfortunate occurrence.  We have found in the past that the words "insurrection", "rebellion", and "civil disturbance" are infinitely preferable to "revolution".).

We appreciate that you have completed the additional sections around manner of government, rights of citizens, and broad government policies.  We note, however, that you have missed some common items that might have an impact on your separation process:

- Currency:  We see that you have suggested the previous national currency as your currency of choice.  We regret to inform you that in most cases, the predicate country will not allow their currency name to be used.  As a subtext to this, we might also note that you will have to develop a backing for your currency in order for it to be accepted on the world market.  You should give some thought now to how that will be accomplished.  Please remember that, in general, promissory notes and a belief in "The New You" are not considered sufficient collateral.

- Land and Facilities:  As with most dissolutions, the land and facilities between the smaller geographic entities and the larger geographic entries - often referred to in the legal documents as "Federal" and "State" - are often co-mingled and therefore difficult to separate.  Some past dissolutions have opted for a blanket possession of all assets; while this is simple enough to implement it does create issues if you intend to do business with your former associates.  It perhaps would be more prudent to consider an exchange of land for debt now and work that into your legal documents (see below).

- Debt:  As with the reallocation of assets, so the reallocation of debts.  Be aware that debtors will not accept a separation as a failure to pay borrowed money.  It is up to you to make provision for the portion of the debt you will be inheriting upon dissolution of the relationship.  If the assessment of Land and Facilities and assets of the previous relationship is not sufficient, we often recommend a "new state tax" to cover the difference, presenting it as the cost of becoming independent.  We do note that such a tax is not universally welcomed and in some cases may create further "disturbances" and trust you have allocated a sufficient budget for your armed forces/law enforcement units to handle the issue..

- Business: The lifeblood of any state is its business, the primary way its citizens are employed, materials provided, and taxes paid.  Understand that from the business' point of view, your separation is not necessarily an asset.  Any attempt to make their working relationship in your new state reflect your vision of the new state - and thus make it unique - will make the business take a serious consideration of it is worth its resources to continue to operate there.  We recommend maintaining, as closely as possible, similar policies to your neighbors or even to your previous relationship.

- Neighbors:  With the advent of your new single status, you will find that you are now the focus of intense interest on the part of any number of other states.  Like any other relationships, these have advantages and disadvantages.  Some will seek to sweep you off your feet.  Others will seek to undermine you for past hurts they may feel.  And for an unfortunate few, your new single status will be viewed as the opportunity to force their way upon you.  As with any change in relationship status, we recommend you manage your new relationships with the care and concern that any reasonable person would exercise in an unknown environment.  We would especially warn you that the practice of "On-line State Dating" is inherently risky and should be avoided.

Again, congratulations on your step into a brave new world!  We are sure that you find that the benefits of self-state-actualization and freedom will counterbalance any temporary issues arising from violence, an ungrateful population, bankruptcy, economic downturns, and neighbors that refuse to cooperate.

Sincerely,

I. M. Chaos
Principal Partner
Chaos, Catastrophe, and Unintended Consequences LLC

Fear Itself

A friend on Facebook posted the following question:  "'The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.' - FDR.  When did  we become a nation that  is so scared?  So paranoid?"

It is a valid and good question, and I spent the better part of two hours thinking about it.  But in line with my long standing policy of publishing not a thing political or political theory based on Facebook,  I decided to give my thoughts on the matter here.

What would make "us"  this way?  After carefully pondering the issues, I came up with at least five things:

1)  We have taught people what to think instead of how to think:  Instead of teaching our young - and ourselves - how to think critically about facts and situations, we have taught them what to think them.  What this means is that when they are presented with alternate information or information that does not comport with their world view and knowledge, they do not take the time to think through what this means and if it is true what these means.  Instead, they simply react - and what they have taught to think about things that do not comport with what they have been taught is to fear it.

2)  We have taught people to rely on others, not themselves:  Instead of teaching our young - and ourselves - to learn to do things for ourselves - or at least try to learn to do them - we have taught them that only the collective can bring the answer.  What this means is that when something happens and cannot instantly be resolved by someone else, be it a tow truck driver or law officer or government agency - we become afraid that the problem will go unsolved and we will be inconvenienced or suffer, instead of at least trying to do something on our own.  In fact in some situations this drives us into even deeper fear, where we clamor for more people to do more things for us.  We have carefully trained ourselves that we "cannot" as individuals.  We only "can" as a group.

(A convenient side note of this is, in general, this is the sort of behavior that so many governments and bureaucracies and business thrive on.  Self reliant people, in general, do not like to give power over any part of their lives to others.)

3)  We have created a society of either/or, where things become a reaction to the other side rather than trying to come up with the truly best answer:  There are two items here.  The first is where policies are passed by fiat and imposed, regardless of how it impacts the individuals involved.  When the matter is brought up, the typical response seems to be something along the lines of "Tough. Adapt.  We are in charge."  Not unsurprisingly, people come to fear this sort of social or economic governance.  The other side of this is the counter-reaction, where the other side (who is now the ascendancy) pushes back.  Now those who passed the first round are in fear.

What does this mean?  The answers offered are always either/or:  "We won"  comes the response, "and we will do what we think best."  "We think best" is most often not the same as "What is best." Asking "what is best" takes a strength of character in that we must accept views contrary to our own, and that these views may be right.  It also takes the ability of people to critical think instead of just react (see item 1).

(Lest you think I am speaking only of government, business has the same sorts of modus operandi.  For example, everyone loves electric cars; no-one really cares to want or know how batteries are made or how destructive they can be to the environment.  Likewise with driverless cars:  We are told it is the future - yet Yahoo cannot hold onto my e-mail securely.  The chances that the cares are any less prone to hacking?  Oddly enough, never discussed.  Again, it is an either/or solution:  either you are for safety and cleanliness or you are for the unsafe and environmental destruction.  There is no third way.)

4)  Fear sells:  Fear sells in two ways.  The first way is simply as an economic tool.  People - governments, businesses, individuals - make money off fear.  If I can get you to become afraid of an outcome, I can offer you a solution - and with you emotionally engaged, you are far more likely to act to "solve" your fear.

The second is that fear brings power.  If I can make you afraid and offer a solution, then you will support me if you believe that my solution is superior to the fear.  Again, this stretches across governments, businesses, and individuals.  How many have found their start in fear - and stretched that fear out, lest the problem be solved and their power dissolved?

It is commercial exchange run amok:  the buyer gets a sense of safety, the seller profits from the power.  Unfortunately like any addiction the relationship will probably never end, as it is not in the seller's best interest and they will do their best to convince their buyer they are "better off" with the fear and their solution than addressing the problem head on.

5)  We no longer value risk or failure:  When I was a lad, I did some incredibly (by today's standards) risky things. I went down a rather steep hill on my back on a very narrow skateboard.  I played with fire.  I rode without a helmet, swam before 30 minutes, and tore around in the woods at night without a flashlight.  In other words, for the time I lived in I was a normal boy.  I risked.  And sometimes I paid the consequences.

I have also failed.  More than I wanted to of course and sometimes in painful ways emotional and economic.  I learned from the those experience things I would not otherwise learned.

But as a society, we are different now.  We don't encourage our children - or ourselves - to risk, except in specific socially acceptable ways.  And we sure do everything in our power to avoid our children or ourselves failing, to the point that this is unhealthy.

What does this create?  A people that, when presented with new or potential unknown situation, are neither willing to risk trying something or simply will not do something because they may fail.  It is easier to live in fear that try at risk or try and fail - because risk and failure are perceived as the true thing to be feared.

How to solve this?  As usual, I pose questions to which I do not know that I have the answers.  But I suspect a good place to start would be to simply reverse the five items:

- Teach ourselves and our children how to think instead of what to think.
- Teach ourselves and our children to be self reliant.
- Teach ourselves and our children to look for the best solution, not the either/or solution.
- Teach ourselves and our children to not allow ourselves to buy into fear, or to sell ourselves to it.
- Teach ourselves and our children to risk and fail.

Easy to write, hard to do.  But the only other option seems to be the increase of fear in our society, to the point that simply become able to do or say anything and live instead in a circle bounded solely by the fear we have of everything.

The Prophet Amos

Of all the minor prophets, I think I like Amos the best.

He is the only one that lets us know - before he gets God's commission - what he did for a living:  "who was among the sheepherders of Tekoa" (Amos 1:1). When arguing with the Amaziah of Israel he states "I was no prophet, Nor was I the son of a prophet, but I was a sheepherder and tender of sycamore fruit." (Amos 7:14)

I enjoy this because of all the prophets, I can most identify with him.  A man whose job was sheepherding and tending sycamore (fig) trees was a man who spent a great deal of time away from humans and with the natural world, sheep and trees.  A great deal of quiet, a lot of dirty work and wind and rain, obviously a some level of thinking about and communing with God (else he would not have been selected by God or heard the call).  A man who probably right to the point of his call was perfectly happy living with the wind and sun and sheep and trees.

And then God calls him away from all that, to go into the world of urban living and traveling outside of his own land to give his message.

I get the suggestion, at least once, that he was not altogether happy with changed:  "Then the LORD took me as I followed the flock, and the Lord said to me, 'Go, prophecy to My people Israel. (Amos7:15).  In his comment I hear the voice of a man who is not altogether happy with where is at the moment and would just as soon return to those flocks and trees instead of being where he was.  I sympathize with him:  being amidst an urban sprawl, surrounded by people, is not necessarily where i want to be either.  But apparently for a time that is where he - and I - were called to be.

Give him a read - it is only 9 chapters and touches not only on judgment coming for Israel and Judah but for the surrounding nations as well (God plays no favorites:  righteousness and unrighteousness have one standard, His own).  Read it and hear not only a prophets cry for a people to turn from their wickedness but the heart-sense of a man who ultimately just wants to go back to herds and orchards, to hear the voice of God in the wind and sun and rain.

Of Populism and Tribalism

In recent months I believe I have not heard the word "Populist" so much since I was junior in high school studying American history (The Populist Party in the late 19th Century American politics, for those of you for whom, like me, it has been a while).  And it not just here in the U.S.:  the same sorts of language is coming from Europe as well. It is generally (in its current usage) a sort of curse word:  someone is accused of being a "populist" as one might have been accused of being "Catholic" 125 years ago.

A populist, in case you have forgotten, is "a member of a political part claiming to represent the common people" or "a believer in the rights, wisdom, or virtue of the common people."   In the past such a party - The Populist Party"- was largely supported by farmers in the South and Midwest  against the perceived entrenched interests of the industrial elite.  In its present incarnation the term "populist" is put in opposition to "globalist", "a national policy of treating the whole world as the proper sphere of political influence". This has redefined populist as a sort of national minded party only - a party of the people of a particular place.

My contention is that in reality, even most who proclaim themselves globalists are practicing populists.

A populist now defined is a person interested in the rights of a smaller group than the international playing field - typically a state.  Such are accused of benefiting themselves to the expense of the international order.

But oddly enough, we have made a practice and habit of practicing something else, tribalism.

The Interweb really accelerated the process. Once upon a time - a time I can barely remember myself - if one had interests that were often not shared by any of one's friends, one sort of suffered in silence or lived via magazine and mail order. Suddenly, as the world became more "connected", one found that one had companions in one's various interests:  I was not the only one interested in role playing games or 13th Century Ireland or Japanese swords.  I became part of a community - a community that was often not defined by my geographic area but rather my interests.  A group that shared common interests and, over time, a somewhat common way of thinking, at least about sudden things.

I had found a tribe.

Now most people are parts of tribes, even if they do not realize it as such.   They talk within the tribe, they share within the tribe, they defend the tribe from outsiders, they support the tribe.  And this sort of behavior is supported, even blessed, by culture that has come to value this as the true sign of individual freedom. Even those those who are thoroughly internationalist and globalists are, if they at all belong to one or more subgroups and act in this way, tribal.  We can none of us escape it in the modern world.

But now we have a problem:  populists are also a sort of tribe by this definition.   They talk within a group, they share within a group, they defend against outsiders, and they support the group.  It is just that they have a larger group than most.

I do not necessarily have an answer for this (and thank you for sticking with me through this).  It does strike me as odd though that we seek to decry and mock the very sort of thing that we claim to cherish and support.  It is either the sign of a society that is schizophrenic or a sign that we have lost the ability to ask the deep hard questions about what we really believe and what we are truly about.

The Destruction of Facebook Revisited

You may recall that back in November I did a short fast from Facebook in order to get through the actual election.  The title - And That, Friends, Was Facebook - was reflective of my opinion that the vehicle of the election had effectively destroyed the concept of Facebook as a community, that the vitriol and bitter anger of both sides would collapse it as a social medium.

I am sad to report - but not altogether surprised to report - that this seems to be exactly what has occurred.

The level of ire and wrath has not decreased on either side -indeed, it has come to reach even greater levels than I could have anticipated.  Having friends on both "sides", I get to see the best and worst (but mostly the worst) of both.

There are a narrow range of people that still do not seem to comment one way or the other and in some cases actually go out of their way to avoid talking anything about it (I would be one of those).  But it is a small group, and seems to be getting smaller as the lines are hardening.

The thing that is most disconcerting is when someone posts something particularly scornful, sarcastic, or mocking.  What I find that does to me is instantly begin to compromise anything else that they say. It becomes the filter through which I find myself reviewing everything else I know about them. If I am not careful, I find myself saying "If they believe that and say that, how can they hold to this position?"

I wonder, in the back of my head at times, if this is what the beginning of all civil disruptions begin like:  the rhetoric becomes more and more hostile and people listen less and less.  Before long, they find that they cannot stand the other side at all.  They begin to attribute intentions to the other side that may not exist because of the rhetoric used.  Words become feelings, feelings become actions.

So perhaps it is not that Facebook is slowly destroying itself that is the issue. It is the fact that Facebook has become a mirror of our society slowly destroying ourselves.

On An Answered Prayer

Yesterday morning I had a selfish prayer request.

I try to not ask for anything for myself, because somehow it seems...small. Self focused.  Not the place my attention is supposed to be.  But the matter had been gnawing away at my mind and I did not see a resolution.

"Father", I asked, "can I please  have the money to go to Japan to train next year?"

Self-centered, right?  But strangely enough, important to me. I had to miss going a year ago and I would very much like to go next year as part of my development.

So I prayed.  And went off, having forgotten about it.

Fast forward to the afternoon, when my boss presents me with a raise and a bonus.  And not just a raise and a bonus, a raise and a bonus based on if I had worked there a full year, not five months.  It was, shall we say very generous.

And then the prayer request came into my mind.

I am not (and have never been) a believer in the "pray and believe and it is yours" group (that whole "according to God's will" section always trips them up) nor am I of the "materialize your desires through positive thinking" crowd.  I have no reason to suspect - nor do I believe - God will constantly do this for any us.

So why this? Why now?

If I had to theorize, I would thinking that God is playing to my own insecurities.

I am awash in feelings of discomfort and fear right now.  There is so much instability in the world, so much anger, so much hatred.  So much uncertainty.  And into this comes God, not with the glaring answers to world problems but a mundane answer about money - as if to say "If I can answer this, surely I will deal with the rest in My own good time."

Perhaps the gift of money was really meant to answer a bigger need - the continuing belief and confidence in God's sovereignty.

On Doing Good

Yesterday's post left me thinking throughout the day about doing good.

I stand by my point: protests, on the whole, may do other things, but they do not do good.  They do not, for the most part, solve immediate problems or resolve the real needs of people.

But allow me to turn the question on myself: what am I doing to do good?  And by doing good, I mean both the daily actions I take as well as the conscious course of my life.

On a daily basis, am I doing good?  Am I making things better?  Am I solving an issue that matters to someone?  The challenge, of course, is that this should be simply wider than the work I do or the family and friends I have and am responsible for.  Those are really simply the things that I should be doing anyway.  No, this is the conscious seeking of doing the same for someone or something that is not remotely related to me or paying for me to do it.  It is the mindset of actively seeking for opportunities to do good in the lives of others for no other reason than it should be done.

And in the conscious course of my life:  is it directed towards doing good?  Yes, it is good to be concerned with various things and be conscious of them - the poor, the environment, homeless rabbits (my personal one), those that cannot find work - but are we going just being conscious and maybe dropping a few dollars in the virtual cup or get the magazine, or are we going to be actively involved in doing something, which takes time and commitment (often more so than money)?

This caused me to do a great deal of soul searching yesterday as I went about my business, especially the second part.  If I had passion for solving the multitudinous problems of this world, where would I start?  What would they be?

I am not quite sure at this moment, but where I find myself coming down is 1) On work and those who have been passed by in the current incarnation of the economy and business; and 2)  The continued existence of slavery anywhere in the world.  (And the homeless rabbits, of course.  Always them).

I am not sure that this are the things, nor do I quite know what I would do about any of them.  I remain confident in the fact that starting to think about them and becoming educated about them will help to show the path for them - or, perhaps it will reveal another path entirely.

A rather trite and hackneyed phrase in the Christian Church is "Do not do church, be the Church".  I might suggest we consider expanding that to cover us all:  "Do not talk about the good, be the Good."
Or as Mahatma Gandhi said, "Be the change you wish to see in the world."