804 Jungle Gardens, Sarasota Florida

A few years ago, one of our nieces got married here on the site of Jungle Gardens, a lush tourist attraction. Although the marriage didn't last, it is still a pretty place to visit and to hold a special event. I was able to get quite close to the Flamingoes for photographs. It started as a private residence and evolved into a place to observe a variety of plants and animals.

In the photo, a bird is enjoying lunch while we waited for "Birds of the Rainforest" show. While we were there taking in the Florida sites and sights, I had more visitors to my blog site than when I am blogging. I should take more vacations.


Lunch with a friend

803 The shopping Jean

Quite by accident, I discovered that my sister-in-law, Jean, has no shopping gene. This is unusual for a woman. While in Florida we were guests in their 8 x 33 RV trailer. We slept on a futon on the attached porch. The bathroom was pretty small--about the size of a postage stamp and I'm a #10 envelop. Tuesday I was brushing my teeth and threw my back out because I didn't open the door to put my rear end in the hallway. You get the picture?

So Jean loaned me one of their 3 back braces; they are sort of a lending library for the RV park, I think. It felt so good that I thought I should buy one. I've been having periodic back trouble since my horse fell on me years ago, and hadn't found much that would help. So she suggested Wal-Mart. I made a list of a few things I thought I needed and off we went in her big Lincoln (about the size of the trailer).

I just love to shop at Wal-Mart, but I knew we were in trouble the minute we stepped through the doors. She looked at the ceiling for the directional signs, pointed and said, "That way." We were off and running, and had all the list accomplished in about 2 minutes, were in the check-out lane and back in the parking lot in a no time.

I said, "Jean has no shopping gene."

Here's a cozy photo of the "kitchen," and we were playing Uno--this particular game lasted about 45 minutes (we didn't have the rules with us). We had such a good time that they bought a game too, and now we know what we were doing wrong.

Playing Uno in the trailer

802 Traveling with books

"Books I travel with. . " dangles a preposition far away from its object, so I changed the topic line. They need to be light weight, easy to pick up and restart, and attention grabbing, so I can read above (below) people chatting in airports, on cell phones, or two guys loudly watching the Super Bowl 3 ft away in my relatives' trailer/camper. This trip had a first--a woman in a bathroom stall talking on her cell phone--made me wonder what the person on the other end was hearing. Then I realized it was the janitress, so probably the callee was accustomed to hearing toilets flush, and other less gentle sounds.

But the book I took along is "Got game; how the gamer generation is reshaping business forever" by John C. Beck and Michell Wade (Harvard Business School Press, 2004). The boomers were big--affected everything about our culture, but the "gamer" demographic is bigger yet, and so is the generation gap, according to Beck and Wade.

Gamers are those who have grown up with and regularly use video grames--and here the authors include arcade games, computer games, hand held games, and digital games played on TV. The delivery platform is not important, but the nature of game playing is (you are the star, everything is possible, things are simple, the young rule, etc.).

I found this book as interesting as a good novel because it revealed another universe going on around me which I'd been completely ignoring. It's the topic I skip when "Wired" does an article on xbox, and the blog I impatiently skim when it includes a love song to the latest purchase of an interactive fantasy game.

These authors look at the gamers from a business management angle, but teachers, pastors, social workers and librarians could also benefit because the world view is very different. The 25 year old Indianapolis gamer may have more in common with a gamer from Korea, than a 30 year old from Buffalo who is not a gamer.

If you are short on time, just read the introductory material--the rest is somewhat anecdotal and repetitive. However, it includes references, data and charts, something I always appreciate (it's a librarian thing). It will prepare you for understanding the gap.

The pony tail

Remember in the mid-1970s the fifty-something waitress who still wore her hair around a "rat" like it was 1945? If you weren't born yet, just so you can picture this, you see something similar today on the beaches in Florida, and probably California.

Male boomers, bald as an egg, with tiny wispy gray pony tails in a petite sausage curl, announce the 'tude of their college days when long hair was a statement of rebellion for boys. Now the curl shouts, "Hell no, I won't go--into retirement, into a senior discount, into the sunset, into the rocking chair." Now it says, "Hey, I'm still so cool."

Saturday evening in Bradenton

Here I am at my brother's blogging for the first time this week. Big blog withdrawal. We're celebrating my sister in law's birthday.

Nice week, but a little coolish. Did St. Armand's Circle, Jungle Gardens, ate breakfast at the Broken Egg, had lunch at the Sandbar, and I've had 2 pieces of key lime pie, my favorite.

We had a nice get together with all my Florida relatives at the Twin Dolphins today. Flying home Monday. Signing off.

On the beach

Certainly not my best painting, however it grabs the ambience of four midwesterners, fully clothed, heads covered, slathered in sun screen, covered with umbrellas. The women are looking at the water; the men are watching the babes.


On the beach

Check back next week for more exciting stories from Florida.

801 National Adoption Month

It isn't in February, it's November. But Marvin Olasky says nothing appeared in the major media about it even though there are 118,000 children in foster care who are eligible for adoption. He decided to cover the topic any way, and you can read it here for Capital Research Center. The co-author is Dan Vazquez who works in India with disadvantaged children and covers street children in Mexico for this article.

800 The cat who hears cheese

If I open the door of the refrigerator and take out a tomato, or margarine or a sack of apples, I am alone. If I take out a package of cheese, the cat appears from nowhere and is sitting quietly behind me when I turn around. She could have been in a sound sleep on the couch in my office not having moved since breakfast at 5:15 a.m. with my comings and goings, entrances and exits.

She has issues--was abandoned or abused in young adulthood and we got her at a cat rescue place. Now I wonder if she had been locked up in a basement somewhere. Last week I brought home a 1954 National Geographic special reprint about the wonders of the telephone age from the freebie box at the public library. Since a baby bell has gobbled up momma, I thought it might be interesting (and it is, since it sort of chronicles that Bell Labs really didn't know the goldmines that awaited in the future). I didn't realize at first that it had a horrible odor. Our suburb had a very bad storm and flood in the early 70s. Our house was one of the few that did not flood (we had no basement), but for weeks the neighborhood reeked of mold and mildew, rotting carpet, and destroyed wall panelling as exhausted home owners brought damaged goods to the curb for pick up. Our neighbor's wine collection had all the labels loosen and float away (he was right on the creek).

Anyway, that's what "New Miracles of the Telephone Age" smells like. And the cat loves it. I put it next to the register thinking it needed to air out, but she sits on it, rolls on it, nibbles on the pages and looks like she is rolling in cat nip.

Must sound like cheese to her.

799 Put some spice in your marriage

Advice is something librarians dispense, but usually I stay away from advising people about relationships. I am well aware that I married the greatest guy in the world, so what's tough about that?

However, after 45 years, conversation does get a bit thin. He tends to say "Yes, yes," before I even get the words out of my mouth about something I read on a blog, because he just saw it on the News. So we've been having game night. So far, we've only tried Boggle, Racko and Uno, because I'm really, really awful at games, and I'm a poor loser. I'm also a poor winner, because I don't like to see anyone lose. Euchre is the national passtime for anyone from Indiana, so if I really want to wow him, I offer him a game of Euchre. Boys from Indianapolis find that very sexy.

Here's how it raises the level of discourse in our home:
"I can't believe I did that."
"Is that a word?"
"Let the answering machine take that."
"Do the rules say we can do that?"
"We've lost the rules."
"When did we buy this game anyway?"
"Box says 1971."
"I'm no good at this."

Since we'd lost the rules to the Uno game, my husband took it to his lunch session with the 4th grader he mentors. He explained it to him--but we think he missed a few of the finer points. It is an urban school in sort of a rough neighborhood and we suspect that whoever shouts loudest gets to set the rules. I tried checking the internet but found 3 sets of rules (to download) and they don't look like our box. Our first attempt ran to about 45 minutes, so we think we've missed something.

Boggle is more fun, but only for me. I'm the wordsmith in the family. My husband had a really awful start in school, but because he was sweet, cute and charming with adorable red curls, I think they didn't notice he was a poor reader. Good kids who don't make waves sometimes don't get the attention they should. He reads fine now--in fact, because he is disciplined and focused, he has read the Bible through 3 times, something I've never done (no discipline). But he only reads if he has too, like building specs or committee reports. It gives him no pleasure. When I first visited in his parents' home when I was in college, I noticed there was no reading material--not a newspaper or magazine or book. About 15 years later that had changed some. When we'd visit with the kids I could browse Field and Stream and the Indianapolis Star, and a few text book's my father-in-law had purchased for his job.

In Boggle you get one point for finding 3 or 4 letter words, two points for five, three for six, etc. The letters are upside down or backwards, but you can spell any direction--up, down, back, forward, sideways. In 3 minutes. If you both find the same word, neither gets a point. I thought my mind might react quicker if I refreshed it with four letter words. No, not that kind, but basic building blocks of most of our sentences. Suddenly, I began seeing four letter words everywhere. Then I stopped to write them down. My morning notebook, instead of having notes for my blogs, now has pages of told, bond, firm, them, week, push, just, over, took and take. Four or five pages of this nonsense. Then I tried putting them into rhymes and sentences. (Proper names are generally not used, however).

WITH THAT HUGE
IRAQ VOTE
POOR FLIP FLOP JOHN
TIPS OVER BOAT.

FOOT BALL BOWL FANS
GULP COLD BEER
WHEN TEAM LOSE
YELL FOUL PLAY

NINE TEEN FIVE FIVE
PROM GALS WAIT
PINK GRAY FORD
ROCK ROLL DATE.

BUSH HELD FAST
TALK SHOW TELL
LAST YEAR WINS
VOTE FROM HELL

THEY WERE CALM
JUST MORE HARD NOSE
CORE WILL STAY
COLD WIND BLOW

GALS SHOP TILL DROP
BACK FOOT SORE
SALE, SALE, SALE
HAIL TAXI PLAN MORE

Just so I can move on with my life, I'm going to start in on five letter words.

798 Hanson on fire

Usually Victor Davis Hanson is fairly controlled, nuanced and cautious in criticism. But he's on fire in this one, "The Global Throng;
Why the world’s elites gnash their teeth." It gave me the opportunity to use my new Answers.com toolbar to look up why he called Ted Kennedy "the old minotaur" (with the correct pronunciation).

797 Such an exclusive deal!

Yesterday I returned a birthday present--the slacks were 5 inches too big in the waist, and about 4 inches too long in the legs. Rather than pay a seamstress to make the adjustments, I returned them to Lazarus. At least we called that store Lazarus when my daughter bought the gift in September (took me awhile to try them on--she loves that brand, but she has long legs and is short waisted). It was really a Macy's store when I took them back (name was actually changed in 2003).

With my new Macy's charge card I received a 15% off coupon to break it in. With the $44 credit for the slacks (I had no receipt, so I got whatever the current price is), and the coupon, and a huge 70% off sale, I figured the store would be paying me to shop! Maybe I'd pick something up for the Florida trip. But it was not to be. Nothing but picked over winter stuff in sizes 2XL or Petite2. Besides, the fine print on the coupon had that little "exclusions apply, see back for details" note.

May not be combined with any additional discount offers.
May not be applied to previous purchases.
Excludes Everyday value items
Excludes specials
Excludes super buys
Excludes cosmetics and fragrances
Excludes Polo/Lauren/Ralph Lauren
Excludes Tommy Bahama
Excludes Impulse
Excludes Bridge and Design Sportswear for her
Excludes Dooney & Bourke
Excludes Coach
Excludes Kate Spade
Excludes watches
Excludes Bridge/Designer shoes, handbags
Excludes small electrics and personal care
Excludes Vera Wang
Excludes Waterford
Excludes furniture, mattresses, floor covering
Excludes services
Excludes restaurants
Excludes Macys.com, macysweddingchannel.com/Kiosks
Excludes special orders
Excludes Macy's gift cards and merchandise certificates

Twenty five years ago I wrote a newsletter called "No Free Lunch" about marketing schemes using coupons, stamps, sweepstakes and other ways to play with your food. It is all coming back to me now. The house always wins.

796 More?

Reading this item yesterday was disturbing: "USAirways is cutting 318 more maintenance jobs in Charlotte NC." More? We are planning to fly into Charlotte on our way to Florida, so the thought of "more" means they are down a few already, doesn't it? "The airlines is in bankruptcy court for the 2nd time in 2 years." I hope they can hang in there through February!

795 Ward Churchill Poll

Bill O'Reilly's page has a poll asking if Ward Churchill should be fired by the University of Colorado, and I voted No. If he is fired, conservatives should protest. Why give this 60s wannabe the red carpet treatment? Let him go the brave route many other faculty have taken--like being assigned no teaching assistants, a crummy office, all the worst departmental appointments, denial of grants and research funds, and especially, large freshman classes of introductory classes. That's how universities get rid of conservatives. Of course, there is no evidence anyone wants to get him off the faculty except a few parents who think their hard earned tuition money for junior has gone up in smoke.

Professor Bainbridge on what conservatives should do.

794 Super Bowl ad pulled

Ad Age.com reports that Ford Motor Company's Lincoln will not be seen in the Super Bowl ads this coming Sunday. ". . .the ad, which was created by WPP Group's Young & Rubicam Brands, Dearborn, Mich., after receiving complaints from an advocacy group, Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. The group said the commercial, which showed a priest lusting after the Mark LT, was offensive.

Ford in a statement today said, "Lincoln has decided not to run the Lincoln Mark LT ad on the Super Bowl this Sunday. Of course we had no intention of offending anyone -- and we are frankly surprised there is a negative reaction." " Story here.

I'll have to think about this one. I probably would have thought it was offensive even if I'd never known about the abuse. Or at least tacky. What goes through their heads, she mumbled.

If you just have to know about the rest of the ads, here's a chart. I'm not much for football, but I might walk through the living room for a good ad.

Update: Now that removing the ad is news, I saw the complete ad on a news story tonight. And it probably didn't even cost Ford a thing to run it that way. It really is a pretty silly ad. It wouldn't make me buy a Lincoln.

793 Federal employees and their Thrift Savings Plan

The same congresspeople who booed the President last night when he talked about the end of their gravy train have access to their own TSPs, Thrift Savings Plans, and they are trusted to manage them. It's a little bit like the school choice issue. They can choose to send their kids out of the district to a private school that is superior to the public one across the street, but they don't want you to do that because it might hurt public education. It is OK for them to shelter their retirement funds, but if you or I do it with funds that could go the government, it might hurt Social Security. Take a look:

"The TSP is a retirement savings plan for civilians who are employed by the United States Government and members of the uniformed services. The Federal Retirement Thrift Investment Board, administers the Thrift Savings Plan (TSP). The Web site http://www.frtib.gov, provides information about the FRTIB electronic reading room, procurements, and employment opportunities. "

This is like the 401(k) you may have through your company, but the "company" who contributes to this plan is you and I, the taxpayers. Gene Sperling, a Clinton economic adviser, has proposed a Universal 401(k) plan which would be similar to what federal employees have. It is described at www.americanprogress.org/ Center for American Progress: "The president and progressives could both protect Social Security’s guaranteed benefit and promote ownership with a new Universal 401(k) that offers all Americans a private retirement account on top of Social Security, and uses government funds to match contributions made by middle income and lower-income workers. The Universal 401(k) would spread individual savings and wealth creation to tens of millions of American families currently falling through the cracks by offering all Americans the generous incentives and automatic savings opportunities that the best employer-provided 401(k)’s offer their employees."

792 Life-affirming, inspirational, and motivational

That's how Boogie Jack describes his Life's Little Goodies column in his how-to, webmaster's newsletter, Almost a Newsletter. Even though I'm no longer responsible for a web page, I've continued to subscribe because he is upbeat, positive, and offers instructions for code I occasionally try.

In issue 119 (he'd been gone for awhile due to eye problems), he includes some script to enable you to set up an e-mail link that will avoid spammers scooping up your address. So I've put it on my blog, and we'll see how it works. Before I used the "at" and "dot" spelled out, which for newbies was confusing. Check out his #119 and browse through his Tips Jar. He provides the complete script with explanations. Then sign up for his free newsletter.

791 A Scolding for Christians

If you are not a Christian, you can skip this entry. Ronald J. Sider, sort of a perennial scold, has a real tongue lashing for Christians, particularly the "born agains" (larger group) and evangelicals (smaller group). He uses a number of statistical reports, particularly those done by George Barna, the one with which I'm most familiar. But he weaves together a pretty discouraging basket of bad news in the January/February 2005 issue of Books and Culture.

"To say there is a crisis of disobedience in the evangelical world today is to dangerously understate the problem. Born-again Christians divorce at about the same rate as everyone else. Self-centered materialism is seducing evangelicals and rapidly destroying our earlier, slightly more generous giving. Only 6 percent of born-again Christians tithe. Born-again Christians justify and engage in sexual promiscuity (both premarital sex and adultery) at astonishing rates. Racism and perhaps physical abuse of wives seems to be worse in evangelical circles than elsewhere. This is scandalous behavior for people who claim to be born-again by the Holy Spirit and to enjoy the very presence of the Risen Lord in their lives.

In light of the foregoing statistics, it is not surprising that born-again Christians spend seven times more hours each week in front of their televisions than they spend in Bible reading, prayer, and worship.(32) Only 9 percent of born-again adults and 2 percent of born-again teenagers have a biblical worldview.(33)

Perhaps it is not surprising either that non-Christians have a very negative view of evangelicals. In a recent poll, Barna asked non-Christians about their attitudes toward different groups of Christians. Only 44 percent have a positive view of Christian clergy. Just 32 percent have a positive view of born-again Christians. And a mere 22 percent have a positive view of evangelicals.(34)

Evangelicals rightly rejected theological liberalism because it denied the miraculous. In response, we insisted that miracle was central to biblical faith at numerous points including the supernatural moral transformation of broken sinners. Now our very lifestyle as evangelicals is a ringing practical denial of the miraculous in our lives. Satan must laugh in sneerful derision. God's people can only weep."

It is quite long and well referenced, summarizing his points in The Scandal of the Evangelical Conscience (Baker, 2004). Sider is a professor at Eastern Baptist Theological Seminary.

790 The brain and risky behavior

This came as a surprise, but only because I'd been told this as a fact and believed it when my kids were 18 and 19. Apparently, the information was purely anecdotal and shared among parents before the NIH tested it.

"A National Institutes of Health study suggests that the region of the brain that inhibits risky behavior is not fully formed until age 25, a finding with implications for a host of policies, including the nation's driving laws."

News story here.

789 Alice Robie Resnick's DUI

If you're not from Ohio, you probably haven't heard that six drivers on Interstate 75 reported a drunk driver was weaving and careening her way south. The state police caught her around Bowling Green, and she told them she was in a hurry to get to Columbus and she took off again. They followed her and stopped her again, and yes, she was 3 times over the limit. She's an Ohio Supreme Court Justice.

If six passing motorists noticed her behavior, so did those who regularly sit on the bench with her, her staff, and her family. Did they care too much, or not enough? She's had at least three auto accidents since 1998 according to today's Columbus Dispatch. Let's set aside for a moment that she's making legal decisions that affect the people of Ohio; she is dangerous behind the wheel and might kill someone!
Apparently, holding a job wasn't Ms. Resnick's problem--she gets reelected as the court's only Democrat.

People who are drunk at 2 p.m. on the interstate aren't social drinkers; they need help. They need to have their car keys and license taken away by someone more responsible and be handed a scholarship to Betty Ford or some other clinic to dry out, and then start working those 12 steps.

788 Draft Horses making a comeback

When my mother was a little girl, her family still kept a carriage horse in the barn that did useful tasks like pulling their cars out of the muddy lanes that approached their graceful farm home two miles from the main road near Franklin Grove, Illinois. I believe she told me the children never rode "Beauty" because she hadn't been broken to ride. Because I was madly in love with horses, I couldn't imagine having a horse that close and NOT riding it. My grandparents were "early adopters" and owned automobiles probably before 1910. Draft horses were still used in the fields because tractors weren't reliable enough, but I believe they were stabled at the tenant farm barn. My father's family in the next county, however, used draft horses regularly in farming. My father told me they sometimes rode one to church, the Pine Creek Church of the Brethren (now disbanded). Draft horses are so massive, so wide and so powerful, I have difficulty picturing this. My grandmother was blind and the four older children would have been quite small. But then, picturing her walking there with little ones doesn't read either.

Tomorrow and Friday the Eastern States Draft Horse Sales will be at the Ohio Expo Center. I'm ticking off the list of friends who remotely might be interested, and can't think of a one, so I may have to go alone. Maybe Bev. That woman will try anything once and turn it into an art project.

According to Draft Horse Journal:

"The Industrial Revolution proved to be responsible for both the rise and collapse of the heavy horse in America. Demand for draft animals was spurred on by the growing transportation, construction and agricultural needs of the nation. The last half of the 19th century made draft horse breeding both essential and profitable. Massive importations from Europe took place. The period also ushered in the development of the present day breeds of heavy horses. The number of horses and mules in The United States peaked in 1920, at about 26 million. The groundwork for today's agriculture had been laid.

The horse lost the battle of the streets to the automotive industry rather quickly. As for the battle of the agricultural fields, it fought very tenaciously, but eventually yielded in most cases to greatly improved tractor power. By 1950, it was indeed, on thin ice. "Get big or get out" was heard across the nation and many did just that. It appeared to many that the draft horse was destined for the museum, a relic of days gone by.

Since that time, the draft breeds have not only stabilized their numbers, but once more enjoy a thriving trade. The fact that the old order Amish decided in the '20s to reject tractor power in the fields was a considerable factor, as were the dedicated breeders that had produced these splendid breeds." Read more.

February must be a good time for draft horse sales, because I see that during this month there are two in Florida, one in Illinois, one in East Lansing, two in Missouri, one in Orange City, Iowa, and one in Winona, Minnesota. Probably can't get into the fields so why not go hang out at the barn with the guys. Many midwest Amish vacation in Florida.

Logo of the Draft Horse Journal
Cute bumper sticker and great photos here. North American Spotted Draft Horse Association