Thirteen Reasons I'm not stressed at Christmas

There seems to be a lot of stress in the air this time of year. Here's 13 reasons I'm not part of it.

1) I'm volunteering at the weekly (noon) Advent services at our church. This allows me a mid-week opportunity to reflect on what this season is about. If they were at night, I'd probably stay home.

2) Because of my career, I didn't do much of the hands-on work like serving lunch or helping in the kitchen. Although working in the kitchen is out of my comfort zone, it is a pleasure to mingle with the saints who can now take a bit of a rest. Wonderful music by our fabulous church organist, and great food and fellowship.

3) Then I slip on my robe and help with communion. Nothing says what it is all about like placing a piece of bread in the hand of a person who has struggled to come to the communion rail to be refreshed by the body and blood of our Lord.

4) My husband painted a watercolor of a wonderful scene with a man and child walking through the snow with a cut tree for our annual Christmas card. This relieves me of any pressure to go to a store or look through a catalog. He even sorts, stamps and puts the return address label on the envelop.

5) I write the letter that goes in the envelop with the card. This gives me an opportunity to sift through the year's events and decide what's worth keeping and what gets thrown out. I enjoy thinking about the family and many friends--some we haven't seen since the early 1960s, and this is the only time of year we're in touch. I keep a scrapbook of all the old photos and have been watching their children grow up, now their grandchildren.

6) Although I sighed when the computer crashed right as I was getting ready to run address labels, handwriting the envelopes wasn't that bad--did about 25-30 at a time and then would do something else.

7) In late November I decided to have a simple open house on the last Sunday afternoon in December. Close church friends, easy menu. Plenty of time to clean and prepare. Maybe the carpet will be cleaned in January, so I won't even look down at what gets tracked in (white carpet). If you keep the menu simple, you have more time to enjoy your guests.

8) I'm running recipes through my head and counting plates--decided not to use paper. Will polish the silver soon while listening to Christmas carols. While I do this I think about the joys of friendship and other Christmases, like when Daddy came home after the end of WWII (and Mom went all out and got us children a sled and a doll house, to be shared by four).

9) I spent a few minutes thinking about some awful Christmases, too--like 1963 and 1964 and 1986 and 1987. If you don't give the bad times their due, they might try to knock on the door and slip in to spoil the day. Now they've been examined and packed away.

10) We'll have the opportunity to spend the week-end before Christmas with my husband's family in Indianapolis. The calendar only cooperates on certain years, since they have this gathering the Saturday before Christmas. So unless Christmas is Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday, it usually interfers with our Columbus at-home activities. All we do in the way of preparation is buy and wrap 2 exchange gifts, bring a dish to pass and show up at a niece's home.

11) I bought a new Handel CD which I'm playing during the day, and I'm reading a new (to me) book by Elisabeth Elliot, "Keep a Quiet Heart," for morning devotions.

12) We've had just about the right number of invitations for the Christmas-New Year season. We had a dinner at friends' home 2 weeks ago, a few restaurant dates with other couples, followed by dessert at their homes, and an invite to a New Year's Eve gathering. Nothing frantic, but we don't feel left out, either.

13) We talked about a budget for Christmas in November and won't be hit with big bills in January. My husband's gift was ordered from a catalog and should be arriving any day. Of course, there's the new computer and tires for the van, but we can't call those Christmas related even if the bills show up in January.

So that's my stress-free Christmas. How's yours going?

Big thank you to Amanda for the pretty Christmas banner.

Shelby Steele on Barack Obama

Shelby Steele's new book, "A bound man; why we are excited about Obama and why he can't win," suggests that black voters may reject him, not whites. I think you might want to buy the book because like the "Dewey defeats Truman" headlines in 1948, Steele might be wrong.

". . . Today we blacks have two great masks that we wear for advantage in the American mainstream: bargaining and challenging.

Bargainers make a deal with white Americans that gives whites the benefit of the doubt: I will not rub America's history of racism in your face, if you will not hold my race against me. Especially in our era of political correctness, whites are inevitably grateful for this bargain that spares them the shame of America's racist past. They respond to bargainers with gratitude, warmth, and even affection. This "gratitude factor" can bring the black bargainer great popularity. Oprah Winfrey is the most visible bargainer in America today.

Challengers never give whites the benefit of the doubt. They assume whites are racist until they prove otherwise. And whites are never taken off the hook until they (institutions more than individuals) give some form of racial preference to the challenger. Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson are today's best known challengers. Of course, most blacks can and do go both ways, but generally we tend to lean one way or another.

Barack Obama is a plausible presidential candidate today because he is a natural born bargainer. Obama--like Oprah--is an opportunity for whites to think well of themselves, to give themselves one of the most self-flattering feelings a modern white can have: that they are not racist." Steele, The identity card

Review by Jason Riley here.

Christians who expect the government to do their job

Chuck Baldwin writes about Christians who want the government to do the heavy lifting.

The idea that James Madison and the other authors of the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights intended to prohibit children from praying in school, or state and local governments from posting the Ten Commandments and from erecting Nativity scenes is the invention of modern-age humanists, whose real goal is to eviscerate America's Christian heritage. Such reasoning is a complete inversion of the real meaning of the First Amendment. All the First Amendment was designed to do was recognize religious liberty, something Americans enjoyed until the infamous Supreme Court decisions in 1962 and '63.

That said, it is equally apparent that many Christians and ministers today have developed the attitude that somehow the federal government is supposed to enforce by law what only the Spirit of God can enforce through grace. Let's be plain: the federal government cannot do the church's job.

I suspect Baldwin is a libertarian by politics, because he states that although the government has the right to regulate pornography, prostitution and drugs, it shouldn't be in the business of legislating morality. I wouldn't go that far, because I see much of that as a mental pollution linked heavily to organized crime. But if he's talking about Christians who support it with crossed fingers hoping no one will find out, he's right. These businesses would probably collapse if all the Christians withdrew both their investments in these businesses and their patronage. Christianity Today a few years ago did a report on the millions of Christians addicted to pornography and gambling. Unbelievers like to think that Christians are smugly pointing fingers, but if they are, it isn't in my church, where in 30+ years I've never heard a sermon on any form of public or private morality.

Baldwin goes on to relate this to the upcoming election. And I do agree with him. You can't wedge a piece of dental floss between the theology of Al Gore, Bill Clinton and Mike Huckabee--they are all Baptists and believe that Jesus died on the cross for their sins. I don't doubt their faith for a minute. If I don't meet them in this life, I know I will in the next. How they will translate their personal and political beliefs into policy, however, is very different. Gore and Clinton technically aren't on the ballot, but Clinton's persona, fake and flip-flopping as it may be, is very much a part of the campaign; and Gore's wingnut beliefs are invading every follicle and hair of our lives. Don't let the MSM frighten you about Romney or Huckabee. Look at policy and issues:

Therefore, instead of looking to presidential candidates who will use the federal government to accomplish everything we want done (even the good things we want done), we should support only those candidates who recognize the proper role of the federal government as being limited and narrowly defined (by the Constitution). And then, it behooves us to look to ourselves to be the parents we should be to our own children at home, and to look for pastors and churches that are not trying to be popular, but that are courageous and faithful custodians of the truth.

Greenspan bursts some bubbles

Demand driven by expection I think is a fancy phrase for greed

"I do not doubt that a low U.S. federal-funds rate in response to the dot-com crash, and especially the 1% rate set in mid-2003 to counter potential deflation, lowered interest rates on adjustable-rate mortgages and may have contributed to the rise in U.S. home prices. In my judgment, however, the impact on demand for homes financed with ARMs was not major.

Demand in those days was driven by the expectation of rising prices--the dynamic that fuels most asset-price bubbles. If low adjustable-rate financing had not been available, most of the demand would have been financed with fixed rate, long-term mortgages. In fact, home prices continued to rise for two years subsequent to the peak of ARM originations (seasonally adjusted)." in Today's Wall Street Journal

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When is an increase a decline?

When journalists look at job figures and the economy. My friend A.Z. and I were reminiscing about housing prices this week. We're old. We don't remember the Great Depression, however, so we can't tell the stories our parents told us. But like our parents, we wish our children had some perspective. She remembered when they sold their home in south Arlington in 1980 the interest rates were 17%. I recalled paying 10% in 1988 when we bought our summer home in Lakeside, and we were happy to get it. Thirty years ago the unemployment rate was around 7.8%; today it is 4.7%. No matter. It is always gloom and doom when the media get ahold of the figures. Sort of makes me happy I didn't read the economic news in the 1970s.

Kelly Evans at the WSJ reported "little cheer" in the job report for November. Employment ROSE by 94,000 in November (it was 44,000 in September), and unemployment stayed at 4.7% for the 3rd consecurive month. And consumer expectations have "slipped" according to a Reuters/University of Michigan survey (can't imagine a worse state for economic news if that's where the survey was taken). Its index of current economic conditions rose in December to 92.1 from 91.5 in November, but consumers (who have to listen to a constant roar of negative news from the MSM) found higher gasoline prices and are not happy (let's reduce taxes on gasoline and make the consumer smile). Evans' article also mentioned low inflation, and the fact that the average hourly wage earnings jumped to $17.63, up JUST 3.8% from a year ago, and a resilient labor market. Oh woe is me. Can you stand the pain?

I don't know where

Florida Cracker finds her news stories, but she's always entertaining. (She's a librarian.) Women are apparently making some headway in areas formerly reserved for dirty old men.

Mike addresses the immigration problem

Sure, it would be nice if he'd jumped in earlier, but this is workable, certainly better than what we have now, which isn't even being enforced.

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CIA Freedom of Information web site

In 2000, before 9/11 and the current war, the CIA prepared a 15 year forecast. [These are scanned, not digitized, so not particularly easy to read.] It is really instructive to go back and see what career government intelligence employees were warning our elected leaders about. Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD)were probably the most consistent warning. Russia, China, North Korea, Iran and Iraq were said to have "the capability to strike the U.S. and the potential for unconventional delivery of WMD by both states and nonstate actors." I'm sure this is not the only document in there with this information, because we know a number of prominent Democrats like Kennedy, Edwards and Kerry were beating the WMD drum in the late 90s, but then backed off when a President not of their party took their warnings seriously.

There were erroneous predictions about the global economy, and we were in a down turn then and no one foresaw the incredible boom of the 21st century. Although reading between the lines, they were general enough to be true--such has Europe and Japan needed to manage their aging work force or there would be consequences (well, duh!). If the global energy supplies were disrupted, it could have a devastating affect on the whole world (take that you "it's all about oil" peaceniks!). Also, this interesting tidbit: "Recent estimates indicate 80% of the world's available oil still remains in the ground, as does 95% of the world's natural gas." p. 17

I'd say the report was spot on about information technology and biotechnology predictions, if anything, it is a bit sluggish as those fields blossom like mold in a damp basement. The report was pretty accurate here, too: "Most anti-U.S. terrorism will be based on perceived ethnic religious or cultural grievances." Now, I wonder who plays that up and then asks, "What can we do to regain our place in the world and get along?"

For a 51 page report, the amount devoted to global climate change/warming is extremely modest, or maybe it just seems that way given the constant coverage we have today. It did address the "environmental neglect" of the formerly Marxist countries as a problem, and predicted the failure of the Kyoto Protocol, not because of the danger of a Republican administration, but because of the growing economies of China and India.

But it was soooo on target with comments about religion, I almost couldn't believe it: "Activist components** of [Christians and Muslims] and other religious groupings will emerge to contest such issues as genetic manipulation, women's rights, and the income gap between rich and poor. A wider religious or spiritual movement also may emerge, possibly linked to environmental values." Someone in the CIA spotted the rise of pantheism as a world religion. Good job!

You can do a dual search: first search your topic (Iraq= >1000 documents) then limit by year (2007=26). The date will most likely refer to the year it was "released," so you can easily see what was being said or researched in the 90s and review how that works out today. Check out NIE 2002-16HC, "Iraq's continuing programs for WMD, October 2002" which makes a "key judgement" that Baghdad has chemical and biological weapons as well as missiles with ranges in excess of the UN restrictions. It estimated 100-500 metric tons of chemical warfare agents including mustard, sarin, GF and VX stockpiles.

**"Religious voices are part of a two-week-long United Nations conference on climate change being held in Bali. Delegations from the World Council of Churches, the Vatican, and many Catholic orders are among the participants. The conference plans to develop an international pact to battle global warming. Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams and other religious leaders urged the delegates to take aggressive action to protect the environment." Report from Bali

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When Blacks are sentenced

Michael Vick, a black football player, is to get 23 months for dog fighting. And he deserves every minute and I hope they get the rest of the ring because these fights don't happen with only one guy. However, I'm looking forward to the day when a big, burly NBA or NFL guy gets 23 months for beating up his wife or girlfriend. She usually ends up dropping the charges and he might get a reprimand and returns to the court or field to make millions for an industry that looks the other way. (And yes, I've heard of Mike Tyson, but that's a different "sport.") Oprah or another woman's show occasionally covers the topic, but the media doesn't give nearly the attention it gives the dogs. Or how about jailing the creeps who sing and dance about the bodies of females encouraging assaults with easily recognisable hate speech?

Then there's Conrad Black who's been sentenced to 6.5 years for cheating the shareholders of Hollinger International (now Sun-Times Media Group), mail fraud and obstruction of justice. He was caught on a security camera removing 13 boxes of documents from his office. Sandy Berger, Bill Clinton's national security adviser, was caught also--stole important documents about the Clinton administration response to terrorism from the National Archives, destroyed them, and then lied about it. He got no jail time. Didn't I see somewhere that he was working in Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign? He should be doing more time than either Vick or Black.

And if they are lazy?

"OSU Extension/University District, a member of the Franklin County Earned Income Tax Credit Coalition, is looking for volunteers to help hard working low- and moderate- income families prepare their taxes and receive refunds. Experience in preparing taxes is a plus, but training will be provided." Seen at OSUToday, Dec. 7, 2007.

I guess lazy but employed workers won't get any help with their taxes.

Should Al Gore be required lose weight?

Should environmentalists lead the way to reducing the impact of obesity on the environment? [Interesting perspective on Gore's career leading to the prize, here.] "The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has estimated, albeit roughly, “previously undocumented consequences” of the ongoing obesity epidemic in America. They report that, through the 1990s, the average weight of Americans increased by 10 pounds. This extra weight caused airlines to burn 350 million more gallons of fuel in the year 2000, with represent an expenditure of $275 millions and emissions of 3.8 million tons of carbon dioxide. In other words, obesity is causing increased fuel expenditures and emissions." from Sensors Watch This writer thinks cheap gasoline may actually lead to obesity since it encourages more driving.

Sheldon Jacobson, U. of I., has crunched the numbers (he looks a tad on the thin side) and figures "Americans are now pumping 938 million gallons of fuel more annually than they were in 1960 as a result of extra weight in vehicles. And when gas prices average $3 a gallon, the tab for overweight people in a vehicle amounts to $7.7 million a day, or $2.8 billion a year." (reported in Science Daily)

Forbes.com reports there are other social costs for obesity: "Obese people are less likely to be given jobs, they're waited on more slowly, they're less likely to be given apartments, they're less likely to be sent to college by their parents." Obese people miss more work, costing employers something on the order of $4 billion. Because people are fatter, airlines spend more on jet fuel, and the obese themselves spend more on gas. But these tend to be hidden from consumers themselves. Many researchers believe that it's actually cheaper, in our fast-food society, to eat a high-fat, high-calorie diet than it is to stay slim. Supersizing a meal at McDonald's, Burger King or Kentucky Fried Chicken costs a consumer only 67 cents out of pocket. But after health costs and the price of extra gasoline are factored in, for some people, the price of the meal may have been effectively doubled.

Over at Food System Factoids, the author reports "Food and drink cause 20 to 30% of the various environmental impacts of private consumption, and this increases to more than 50% for eutrophication. This includes the full food production and distribution chain ‘from farm to fork’."

Mike Huckabee, Republican candidate for President, lost 105 lbs. after being diagnosed with type 2 Diabetes. He says it was hard work.

Bride inherited bad genes

Dear Abby (Jeanne Phillips) had a letter from a distraught mother last week. She was giving her daughter a lavish wedding, paid for by her and the step-father. Dead-beat dad had done nothing for his kid--no child support, ran up bills using her name, etc.--over the years, but a week before the wedding the daughter decides she wants to include him.

Dear Abby replies to mom: She is her father's daughter. Your sacrifices have resulted in a selfish, self-centered, rude adult.

So did the daughter get both her mother's doormat genes and her father's selfish genes? Someone needs to warn the groom!

If the election were today

the lawyers representing both parties would be lining up to sue over the electronic voting, because they haven't fixed it yet. We need to go back to paper ballots. But

between Gore and Obama, I'd vote for Gore.

between Hillary and Obama, I'd vote for Obama

between Hillary and Edwards, I'd probably stay home.

Between Gore and Rudy, I'd vote for Gore

between Hillary and Rudy, I'd stay home.

Between Gore and Romney, I'd vote for Romney,

between Romney and Huckabee, I'd vote for Mike.

The Republicans have a much better field of candidates than do the Democrats.

Our no renters policy

Our condo association has an owner-occupied-only policy. Unfortunately, some owners who are quite wealthy, spend half the year in warmer climes. Then there was the career mom who travelled a lot and left her college age daughter in charge of the high school daughter. My oh my--the parties we were privy to.

So the condo is turned over to the "children" (adults behaving badly). Eight or ten cars (expensive) may be parked haphazardly on our narrow street on a week-end, the garage door left up, lights on all night, beer cans strewn around the lawn.

If they weren't low class they'd have no class at all.

The Bali Earthquake

After the ridiculous vision of 10,000 people flying to Bali to discuss global warming and stay in tents (imagine the "carbon footprint" and pollution), and then having an earthquake on Dec. 7 remind them all that they are in no way in charge of the planet earth, well, it was just too rich. Virtually every story is the same AP report, which down played it (called it a jolt), but over at Forbes.com I did find:

JAKARTA (Thomson Financial) - A 5.9-magnitude earthquake struck off Indonesia's Bali on Friday, officials said, and it was strongly felt at a UN climate conference in the resort island. The earthquake, which hit at 17:45 pm (1035 GMT), struck 261 kilometers southwest of the Bali resort of Nusa Dua, where delegates are meeting to craft a strategy to combat climate change, Indonesia's Meteorology and Geophysics Agency said in a statement. There was no threat of a tsunami, and the quake struck at a depth of 10 kilometres, the agency said.

If you don't care for the Genesis account of creation (who did it and why and how long it took) try the more poetic Job 38-41 where the Lord asks Job, "Where were you when I laid the earth's foundation? . . . Can you set up God's dominion over the earth?" And Job admits he spoke of things he didn't understand which were too wonderful for him to know. And he repented.

Gasoline conservation tips

Save on food prices. Put corn in cows, pigs and chickens, not cars. Gasoline prices in central Ohio range from about $2.80 to $3.20. Anything made with basic food stuffs is going up much faster than gasoline, according to yesterday's Columbus Dispatch.

From the Tok, Alaska Mukluk News--and this town really knows transportation (Thanks, Cuz):

1.) Fill up your car in the morning when the temperature is still cool. (The colder the ground, the denser the gasoline.)

2.) If a tanker is filling the station’s tank at the time you want to buy gas, do not fill up. (Dirt from the bottom of their tank might transfer into your car’s tank.)

3.) Fill up when your gas tank is half-empty. (The more gas you have in your tank the less air there is and gasoline evaporates rapidly, especially when it’s warm)

4.) When you’re filling up, squeeze the trigger at the SLOW setting. (Minimizes vapors created while you are pumping.)

Tok, Alaska, established in 1942 has about 1400 residents, 13 churches, a public library, an elementary school, a 4-year accredited high school and a University of Alaska extension program. Local clubs include the Lions, Disabled American Veterans, Veterans of Foreign Wars and Chamber of Commerce. According to its nice web site, Tok is not short for Tokyo Camp (as I was told years ago), but was named for a Husky puppy, Tok, which belonged to men of the 97th U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Photo source, Nicky

In Ohio if the election were tomorrow

Given the margin of error and the undecideds, Huckabee could beat Clinton in Cincinnati, Ohio, and does better than Rudy and Mitt. If it were Obama, he definitely would. However, in Cincinnati, McCain does the best against Clinton. This poll was taken in Cincinnati by SurveyUSA.

Remembering why I hate coupons

Generally, I refuse to play games with my food--coupons, sweepstakes, loyalty cards, filling out forms on the internet, etc. But this week we got a coupon for our favorite pizza place up the road. Well, it's not really our favorite--that one is in Grandview and since we moved in 2002, it takes too long to get there. But this one is pretty good. Anyway, there was a "$1.00 off any size" coupon. So even though we really didn't need a pizza tonight (we ate out last night), I called one in. The price had gone up about $3! That's the primary use of a coupon--to cover up a price increase. And I know that because I used to write and interview about these scams, but it still makes me mad. Based on other price increases, it shouldn't have gone up more than $.40. It's you global warminists doing this, you know--putting corn in our gas tanks instead of our cows.

It's not too late

to purchase American made gifts. Made in the USA has some lovely things--glass, pottery, toys, backpacks, etc. You can also support local Christmas bazaars and church sales. This tip came from Janeen's web site, a mommy with a lot of good information about allergies and yummy recipes.

Sweet potato muffin mix at Homestead Gristmill

Homestead also has a craft, workshop and learning site you'll have fun exploring.

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Usually this is called homophobia

observes James Taranto, on the "proof" provided by the Idaho Statesman on Larry Craig. I wonder what is the point? Can closet gays not be good Senators? I admit they probably don't make the best husbands, but that's between him and Mrs. Craig. To look at the roster the Democrats have put forward for president, a Senator's qualifications aren't all that important. They're deciding among the wife of a philanderer (he kept her busy trying to take over health care in the 90s), a lawyer with good hair who's made his fortune suing American businesses and now has a huge carbon footprint to show for it, and a guy who was writing essays about becoming the president while in kindergarten in Indonesia. Maybe it's time they took another look at Bill Richardson or Al Gore.

[Tom] Russell, 48, a Nampa native who lives in Utah, was among three men who contacted the Statesman about what they described as unusually attentive behavior on Craig's part. . . .

Russell worked as a food service manager at Bogus Basin ski resort and said his encounter probably occurred in the 1983-84 ski season, soon after Craig had married following the 1982 page scandal. Russell had taken a food class from Suzanne Craig [the senator's better half] and had heard the rumors that Craig was gay.

Russell, openly gay at the time, said he set out to engage Craig "and attempted to show a personal interest--not in a suggestive way--but a personal interest to see if he would respond."

"I recall that he was very delighted to talk to me--smiling, happy, very delighted--and that he had suggested that we could get together sometime," he said. "Why would he have a personal interest in meeting me elsewhere?"

Russell said he became convinced Craig was gay because he used subtle signals consistent with communication between gay men in public places.

"You've heard the term, 'gaydar'? OK, it's there. You know it. You know when somebody is raising an eyebrow at you because it's their gesture when they say 'hello' or when they are subtly trying to send you a message that they recognize you as being a gay person."

Nothing came of the meeting, Russell said. But he came forward now because he is offended by Craig's denials.

"I'm disgusted because it's hypocritical, and he's lying. He's lying through his teeth. Heterosexual men do not behave like that."