Against the Wind

Some days are just blessings. This was one of them. Some of the highlights? I spoke to Linda, my high school buddy at length. Thoroughly enjoyed our visit. C– my walking and bridge buddy got some very good news on lab results from her husband’s x-rays. They’d been told there was a mass on his kidneys, and now the Dr. says he sees no such thing. Cameron started school, got off the bus, and was so pleased with himself for being such a big guy, he could hardly stand all that pride. Went to stitch at the library bee, and almost was applauded there. It was so good to be back to the library bee. And that was just the beginning. It was a very good day!

Tomorrow includes some dentistry, and may not be so much fun.

So, back to photos and time on a tour on a cruise line.
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The next few days will be photos from the Alcazar in Seville. I’ve posted a few of the photos from there, but never got to pick out my favorites, so this time through maybe I’ll get that task under control.

An alcázar is a type of Spanish castle, from the Arabic word ????? al qasr meaning palace or fortress.

Wikipedia

The Alcazar need not mean the Alcazar in Seville, which is such a lovely spot it is still the residence of the royals when they are in Seville. It was built in 900 something by the head of one of the Moslem dynasties that ruled Spain.

The architectural detail is overpowering. This photo is just a detail from the one above, but shows the ornateness on top more ornate that is characteristic of the place. The other characteristic would be the lovely gardens.

A detail that intrigued me was the bit on the left hand side of the main doorway area.  The whole building is draped with a canvas while the building undergoes renovation and reconstruction.  That would be a continual process, but I thought it was very neat that the canvas was covered with an image of what the building behind it should look like, so it’s not so jarring.  They used the same thing in Venice on St. Mark’s square.

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And it’s been a while, and I’ve not talked politics. But Obama’s approval ratings are right there along with what Bush’s were, and this with a very friendly press corps. So I’ll take a shot too, though I hope to keep it rare. I continue to pray that he will find footing and lead for the next couple of years. Just not well enough to be reelected!

So I found it nearly humorous to run into this plea by a partisan. Mark Halperin,

in his piece “Obama’s Islamic-Center Stance: Why the GOP Shouldn’t Run Against It,” Halperin–seemingly on bended knee–writes to the GOP:

If you go full force on the offensive, every Democratic candidate in every competitive race in the country will have three choices, none of them good, when asked about the Islamic center: side with Obama and against public opinion; oppose Obama and deal with the consequences of intraparty disunity; or refuse to take a position, waffling impotently and unattractively at a crucial time.

This by way of Big Peace. My goodness if a Republican president is making an ass of himself, do you suppose for a minute the hounds with typewriters would let him go unchallenged? Obama opened the door full wide for the attacks, and deserves to be attacked. Shame on the GOP if they don’t make political hay out of Barak’s support of the building of a mosque near the site of the twin towers.

I’m libertarian enough to say, yeah, they have every right to build there. But it’s a crude triumphalist gesture, and we’re more the fools if we allow that. And BHO is the biggest fool for thinking he can support it one day and weasel out the next. What an ass of a man. And what fools we the American people for electing him.

One of the Southern expressions I ran into and loved today was, “I must have brushed my teeth with gunpowder this morning.” This from Jane of the quilt guild! She was shooting off her mouth a bit, and she’s normally very reserved and proper. I too must have used the wrong tooth powder.

Another follow on. Megan at the Atlantic seemed willing to defend the finance writer/unrepentant overspender.

At the end of his book’s harrowing account of mortgage mistakes and credit card crises, Edmund Andrews writes: “While our misadventure had certainly been more extreme than those of many other Americans, our situation was not all that unusual.”

She goes on to show how his wife has a history of serial bankruptcies, on salaries of $100K. It looks a lot like he married a spendthrift, and decided to blame the lenders. Still I say, “man up.” Why don’t we demand responsibility from people instead of the constant whining?

Another story Megan has written about a good bit is the federal heavy hand in the Chrysler bankruptcy. Many fund holders having funds in Chrysler were bent with some heavy handed threats to unleash the dogs of the subservient press corps on the bankers again. The few who made fighting noises subsided. But now the teachers retirement funds in Indiana are standing up and saying, “No, we cannot accept.” I hope the bankruptcy goes to court and the secured creditors are honored. Megan has explained well why they should be. Has a gread deal to do with honoring contracts and rule of law and such. Team O seems to feel there’s no problem running roughshod over legal niceties and getting a big chunk of the reorganized Chrysler in the hands of the union bosses. The Financial Times outlines the story.

And last, before bed, a grandma photo. It’s hard to get pictures of the boys that aren’t mugged, but I keep trying.

Ahh, the life of a social butterfly. I opted out long ago of the invitation to go to Metairie to a hang at the party of a friend from my Writer’s group. So yesterday J– called and needed a fill in because J— was too ill to come play bridge at their end of year bash. So I got called in as a last minute substitute. I’ll play with B—-, whom I’ve not played for years and years. She’s a good solid player, though she worries as much as I used to. I’ve finally learned to play the game and not get much bent one way or the other over the outcome. I just try to do my best and help partner do the same. Fun filled evening at the bridge table. The brownies are cooked and ready for finger food offering.

Today’s project was to find and embed a slide show viewer for the photos of Gail’s quilt top. This one is adequate in most respects but I never did see how I could drag and drop to reorder the photos to my wishes. I started with a cropped photo of the center, and since photo shop allows you to color match, I matched the colors of the remaining photos of the progression. Unfortunately when it came to the light yellow big border I added, the color settings are too far to blue, and the yellow is pretty muddy. The acutal fabric is not that color. So I included a couple photos that have been in the blog before, uncolor matched.

Tell me what you think of the viewer and the slide show. Two more quilts to give this treatment to, and I know I’ll shop for a different viewer for the next one.

The only link is to a blog post of editorial cartoons on the fun in Gaza. From a blog of photos that aren’t mostly to my taste, but decent photography nonetheless.

Marianne just got home from Trinidad, and she says they celebrate “old year’s night” instead of New Year’s Eve. So in the retrospective sort of mood that Old Year’s Night should bring, I was trying to decide if there was anyone/anything particularly admirable or notable in the old year. Resolutions are soooo tomorrow.

As far as events, the big family event was the wedding, as most of you know. On a personal level, in preparation for the wedding I began fretting a bit about needing a cash transfusion. I really decided that what I wanted was to teach in a gifted high school sort of setting.

I could go find the place that I journaled about wanting exactly that. And amazingly, a prayer was answered. That may not be the way most would like to describe it. We’re so hung up on not being ‘religious’ that it’s fearsome to say that a prayer was answered. Makes one tend to be labeled some sort of kook. I gotten a chance to earn some income teaching in a high school setting with some very talented young people. I will continue with the gig in the spring.

It’s rather unsettling having a prayer answered. A very specific prayer answered in a very specific opportunity. I certainly don’t think of God as some sort of Santa for adults, but I believe there is some mysterious force that we can work to align ourselves with. Some call it sychronicity, others call it God, to paraphrase a poem.

It all started with the writing, and trying to write in a journal as a form of prayer. From there I’ve allowed it to take its own path through my life, and something has been growing in response to a budding prayer life.

Less impressive was the interest in joining WW but I rather resisted. But with a wedding coming up, my two younger daughters expressed an interest and I jumped at it. I’m down 20 some lbs and still at it. That’s the big stuff in my old year. NYT has been asking people

What professional project do you plan to complete in 2009? What personal resolution do you finally hope to keep next year? And what problem should your industry or professional community tackle more effectively?

So that’s a reasonable jumping off place for thinking about 2009. But maybe not what professional project, but what personal project? How are you going to go about being as close as you can be to the person ‘God intended you to be?’ What problem or project should your church, your family or your quilt guild tackle more effectively? How can you be a catalyst for that?

I’ve a collection of links, but I think I’ll leave it down to one. I can’t embed this one, so you have to click through, but it’s Monty Python, six minutes, and should leave you smiling. Pete sent this recommendation.

Pete also finds the most appalling videos of Islamic justice and horrors. The one I saw a bit of today has no link anyway, but perfectly dreadful. He has some driving need to expose the horrendous applications of sharia law. I can’t imagine filming tongue cuttings, hand choppings and the like, and cannot seem to watch the horrendous footage. But it’s available to be seen. He’s like a Jeremiah wanting to let people know… says it’s closer to us than we know.

Ok, a bit of Wisdom to lighten up…

Proverbs 8:10 - 11 (Wisdom still calling)

Receive my instruction, and not silver,
And knowledge rather than choice gold;
For wisdom is better than rubies,
And all the things one may desire cannot be compared with her.

This always reminds me of my students in Uganda saying, they wanted an education, as no one could take that from them. Seek wisdom. Not affected by market crashes.

And a couple of photos…. shifting gears. The wedding photos are now finished. I was busy being m- o- b, not photographer for the event itself.

The day after we went to the Frenchman and delivered some shoes to Tania. Here’s Carlo on the stoop of the Frenchman.

And then shifting completely away from wedding stuff, a picture of Sisters of the Cloth, on the way out to dinner.

In the time after the gifts get opened and life moves on to it’s next little phase, let me recommend one of the gifts that moved into that particular moment for me. Tara bought me a book of essays by Lisa Boyer. Who says quilting can’t be just laugh out loud funny! I think I have a new favorite author.

The tree is up, it’s got lights on it, and I’ve made four of the “block of the month” blocks from the shop hop. I’ll shortly have two more quilt projects started. The round robin will fly soon, and then there’s a class in January here.

Proverbs 8:1 - 2

Does not wisdom cry out, and understanding lift up her voice?
She takes her stand on the top of the high hill, beside the way, where the paths meet.

Proverbs 8 is subtitled “Excellence of Wisdom” in the New King James translation online. The way it reads with Wisdom personified as a woman, the contrast to the harlot of earlier chapters, particularly Proverbs 7 renews my conviction that the “harlot” is not just the whoring woman, but the personification of allowing yourself to be enchanted by any corrupt influence that leads you from seeking wisdom and justice.

Further the picture of wisdom standing atop the hill, at the fork in the road is oddly reminiscent of the Phantastes: A Faerie Romance for Men and Women of George Macdonald. Before Rev. Marlsbury left I had to return his books of Macdonald, but I surely enjoyed reading the parts that I did. His work was inspirational to such authors as Tolkien and C. S. Lewis and the less well known Chesterton. It’s a lifetime commitment, seeking wisdom.

Daily photo

A photograph from the muggy misty evening before the wedding… I hurried to the rooftop to find there was no one up there yet. Then this amazing looking young woman shows up, the very sort that intimidate the bejus out of me. She speaks to me by name, “Miss D….” Whoa, I know that voice, it’s NO! Can it be the tiny little sprite of a girl that was Tania’s great friend from Kindergarten through… TINA! Tania had asked her to do some setting up of the bar and hors douvers. Wow what a surprise. I knew she was coming, but I didn’t even recognize her.

And last a bit of humor. Yes it’s political, and conservative. Iowa Hawk has linked some of his more popular pieces. This one dated 2000 called, “Why I am a Democrat.” I thought it a hoot.

I am a Democrat because I believe in helping those in need. All of us, you and I, have an obligation to those less fortunate. You go first, okay? I’m a little short this week.

About the time I started the blog on this site, we had a marvelous birthday celebration for my #2 daughter. Tania, the #1 daughter was in town figuring out how to get stuff together for the wedding now galloping toward us. All my daughters are born in May (you figure that one out) so there’s sort of a celebration season then every year. Tania did a lot of Business on Saturday, all the time keeping her lie ready in case she ran into her sister. The party was a surprise held at the apartment Marianne had just moved out of. This is the apartment she vacated during the federal flood. Tara and Tania, her sisters, and Kate the ex roommate really knocked themselves out for this affair, and it came off very nicely.

So in an unusual move, today it’s five photos. Small ones so they don’t take forever loading.

Kate and Bartley were busy building a pinata. The kids have enjoyed pinatas since they were young, as it’s a Honduran thing. This pinata was a “dying uterus.” Turning thirty can be painful!

The back yard of the apartment is really an asset. Marianne enjoyed an herbal garden back there, and the boccie ball court was fun. For the party, they girls set up a couple shade canopies and as many chairs for hanging out as the kids could find. The view into the yard is from her kitchen.

Kate is getting ready here to hang the pinata under the carriage way. Since the house is built over the carriage way it was not extensively damaged in the flooding. We just cleaned up broken glass and got the fridge down those stairs.

Marianne saw her friend Katie’s car and thought it was to be another boring birthday with Kate and Katie. Here the surprise of seeing Tania is hitting her. She’s about to burst into tears, though I’ll do her the favor of not posting that photo on the net.

While all the other preparations were underway, Darryl was boiling the first batch of crawfish. (Spell checker doesn’t like that spelling. hmmmm..) The table was neat.. a board with two square holes, covered in red plastic, mounted on big trash cans. As you eat you shovel the remains into the holes which have the mess already bagged and ready to carry out. Katey was grilling in another corner of the yard. Folks came and ate and drank and hung out in the truly New Orleans style.

And when this was current, I didn’t even mention it on my blog. The day was coolish… at least not unbearable. We had a lovely spring this year. Long and not horribly humid. Summer is surely here.

I’ve found a bunch of Independence day stuff to post, but let me defer to even older wisdom than T. Jefferson and the Declaration of Independence.

Proverbs 3:19-20

The LORD by wisdom hath founded the earth; by understanding hath he established the heavens.
By his knowledge the depths are broken up, and the clouds drop down the dew.

As I wandered through my blog reading circuit, there were several approaches to independence day. Unalloyed pride in America, some questioning of America and her values, some historical references, and more than a few blogging as if it were any other day.

Michael Totten said he read the Declaration of Independence for the first time since it was required reading, and recommended it. So I did. I too recommend it. I was intrigued by the long list of grievances against King George at the end of it.

Powerline blog has two posts on the eternal meaning of Independence Day. One features a photo of Lincoln, the other is on Calvin Coolidge’s address on the 150th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.

I know little enough about Coolidge that the bit they wrote sent me back to find out a bit about him. My only memory was the quip that as the most terse, taciturn president, an able socialite tried the coversational gambit with him,

Dorothy Parker, seated next to him at a dinner, said to him, “Mr. Coolidge, I’ve made a bet against a fellow who said it was impossible to get more than two words out of you.” His famous reply: “You lose.”

Another story in Wikipedia, is that when he was newly married, he brought his new wife a bag of 52 pairs of socks needing mending. She asked, “Is that what you married me for? To darn your socks.”

Without cracking a smile and with his usual seriousness, Calvin answered, “No, but I find it mighty handy.”

He became president when Harding died on a speaking tour in California, and was elected to his own term afterwards. He presided over the era known as the roaring 20’s. He was succeeded by Herbert Hoover. His comment about Hoover, his secretary of commerce, was,

“for six years that man has given me unsolicited advice—all of it bad.”

The speech he gave on the 150th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence is not terse, and is readable. The link is provided if you care to read it. I’ve clipped extensively.

We meet to celebrate the birthday of America. The coming of a new life always excites our interest. Although we know in the case of the individual that it has been an infinite repetition reaching back beyond our vision, that only makes it the more wonderful. But how our interest and wonder increase when we behold the miracle of the birth of a new nation. It is to pay our tribute of reverence and respect to those who participated in such a mighty event that we annually observe the fourth day of July. Whatever may have been the impression created by the news which went out from this city on that summer day in 1776…

He continues to provide a thorough retelling of the drive of the colonies and colonial people to independence from England. As a side note, he says,

the preponderance of all those who occupied a position which took on the aspect of aristocracy did not approve of the Revolution and held toward it an attitude either of neutrality or open hostility.

That caught my interest, because my mother’s family is descended in a direct line from the Mayflower, but someone told me long ago, not to get any high falutin’ ideas about becoming a member of the DAR (Daughters of the American Revolution) because our people were mostly on the other side. I’ve had no interest in joining the Daughters, and have never checked out that report. Just an oddity of history.

Here however is the money quote. For all the folks rending their clothing about how unworthy a nation we are, there is this.

There is something beyond the establishment of a new nation, great as that event would be, in the Declaration of Independence which has ever since caused it to be regarded as one of the great charters that not only was to liberate America but was everywhere to ennoble humanity.

It was not because it was proposed to establish a new nation, but because it was proposed to establish a nation on new principles, that July 4, 1776, has come to be regarded as one of the greatest days in history.

Then he goes through a history of the thought, religious and philosophical to locate the historical antecedents of the Declaration. He wraps it up… a very long speech indeed, reading more like a college lecture than a picnic speech, with this.

No one can examine this record and escape the conclusion that in the great outline of its principles the Declaration was the result of the religious teachings of the preceding period. The profound philosophy which Jonathan Edwards applied to theology, the popular preaching of George Whitefield, had aroused the thought and stirred the people of the Colonies in preparation for this great event. No doubt the speculations which had been going on in England, and especially on the Continent, lent their influence to the general sentiment of the times.

And as to the meaning of the Declaration of Independence as a pinnacle of enlightenment thought on the relationship of government to the governed.

About the Declaration there is a finality that is exceedingly restful. It is often asserted that the world has made a great deal of progress since 1776, that we have had new thoughts and new experiences which have given us a great advance over the people of that day, and that we may therefore very well discard their conclusions for something more modern. But that reasoning can not be applied to this great charter. If all men are created equal, that is final. If they are endowed with inalienable rights, that is final. If governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, that is final. No advance, no progress can be made beyond these propositions. If anyone wishes to deny their truth or their soundness, the only direction in which he can proceed historically is not forward, but backward toward the time when there was no equality, no rights of the individual, no rule of the people. Those who wish to proceed in that direction can not lay claim to progress. They are reactionary. Their ideas are not more modern, but more ancient, than those of the Revolutionary fathers.

Quite a speech from Silent Cal.

Daily stuff

They’re here! The sparrows have found the bird seed. I noticed this morning that the sunflower seeds were gone. Now I’m seeing sparrows on my window sill every time I go in the kitchen. The photos are not yet good, but I’ll be working on that.

Now into April (still three months behind) here’s the end of the pansy season. They got going pretty good in the spring just before it got too hot for them