Well, folks, it’s Saturday, I’m kind of lazy, and I’ve heard a rumor that Jess is indulging her girly side, and has gone shopping. This is also the 1201st post on Nebraska Energy Observer. I have no idea if that’s any sort of a milestone or not but, that’s what the dashboard says. So there.
One thing that doing this blog has done for me is introduce me to a whole lot of fascinating people, and let me call reading and listening to them, research. Now that’s a winner! So I’m going to share one of my guilty pleasures with you. Ever seen one of Bill Whittle’s Stratosphere Lounge podcasts?
Well, here is one, so get a cup of coffee, find a comfortable chair and enjoy.
When I was a kid there was a comedy about the NYPD, and a couple of misfit officers who were never where they should have been. It seems strange now, a comedy about the police but it was reasonably amusing.
Simpler, better days, they were.
But I can also remember my folks telling my sisters to call when they got home. I thought it was silly, they’re grown-ups they’ll be fine, after all they always had been. Funny how this changes, isn’t it?
My partner is currently in the Philippines with his fiancée, if I haven’t mentioned it she’s pretty darned wonderful in my opinion, as well, apart from being an industrial engineer and a specialist in lean management.
Immigration has turned into a nightmare, apparently our State Department equates self-employment with being unemployed, in some cases I’m sure it’s true but their requirements for sponsoring her into the country are very burdensome, they start with $80,000 in liquid assets and go on from there, and then add the requirements of her government and you have just created a red tape mountain of Everestian proportions.
They completely failed once, and that is why or business is on hold, we decided if we were going to get this done, we would just have to close and let him take a job, we do enough side work to keep me going but that’s about it, for now. Honestly, he took a pretty good pay cut to do it as well.
And he’s like that too, he’s knows its going fine so why tell anybody so (full disclosure: so am I) but you know, it’s hard when your sitting here with several problems stewing and you don’t know for sure because you haven’t heard from him. It’s very likely that everything is fine and he’s having a wonderful time like those old postcards from Florida said. But I wish he’s say so.
Silly? Of course it is. But I’ll bet every one of you parents know exactly what I mean. After a while, the ‘what-if’s’ start piling in and pretty soon you’re living on coffee and antacids, and worrying more and more.
And if it happens that two people drop off the screen at the same time, it seems to about treble the worry. Rational? No, it’s not. But it is.
For some reason this morning a couplet from The Battle Hymn of the Republic‘s third verse, as slightly revised for the US military is rattling around the echoing space in my brain, so I thought I’d share it with you.
As He died to make men holy;
Let us live to make men free.
In other news: Jeff Carter over at Townhall has some wisdom from a farmer that will stand you in good stead.
“Your fences need to be horse-high, pig-tight and bull-strong.”
We do not really want a religion that is right where we are right. What we want is a religion that is right where we are wrong. In these current fashions it is not really a question of the religion allowing us liberty; but (at the best) of the liberty of allowing us a religion. These people merely take the modern mood, with much in it that is amiable and much that is anarchical and much that is merely dull and obvious, and then require any creed to be cut down to fit that mood. But the mood would exist even without the creed. They say they want a religion to be practical, when they would be practical without any religion. They say they want a religion acceptable to science, when they would accept the science even if they did not accept the religion. They say they want a religion like this because they are like this already. They say they want it, when they mean that they could do without it.”
—G.K. Chesterton via The Anchoress
You have a great love of history and liturgy. You’re attached to the traditions of the ancients, yet you recognize that the old world — great as it was — is passing away. You are loyal to the customs of your family, though you do not hesitate to call family members to account for their sins.
JessicaHof
NEO
