He's now at the top of the transplant list. . . .

How firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord,
Is laid for your faith in His excellent Word!
What more can He say than to you He hath said,
You, who unto Jesus for refuge have fled?

In every condition, in sickness, in health,
In poverty’s vale or abounding in wealth,
At home or abroad, on the land or the sea,
As thy days may demand, so thy succor shall be.

Thanks, jc!

"Sarah, if the American people had ever known the truth about what we Bushes have done to this nation, we would be chased down in the streets and lynched."
George Bush Senior speaking in an interview with
Sarah McClendon in December 1992

Cute wars

Since I'm being gone quite a bit now, and the cats have found new homes, the wood mouses have expanded their territory to include my house. Most disconcerting is finding seeds in my bed. I think next on their list is to turn my bed into a nest, hence the seeds at the ready, for the new babies.

Having been home for a week, the seeds are now all gone. But I have no doubt that when I return, they'll be back. I know. I need to get traps. But they're soooooooo *cute*!!

Summer Soup

4 cucumbers, peeled, seeded, diced, chilled
1 pound tiny shrimp, thawed, but chilled
1 or two cloves of garlic, minced fine
1 quart buttermilk
1 pint sour cream
salt, white pepper, and LOTS of dill

Combine, chill, serve

(And don't let anyone tell you that they won't like it because they hate buttermilk. . . . They will love it!)

This picture was posted today.

Lungs are clear. Still a little worried about the fungus which is keeping him off of the transplant list for the time being. Prayers, etc, please. . .

Another freak storm

The day I left my Mother's place forever, in August of 1999, a tornado hit Salt Lake City, blowing out, among other things the window in my brother's office in downtown Salt Lake City. This week, we've had three freak storms, just on this little branch of the Potomac. Just now, I'm waiting for another.

At what point do we stop calling them freaks, and just admit that this is the new reality?

Millions of butterflies killed by freak storm
By Ronald Buchanan in Mexico City
(Filed: 13/02/2002)

HUNDREDS of millions of monarch butterflies have died in a freak snowstorm in the Mexican mountains, where they spend each winter after a journey of up to 3,000 miles, scientists reported yesterday.


American and Mexican researchers estimated that as many as 270 million frozen butterfly bodies littered the ground after the storm last month in their pine forest havens west of Mexico City.

"I've never seen anything like it," said Dr Lincoln Brower, an American biologist who has followed the migration for 25 years.

The annual flight of the monarchs from as far north of Canada is regarded as one of the great migrations of the natural world.

They descend on the forests in great orange clouds each November.

Because their arrival coincides with Mexico's Day of the Dead celebrations, many villagers believe that the butterflies represent the spirit of their ancestors.

Morning Has Broken

Morning has broken, like the first morning
Blackbird has spoken, like the first bird
Praise for the singing, praise for the morning
Praise for the springing fresh from the world

Sweet the rain's new fall, sunlit from heaven
Like the first dewfall, on the first grass
Praise for the sweetness of the wet garden
Sprung in completeness where his feet pass

Mine is the sunlight, mine is the morning
Born of the one light, Eden saw play
Praise with elation, praise every morning
God's recreation of the new day

-- Eleanor Farjeon

The Big Here

1) Point north.
The right corner of my front window.

2) What time is sunset today?
Around 8:30 [Actual Time 8:37 PM EDT]

3) Trace the water you drink from rainfall to your tap.
No tap. Rain on ground, runs to river, I gather it in a bucket and bring it in to my water keeper under my sink. (River is also spring fed from its bottom.)

4) When you flush, where do the solids go? What happens to the waste water?
I don't flush. I have a composting toilet. The rest of my waste water, about a quart-to-gallon a day, runs onto the ground under my house.

5) How many feet above sea level are you?
1320

6) What spring wildflower is consistently among the first to bloom here?
Easily, Coltsfoot.


There are 25 more questions. Click title.

Hattip to Bird on the Moon (again!)

Dirge Without Music

I am not resigned to the shutting away of loving hearts in the hard ground.
So it is, and so it will be, for so it has been, time out of mind:
Into the darkness they go, the wise and the lovely. Crowned
With lilies and with laurel they go; but I am not resigned.
Lovers and thinkers, into the earth with you.
Be one with the dull, the indiscriminate dust.
A fragment of what you felt, of what you knew,
A formula, a phrase remains,--but the best is lost.
The answers quick and keen, the honest look, the laughter, the love, --
They are gone. They are gone to feed the roses. Elegant and curled
Is the blossom. Fragrant is the blossom. I know. But I do not approve.
More precious was the light in your eyes than all the roses in the world.
Down, down, down into the darkness of the grave,
Gently they go, the beautiful, the tender, the kind;
Quietly they go, the intelligent, the witty, the brave.
I know. But I do not approve. And I am not resigned.

-- Edna St. Vincent Millay

Original has live links, clicky

A complete list of things caused by global warming

Air pressure changes, allergies increase, Alps melting, anxiety, aggressive polar bears, algal blooms, Asthma, avalanches, billions of deaths, blackbirds stop singing, blizzards, blue mussels return, boredom, budget increases, building season extension, bushfires, business opportunities, business risks, butterflies move north, cannibalistic polar bears, cardiac arrest, Cholera, civil unrest, cloud increase, cloud stripping, methane emissions from plants, cold spells (Australia), computer models, conferences, coral bleaching, coral reefs grow, coral reefs shrink, cold spells, crumbling roads, buildings and sewage systems, damages equivalent to $200 billion, Dengue hemorrhagic fever, dermatitis, desert advance, desert life threatened, desert retreat, destruction of the environment, diarrhoea, disappearance of coastal cities, disaster for wine industry (US), Dolomites collapse, drought, drowning people, drowning polar bears, ducks and geese decline, dust bowl in the corn belt, early spring, earlier pollen season, earthquakes, Earth light dimming, Earth slowing down, Earth spinning out of control, Earth wobbling, El Niño intensification, erosion, emerging infections, encephalitis,, Everest shrinking, evolution accelerating, expansion of university climate groups, extinctions (ladybirds, pandas, pikas, polar bears, gorillas, whales, frogs, toads, turtles, orang-utan, elephants, tigers, plants, salmon, trout, wild flowers, woodlice, penguins, a million species, half of all animal and plant species), experts muzzled, extreme changes to California, famine, farmers go under, figurehead sacked, fish catches drop, fish catches rise, fish stocks decline, five million illnesses, floods, Florida economic decline, food poisoning, footpath erosion, forest decline, forest expansion, frosts, fungi invasion, Garden of Eden wilts, glacial retreat, glacial growth, global cooling, glowing clouds, Gore omnipresence, Great Lakes drop, greening of the North, Gulf Stream failure, Hantavirus pulmonary syndrome, harvest increase, harvest shrinkage, hay fever epidemic, heat waves, hibernation ends too soon, hibernation ends too late, human fertility reduced, human health improvement, hurricanes, hydropower problems, hyperthermia deaths, ice sheet growth, ice sheet shrinkage, inclement weather, Inuit displacement, insurance premium rises, invasion of midges, islands sinking, itchier poison ivy, jellyfish explosion, Kew Gardens taxed, krill decline, landslides, landslides of ice at 140 mph, lawsuits increase, lawyers' income increased (surprise surprise!), lightning related insurance claims, Lyme disease, Malaria, malnutrition, Maple syrup shortage, marine diseases, marine food chain decimated, Meaching (end of the world), megacryometeors, Melanoma, methane burps, melting permafrost, migration, microbes to decompose soil carbon more rapidly, more bad air days, more research needed, mountains break up, mudslides, next ice age, Nile delta damaged, no effect in India, nuclear plants bloom, ocean acidification, outdoor hockey threatened, oyster diseases, ozone loss, ozone repair slowed, ozone rise, pests increase, plankton blooms, plankton loss, plant viruses, polar tours scrapped, psychosocial disturbances, railroad tracks deformed, rainfall increase, rainfall reduction, refugees, release of ancient frozen viruses, resorts disappear, rift on Capitol Hill, rivers raised, rivers dry up, rockfalls, rocky peaks crack apart, Ross river disease, salinity reduction, Salmonella, sea level rise, sex change, ski resorts threatened, smog, snowfall increase, snowfall reduction, societal collapse, songbirds change eating habits, sour grapes, spiders invade Scotland, squid population explosion, spectacular orchids, tectonic plate movement, ticks move northward (Sweden), tides rise, tree beetle attacks, tree foliage increase (UK), tree growth slowed, trees could return to Antarctic, trees less colourful, trees more colourful, tropics expansion, tsunamis, Venice flooded, volcanic eruptions, walrus pups orphaned, wars over water, water bills double, water supply unreliability, water scarcity (20% of increase), weeds, Western aid cancelled out, West Nile fever, whales move north, wheat yields crushed in Australia, white Christmas dream ends, wildfires, wine - harm to Australian industry, wine industry damage (California), wine industry disaster (US), wine - more English, wine - no more French , wind shift, winters in Britain colder, wolves eat more moose, wolves eat less, workers laid off, World bankruptcy, World in crisis, Yellow fever.

and all on 0.006 deg C per year!

Hattip to birdonthemoon

An Angry God


Who Loosed My Dogs.
Who loosed my dogs that Never paid service to me.
Where are my boys.
Where have My Beautiful Boys gone
From me.
Where


Who loosed my warriors
My Champions
My Paladins for Peace most virtuous
Loved and beloved by all.
Who Loosed My Dogs. Who loosed my dogs that
Never paid service to me.


I curse the one, if I curse the one who stole them
All Heaven and Hell will destroy him,
His soul, his kin, and all his people for all the ages to come.
I'll squash him like a bug, roll him to a sticky ball of snot.
I'll bring the sky down upon him and Hell up to greet him.
Fire will sear his flesh and leave him writhing in the dirt
And when the swollen form is charred to ash
A poison lime will rain down and turn it to stone
Another reminder to those who think they can play
And not pay service to me.


Oh wait wait wait.
He has not the slightest clue
So let me first tear off his arm and show him what he has done.
Let him see the Dripping gore of it while he still lives.
Veins and muscle ripped and
Torn tendons and ligaments and
Bones all snapped, and bloody useless.
I'll make licentious parts of him to scatter in the road.


Oh where are my boys
Where have they gone from me.
My Crusaders for Christ, My Mujahadin for Allah
My Heroes for Saul and Greece.


Who loosed my dogs. Who is this one that never served.
He's never run with me.
He does not know my dogs and
They will turn on him and rape him as they please.
They are out of his hands. And the tortures,
Oh the Tortures my boys know.
Shock and Awe will be
Like spring flowers to him before my boys are done.


He can not hide
Or lie away from me. I will call to him
He'll hide he thinks in daylight
But at night is where I will find him.
Vexed with fear and pills His kin will be no solace
His wife not able
To mollify the lies.
They will all be strange to him
no comfort, no satisfaction found


Woe is he
Who took my dogs, left them caged in filth,
Bought them under with lies and bribes
And never paid service to me


Give me back my boys.
My beautiful young boys.
When they should be with me
Where winds blow free
Coats gleaming bright, Eyes clean and sharp,
On the hill pressed into the cool grass there
In the dappled shade of oaks.


by Frank DeVuono

pReznit Zombie strikes again...

Praise the Lord. The world is now safe from Quaker terrorists.

Years ago, when my former 70 year old sister-in-law was made to drop her pants in an airport in the name of passenger safety, I was fairly disgusted. Same for the mother who wasn't allowed to bring bottled breast milk on board. And now, we must all remove our shoes. Safe to say, none of this makes me feel any safer.

Yesterday, I was pulled from line, my purse dumped on a table, and two lighters and one pocket knife were removed. Mind you, these same items had made it through BWI the week before.

I haven't flown since 9-11; nowhere in the ticket buying, ticketing process, nor the airport was a list of prohibited items.

The knife was about an inch and a half long, leather covered, and said "Bermuda" on one side. It was a gift from a Bermudian friend. I've carried it for thirty years. It's cut hay bales and opened Motrin packets.

As I started to cry, I asked if it couldn't be mailed to my home. The answer: some airports do, we don't. And oh, I could check it in some luggage. Good plan: you don't go through security until AFTER you have checked your luggage. The line at the counter to check luggage is a half hour long. At this point, it is a half hour before the flight, and the gate is the furthest away.

Yesterday, an asshole at LAX took a little piece of my heart. I certainly hope this makes y'all feel safer. . . .

We are terrorists, all.

We stand with our backs straight when told to bow and we laugh when you'd rather us cry. We meet your glare unflinchingly.

We are terrorists, all.

We get the joke in ways that you could never understand. We see with absolute clarity that which you stumble over. We hear the sounds that fly past your deaf ears as unmistakably as we hear our own voices.

We are terrorists, all.

Shouldn't we just accept what you try to hand us? Shouldn't we stop being so stubborn, angry, difficult, abnormal, demanding, unpredictable, emotional and uncouth?

Hell, no. We are terrorists, after all.

We are driven by something you cannot measure, threaten or steal. We dance and weave as you grab at us, but we slip through your grasping fingers like smoke. We more elusive than a petal in a windstorm, and this makes you clench your jaw and your fists so tight you'd think they could just pop.

We are terrorists, all.

We move to a gravitational pull that is all our own. We are mocked, deceived, slandered, jailed, beaten and killed, but despite your best efforts, we grow in strength. We can be heard where children gather, in boardrooms behind hastily closed doors, and in the highest office of the land.

We are terrorists, all.

Couldn't we just shut up and close our eyes? Couldn't we be more compliant, reasonable, passive, orderly, tractable, easygoing, detached and polite?

Hell, no. We are terrorists, after all.

February 1, 1960:
After passing by Ralph Johns' store on Market Street, Ezell Blair Jr. (Jibreel Khazan), David Richmond, Joseph McNeil, and Franklin McCain enter the Elm Street Woolworth's at 4 p.m., purchase school supplies and "sundry" items. They then approach the lunch counter and order coffee at 4:30 p.m. They are refused service. The four remain in their seats until closing at 5 p.m.


When it happened, I wished I could have been there. Still do. If I'd ever put together a personal pilgrimage, this Woolworth's would be on it. Now I have seen it: it's a block down from the theatre. It will someday be a museum.

Bless them, and all who act for the good of us all with their hearts, putting their bodies where it matters, and taking the consequences. . . .

Traveling mercies

Reuters


Patriotism and the Fourth of July By Howard Zinn, AlterNet. Posted July 4, 2006.

The Declaration of Independence gives us the true meaning of a patriot, someone who supports a country's ideals, not necessarily its government.

In celebration of the Fourth of July there will be many speeches about the young people who "died for their country." But those who gave their lives did not, as they were led to believe, die for their country; they died for their government. The distinction between country and government is at the heart of the Declaration of Independence, which will be referred to again and again on July 4, but without attention to its meaning.

The Declaration of Independence is the fundamental document of democracy. It says governments are artificial creations, established by the people, "deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed," and charged by the people to ensure the equal right of all to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." Furthermore, as the Declaration says, "whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it." It is the country that is primary--the people, the ideals of the sanctity of human life and the promotion of liberty.

When a government recklessly expends the lives of its young for crass motives of profit and power, while claiming that its motives are pure and moral, ("Operation Just Cause" was the invasion of Panama and "Operation Iraqi Freedom" in the present instance), it is violating its promise to the country. War is almost always a breaking of that promise. It does not enable the pursuit of happiness but brings despair and grief.

Mark Twain, having been called a "traitor" for criticizing the U.S. invasion of the Philippines, derided what he called "monarchical patriotism." He said: "The gospel of the monarchical patriotism is: 'The King can do no wrong.' We have adopted it with all its servility, with an unimportant change in the wording: 'Our country, right or wrong!' We have thrown away the most valuable asset we had -- the individual's right to oppose both flag and country when he believed them to be in the wrong. We have thrown it away; and with it, all that was really respectable about that grotesque and laughable word, Patriotism.

" If patriotism in the best sense (not in the monarchical sense) is loyalty to the principles of democracy, then who was the true patriot? Theodore Roosevelt, who applauded a massacre by American soldiers of 600 Filipino men, women and children on a remote Philippine island, or Mark Twain, who denounced it? Today, U.S. soldiers who are dying in Iraq and Afghanistan are not dying for their country; they are dying for Bush and Cheney and Rumsfeld. They are dying for the greed of the oil cartels, for the expansion of the American empire, for the political ambitions of the president. They are dying to cover up the theft of the nation's wealth to pay for the machines of death. As of July 4, 2006, more than 2,500 U.S. soldiers have been killed in Iraq, more than 8,500 maimed or injured. With the war in Iraq long declared a "Mission Accomplished," shall we revel in American military power and insist that the American empire will be beneficent?

Our own history is enough to make one wary. Empire begins with what was called, in our high school history classes, "westward expansion,"a euphemism for the annihilation or expulsion of the Indian tribes inhabiting the continent, in the name of "progress" and "civilization." It continues with the expansion of American power into the Caribbean at the turn of the 20th century, then into the Philippines, and then repeated Marine invasions of Central America and long military occupations of Haiti and the Dominican Republic. After World War II, Henry Luce, owner of Time, LIFE, and Fortune, spoke of "the American Century," in which this country would organize the world "as we see fit." Indeed, the expansion of American power continued, too often supporting military dictatorships in Asia, Africa, Latin America, the Middle East, because they were friendly to American corporations and the American government. The record does not justify confidence in Bush's boast that the United States will bring democracy to Iraq.

More, clicky.

Hattip to Mainefem. Thanks, jc!

Dear America

Ah! It's my Man!!

VAL CAÑEZ/Tucson Citizen

Dems' Dean says Arizona will turn blue

500 here hear him say Kyl, Hayworth doomed to defeat
BLAKE MORLOCK
Tucson Citizen


The head of the national Democratic Party called his troops in Arizona to unified action last night, but in the crowd - and working the crowd - candidates in a heated congressional primary jockeyed to stand out from the field.
Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, the Democratic Party's chairman, promised that "Arizona will be a blue state after this next election."
He spoke to about 500 people downtown at the Temple of Music and Art.
Democrats stand a solid chance to knock off Republican Sen. Jon Kyl and GOP firebrand congressman J.D. Hayworth and pick up the seat vacated by Republican congressman Jim Kolbe's retirement, Dean said. That would give Arizona Democrats as many congressmen and senators as Republicans.

http://www.cagle.com/working/060630/britt.gif