About Last Night

I remember one time when I was about five or six years old, my mother was putting me to bed.  I asked her, "How do you go to sleep?"

"You just lay down and close your eyes, and go to sleep,"  my mother replied. 

"But how?"  I asked.  "How do you go to sleep?"

I never did figure that out.  Even as a child, I'd lay in bed for hours with my eyes closed and not go to sleep.  I still do it.  

I was doing it last night at 2:00 AM ish, and that memory immediately sprang to mind.   Lots of other things sprang to mind, as well, but I really felt like I needed to re-run this for those folks up in New York City.  All of the photos in this post were taken my yours truly in the local Walmart back during COVID.  

This will be NYC soon.  And no, you better not move down here.  You voted for this mess.  You stay there and live in it. 

 The Gods Of The Copybook Headings

As I pass through my incarnations in every age and race

I Make my proper prostrations to the Gods of the Market-Place

Peering through reverent fingers I watch them flourish and fall,

And the Gods of the Copybook Headings, I notice, outlast them all.

We were living in trees when they met us. They showed us each in turn

That Water would certainly wet us, as Fire would certainly burn:

But we found them lacking in Uplift, Vision and Breadth of Mind,

So we left them to teach the Gorillas while we followed the March of Mankind

We moved as the Spirit listed. They never altered their pace,

Being neither cloud nor wind-borne like the Gods of the Market-Place.

But they always caught up with our progress, and presently word would come

That a tribe had been wiped off its icefield, or the lights had gone out in Rome.

With the Hopes that our World is build on they were utterly out of touch

They denied that the Moon was Stilton; they denied she was even Dutch

They denied that Wishes were Horses; they denied that a Pig had Wings.

So we worshipped the Gods of the Market Who promised these beautiful things.

When the Cambrian measures were forming, They promised perpetual peace.

They swore, if we gave them our weapons, that the wars of the tribes would cease.

But when we disarmed They sold us and delivered us bound to our foe,

And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said:  "Stick to the Devil you know." 

On the first Feminian Sandstones we were promised the Fuller Life

(Which started by loving our neighbor and ended by loving his wife)

Till our women had no more children and the men lost reason and faith,

And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "The Wages of Sin is Death." 

In the Carboniferous Epoch we were promised abundance for all,

By robbing selected Peter to pay for collective Paul;

But though we had plenty of money, there was nothing our money could buy,

And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "If you don't work, you die."

Then the Gods of the Market tumbled, and their smoothed-tongued wizards withdrew,

And the hearts of the meanest were humbled and began to believe it was true

That All is not Gold that Glitters, and Two and Two make Four--

And the Gods of the Copybook Headings limped up to explain it once more. 

As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of Man--

There are only four things certain since Social Progress began--

That the Dog returns to his Vomit and the Sow returns to her Mire,

And the burnt Fool's bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire--

And that after this is accomplished, and the brave new world begins

When all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins

As surely as Water will wet us, as surely as Fire will burn

The Gods of the Copybook Headings, with terror and slaughter return!

Rudyard Kipling

 *Note:  all photos taken at the local Walmart within the last two weeks. 

            

So Nice

Here it is, finally finished-- the hat so nice, I knit it twice.  

That makes three charity hats for the year, which means I need to get busy.  Eh, I'll cast on another one tomorrow.  I've still got all of my sock yarn hats I need to be knitting, plus baby stuff if my sister ever tells me if the baby is going to be a boy or a girl.  

In other news, it would appear our brief stretch of nice weather is about to come to an end.  I was going to put my chair back outside and sit in it for a while, but given that we are expecting more storms tomorrow, I changed my mind.  

Instead, I got my shovel out and dug up a few more day lilies from this spot.  

This is where I need a landscaper to help me, because it's going to take me forever to do it by myself.  I want to make this corner my garden spot, but it needs a lot of work done to it first.  I need all those plants dug up, but the day lilies and the spider lilies, plus what's left of that rose, then I need dirt brought in to build it up a bit.  And I need to finally get that fence painted.  

Once all of that is done, I want to put raised beds all around the edge, plus a couple in the middle.  I want a whole bed of lemon balm, a whole bed of sweet basil, rosemary, and peppermint, plus I want to put tomatoes and sweet banana peppers in the middle beds, and I may grow some chili peppers and cayenne peppers to hang and dry for Cody and Brennan. 

I guess I need to find out what he's going to grow first, so I can choose something else, huh?  I'm still waiting to see which of my plants from last year are going to come back.  So far, it's just the lemon balm, peppermint, Greek oregano, rosemary, sage, and French tarragon.  None of the peppers are showing any signs of life.  

Ok, Ok, I'll stop boring you with my garden talk, and bore you with weather talk.  I spoke to Supervisor Green Jeans today and said we got lucky that it didn't frost.  I told him I was thinking about his corn the whole time!  Oh, wait, that's garden talk, too, isn't it?  

Moving right along...this made me laugh way more than it should have:  

Shoutout to all of the meteorologists and storm chasers.  This last week has been very taxing for them.  

 With that in mind, I think it might be time for a re-run of my Weatherman song which I wrote sitting in the tornado shelter at work back in 2022, sung to the tune of The Wellerman.  

The Weatherman

There once was a man who watched the skies

He studied it with knowing eyes

The satellites, the radar scans

He is The Weatherman

(Chorus)Hear what The Weatherman says

We gotta go get the milk and bread

When he says a storm will come

To Walmart we'll all go

The radar turned all shades of red

The forecast filled our hearts with dread

The lightning flashed, the thunder crashed

Oh blow my stormy winds blow!

(Chorus)

There in the sky!  A funnel cloud!

The siren wailing long and loud

"Oh do not fear, for I am here,"

So says the weatherman!

When all around him fled in fear

"Not me!" he said,  "I'm staying here!

I must ensure the people know

To shelter I'll not go."

(Chorus)

For forty days or even more

The sky turned dark, then light once more

But through it all one man stood tall

He is The Weatherman

(Chorus Twice)

I'll see myself out. 

Hadn’t Planned

I hadn't planned on going into town today, but when Group Leader Shark came around and said, "Y'all wear something Christmassy tomorrow!"  I kinda didn't have a choice.  

OK, I had a choice, but I wanted to wear something Chritmassy tomorrow, so I chose to go to the store, since all my Christmas t-shirts have gotten a bit bedraggled over the years.  

Anyway, I got there and browsed through the women's section, but didn't find anything I liked, so I went over to the men's and found this:  

Perfect!

While I was there, I picked up a new bag of corn for the deer and a few other items, but I'm saving the bulk of my shopping until Friday, because I have to go into town one more time to pay a bill.   That's the last bill I still pay by a check, but only because I'm too stubborn to pay the processing fee.  

On second thought, I might ought to do that tomorrow because it's supposed to be bitterly cold Friday morning.  They're saying we could get down to 24°, and I know for those of you up north, that's just another Friday, but remember, most of us down here don't even own coats.  I don't.  Own a coat, I mean. 

I have a few jackets and some hoodies, but that's it, unless you count the insulated coveralls I got when my uncle died.  I suppose I could wear those to Walmart.  I've seen worse...

And finally, this morning's advent figure is the star, 

The verse accompanying today's entry is:   A star shall come out of Jacob, and a scepter shall rise out of Israel.  Numbers 24:17

But what really caught my attention was the subheading in the booklet, which said "an unusually bright star which appeared in the sky."  It got me thinking, and when you work in a no-brainer job like mine, you tend to have a lot of time to think.  But that's beside the point. 

It got me thinking.  That the star was unusually big or unusually bright is a commonly held cultural belief, but was it really?  You'd think an astronomical phenomenon like that, like an unusually big and bright star suddenly appearing, would command quite a bit of attention, yet none of the secular historians of the day mention it.  Luke doesn't even mention it in his gospel. 

He talks about an angel, and the heavenly host, but no star.  As detailed as Luke liked to be about things, you'd think he'd mention a big, bright star.  

Then there is King Herod.  Given the level of paranoia he suffered, to the point of having his own sons killed because he was afraid they'd try to take the throne, he'd be all over something like a giant star as an omen, or whatever, and would raise quite the ruckus.  

Yet, he didn't.  According to the Bible, Herod didn't raise a ruckus until the Magi arrived in Jerusalem claiming to have seen the new King's star.  (Matthew 2:3 -- When King Herod heard this he was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him.)  

So, what was the star of Bethlehem?  People have been trying to figure that out for the last two millennia, and there have been multiple theories.  The most commonly held beliefs are that it was a planetary conjunction or a comet.  We know that it couldn't have possibly been either of those, because the Maji had been following the star for two-ish years.  (Matthew 2:16 --   When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi.)

I've seen both planetary conjunctions and comets, and they don't hang around that long.  A conjunction usually only lasts a few days -- with peak conjunction coming in a single night when it usually too cloudy to see it.  Or is that just me?  And a comet is only visible for a few weeks.  So, that rules out both of those. 

Some folks want to say the star was a supernova, which I suppose is possible, but highly unlikely.  For one thing, they don't really move.  I mean, they expand and all, but they generally stay in the same place in the sky.  Matthew 2:9 says, After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they had seen when it rose went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was.   A supernova is a pretty amazing thing, but somehow I doubt it can lead men around like that.  

Which brings us back to the original question, what was the star of Bethlehem?  The answer I'm about to give you is my own personal thoughts and feelings.  I have no Biblical or theological evidence to support what I'm about to say, but it is what I firmly believe.  

I believe the star of Bethlehem was a miraculous phenomenon sent by God specifically to the Magi with the express purpose of leading them to the Christ child, and as such, only they could see it.  Furthermore, I believe that once it had shown them where Jesus was, it vanished, never to be seen again.  Say what you want.  That's what I believe.  

Which brings us to the next question:  why?

Why would God send a star to a bunch of Persian Zoroastrians to lead them to his only son?  By the way, we believe that they were from Persia because of the term Magi.  The conundrum there is in the translation of the word from the original text.  It's the commonly held that this is what Matthew meant when he was writing his gospel, but the oldest versions I can find simply say they were men who studied the stars.  Astronomer, if you will.  But, the standard belief is that they were Zoroastrians from Persia, because it is known that they studied the stars, so we'll roll with that.  That detail isn't really that important anyway. 

The point is, they weren't Jews.  The weren't men the Jews would consider faithful to God, so why did God even send for them?  

Folks, God sent for the Magi for us.  For you and me.  So that we would know that Jesus didn't come just for the pious.  He didn't just come for the righteous.  He didn't just come for the faithful.    He came for the unfaithful.  He came for everyone.  He came for us. 

So come, all you unfaithful.  Come. 

Christ was born for you. 

P.S.  No you are not going crazy.  This was last year's post, which I felt deserved a rerun. 

Conversate More

A few years ago, back when the brazers were still working on the lines, one of the temps came over to my brazing stand and said, "I've been watching you, and all you do is work, work, work.  You need to step around the line and conversate more!" 

I replied, "I don't get paid to conversate.  I get paid to make parts."  What I didn't say -- at least out loud-- was, "What could you and I possibly have to conversate about?  We likely don't know the same people.  We certainly don't have the same interests, so what do you want to talk about?  

Do you want to discuss the episode of Secrets Of The Dead I watched the other day in which Phillipa Langley -- you know, she's the one who found Richard III in that car park in Leicester back in 2012, and we can conversate about that one, too --uncovered evidence that solved the mystery of the princes in the tower?  

Or would you rather discuss how many times the movie Air Force One defies the laws of physics, and and exactly how it does so?  Or hypothesize about how different history would be if just one of Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon's sons had lived?  Or how it would be literally impossible to explore new worlds without violating the Prime Directive?  

Oh, I know!  We can discuss wind shear and it's negative effect on hurricane formation, or how El Niño and La Niña influence weather patterns!

No?  Then we have nothing to talk about, because I couldn't care less who is sleeping with who or what celebrities are up to, so if you don't mind, I'm going to get back to my work, work, work now. "

In other news, lookit!  The birds are starting to find the new feeder!

That's good, because it won't be long before they'll be needing that extra feed.  It was chilly enough this morning that I was able to light the first fire in my little fire box. 

It warmed up pretty quickly, but that fire sure was cozy there for a minute. 

On a similar note, someone posted this on Facebook today and boy, I felt it to the depths of my soul.  

I do this all the time.  I can't seem to relax, because I know I have soooo much stuff I need to get done, and I can't seem to get my act together enough to get any of it done.  I don't have any family in the area to help me out, and I certainly don't have any friends who'd even show up to offer moral support, so everything falls on me. 

Then I look at my list -- which is getting longer by the day -- and see how much is on it, and get overwhelmed and can't do anything.  So I sit around and knit, and berate myself for being such a numpty.  

And believe me when I tell you that numpty is actually much kinder than what I really call myself. 

But, as is my custom, in the middle of all my bouts of self-denigration, I managed to get most of the bricks behind my wood stove painted. 

I still have to do the ones in the back corner, but I didn't quite feel up to getting down on my hands and knees and crawling back there.  I also noticed that the ones in the upper right are whiter than the rest.  I'm not sure why, because I didn't go over them or anything.  I wonder if it's because I sponged them instead of brushing them.  That's how I started out, but decided it was taking too much time.  Maybe tomorrow I'll start sponging a second coat on the rest of the bricks, but even as they are, it makes that corner so much less dark and gloomy than it was before. 

As far as Thanksgiving prep goes,  I got my turkey out of the deep freeze and put it into the fridge to start thawing.  Then I made two pies and put them into the freezer.  One was a banana cream pie, made with sugar free pudding mix.  I was going to make Cody his cream cheese pie, but decided he didn't need all that sugar, either, so I made the second pie with sugar free cheesecake pudding mix.  

I'm debating on whether to go ahead and make the pumpkin pie tomorrow, or to wait until Thursday to do it.  I think I'll wait on that one.  

I had bought the canned cranberry jelly to serve, but when I was in the store yesterday, I saw bags of fresh cranberries and bought one on impulse, so I guess we're getting both.  Ah, well, Cody and Bren will have lots of leftovers to take home, then. 

And finally, today is my bloggiversary.  Can you believe it was 19 years ago that I wrote my very first blog post?   So much has changed.  I've lost readers, and gained new ones, and I'm grateful for every one of you who've stuck with me through the years.  

So, while I was looking for something else, I found and old draft of a post that had never gotten published.  I'd written this back in 2019, and don't know why I never posted it.  Anyway, here it is for your enjoyment.

The plant has this notice up, asking for people who want to train to braze. I don't know why. Even the ones they do train they don't let them braze. Eh, who knows. 

 A few weeks ago, Stalker was training one guy on an empty sub-brazing stand. He hasn't brazed since. He now works on line 1 putting on flo-rators. But that's beside the point. 

He was over there training, and one of my coworkers said, "He looks like Buh-Lak-Ay from the Substitute Teacher." 

Now, if you don't know what that is, it's a comedy sketch by Key and Peele which you can look up on YouTube if you're interested. I'm not going to share it here, because it does have some language and I want to maintain my G rating for my blog. 

We have no idea what that guy's real name is, but ever since then, we've called him Buh-Lak-Ay. 

Now, we're over there treating him like he's some sort of celebrity. "Hey! I saw Buh-Lak-Ay in the break room!" "I saw Buh-Lak-Ay coming out of the restroom!" "I saw Buh-Lak-Ay over on line 1!" He's just an ordinary guy, but here we are, totally fan-girling over him. 

And he has no idea.

Eighty Years

June 6, 1944

Eighty years ago today. 

In the misty gray light of early morning, landing craft approached the beaches of Normandy. Boats filled with frightened young men, many of them barely more than boys. 

Boys wishing they were still at home in bed. Shaking with fear. Praying. Maybe crying. Knowing that many of them would not survive the day.

 And yet, when those landing craft hit the beach, 

 when those ramps opened, 

without hesitation, they stood and charged into the hail of bullets that would claim nearly 10,000 of them before the sun set. 

Seeing their friends, their brothers in arms, cut down beside them. 

Still they ran. Still they fought. 

In spite of their fear, and knowing that the fate of the entire world rested on their shoulders, they claimed that beach and began the long, slow slog across Europe that would eventually lead to Hitler's demise.

That is why they truly were The Greatest Generation.

Most of those who stormed the beaches at Normandy that day are gone, and those who remain are well into their 90s and early 100s.  Soon, they'll all be gone. Soon there will be no one left who remembers that great and terrible day. 

That is why it is up to us.  It is up to us to remember them.  To guard their legacy.   To teach our children what they did for us -- for the world -- that day in 1944. It's our responsibility.  

Not the school's. Not the History Channel's. Ours. 

We must tell the story.  So that we may never forget. So that they will never be forgotten. 

 Tell it to your children, and let your children tell it to their children, 
and their children to the next generation. Joel 1:3  

Rerun Time

I'm sure you will all be pleased to know I wore my new socks to work today, and wonder of wonders they did not fall down and wad up in the toes of my boots.   

I'm about halfway through the heel flap, and should get to the gusset decreases soon.  Oh, joy, my least favorite part.  But what I wanted to share with you today is something I found when I was looking for what yarn that is.  All I found is that it's Cascade 220, but other than that, it's mystery yarn.  

What I found that I wanted to share with you is this old story from 2019.  I found it amusing, and thought you might like to re-read it, too.  It's from back when the blog was still entertaining.  

Just popping my head in to let you all know I'm still alive.  For now...

The plant has been working us so hard these last few weeks.  It's unreal.  It's not just the hard work and long hours.  It's the stress of how they're treating us.  I've never seen this place so badly unorganized as it is right now.  We can't get our parts from tubing, so we can't get ahead.  Then, we've got the assembly lines waiting on us, only we don't have anything for them, because tubing doesn't have anything for us.  And instead of solving the problem, they just want to stand over us and rush us.

It's nerve wracking, and very, very stressful.  I come home and I don't feel like doing anything but going to bed.

I don't feel like blogging.
I don't feel like knitting.
I don't even feel like playing my piano.  I'm having to make myself practice.

Then, of course, there is the stress of dealing with my stalker.  He just makes me sick. He literally makes my skin crawl.  Him staring...always staring at me.  He'll even deliberately position himself so that he's in my line of sight.  One day last week, I was getting a drink out of my cooler on the shelf under my table.  When I stood up, there he was, right at the end of the line of brazing stands, just staring...Something is seriously wrong with him.

It was kind of funny today, though.  I was thinking about the upcoming Fiber Fun In The 'Sip festival in September, daydreaming about how much fun it's going to be hanging out with Amy, Christi, and Leann again...

Somewhere in the middle of my daydream, my white headed shanty men showed up -- including the one who may or may not eventually become my imaginary boyfriend, if I can ever bring myself to make an imaginary commitment to him.   They were going to be part of the entertainment.  Once they'd finished singing, we ended up talking, and I took him out....to...ummm..

TheVicksburgNationalMilitaryPark

Yeah.  Most people take their imaginary dates to a romantic candlelit dinner, or a long moonlit walk on the beach, or maybe they snuggle under a blanket in front of a fire at a ski lodge.  Or something.  Not me.

I take mine to a freaking Civil War Battlefield.  A Civil War Battlefield!!

Sigh...I'm definitely not normal.  Or whatever.

Normal is over-rated, anyway.

Anyway, I was really getting into it.  My imaginary tour of the Vicksburg National Military Park, that is.  We were reading the signs and things, and those things where you can scan the QR code with your phone and a video opens with a Ranger telling you why that spot is significant.  I was telling him about some of the statues, and who those men were -- as much as I knew.  I'm not really big on Civil War history.  Now if it were Texas history, that'd be a completely different story.  But still...

We went to the Illinois memorial -- the one where all the ghosts are.  There I ran into a fellow veteran.  I'd worn my DD-214 Alumni shirt, which he recognized instantly.  He said, "Thank you for your service." and I replied, "And you for yours, Brother."  We shook hands and said, "Never forget," then parted ways.  My imaginary friend asked who that was, and I said, "No idea."

"But you called him Brother."

"He's a fellow veteran.  That makes him my brother."

I ran my fingers along the names on the plaques.  The names of those long ago men who'd served in the Illinois regiment, and told my imaginary friend who may or may not become my imaginary boyfriend that these men had donned the uniform and swore the oath, same as I did, and that makes them my brothers forever. Whether I knew them or not doesn't matter in the slightest.


In the midst of my daydream, I put some adapter tubes into my brazing jig, flipped down my glasses, and lit my torch.  That's when I discovered I hadn't put a header onto the parts.  I said, "I don't know what I thought I was going to braze."  And looked up to see Stalker, just staring.  Laughing. 

He. Makes. Me. Sick.

I thought, "If you only knew!  Here I am, I'd rather be with an IMAGINARY boyfriend, than with you in real life, you pathetic loser!"  Seriously, if he's the best I can do, I'd rather do without.

Imaginary husbands are better anyway.  They never leave their dirty socks on the floor.  They never complain about what's for supper, and they never hog the remote.

So there.

Freedom

I don't know, little girl. 

We have not been truly free in this country since long before I was born. Don't believe me? Think about this, who owns the fruits of your labors?  Who owns your paycheck?  You?  Think again.

Who decides how much income tax you have to pay? In other words, who decides how much of your paycheck you are required to hand over to the government?  You?  No, the government does.  

And what happens if you decide you want to keep what you've worked so hard for?  That's right.  If you don't pay your taxes, you go to prison.  Now, why would you go to prison for keeping your own property?  Why would you go to prison if your paycheck were really yours?  What this mean is, the government owns all of our wages, and they just give us an allowance to live on.  . 

Who owns your houses and properties? You? No. Even if you've paid off the mortgage, you still have to pay property taxes. What happens if you don't pay? The government seizes your property. What that means is, the government owns all property, and you just rent it from them.

By the same token, who owns all the businesses in this country? Yep, the government. Because the government sets the rules by which you can operate a business. And they set the taxes those businesses have to pay. If a business doesn't comply, what happens? The government shuts them down at best, and at worst, seizes all their assets.

But you think you still have freedom of speech?  No, only speech the government deems is acceptable is still free.  Don't believe me?  Then ask yourself why a man is sitting in prison right now for making a YouTube video, or a 14 year old boy was arrested for wearing a t-shirt.  Better yet, try mentioning God in a public place.  Try putting a Nativity scene in a public park, and see how free your speech still is.
  

Or your religion.  You think you still have freedom of religion?  Think again.  Only the religions the government deems acceptable are allowed.  Even churches must meet strict government standards, or they will lose their tax exempt status, and without being tax exempt, most churches would be taxed out of existence. 

And the government decides which light bulbs you can buy, and the government decides how energy efficient your appliances have to be, and the government decides how much gas mileage your car must get -- or if you can even drive a gas powered car --, and the government decides what kind of health insurance is acceptable, and the government decides how much salt you can put on your food, and what kind of stove you can cook that food on, or how much soda you can drink, and the government decides pretty much every miniscule jot and tittle of your life. Heck, you even have to ask the government's permission to get married.

Free?  No we're not free, and haven't been for quite some time.

 Or as Harriet Tubman once allegedly said, "I freed a thousand slaves. I could have freed a thousand more IF ONLY THEY HAD KNOWN THEY WERE SLAVES."

We are slaves, and most of us don't even realize it.

But when a long Train of Abuses and Usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object, evinces a Design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their Right, it is their Duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future Security.   -- The Declaration of Independence

Lots To Talk About

I've got lots to talk about today, so bear with me, OK?  

First of all, let me catch you up on my knitting progress.  I didn't really do much over the weekend but knit, mainly because I'm in the middle of a plantar fasciitis flare up.  It started Friday at work, and though I looked all over the house when I got home, I could not find my arch supports anywhere.  By yesterday afternoon, I was in so much pain, I was seriously wondering how I'd even make it through work today. 

Finally, right as I was crawling into bed last night, I remembered that I had some of that sticky, stretchy bandage stuff I'd bought years ago.  This morning, I wrapped my foot with it, and oh, my.  Even that little bit of support made such a difference.  Within just a few hours, my foot felt so much better.  Oh, it's still a bit sore...OK, a lot sore... but the inflammation type pain is much less.  Now it just feels like a bad bruise.  

After work, I had to run into town to pay the bills I forgot to pay Friday, because I forgot to bring them with me Friday, because apparently I forgot it was Friday.  While I was in town, I ran by the store and bought some new arch supports.  And a rotisserie chicken.  Which has absolutely nothing to do with my plantar fasciitis.  I just wanted one. 

All that to say, I didn't do much this weekend other than knit.  And what did I knit?  I finally finished this hat.

This one is a watch cap, usually worn with the brim turned up.  

I like the way this one turned out.  I think next time I'll knit the beanie pattern with this yarn.  

Once I'd finished, I knit a couple of rounds on the orange hat, then cast on another Calorimetry. 

This is some of the Red Heart I bought Friday.  The colorway is Wildflower.   I used a size 9 needle, and the finished product still ended up being much shorter than the pattern calls for.  Even so, it felt huge on my head.  

This morning, another one of my coworkers slipped me a few dollars and told me to buy myself some more yarn.  I told her it wasn't necessary, but I thanked her anyway.  I'm going to have to wait, though, because our local Walmart hardly has any yarn in stock right now.  I might order me some size 8 interchangeable tips from Knit Picks. I thought I had some, but can't find them anywhere.  They're probably in a WIP somewhere...

The other thing I wanted to talk about today is this.  Back in 2018, my small town in Mississippi voted to raise taxes on themselves to build a fourth sports complex here.  Because apparently, three wasn't enough.  I even blogged about it:  

Congratulations!

Congratulations, Grenada!

You just voted to raise taxes on yourself to build a new sports complex.  Because I guess the one...

Sports Complex on Jackson Ave. Extension

two...

Sports Complex on Jasper Neely Dr.

three...

Sports Complex at Grenada Lake (This one has tennis and basketball courts as well)

sports complexes in this town with a population of only 13,000 just aren't enough for you.  So, go ahead!  Play ball!

After the game, you can drive home

dodging the potholes in our crumbling infrastructure,

skirting the garbage piled at the end of your driveway, which may or may not get picked up on time -- or at all,

and bathe your kid in the brown water that comes out of your tap,

(Actual photo of city water, taken from a Facebook page)

so you can put him to bed, because he needs a good night's sleep before you get him up in the morning to send him to a below average school,

from which he will eventually graduate and spend the rest of his life working at a low paying factory job, whereupon he will have a heart attack at age 50,

and die in the waiting room of our underfunded and understaffed hospital, which was recently given the only failing grade of all the hospitals in the state.

As the breath leaves his body, and the light fades from his eyes, I'm sure his last thoughts will be, "Boy, I'm glad my parents voted for that fourth sports complex, instead of caring about the things that really mattered."

Because, you know, I'd hate to live in a town that only has three.


*Images courtesy of Google Earth.

Now, back before this was even voted on, there was a lot of discussion about it in some of the Facebook groups, and I was one of the few who argued vehemently against this, even though I would not be allowed to vote on it because I live outside city limits.  The whole argument the pro sports complex side was making was that we needed to do away with having segregated little leagues and begin the healing process.  

OK, by way of explanation, the Little League isn't technically segregated.  It's just that there's a public league run by the city parks and rec department.  Anyone is welcome to join that league.  There is also a private league which is also open to anyone who wants to join, but it's much much more expensive.  Though it's not legally segregated, it's long held tradition -- from long before I moved here -- that black kids play in the public league and white kids play in the private league.  I didn't make these rules, nor do I agree with them.  Honestly, I'd never even heard of segregated little league until I moved here.   

So, yesterday I ran across a poll on the local paper's website which read:

Should local baseball/softball teams be allowed to use the new sports complex?  

What?  Isn't that what it was built for?  Apparently not, because now they're saying it's only intended for travel ball tournaments.  Fancy that.  We're being taxed for a sports complex our own kids won't even be able to use.  That's not the story they told us when we were pushing this thing on us.  We were led to believe it would be for our kids to use.  For our little league games.  That whole desegregating the leagues so we can heal the past thing, you know.  I'd even argued that we could desegregate the league and use the existing facilities, but was quickly shot down.  

"No!"  They said.  "We need a fresh start.  A new beginning, and for that we need a fresh, new sports complex."  And had I seen the old complexes?  The parking is terrible!  We need this to attract new industries to the area!  Which begs the question now, what will these new industries think when they realize their kids won't be able to even use the sports complex?  

Now the one guy who was pushing this -- to attract tourism dollars, he now says-- is claiming he never said any of that.  Even if he didn't actually say it, he was reading the posts and the comments and never, ever contradicted any of it.  He knew people were thinking this would be for our kids, and never disabused anyone of that notion.  He deliberately let people go on thinking this would be for us, for our kids.  

Now that it's all but built, he's saying that eventually, they hope the public Little League will be able to use it, but Grenada Youth will never have access to it.  The great irony in all of that is, back when we were still discussing it, the ones most passionate about getting it built were....the Grenada Youth League.  Now they're not even going to have access to the sports complex they fought so hard for and their tax dollars are doing the bulk of the financing of.  

I wish now I could go back into the group and find all those old messages and reply with just one phrase.  And that phrase would be....

Gotcha sucker!  

Heh, maybe I will....

Spindletop

All this week, I've been telling myself that when I get home, I'm going to go for a walk.  Not far, just up and down the road.  And all this week, I haven't.  

Gone for a walk, that is.  

I get home and decide I'm just too tired, and I'll do it tomorrow.  Then tomorrow comes and I don't.  Go for a walk, I mean.  And I know you must be tired of reading my complaining about how tired I am.   All I have to say to that is, "Man, I need a nap." 

In other news, they've decided we need to wear steel toed boots to work now.  I'm not sure when it's supposed to start, but they announced it in a safety brief last fall.  What we were told is that it has always been Lennox policy (they're our parent company), and this is just to bring us in line with that.  We've really been supposed to be wearing them, but they just haven't enforced it.  Now they're going to. 

That's the official line.  What I think -- completely off the record, of course -- is that they're tired of seeing people wearing house shoes to work.  Seriously.  People are seriously wearing house shoes to the plant.  I saw someone last week walking down the aisle and out the door at the end of the shift, and she had moccasin style HOUSE SHOES on.  

They looked just like these:

A bit of good news before I go -- a new season of Kid's Baking Championship has started, and new seasons of All Creatures Great And Small and Miss Scarlet And The Duke are showing on PBS, so now I have some good shows to watch.  Yippee!  

And finally, I couldn't leave you without acknowledging this important day in Texas history, the discovery of oil at Spindletop.  

It was January 10, 1901....

The Lucas Gusher blew the cap off of oil production in Texas, and revolutionized the oil industry.

Prior to that, oil had been primarily used for lighting and lubrication, but the discovery of such a massive deposit made using it for fuel feasible for the first time.  The rest, as they say, is history. 

It also led to today's earworm, which I will now pass on to you.



You're welcome.

For more information, The Texas State Historical Association has a pretty good article:  Spindletop.

And also, Wikipedia.

Scrooge Kind Of Day

 If you follow me on either Facebook or Instagram, you might think I haven't done anything today but watch movies.  I mean, based on what I've posted in my feed, that is.  

It all started with this one: 

It is a made for TV cartoon version that we watched every year when I was a kid.  My dad always made us watch it with all the lights turned off, except the Christmas tree and maybe a candle or two.  I'd found it on VHS when Cody was little, but something happened to the tape.  I'm not sure what, but luckly I found it again on YouTube a few years ago.

Before I continue, I have to confess this is the most terrifying Marley's Ghost I have ever seen.  Especially to a 4 year old...  

I guess I was just in a Scrooge kind of mood, because after that I watched the 1935 version, the 1938 version with Reginald Owen, and the 1951 with Alistair Sim.  I finished the day with A House Without A Christmas Tree and A Charlie Brown Christmas, but all that Scrooging put me in mind of a post I'd written years ago about the fictional character I'd most want to be.  

I felt it was time for a rerun.  Here for your enjoyment is the post in its entirety, complete with original formatting. 

The Fictional Character I Most Want To Be Like

I think you may be a bit surprised by my choice. It's not Galadriel, or Arwen, or Xena the Warrior Princess or any of the strong, beautiful women out there. No, the fictional character I would most want to be like is

Ebeneezer Scrooge.

Huh? Why would I want to be like Scrooge? He was a

tight-fisted hand at the grindstone,...a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous old sinner...hard and sharp as flint, ...as solitary as an oyster.

Aren't there enough Scrooges out there? It would seem that there were. All over blogland and the web I've seen evidence of his presence. Those who've grown hard and bitter toward Christmas, because it's become too commercial, or it has lost it's true focus, or the pressure to buy, buy, buy has grown so great. So these people let society determine how they will, or will not celebrate, Christmas.

Yes, refusing to celebrate because you don't like the societal pressures is allowing someone else to dictate how you celebrate your holidays.

So why would I want to be like that?

I don't. The world has plenty of those. That's the image people have of Scrooge, but it is an inaccurate one. You see, most people forget that something happened to Scrooge.

He changed.

Now, what happened to bring about that change is an interesting story, but it is less relevant than the fact that he became a different person. So what did happen to Scrooge?

He became as good a friend, as good a master, and as good a man as the good old city knew, or any other good old city, town, or borough, in the good old world. Some people laughed to see the alteration in him, but he let them laugh, and little heeded them; for...his own heart laughed: and that was quite good enough for him...and it was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge. May that truly be said of us, and all of us!

That's the Scrooge I want to be. Someone who still finds joy in Christmas. Someone who still loves the lights, and the trees, and the decorations, and putting a dollar or two in the Salvation Army bucket. Someone who still sheds a tear when reading the Christmas story from the Bible.

Someone who knows how to keep Christmas well.

To all my friends out there in blogland, those whom I've met in person, and those whom I've only met online, I wish you the most joyous of Christmases. I love you all, and leave you with this wish:

As Tiny Tim observed, God bless US, Every One!

All Patti's Fault

This is a post I'd originally posted way back in 2009.  When my friend Jennifer -- mentioned later in this post -- posted a photo of her and Patti a few days ago, this post immediately sprang to mind.  I don't know if Jen had ever read it, so I felt it was time for a rerun.  So without further ado, It's All Patti's Fault. 

P.S. If you go and read the original post, you can see some of Patti's actual comments.  

All Patti's Fault

Here's another blast from the past:

This is my friend Patti on the left, and Susan on the right. They were college buddies of mine. Patti often comments on my blog. Sometimes she tells off on me. She loves to tell this one particular story, which I fondly refer to as The Sheet Music Incident. In the comments a couple of days ago, she again referred to this incident. Since some of you may have missed it, I will tell you the story here, too.

I went to college at Hardin Simmons University, in Abilene, TX. While attending there, I was a member of a church called Elmcrest Baptist Church. Being located in a college town, Elmcrest naturally had a rather large college and career group. Many of us also participated in their college and career choir. I was never musically inclined myself, but I did enjoy being in that choir.

One Sunday evening, the choir went to sing at a smaller church in one of the nearby towns. We sang our 4 or 5 little songs, then we were standing there, still in the choir loft. Someone may have been praying, I don't remember. I was standing at the end of a row, and Patti was just to my right. There was an empty chair beside me, so I decided to toss my sheet music down on it. As it turns out, I put a little too much oomph in my toss, and the sheet music slid off the other side of the chair, down some steps, and into the little foyer behind the choir loft. There was nothing I could do but to watch it go--flowing like water down the steps.

It finally settled, and came to rest on the floor in the foyer. I turned and looked at Patti, who had witnessed the whole thing, and said, "oops." She got the giggles. Then I got the giggles, and we giggled over that through the whole rest of the service.

In the comments to my post a couple of days ago, she again mentioned that incident, and I was thinking about it last night after I had gone to bed. And I got the giggles. And then I remembered something else we had done.

Patti and I had a friend named Jennifer. Jennifer had a car named Faith, because she said that's what it ran on--faith. One Christmas, Patti and I decided we were going to decorate Faith. Patti went out and bought some red and green yarn, and we tied little yarn bows all up and down Faith's radio antenna. Jennifer didn't like them on there, because she said they made the antenna bend backwards too much when she drove. She would push all the bows down to the bottom of the antenna. Patti and I would spread them back out, and Jennifer would push them all back down. One day the three of us were driving somewhere. Jen was driving, Patti was in the back seat, and I was in the passenger seat. Jen had again pushed all the little yarn bows down to the bottom of the antenna, where they sat there in a wad. We stopped at a stop light, and who should pull up beside us, but another college buddy named Cary. Our windows were down, and Cary said, "What is that on your antenna?"

"Decorations," I replied.

Cary said, "It looks like you hit a bird!"

And I'm remembering that last night as I lay in my bed, and I start giggling over that, too. And I giggle half the night. So, I'm sleepy today because I giggled half the night over college memories.

And it's all Patti's fault!