tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post1070471753692903026..comments2024-03-27T12:58:00.592-07:00Comments on Snowbrush: A newsy letterSnowbrushhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00436087215476479042noreply@blogger.comBlogger50125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-31073782968825942682016-04-07T17:54:21.920-07:002016-04-07T17:54:21.920-07:00I'm a bit behind in responding but if your cat...I'm a bit behind in responding but if your cat is on dry food switch him to wet food only. Dry is the worst for crystals. No fish flavors either. My vet gave me the special diet dry food but Bosco was not getting better. After some online research I switched to grainfree wet food with no fish and I add water to it. He's been doing great.Ginnyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11686450030075980690noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-46345263067226083692016-02-26T09:01:23.050-08:002016-02-26T09:01:23.050-08:00Or they could just read your poem here:
Visitatio...Or they could just read your poem here:<br /><br />Visitation<br /><br />Near the mill, in the mist of a morning,<br />Where the dew was an emerald sea,<br />There was brilliance aplenty adorning<br />When angels came walking to me.<br /><br />For they came with a glorious splendor;<br />They approached with a jubilant psalm;<br />And the song that they sang did engender<br />Magnificent, infinite calm.<br /><br />Oh, I cannot remember their faces<br />(Though the music was jubilant psalm),<br />But a Light filled my hiddenmost places<br />And healed them with Gilead’s balm.<br /><br />They passed by without seeming to see me<br />As they joyously went on their way,<br />But their jubilant singing did free me<br />As the Light turned gross darkness to day.<br /><br />And the glory that shone was resplendent,<br />And the triumphant sound of their song<br />That had made one brief moment transcendent<br />Shall stay with me all my life long.<br /><br />For the mill was in mist on that morning,<br />And the dew was an emerald sea<br />When, with brilliance aplenty adorning,<br />The angels came walking to me.<br /><br />I miss drugs. This seems an odd thing to say for a fellow who has narcotics, tranquilizers, sleeping pills, and a drug that makes my dreams so vivid that I can’t tell dreaming from being awake; but what I mean is that I miss hallucinogenics. Even marijuana was enough to make a susceptible soul like myself see visions and hear voices, and this made me go easy on the stronger stuff like LSD and mescaline, although I took them too, and the experience was always good. Now, I want mescaline. Give it to me now, and I would take it now so that I might see the visions again. Marijuana? No, I had to give it up because three hours of feeling frantic followed by a full day or more of being clinically depressed wasn’t a trip that I wanted, and that’s what pot had consistently turned into. It was as if a very good friend had turned against me so hurtfully that I’ll probably never take him into my body again.<br /><br />You weren’t on drugs, of course, but you might have been because that’s what they often do. One night, drugs first took me to hell—complete with demons. I could hardly walk, and eventually found myself in bed in a dark room, only it wasn’t dark for me, but was full of joyous colors and patterns, somewhat like a kaleidoscope. But the best part came a little after dawn when I went outdoors, sat atop the cab of a truck, and watched pecan trees dance across the Louisiana delta. So, what was real, the ordinary without drugs or the sublime after the drugs should have long since worn off? If I had such experiences as you had, I too might be a believer, but again, I probably wouldn’t. I think we have to die to know.Snowbrushhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00436087215476479042noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-74662282288714022952016-02-26T05:14:49.471-08:002016-02-26T05:14:49.471-08:00About your questions to me concerning highness, I ...About your questions to me concerning highness, I think you may be on to something (as opposed to being on something, although that may also be true), especially regarding the trees and also angels. Please go to my other blog, billyraybarnwellhere.blogspot.com, click on Chapter 33 in the right margin, then do a search on the word "Visitation" to see a poem I wrote years ago. Other readers can do the same if they're so inclined; everyone is welcome.rhymeswithplaguehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10870439618129001633noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-11151914864097056502016-02-24T11:07:45.004-08:002016-02-24T11:07:45.004-08:00I doubt that the average American women is much go...I doubt that the average American women is much good at baking. Rolls and biscuits come in a pop-open can; pie crusts come ready-made in a disposable aluminum pie plate; cornbread is rarely made anymore except in the Deep South; and pretty much everything can be picked up a bakery including your kid’s birthday cake. Domestic skills are but little valued here. The crackers I bake, I couldn’t buy anywhere at any price, and everything that either of us bake is different from what we could buy in that we use mixed whole grains, canola oil—even for pie crusts—and very little sugar.<br /><br />“Your relationship with Peggy is such unique one. I doubt if this can be allowed to happen here talkless of making effort to make it legal.”<br /><br />My image of the world’s poorer countries is that individual rights are but little valued, and that any deviations are met with severe reprisals. While America has many severe problems, they don’t greatly impact people’s personal wealth or freedoms. The former is changing in that the rich here are getting richer and everyone else is getting poorer. Also medical expenses are so high that almost anyone can be bankrupted by illness. Still, if you want to live a life that’s different from most of your fellows, you could worse than to live in America. As I’m sure you know, homosexuals can even marry here and have children, and marijuana is becoming legal in more places almost everyday (when I first started using it, I could have been sent to prison for ten years for a single joint).Snowbrushhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00436087215476479042noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-72951069941366991132016-02-24T10:32:07.480-08:002016-02-24T10:32:07.480-08:00Your relationship with Peggy is such unique one. I...Your relationship with Peggy is such unique one. I doubt if this can be allowed to happen here talkless of making effort to make it legal. A man may marry two women, but not women.<br /><br />Our women are good in baking and they can bake as much as Americans women do.<br /><br />How are you!Uthman Saheedhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00932760816409731382noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-54006254222976558562016-02-24T09:06:05.096-08:002016-02-24T09:06:05.096-08:00“Also, your author friend may not have realized th...“Also, your author friend may not have realized that anyone who moves to Kennebunkport is destined for obscurity to the third and fourth generation.”<br /><br />She was a country girl from western Pennsylvania (her area has since been swallowed up by Pittsburg), and although she lived in NYC and, after she was married, Boston, she wanted to be in the country, so during Lorin’s life—and once they could afford it—they spent summers in Kennebunkport and the rest of the time in Boston. She was a noted lover of dogs and flowers, and her books contain descriptions of every growing thing. You would very much enjoy her Dr. Lavendar books, the good doctor being a country priest of your age who often faced moral dilemmas and tried to help foolish people. You can get them cheap in the first editions if you don’t care too much about their condition.<br /><br />“I don't think I am high today, but then how would I know?”<br /><br />Do you feel an ecstatic oneness with all things causing you to feel that you’ve found your home, and it was there all the time? Are you unable to judge the passage of time and,if you’re in a car, of speed? Do the things around you seem alive, and do they flow into one another? Have you lost your sense of personal boundaries, leaving you unable to know where you leave off and other things begin. When you look into the sky, do you feel that you are both on the ground and floating among the clouds? Do you sense that everything is exactly as it should be? Do colors have such depth and vibrancy that you feel as if they’re bottomless? Do trees seem to dance in celebration of life, and are they aware of your presence? Do angels pass above your head speaking strange languages, and do demonic faces threaten you from inanimate objects?Snowbrushhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00436087215476479042noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-71071154125603259752016-02-24T08:02:21.332-08:002016-02-24T08:02:21.332-08:00I for one do not ever intend to get a mammogram, b...I for one do not ever intend to get a mammogram, but do let us know how yours goes. Also, your author friend may not have realized that anyone who moves to Kennebunkport is destined for obscurity to the third and fourth generation.<br /><br />I don't think I am high today, but then how would I know?<br /><br />rhymeswithplaguehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10870439618129001633noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-53857805967200298172016-02-23T11:50:51.533-08:002016-02-23T11:50:51.533-08:00"Brooks being a friend of her and her husband..."Brooks being a friend of her and her husband who later became the Episcopal bishop of Massachusetts."<br /><br />I meant Brooks, not her husband. Brooks didn't last too long as bishop because he worked himself so hard that he wouldn't slow down for illness.Snowbrushhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00436087215476479042noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-90132473590410113042016-02-23T11:49:11.766-08:002016-02-23T11:49:11.766-08:00“What about Deadwood?”
I keep checking my mail, b...“What about Deadwood?”<br /><br />I keep checking my mail, but it’s never there—maybe if you had my address? I’ll give you my address.<br /><br />“If you're lying awake reciting poems, does your brain get a chance to update its files and put everything in the proper sectors so it can operated at peak efficiency?”<br /><br />My brane is at peek eficiency. Don’t it show?<br /><br />P.S. Once again, I’ll put a hold on Deadwood.<br /><br />“ i don't read a lot of literary/historical realism but surely i should have heard of her!”<br /><br />I should think. She lived at 35 Newbury St in Boston, which was an easy walk over to Trinity Cathedral to hear Phillips Brooks preach, Brooks being a friend of her and her husband who later became the Episcopal bishop of Massachusetts. After her also famous husband, Lorin, died, she and his black nurse—who had become like a daughter to her—moved to Kennebunkport into a house that she enlarged and which still stands. Deland was a major literary figure in her day, and she did much to make it possible for women to be self-supporting because it was common in her era for middle class women to become destitute after their husbands died, the reason being that they had no marketable skills; it was socially unacceptable for them to work; and it was also socially unacceptable for them to even admit that they were poor. This put them in the position of relying on the charity of friends (such women would sell their needlework to their friends while everyone pretended that the needlework was a “gift” and that the payment was simply given to cover the cost of the materials). <br /><br />Deland’s characters were often strong women, an outstanding example being steel-mill operator Mrs. Maitland in “The Iron Woman.” Despite her push for women’s rights, she nonetheless opposed women’s suffrage, although she didn’t make a point of doing so. Like a lot of us, Deland had her internal conflicts, one of them being that she was concerned that, with greater rights for women, families would be more prone to fragmentation, so this put her in the position of helping women be independent (through providing job-training schools for example) while worrying that too much independence would destroy families. Her husband was an outstandingly fine man who was at one time the head football coach at Harvard, and who started the world’s first advertising agency. He was also a prominent philanthropist, and it was through him that Margaret became concerned with philanthropy (soon after they were married, they started taking unwed pregnant women into their home). As for independence, Margaret was so bent on being independent that she became alienated from her fairly wealthy and very traditional family while still in her teens so what she feared in regard to women’s ndependence, she had herself experienced.<br /><br />“it's going to be a painful political season here in america. i shudder.”<br /><br />I had thought that, perhaps, my support of Sanders would redeem me, at least to some extent, in your eyes even if you’re for Hillary.<br /><br />I think that Billy Collins is an unfortunate name for a poet, but I believes he’s the poet laureate of America. I’ve heard him interviewed, and he seemed like a pretty good guy, and I very much like the poem you shared, although I’m not sure what it means. Surely, one can be neurotically—and hence miserably—concerned with safety in regard to things that almost surely won’t happen anyway, but I’ve also been struck by the fact that some of the silliest sentiments I’ve ever heard were expressed by various people who claimed that by taking precautions, we attract to ourselves the very things that we fear, hence we shouldn’t take precautions, not only regarding household but even getting mammograms (such people nonetheless look before they cross the street). I definitely lean the other way, seeing some of myself in the woman in the poem.Snowbrushhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00436087215476479042noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-31046176918376147132016-02-22T20:02:24.657-08:002016-02-22T20:02:24.657-08:00P.S. one of my favorite poems because i wish I'...P.S. one of my favorite poems because i wish I'd written it:<br /><br />The Country<br />by Billy Collins<br />I wondered about you<br />when you told me never to leave<br />a box of wooden, strike-anywhere matches<br />lying around the house because the mice<br /><br />might get into them and start a fire.<br />But your face was absolutely straight<br />when you twisted the lid down on the round tin<br />where the matches, you said, are always stowed.<br /><br />Who could sleep that night?<br />Who could whisk away the thought<br />of the one unlikely mouse<br />padding along a cold water pipe<br /><br />behind the floral wallpaper<br />gripping a single wooden match<br />between the needles of his teeth?<br />Who could not see him rounding a corner,<br /><br />the blue tip scratching against a rough-hewn beam,<br />the sudden flare, and the creature<br />for one bright, shining moment<br />suddenly thrust ahead of his time—<br /><br />now a fire-starter, now a torchbearer<br />in a forgotten ritual, little brown druid<br />illuminating some ancient night.<br />Who could fail to notice,<br /><br />lit up in the blazing insulation,<br />the tiny looks of wonderment on the faces<br />of his fellow mice, onetime inhabitants<br />of what once was your house in the country?<br />"The Country" by Billy Collins, from Nine Horses: Poems. © Random House, 2003. Reprinted with permissionkjhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15122196887043345981noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-82555214227310610312016-02-22T19:58:45.584-08:002016-02-22T19:58:45.584-08:00Hi snow,
I had to look up margaret deland, which ...Hi snow,<br /><br />I had to look up margaret deland, which i admit with some surprise and embarrassment. i don't read a lot of literary/historical realism but surely i should have heard of her!<br /><br />i liked your letter also: lots of mish mashes and that's one of my favorite subjects. i like knowing you bake. i do too: breads and biscuits are comfort food for me. i feel productive when i bake.<br /><br />"sometimes I wish I had someplace to go too, although I don’t wish it hard enough to actually do it." i worry about this for myself sometimes: i walk this balance of being too active and not active enough. maybe because i write, i could so easily remain sedentary and solitary. JB has nudged me to walk with her most days and i do it reluctantly, due to sheer laziest.<br /><br />it's going to be a painful political season here in america. i shudder.<br /><br />take care, snow,<br />love<br />kj kjhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15122196887043345981noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-82735708102999456822016-02-22T08:47:09.024-08:002016-02-22T08:47:09.024-08:00Banacek, Perry Mason...
What about Deadwood?
If ...Banacek, Perry Mason...<br /><br />What about Deadwood?<br /><br />If you're lying awake reciting poems, does your brain get a chance to update its files and put everything in the proper sectors so it can operated at peak efficiency?E. Rosewaterhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03935662703893558945noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-72423795128708523372016-02-21T13:53:59.441-08:002016-02-21T13:53:59.441-08:00I loved this post. Now I feel I know you a bit mo...I loved this post. Now I feel I know you a bit more. Sanders is my pick. I did not donate money to his campaign but certainly entertained the idea I have ill feelings about Miss Hillary. She has a vast number of 'fans' though. My gut feeling is that by hook or crook she will come out on top. Why do I feel this way, you may ask. I know enough about the Clintons that there is no trust coming from me. Ha, mark my words, Chelsea will be campaigning for a spot before we can get a deep breath. I think this country has had enough of the Clinton clan. I definitely have. I like Trump too. Spending his own wealth campaigning impressed me much. Has that ever happened in our history?<br /><br />You have much in common with me and collecting. "I GOT ROCKS", plants galore, collect buttons and apparently books - all kinds- to learn from, for pleasure. What a fool I am, $1000s sunk in books that would take two or more lifetimes to read. Art is my favorite buy today. I must investigate your lady writer; wondering if the library carries any of her writings.<br /><br />I hope you will continue posting in this chatty mode. Have read but 1 comment so far, yet I'm betting all your readers enjoyed it greatly. Keep 'em coming, Snow.<br /><br />Caddiehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07575600935524610154noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-84835389478132381462016-02-21T10:54:43.391-08:002016-02-21T10:54:43.391-08:00“this letter has given me a detailed insight into ...“this letter has given me a detailed insight into what kind of person you are. Okay, here it is: I like you.”<br /><br />Why thank you!<br /><br />“You appear to be gentle, amusing, thoughtful, cat-loving, wife-loving, eminently sensible and an accomplished cook, baker and all-round bottle-washer.”<br /><br />Give me a moment to go over your list to see if I agree… I especially love “eminently sensible,” because I try very, very hard not to do stupid things if only because they put a person to a lot more work, and that’s if they can be remedied at all. I would only dispute two of your points. I like to cook soups, but other than that, I would say, “Put a recipe book in front me, and I can probably cook whatever you want cooked, but I will neither hate doing it nor enjoy doing it.” I’m only fair at yeast breads because the whole grain loaves never come out as well as the bleached loaves (which I don’t cook)—maybe I would do better if I used special bread flour or had some of the additives the big bakers use. Crackers, though, that’s my love and my meditation. One batch takes three hours, and they’re messy to roll out, and I’ve never met another person who baked crackers or even had an interest in homemade crackers. so what’s to love? It’s the sturdiness, the primitiveness, and the fact they keep indefinitely, of crackers, as well as the fact that if I don’t bake them, I won’t have them. It is not a shared enthusiasm. Put a loaf of homemade yeast bread in front of a person, and they drool, but put a recipe of crackers in front of them, and they look loathe to even taste them, and make no comment when they do.Snowbrushhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00436087215476479042noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-6414960429548056542016-02-21T10:32:45.387-08:002016-02-21T10:32:45.387-08:00Hello Snowbrush, I really enjoyed this inconsequen...Hello Snowbrush, I really enjoyed this inconsequentially rambling letter. I haven’t ‘known’ you for long but this letter has given me a detailed insight into what kind of person you are. Okay, here it is: I like you.<br /><br />You appear to be gentle, amusing, thoughtful, cat-loving, wife-loving, eminently sensible and an accomplished cook, baker and all-round bottle-washer.<br /><br />I shall look forward to more of these letters.Frikohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04277167831642088694noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-52656156530429458912016-02-20T13:48:36.929-08:002016-02-20T13:48:36.929-08:00“If a person is fully engaged in the real world, t...“If a person is fully engaged in the real world, then the cyber world and blogging plays a small part.”<br /><br />So if I write to you about you’ve said, you would regard it as less “real” than if we talk in person? I say this to illustrate my difficulty in understanding the point of your comment, it being based upon terms that I can’t define, terms like “real world and “fully engaged”. Obviously, many people over-emphasis computer-based communication and games, including texting on cellphones, to face-to-face communication, but let’s not forget non-computer related diversions that accomplish the same end. For instance drugs, reading, world travel, hobbies, shopping, TV, gambling, sex, risk taking, acculating money, and hundreds of more things, can all be used to avoid being emotionally present, and they’re not just for humans either. For example, I saw something on TV about monkeys who discovered that the defensive odor emitted by some sort of arthropod would get them high, and this made it a very popular arthropod. <br /><br />“But if a person is not fully engaged in the real world and lacks the ability to interact with people on a personal level, then the cyber world becomes more important.”<br /><br />Again, I don’t know what you mean by “real world,” fully engaged,” or “lacks the ability to interact,” however, they seem to portray the situation as rather more black and white than I’m comfortable with, so I’lll run something past you, and you can let me know if I’m right. Ram Dass and Thích Nhất Hạnh are two notable modern gurus who insist that not being in the “real world” means not being fully present in the moment. To address this, Ram Dass—in Be Here Now—forbade a traveling companion from talking about any person or event that was someplace else, whether geographically or in time, and Thích Nhất Hạnh even objected to a person talking, watching TV, while doing dishes, his feeling being that when you sweep, do dishes, chop wood, and so forth, that should be all you. So, my friend, is there how you think we should live?<br /><br />“A man can imagine himself to the smartest creature on earth and spin all sorts of tales on a blog. It's cheaper than seeing a therapist.”<br /><br />It’s also not so great a waste of time.<br /><br />“Has anything in human history dumbed people down and spread more false data than facebook?”<br /><br />Or TV, texting and so forth. We’re coming be less and less interested in that which is isn’t both instantly available and bumper-sticker brief.<br /><br />“Why the comment moderation? Are your followers so untrustworthy that their comments require vetting before being published?”<br /><br />I guess you need to define “untrustworthy" as well as it surely suggests more that one possibility, but why would is it that the supposed ill-will of my readers was the only possibility that suggested itself to you? That said, I enabled comment moderation because I don’t want to waste my readers’ time with SPAM, rabid attacks on yours truly, comments that have nothing whatever to do with the subject of the post, comments that contain nothing more than a personal message to me, and duplicate comments by people whom aren’t sure their first comment went through. For the same reason—not wanting to waste time or cause their mailboxes to be stuffed unnecessarily—I often address multiple comments in the same comment box.Snowbrushhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00436087215476479042noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-63623453173046295712016-02-20T10:35:06.474-08:002016-02-20T10:35:06.474-08:00I consider the world of cyber communication to be ...I consider the world of cyber communication to be an adjunct to the real world. If a person is fully engaged in the real world, then the cyber world and blogging plays a small part. But if a person is not fully engaged in the real world and lacks the ability to interact with people on a personal level, then the cyber world becomes more important. A man can imagine himself to the smartest creature on earth and spin all sorts of tales on a blog. It's cheaper than seeing a therapist. <br /><br />Has anything in human history dumbed people down and spread more false data than facebook? I don't think so.<br /><br />Why the comment moderation? Are your followers so untrustworthy that their comments require vetting before being published?Michael Valentine Smithhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06178225391656275884noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-30786470819327697962016-02-19T11:16:35.657-08:002016-02-19T11:16:35.657-08:00“You must spend a long time replying to blog comme...“You must spend a long time replying to blog comments. That is intimidating. One has to be so careful what one says as each word will be analysed and commented on.”<br /><br />I’m astounded because I rather saw it as a good thing, a gift even, that comes from a desire to give good attention and to engage beyond the superficial. One of my major disappointments with blogging is that many people post nothing but trivia and that their readers people respond to it with one-liners. It’s not that every post needs to be intellectually or emotionally significant, but on many blogs, none are. If I limited myself that way, I wouldn’t blog at all. Another thing that surprises me about so many blogs is that the person is married but never posts about his or her spouse. Maybe their spouses forbid it, but again, if I were so limited, I don’t know that I would blog, and I might not even be with my wife if she were that secretive. On one occasion, I lost two friends—a couple—over a post, but it turned out that they used it as an occasion to tell me that they had numerous problems with me, so the post was simply the final straw, and one for which I could make no apology.<br /><br />“I am not a cat person (do you have children?), but I enjoyed the rest.”<br /><br />No kids. Peggy and I spent forty years as dog people, but we finally got burned-out with how much work dogs are, and that’s why we have cats. The self-cleaning feature, the litter-box feature, the “I’m not completely miserable when I’m alone” feature, and the “I NEVER want to go for a walk” feature, make cats ever so much easier. Granted, cats are not dogs, but they aren’t the distant, callous, and uncaring creatures that people make them out to be either. Indeed, our cats are very attached to us.<br /><br />“It has fascinated me that many blog-followers are quite happy to read about one's mundane and routine every-day life.”<br /><br />I know. Bloggers will write post after photo-laden post about how cute their grandkids are, and people who have never laid eyes on their grandkids will read them. I think the truth is that (a) most people are fairly shallow (which DOESN’T mean they’re dumb), and that (b) people visit bloggers who visit their blogs no matter how boring those blogs are.Snowbrushhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00436087215476479042noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-87003028312960873202016-02-19T08:29:38.707-08:002016-02-19T08:29:38.707-08:00Wow. You must spend a long time replying to blog c...Wow. You must spend a long time replying to blog comments. That is intimidating. One has to be so careful what one says as each word will be analysed and commented on. I enjoyed this post: I am not a cat person (do you have children?), but I enjoyed the rest. It has fascinated me that many blog-followers are quite happy to read about one's mundane and routine every-day life. I guess that is the secret of the TV soapies. Perhaps it is because one can then think, "thank God, my life is no less eventful or boring than the next person's". I am normal. I love it that you bake: we have visitors for a week next week, and I am going to make a load of pastry to make pies. Last week, we made 18 kilos of venison/mutton mince and 20 kilos of pork (well, wild pig) sausage. At the moment, hubby is making a frame to put on our trailer on which to load our 25-year-warrantied mattress which has collapsed, in order to get it into Cape Town for repair. Never a dull moment really.fiftyoddhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17372578925298011630noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-48993655082733995932016-02-17T09:56:45.269-08:002016-02-17T09:56:45.269-08:00“Do you feel a sense of freedom when Peggy is away...“Do you feel a sense of freedom when Peggy is away?”<br /><br />Yes. I also work more, not because more needs to be done, but because I don’t have to accommodate anyone but myself, so I can use that time to "catch up" as it were. After about five days, I miss her too much to want her to stay gone any longer.<br /><br />“How you and Dana get to be friends is beyond me, you put so much effort into being reasonable and she is so much of a "my way or the highway" person.”<br /><br />It might help that we agree about most things. She calls me brother and I call her sister, and it feels right, maybe the moreso because we are both almost without family. She’s on the outs with some of hers, and my only “whole” sister hasn’t spoken to me since 1994 (she’s mad because our father left everything to me, and she’ll stay that way until I share it with her, which means that she’ll die without us ever speaking). I have another sister, a “half” sister with whom I correspond. She too often gets mad at me, but never goes away completely. She also email sometimes, and I value that.<br /><br />“People are endlessly fascinating, aren’t they?”<br /><br />I have a rather low opinion of them enmasse, but I tend to like the ones I actually meet, although I find cats, dogs, and children less troublesome.Snowbrushhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00436087215476479042noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-60273065560757727242016-02-16T11:23:01.751-08:002016-02-16T11:23:01.751-08:00“It was fish, cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions, an...“It was fish, cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions, and garlic!”<br /><br />Surely, there were cucumbers….Oh, I now see that you DID includ cucumbers—I wish you would speak up. I wonder if they had salt for their cukes, and what kinds of melons did they have? I know that if I were considering trading my freedom for melons, I would definitely want to know what kind. Nothing against cantaloupes, but I wouldn’t go into slavery for them, but for good watermelons? Maybe.Of course, I would have to take into consideration that it would be a HOT watermelon, and they probably wouldn’t give me any salt for it either… Just look at Ollie and tell me if he doesn’t look a pharaoh, and come to think of it, that’s about how he’s treated around here. Peggy and I used to lie in bed and stare all doe-eyed at one another; now we lie in bed at stare doe-eyed at our cat.<br /><br />“Most men belived baking and cooking are strictly women responsibility in Africa.”<br /><br />So, how do you feel about me being a baker, my friend? Also, what do the women in your fair land of Nigeria bake? I suppose I picture them baking some kind of flat bread since that seems to be a hit the world over, especially in the hotter parts of the globe. What about in the military—don’t men bake in the military? Traditionally, in America, women did the cooking except for where rich people and expensive restaurants were concerned, and they often hired male chefs.<br /><br />I could tell you all manner of shocking facts about how non-traditional Peggy and I are. For instance, did you know that we used to be in a group marriage with another woman (the law prevented us from making it legal, but, as much as possible, we lived as if it were. Also, she’s retired now, but she made most of the money in our 44-year relationship because I never made much even when I was working, and much of my work—carpentry, roofing, plumbing, electrical work, and yard work—was done on our various houses (we’ve owned four houses in three states), and for that I made no money, although I certainly saved us a lot. Another funny thing is that my favorite color is pink, and her’s is blue, which is just the opposite of what men and women are “supposed” to prefer (people even buy pink clothes and blankets for girls and blue ones for boys). Clearly, if we lived in a time and place where men and women were bound to strick gender roles, neither of us would have been happy. <br /><br />“I love this letter, its cool talking about American politics as well.”<br /><br />Thank you. Tell me something, will you? Where you live, would it be safe to blog approvingly in regard to atheism, Christianity, and homosexuality—how about minority politics? Here, a blogger might arouse a lot of controversy, but it’s unlikely that he would come to harm, and this is something that worries me about militant Islam, not just because of militant Islam itself but because some liberal nations now have laws against offending religious people.<br /><br />It can create a lot of bitterness here because the nation has become increasingly divided between extremes. Trump and Sanders are on opposite sides, yet they are alike in that neither was thought to have any chance of winning when they started out, yet they’ve both so risen in popularity that they very well could win, and if you want to see a record-breaking voter turnout, just let those guys be the candidates. Did you know it takes a billion dollars to run for president in America? It’s a joke here to say that we have the best politicians that money can buy.Snowbrushhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00436087215476479042noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-31175834472595827332016-02-16T03:13:30.556-08:002016-02-16T03:13:30.556-08:00The cats are not looking bad. Its been awhile you ...The cats are not looking bad. Its been awhile you wrote about them. Nice!<br /><br />So you can bake? That's really pretty nice to know. Most men belived baking and cooking are strictly women responsibility in Africa.<br /><br />Talking to someone you met on the internet is good especially when you keep the right minded buddy. I also have some couples of online friends that we now talk on phone on a daily basis.<br /><br />I love this letter, its cool talking about American politics as well. All eyes on 2016, and am currently following the trend of dramatic debate going on among the political parties.<br /><br />Thank you for sharing this.Uthman Saheedhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00932760816409731382noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-1363927817990559622016-02-15T17:14:59.317-08:002016-02-15T17:14:59.317-08:00Close (not). It was fish, cucumbers, melons, leek...Close (not). It was fish, cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions, and garlic! See Numbers 11:5 (Numbers is the fourth book in the Bible --between Leviticus and Deuteronomy).<br /><br />Happy to be of service!rhymeswithplaguehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10870439618129001633noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-30713435390590583502016-02-15T15:29:04.516-08:002016-02-15T15:29:04.516-08:00Dearest Snow,
Thank you for your newsy letter, it ...Dearest Snow,<br />Thank you for your newsy letter, it always brightens my day when i hear from you.<br />A few years ago I found and rescued a very small kitten, we couldnt really keep her here and my parents were pet-less at the time so they took her and within a year she was poisoned (possibly by a neighbour's garden chemicals) and required days on dialysis. As it happened mum & dad were invited to a wedding and so, with nothing they could do for poor Oscar, they left her in the care of the vets and travelled to the wedding. They fretted all the way there but by the time they got back, the cat was well enough to go home and my parents were $1000 poorer. I still get a lot of lighthearted bkame for that little expense!<br />One of our rabbits recently punctured his eye and is needing weekly check ups, we hope he will make a full recovery but it's hard to predict. He is currently in a small hutch rather than his generous outdoor run, it's easier to manage medications that way, but he isnt happy there and has lost 10% of his weight. I look forward to the day we can return him to the run with his brother.<br />Do you feel a sense of freedom when Peggy is away? I used to think I had less obligations when my husband went away but now it doesnt feel much different except that i have to be responsible for more things.<br />I have met quite a number of my blogmates and they all turn out to be true to their written word. I have never had a conscious expectation of how a blogmate will be but i have also never been surprised. How you and Dana get to be friends is beyond me, you put so much effort into being reasonable and she is so much of a "my way or the highway" person. People are endlessly fascinating, arent they?<br />Take care, my friend and write again<br /><br />Kylie xokyliehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08964475783207438103noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23830899.post-61059743982398358222016-02-15T13:45:16.817-08:002016-02-15T13:45:16.817-08:00No political, religious, or other affiliation can ...No political, religious, or other affiliation can guarantee personal integrity. For example, I think that Hillary (and Bill too in some ways) is obnoxious, unethical, and lacking in vision. However, there is a big difference in the way the two parties now operate, and it is that the Republicans consider compromise a weakness and take the position that the government that governs the least is the government that governs the best, i.e. let Big Business do whatever it wants and people die in the streets as more and more of us can no longer afford medical care. <br /><br />You will surely agree that it is generally true that Republicans favor fewer restrictions on the behavior of business and more restrictions on the behavior of individuals, while Democrats favor more restrictions on the behavior of business and fewer restrictions on the behavior of individuals. While both parties must be short-sighted in order to win elections—present wealth being immeasurably more important in the minds of most people than the future welfare of the planet and its human inhabitants—Republicans, as a whole, don’t even pretend to pretend to care about anything else (they trust that God won’t allow ecosystems to fail, and that global warming doesn’t exist), while Democrats at least acknowledge that there is a problem. <br /><br />As for the difference between fascism and socialism, I’ll just paste a few sentences from http://www.just-say-why.com/blog/2012/04/21/whats-the-difference-between-fascism-socialism-and-communism/<br /><br />“Fascism is best described as a merging of corporate and government interests. In simpler terms, it’s when corporations have taken over the government. This is also called a Oligarchy because the wealthy control the entire country.”<br /><br />“Socialism is where people are directly involved in the production of goods and services, things like cooperatives where the workers are the owners of the businesses. This doesn’t mean the government owns and manages the businesses. The business exists for the sake of providing for society, or the social good.”<br /><br />I guess you know that Donald Trump has promised to “keep us safe,” even at the cost of abandoning the freedoms guaranteed by the Bill of Rights, yet he is the overwhelmingly favored candidate of Republicans, so what does this tell you about how much Republicans as a group value freedom? No people are quicker than conservatives to wave the flag in honor of those who have died to preserve freedom, yet it now appears that no people are quicker than they to trade freedom for safety, thus surrendering the very thing that hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of Americans have died to defend. I can’t get my mind around this, and I don’t know how you can. I know you’re not for Trump, yet how can you respect your Party as whole given the willingness of its people to choose personal survival over principal even before a shot has been fired? I’m reminded of the Israelites who so quickly decided that they preferred the slavery of Egypt over the freedom of the Sinai because at least in Egypt, they had turnips (I think it was turnips, but I trust that you’ll be so kind as to correct me if I have my veggies wrong).Snowbrushhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00436087215476479042noreply@blogger.com