Day seems to begin with the weather - - which looking west beyond Thomas Drive, PCB this early dark-thirty morning seems totally dark overcast, mild and muggy on the Florida Gulf Coast where Every Day Is A Beautiful Day.  Then it gets to food, doesn't it. Some mornings I like a snack with my mug of hot & black. Topmost Favorite is liver pate on one of those new whole grain saltine crackers, this morning the same cracker with guacamole from those little two-ounce single-serves. If I'd been sticking to two-ounce servings of everything all my life, Time might have been stretched out a bit longer, eh? But as it is, Life Is Good and wishing you long years. If we let it happen, and I have done, modern technology ensnares us, doesn't it, takes the place of people, supplants relationships and the exercise of mind and body. Someone once accused me of being a "voracious reader" and maybe so, but that was before the Internet. Yesterday though, instead of being online all...

  Not so much anymore, for some years we had a glass of wine early evenings, mine a dry red, heavy, strong, not a light wine. May be the aging, but seems like even one glass gets quickly to my balance these days, so a glass of wine only now and then, before or with a heavier meal. Fathers Day is coming up, for example, and my thinking is, God willing (and we all know what that means) a glass of red with a steak that I grill rare. I'm thinking to grill it outside on 7H porch so I don't smoke up the condo and set off the alarm. With it? IDK, maybe broccoli with cheese? Or a baked potato? IDK, we'll see. Maybe. Whatever, nomesane? The other thing is the martini after church on Sundays. I like a gin martini so I can taste it, not a vodka martini, which is like subtly alcoholized ice water, though sometimes I mix half gin and half vodka, using a potato vodka from Poland. As for gin, I have maybe a half dozen bottles of different gins, all decent for the martini. I like it "...

Why are we here?" is a fair, reasonable, and standard existential question. We are here "because" - - and our task while here, that is to say, while we as intelligent beings inhabit whatever Creation turns out to have been, be, and becoming, is to think, ponder, contemplate ourselves and all that's around us and never believe we have finally figured out the "because." Our task is not to believe, but to think, to seek, again, as in Seek The Truth, Come Whence It May, Cost What It Will.  Every contemplation, and every space telescope that goes up helps deliver us, carrying us farther and farther from primitive nonsensical ignorance that holds us to be the center and reason for all that is, seen and unseen.  And the costs of Hubble and of JWST demonstrate that "Cost What It Will" is Not Only immense physical, material, and intellectual human cost, But Also mind-boggling theological, metaphysical jarring in a world that hosts some 4,200 religions http...

  What happens? Nothing. On days I don't write a blogpost, I've actually written one, but went back later to finish or have another look before pressing Publish, seen what asinine nonsense it was, and pressed rubbish instead of publish.  Rather than starting my day by loosing the dancing fingers on the laptop keys, I may open the Cards file and see if my brain is still alive enough to win a game of two suit spider solitaire. Online, I only play free games, no pay stuff.  Some days open News and see what's going on. Some days open Mail and read an online magazine article, today something from Smithsonian about The Myth of the Dark Ages, pinch a photo, every Thursday brings FiveThirtyEight Newsletter to open again on Friday morning. Some sources still moaning over Trump's interview on CNN - - I did not watch it but later read it verbatim start to finish, it was somewhere way off in NeverNeverLand south of the south pole, WTF is the matter with people. There was a Time whe...

  No more calamari for me, nomesane? And soon as the market opens I'm dumping my squid futures. All because Sean of the South's expose' has given a new meaning to the term Pork Butt. Up early as usual, maybe a bit earlier than most mornings, but I'm dressed and ready because Kristen is to come by around six, and I'll drop her at her school, where middle schoolers are shortly to board a bus for an excursion to Atlanta. While she's away, we'll look after her car, and Linda and I are to drive out to her apartment at PCB and look after Pacey Kitty. He's a good cat, likes me, but when he lowers his ears and squints his eyes, try to distract him while you move your hand away as quickly as possible. Or, wear thick leather gloves. Speaking of Sean, along with unmentionables he mentioned having Krab® rangoon at the Chinese restaurant. I no longer order that, because it's kayfer and if I want crab I don't want kayfer.  My first experience with kayfer was w...

Hatred, I've known hatred at least the past eighty years, and have recognized and been fighting it for half of that. Guilt and shame, but I see by Professor Shore's essay (below, scroll down, and I may have printed it here previously) that my brand of hatred was not only me, but was endemic with my generation and the WW1 and WW2 generations before me. So, I don't feel so singularly infected. That song again, from "South Pacific" You’ve Got to Be Carefully Taught To hate and fear, You’ve got to be taught From year to year, It’s got to be drummed In your dear little ear You’ve got to be carefully taught. You’ve got to be taught to be afraid Of people whose eyes are oddly made, And people whose skin is a diff’rent shade, You’ve got to be carefully taught. You’ve got to be taught before it’s too late, Before you are six or seven or eight, To hate all the people your relatives hate, You’ve got to be carefully taught Once ingrained, hatred becomes part of who/what we ar...

  Still contemplating "We believe" - - this morning while sipping a second mug of hot & black and munching another breakfast favorite, sandwich of two slices liverwurst, smear of mayonnaise (trying a new mayo on Bud's word that Blue Plate is the best and Hellmann's is second) on two slices of Dave's Seed Bread.  But "We believe" - - what am I willing to accept as irreducible minimum in my personal package that includes self-trained amateur astronomer, professionally educated Christian clergyman, and byline "Seek The Truth, Come Whence It May, Cost What It Will". Acknowledging to self that the cost has been, is, and yet may be great, greater, greatest in life, including relationships and associations with others. Always something comes to mind as a point of reference. Right now, what comes to mind is that day in New Testament class in seminary, we were discussing the miracles and signs of Jesus in the canonical gospels, and a class member as...