Chicken or the Egg

My answer to which came first is I don't know.

This epitomizes my attitude about such things. Some folks cannot believe the Bible's main message if the entire Bible is in their eyes flawless (flawless according to their own criteria), so they force themselves to believe that everything must be explained and that (for example) there is no way we came from apes. They end up just the same as the clergy who embarrassed themselves by proclaiming the earth was flat and by persecuting Galileo and his ilk.

Why not just be honest with yourself and be content with what you do know? Why try to prove anything else? It is because men try to know and be more than they do and are that there is more than one Christian church in the world today.

In regard to evolution, science, creation, doctrine, I am content that whatever happened and however it took place did so, no matter what I think. Therefore, why worry or even wonder? I talk to God; He talks to me. I know that much so it makes no difference to me how I came to be. I also know that God wills organized religion - as long as it was organized by Him, and that there are necessary ordinances and oblations administered formally through His priesthood to gaining His presence again. I know this because He talks to me. He talks to anyone who is not afraid to seek Him where He is.

The Bible's main message? Repent, for Christ lives, having died for us. Repent and live forever. It's all through the Old Testament as well as the New.

Stuff That Irritates Me

Normally when I push snow, I am driving a huge 2003 Ford F250 with no frills and, for a 2003, no nonsense.

"IT'S TOTALLY AWESOME"

It's up high, has big tires and nothing stops it. It literally pushes snow - piles of it.

The cab is clean and relatively free of gadgetry for a contemporary vehicle.

Today, I traded with Kenny, who normally drives a newer GMC. It has 4 doors, power everything, is low to the ground, is only 1/2 ton, is basically an El Camino in truck form. It has those new big flashy turn signals in the rear view mirrors. It has On-Star. It automatically locks the doors after you drive 20 feet. I was escorting Matt who was driving the Bobcat on public streets (top speed 4 mph). I had my flashers on, and since I was driving so slow with my flashers on (one can only presume), On-Star called me up and we were busy pushing buttons to make it go away. Finally, it did. I drove off and on for 11 hours today, and since I didn't know where the power buttons to adjust the seat were, I just suffered through with aching back and awkward handling of the controls. I did find the one that blows up the seat cushion though. That did not help.

A whole bunch of crap from the computer kept spewing across a window on the dash. I didn't bother to read any of it, but it inspired me to say, "I don't want to drive around in a computer; they are fine if you leave them on the desktop." I don't need the blue screen of death (nor a window I cannot open or shut because the wiring went bad) where speed and my body are concerned.

Nor do I need ABS, auto, this, that, crap, and least of all do I need electronic beeping and chiming.

I am very grateful for the GMC and the chance to share the experience. It served me well today, and I found driving it very irritating.

Can we get rid of all the useless electronic beeps? Let's start with microwave ovens and big trucks backing up, and work from there.

Revival

It is time for a revival because I have generally slipped into old habits, using more insulin, eating big or long meals and so forth.

My goals now are to train my body never to eat large or long and to keep my sugar from EVER spiking at all.

My focus is not to become insulin shot free.

Not eating after 6:00 or 8:00 pm had gone out the window because of my 24/7 on-call employment, but that should be ending soon.

I also told my wife not to buy me any more peanuts.

I got some good produce the other day and have begun again to eat my salads, vegetable sandwiches, seeds, yeasts, rutebagas and beets.

My motivation as always is, I want to feel great, not like crap. Also, I'd like to be a healthy old coot.

Nihonteki Bento Shokuji

soba noodles - fried tofu - carrot slivers - celery - scallions - fresh ginger - red bell pepper - shiitake mushrooms - tamari - sesame oil (don't overdo it) - sesame seeds - cilantro - garlic

can add millet and barley

can eat two large collard leaves on the side if they are big and succulent and green, green, green

Scott for President

I'm running for President sometime, here's my platform:

-Pro Environment and Conservation (tax credits or perks of some sort for not cranking up your A/C to get 54 degrees F in the Summer time)

-Anti Murder

-Limits on the Ability to Sue, perhaps similar to how they control it accross the Pond

-Make GMO foods and agriculture policy hot issues

-Admit Social Security was a socialistic mistake and phase it out (If you're over 40, take your choice whether to claim benefits, if 40 or under, you have none - or something like that, and eliminate the social security tax immediately)

-Campaign to avoid social, mandatory medical insurance, and keep government the heck out of it We can fight our own medical insurance battles, thank you very much indeed Campaign and thus hopefully avoid another social security type fiasco of mandatory We'll Take Care of You - "Oh, Sure!" MAXIMIZE FREEDOM

-Explore ways to turn welfare over to a local level and even one in which the government is not involved at all

-Conduct an extremely non-media-biased-nor-partisan referendum to find out whether the people Really Don't Want a Flat Income Tax

-Appoint a Justice or two that can overturn Clarence Thomas' conflict-of-interest driven decision that Monsanto & Co Own Earth and Nature.

Monsanto Corp.

Never mind arguing the atrocities they committed in the name of legality, forsaking ethics. Never mind debating their right to step on honest people to "protect their patent."

Never mind that you cannot save your own seeds that have been contaminated by their unwanted yet protected intellectual property.

The original point here is, who gave them the right to change the DNA of our food, to change our planet without even asking???????

I always wondered why this was not an issue during the George W. administration. Then I watched the documentary, FOOD, INC. According to the film, appointed cheeses in the FDA and so forth were former Monsanto executives.

Note that while the prevalent claim is that genetically modified soy beans do not harm us, I regularly ate non-organic run-of-the-mill tofu and roasted beans and soy mayonnaise for years, right up through the contamination and take-over of GMO soy. When the take-over occurred, I suddenly found myself breaking out in hives that wouldn't quit until I switched to organic, non-GMO food. Call it anecdotal.

What gives them the right?

Use it now, worry later - that's always been the American way. It was that way with killing the buffalo, nuclear testing, x-ray machines in the corner drug stores, and everything in between.

So now let's make it an issue. Go watch the film and see who to boycott.

Ironies

Managers of engineers are forever vigilant to prevent engineers from spending too much time on "science projects" in which more analysis and more than adequate tools are used than the need justifies. Problem is, they only have themselves to check themselves and they are men (though a different sort, many times) like their engineers. The result is, they go berserk with more tools and analysis than the problem justifies.

In some offices, engineers are spending all their time assessing and documenting their own poor performance on the job they didn't do because they were busy assessing and documenting their poor performance. When not assessing and documenting, they are documenting and seeking signatures of approval of a plan for their project that they cannot start on until all signatures are obtained. They are compelled to do it by management, who claim to believe it should make the project go faster and seamlessly, while any idiot knows that true inspiration for what to do comes only after one gets started. So the planning intended to prevent screw-ups takes longer to accomplish than the project (including screw-ups) itself. This mostly occurs when there are more managers than are needed, so they institute programs that can show on paper that they accomplished something. Otherwise, they get demoted. So inefficiency grows and professionals spend more and more time at the office. Can you say "Six-Sigma"?

Like a powerful finite element program, Six-Sigma has its place but can be overkill. Managers have been "playing around" with their tools too much in some offices and at the same time admonishing their engineers to "just make it bigger - never mind all those equations."

The reason engineers tend to overkill is that it is fun to get fancy and use the knowledge that they worked so hard to obtain. Managers are no different. Of course, not all engineers nor all managers are like that. But there are enough who are to make a problem in management where there is no one to rein them in. Normally, the Customer serves as the management check, but things are not always normal, especially when the Customer is the government, or indirectly, the taxpayer.

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One popular self-image in America is that of World Protector. "Our role in the world is to sacrifice the lives of our young men to defend all from tyranny in the world." Some seem to relish that role, even when their own sons have not been lost. I see the moral sense in it, but find it ironic that while we "freed the Iraqis," the French, etc., and passionately decry Hitler to this day, we put on blinders to the atrocities in North Korea that exceed those committed by Hitler & Co. We are no different than Hitler's German general public that "didn't seem to know what was going on with the Jews."

There is a reason for this, I'm sure. I don't know what it is, so I don't know whether it is a good reason. Anyway, there it is. You don't need to know the reason to see the irony.

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Do I need to go into detail on how many Americans these days think black is white and other times it is black and if the compass says your train is traveling West it is actually traveling East when it comes to Freedom of Speech and Freedom of Religion? If so, I'll edit this as time goes on.