auld lang syne

we awake today to a fine dusting of frost on everything. the pine needles glisten in the sun. icicles drip from the traffic lights. very pretty, if not for the underlying treacherousness.

the christmas baubles come down today, and the berry garland goes back into storage.

a box of goodies arrives from over the seas. what a lovely way to end the year.

whimpers from coach class

perhaps we should agree to:
1. not recline the seat, so that the person behind can breathe,
2. not grab the seat in front for traction on the way to the loo, and
3. not stuff the space below our seat, so the guy behind can stretch.

and it would be lovely to have footrests to anchor our bodies onto.

night of miracles - christmas cantata 2009

it's my little night of miracles too, as i sing alto to J2's soprano and J1's tenor solo and HOM handles sound and photography. it is an extravagant joy:

1. to be able to sing in choir with my children as my equals,

2. to be able to serve with my whole family, and

3. to be part of a choir again after almost three decades.

notes from hawaii

most awesome:

surfer dudes rising on their boards as they crest a wave.

most abundant:

abc stores, one on each block. i can't imagine their mortgage.

most over-rated:

mai tai. cloyingly sweet without any other bite.

most appreciated:

the sun! the heat!

most fun:

sitting in the pub with HOM J1 and J2 cheering the dallas cowboys to victory against the washington redskins, although in my uninformed excitement i accidentally cheer the replays.

reflections of a traveler flying coach

my pet peeves:
1. getting the last row so that i cannot recline the seat,
2. getting the inside seat so i jump hoops to get to the loo, and
3. - this is really awful - getting a crying baby on board.

my favorites:
1. the aisle seat,
2. two rows from the loo, and
3. an empty seat next to me.

the journey to hawaii

is long drawn out on miniscule airline seats with outrageously truncated leg room so that even my anorexic frame is contorted into unbelievably unnatural angles.

this is one journey that ends marvelously though, as we emerge from the bowels of the airplane and step into the balmy paradise that is hawai'i, and our aches are miraculously exchanged for something suspiciously like a great vacation.

the journey back, which we are facing now, is going to be a grim reminder of life's realities.

it's just another day

it marks one of the two days on which my organized faith is built.

you wouldn't know it though from the frenzy of activities feasts shopping and meltdowns that occur. it might help if we think of it as the annual support-your-local-business drive.

what i hate about snow

1. the shoveling,
2. the indoor sandpit,
3. the traffic snarls, and
3. the slush.


snow, like cold weather, is best appreciated on a postcard.

impressions from cancun 2

4. walmart is in cancun too! and at the back of the low peso stuff i spy the sticker that says, made in china. in mexico!

5. every other stall is selling mexican blankets, which on closer inspection turn out to be kilim type rugs. we find tight weave and vibrant colors that set our hearts a-tripping and acquire three. it means everything else will get squashed, but hey these are wool kilims.

6. my cultural experience does not get to expand beyond tintin and the temple of the sun god, due to a total lack of higher objectives than food and vegetating.

when i finally lift my head from the food pool shopping and predators and accidentally look out to sea, i am captivated. there is a wildness to the crashing waves under a leaden sky that suggests legends and possibilities, and there is a pristine beauty to the famed cancun beach that bewitches even a beachophobe like me. (at least until the excavators turn up to lay the pipes.)

gratitude

i am grateful to return from my weekend trip with HOM to discover that J1 and J2 have been safe fed resourceful and responsible in our absence. could a parent ask for more than to know that her children are growing into maturity? i cannot think of more joyfully humbling knowledge.

snowstorm in d.c.

payback time.

impressions from cancun

1. sun and sea... the beach is off limits this week due to pipe laying, and it is, er, cold. not quite snowstorm cold, but i have packed for phuket type weather, not temps in the sixties. but 's okay; the bikini looks good poolside.

2. to our shock, it rains in cancun. nay, it storms in cancun, enough to flash flood the roads and puncture the awnings and render obsolete our optimistic bottle of sunscreen. then again, the bikini is mainly for show anyway.

3. the place crawls with predatorial purveyors of tours dives trips and vacations who prey on susceptible looking foreigners. fortunately we are so foreign that we do not understand english spanish japanese or chinese.

the journey to cancun

is riddled with challenges, which begin with HOM and me valiantly shoveling the driveway at four a.m. before driving through the blinding snowfall to the airport, where our flight gets delayed two hours on account of a tardy crew member(!@#!), and they continue as we plod through the cattle ranch that is the cancun immigration process to multiple encounters with time-share program vendors who eagerly wait to feed on us as we make our way to our hotel room.

home

HOM and i fly back from sunny cancun to the unmelted snowy banks left behind by the mother of all snowstorms that has pummeled d.c. over the weekend. J1 and J2 have fended very well in our absence and have been fortunate to celebrate cancellation of school as well as church. getaways can grow on one, really. they are certainly one great perquisite of middle age.

rations

supermom notwithstanding, i find myself back at the store to buy bread cookies and other essentials that we are short of. the entire county seems to be here too. the store is overrun with shoppers grimly driving oversized overflowing carts.

at the checkout line, i investigate my neighbors' carts. plenty of meat and bread and lots of toilet rolls. in comparison, my cart has one loaf of bread bars of chocolate and some drinking water, which makes me wonder if i am stocking up on entirely inappropriate items.

above rubies

we're awaiting HOM's return from his trip and bracing ourselves for another snowstorm. do you see a pattern here?

in any case, the storm promises to be the worst in ten years. i'm not sure what that means, but for now i have:

1. stocked up on coffee, milk, english muffins and tv dinners,

2. broken my back lugging the de-icing salt home, all 25 lb of it,

3. dutifully and prophylactically salted our driveway, per the sweet man i met at the grocer's who bought 50 lb of the stuff, and

4. topped up the gas.

i totally feel like the virtuous wife in proverbs 31.

size matters

us postal service

you can apparently post bananas. witness two green birthday gifts from J2 to her friends.

business trip fatigue

this latest trip exacts a high toll. three time zones in two weeks taxes his orientation to place and our joint orientation to time. just a little more, i suspect, and orientation to person will dim as well, and the mental state exam will be complete.

cyril parkinson says when they wanted to make senior civil servants retire they sent them on multiple trips across incompatible time zones*, and it was diabolically effective.

*parkinson's law: the pursuit of progress (1958)

my year in review 2

i have passed three exams, which comforts HOM that the damage done by a vegetating life of leisure is not overtly detectable yet.

i have started three blogs, evidence that my covert cognitive deficits are nevertheless balanced by increasing acidity and decreasing inhibition.

my year in review

i have finally modified my pavlovian conditioning. in response to hihowareyou, instead of reflexly going i'mgoodhowareyou i actually manage to say, i'm fine, thank you.

new year resolution preview

I expect to pass through this world but once. Any good, therefore, that I can do or any kindness I can show to any fellow creature, let me do it now. Let me not defer or neglect it for I shall not pass this way again.

a friend reminds me of the above. looking it up, i find it is attributed to gandhi, emily dickinson, and a quaker missionary called grellet, which makes for a rather sneaky analogy. we discuss implications and logistics and alternatives at length and forget the good we set out to do.

carpe diem. iterum.

excuses and excuses

as a result of:

1. HOM's frequent absences,

2. the chinese water torture, and

3. general malaise,

today, i surface to realize that:

1. we have not mailed any christmas cards this year,

2. it's too late to do so meaningfully by now, and

3. the only thing i'm not too late to do is shop the victoria's secret website, which promises to deliver by christmas day if i order by the 18th. it looks like this year my correspondance will primarily be with various vendors hoping to unlock my inner shopaholic.

sudden light

i stumble onto my primary school alumni association, and am suddenly transported into another world. the memories are delicious and hazy and return in fits. the awkward shyness comes back, but not the pain of awkwardness. the years have polished the child.

the language comes back, which i have not used in years. not at the hello how are you level i mean, but something that is more than purely functional. at native level, malay is as gracefully gently lyrical, as chinese is sharply intellectually satisfying. my loss, to have misplaced one and never acquired the other.

remind me - dottie rambo

the things that i love and hold dear to my heart

are just borrowed they're not mine at all

jesus only let me use them to brighten my life

so remind me remind me dear lord

today, perhaps for the first time, i am able to sing this through, peacefully. it has taken pain to sharpen my vision, and to make me realize that whether or not i would grasp on to precious things, they are never truly mine.

hail to the lord's anointed

which is the closing hymn for today, and as we sing it, a quiet oops slides into place, because it is sung to the tune of one of the infamous, considerably more profane, songs that we used to belt out at the height of an inter-hall songfight back in university.

it distinctly went like this, o why were you born so beautiful, o why were you born at all...

the mall christmas music awards

most often massacred... o holy night

most well done... silver bells

most overplayed... all the santa/snowmen/frosty songs

most likely to unlock my wallet... silver bells

my mall favorite, clearly, is silver bells. my all time favorite is o holy night, the steve green version.

the cloister and the clinic

in korsakov's, or in dementia, or other such catastrophes, however great the organic damage and... dissolution, there remains the undiminished possibility of reintegration by art, by communion, by touching the human spirit: and this can be preserved in what seems at first a hopeless state of neurological devastation. - the lost mariner, oliver sacks

a reminder that we know some but not perhaps much, and so hope is a currency that the wise physician would borrow from the priest.

ouch

biting a. stinging;

it's a bitingly cold day.

statick

my layers of protection come off with the inevitable enthusiastic crackle.

my pantyhose peels off and still holds its shape, with flexures at the knees and ankles.

Dog's disembodied hairs take on a life of their own as they latch onto unsuspecting victims.

the clothes from the dryer sizzle in electrostatic glory.

sometimes, just occasionally, i miss a more humid weather.

tiger woods

the golden boy of golf reveals more clay each day. the list of his paramours so far includes night club hostesses waitresses porn stars and one aspiring model.

all i say is,

1. he seems to have a type,

2. this type seems quite happy to tell all, and

3. the idiot seems to be an unbecomingly unfaithful cad.

remembrances

in the basement i discover a yet-to-be-unpacked box from our latest move. it holds the contents of J1's belated toybox - masks, his lego set, model planes and dreams from long ago. what should i do with this box? my son is a senior in high school but i am loath to discard his possessions from elementary school.

when does it become less heart breaking to retire memories?

health care

Dog goes for his annual exam and vaccination, and drives home the pain of not having health insurance. the vet's fees! the mandatory blood work! the got-to-have vaccines! i find myself trimming his to-have list to the absolute minimum and still end up forking out more than any of the rest of us has for doctors' visits this year, if you discount J1's emergency attendance for his laceration, which is another daylight robbery post.

manna

one has to come to the end of every hoarded resource and feel the cold fingers of fear before it is time to wait upon the only possibility left, divine provision, which is sufficient only unto the day and does not obey the economics of insurance.

even this reminder is manna, from a passage i know beyond knowing, in an hour of darkness, out of an impossible source.

oops

in the process of leaving a comment on chinoiserie's blog i appear to have acquired a new persona on some chinese blogspot. this is a direct result of not understanding the majority of the chinese hieroglyphs and happily muddling through what now appears to have been a registration page, so that i have become the proud owner of a rather complicated looking archetypal page that seems to be promising all manner of possiblities in a language i am only nominally acquainted with.

the eagle and the dove

p.c., book

statistics, essays

drill, needle

bullet-points, sentences

dessert, potatoes

his, hers

happy anniversary, partner

anniversary

it's a nineteen year old prayer, to love, to laugh, and to serve together.

by God's mercy, and against odds, it's been a nineteen year answer.
every good and perfect gift is from above... james 1:17

coffee machines

it's been a little rough getting our coffee. first the krups machine hisses and burns the powder, then HOM goes and barbecues the italian espresso kettle to death and now the french press has done a molotov on me.

it's a good thing our various exotic implements come from yard sales.

the hidden meaning of things

i spy a snow shovel.

ithaca (again)

i stumble across some chinese poems with their english translations here and am enchanted. there is an aching unrestrained beauty that lurks behind the spare words and almost mundane imagery. the art of not saying is magical within the confines of a few metered lines. when you apply the same principles to a play, or prose, you end up with melodrama*, which is awful.

in a nutshell, this is my relationship to chinese literature. i love the way the poetry paints an entire world by suggestion alone, but i dislike the heavy hand when they expand that world. although for pure agony, you can't beat the russians.

*e.g. thunderstorm, which put me off an entire genre.

business travel

HOM is home. rather unexpectedly early, fresh from houston's record setting snowstorm, ahead of our own snow day tomorrow, and in time to leave for his next trip in three days. which makes me inexplicably and gloriously glad, and grateful.

balance

i pull up beside a smartcarfortwo at the gas station. the large gentleman is filling up his tank and we chat about my dream car, after which he bids me good day and inserts himself back into the driver's seat.

the car chassis descends a full six inches onto the tires with the load. i think there ought to be a weight restriction on purchasers of cute subcompacts, in order to preserve aesthetic and mechanical congruence.

provisions

autumn and spring rains in season... the regular weeks of harvest. - jer 5:24

so peace and stability, and bounty, or trying times and grief, or quiet, or turmoil, are not accidental bequests of quixotic fate or the result of unpredictable probability, but what God chooses to give in keeping his promise that my strength shall equal my days.

it is a two part promise, but it's easy to forget that days are given, just as strength is promised.

business trip protocol

when HOM is away,
1. reading dinners are standard,
2. we eat what i wouldn't serve him (like fast food), and
3. i get to go to bed as early as i wish,
but it still makes for a cold bed.

nomenclature

J2 bakes up a big batch of double chocolate cookies, denudes the snacks pantry, and lugs the lot to school. she is co-hosting the inaugural meeting of her brainchild food club today.

if you ask me,

1. it sounds like a party, not a meeting, and

2. it sounds like an excuse for more parties, not a club.

a song to old friends

beyond the distant pavilion beside the ancient road

jade green and fragrant high grass joins the sky

evening breeze sways dripping willows dying flute notes linger

on the hill behind the hill the sun sets

to the ends of the earth and corners of the seas

half our friends are scattered

with a jug of thick wine let's enjoy what remains

and keep at bay tonight's cold dreams

-li shutong

somber thoughts

the commercial strains of black friday sound hauntingly familiar. foreclosures continue telescoping into general bad debt. favored politicians are losing their shine. there's a rash of accidental deaths and military deaths. healthcare is waiting to pull us into a new morass.

is it december already?

adult concerns

HOM wants to go away. privacy, he murmurs. just the two of us.
nothing a good lock wouldn't fix, i say.

living water

jeremiah 2 is the song of a love gone awry, of a covenant reneged. but the sobering lesson is not of losing or keeping one's first love, or even of holding to a pledge, but this:

that we need to believe He is the spring of living water, because the natural thing to do is to dig our own cisterns that do not hold water. it is in seeking our own help that the heart grows less attached; thus are modern idols invited in.

the modern haberdasher's

needles buttons and thread are so old world.

the aftermath

of our encounter with belinda is that we have had turkey with pasta and turkey curry and will perforce have turkey porridge turkey chilli turkey soup turkey noodles and various other turkey incarnations in the foreseeable future. having guests at the table is clearly going to be an act of self-preservation.

mortality

this is our last thanksgiving like this, with a full family in the sweetness of innocence. when thanksgiving comes again, J1 will be in military service and we may not be in this country.

it's a pity that it takes a conscious limit  to add an edge to our experiences that would be dulled by easy unthinking availability.

black friday

the four of us stumble to the mall before the crack of dawn. there is a sea of cars in the parking lot. reality nudges her way in past the morning specials as we realize that:

1. adrenaline runs out after the first five minutes.

2. the 20% off coupon that we have has expired.

3. the line at starbucks is longer than the line at macy's cashier's.

because of the above, there is unexpectedly limited financial fall-out attached to this family outing.

the bird 2

belinda reloaded.

with thanks to turkey tutorials from the food network.

the bird

meet belinda.

my thanksgiving lesson

is this:

if you defrost a turkey without precautions, you are liable to flood your refrigerator with serosanguinous brine.

barking up a tree

there is a cyberphoto of mrs obama digitally altered to resemble an ape. lots of people are up in arms over the racial slur.

this is rather disrespectful to the flotus, of course. back home, one could get sued, on grounds of defamation, or sedition. it is rude and uncalled for. as a woman i am much offended.

but, what is the racial part of the slur? the way i see it, discourtesy and digital morphing do not respect color, or shape, or source really. anyone can be remodeled. perhaps the race refers to the human version, not the black kind, so people are upset that a human gets a simian makeover.

dunnit

fresh from emotionally draining, socially terrifying encounter with the hairdresser. why do people feel obliged to make conversation?

all i want to say is, it looks shorter.

car maintenance 4

the toyota has a new battery. with the other recent acquisitions, we are now practically brand new.

as a result of much early morning drama, i have seen:

1. how to jump-start a car,

2. how to test a car battery, and

3. how to change it.

from the above i realize that the most useful car tool is a visa card.

thank God the action happens today and not tomorrow when the entire country shuts down.

wanna haircut

J1 has gone and got himself a buzz cut.

i want something similar! a jaunty spiky cut. what's holding me back:
1. the new girl, who thinks i need to grow out my hair,
2. HOM who, after nineteen years, apparently likes long tresses,
3. J2, who thinks a middle aged pixie is ridiculous, and
4. personal cowardice.

thanksgiving turkey

in preparation for our first unabridged version, we buy the bird the roasting pan the paraphernalia and HOM hunkers down to turkey tutorials on the food network. at the end of the lessons i return the turkey baster flavor injector pop-out thermometer and oven bags to the store. according to alton brown all we need are a digital meat thermometer and aluminium foil to produce the perfect bird.

he had better be right because plan b involves instant noodles.

thanksgiving 2009

for those occasions which cause us to humble ourselves, and for the strength that has come to us in our hour of weakness and despair; we rejoice and give thanks. - james e massey

a reminder that a different strength comes when i reach the end of my hoarded resources; that there is a greater majesty than i can fathom who holds at bay the fears that would torment, and who safekeeps every fragile hope that i would place in the palm of his hand.

the lord... God our savior, who daily bears our burdens. -ps 68:19

perhaps this posting belongs to the other blog.

to my son

my tattered bible is borrowed and inscribed to J1 for his fifth birthday. he is seventeen now, and has a cooler looking, leather bound edition.

twelve years is hardly long. not enough for boy to become man, for weight settle in. and not enough for mind to form and firm, for faith to grow to strength. the seasons have scuttled away the trusting cherub but i have not yet learnt to let go. hold on, i want to tell him. we're not ready. i wish him readiness for the whole world, and i wish he were more ready.

to my friend

eccl 4:9 two are better than one

everytime i think of you my heart is filled with joy,... i'm thankful for your fellowship, thankful for your partnership, thankful for the love we have in jesus christ

perspective

by faith abraham...went... even though he did not know where he was going... he made his home... like a stranger in a foreign country... for he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God. -heb 11:8-10

a reminder. what is important is not:
1. tent or bricks,
2. wandering or staying,
3. three years or thirty,
but remembering that i am headed to another place regardless of the conditions of travel.

i'm thankful

for strong capable men who have foresight to update the norton and faithfully back up the laptop over all my grumbles and therefore can whip out a secret weapon when i delete ten years' worth of digital photographs with a trigger happy finger.

some people

do not care for personal space, i suppose, because some adults are able to ask without blushing, what is your score? or, how much do you make? perhaps i should ask them, how many partners have you had? but then i would blush.

the line between tackiness and amiable frankness follows the path of the ninth and tenth nerves as they form the pharyngeal reflex.

note to self

the place to scale a fish is behind a screen at the seafood counter in the store, not a residential kitchen, because after scaling the fish one will need to scale oneself as well as the kitchen counters and floors.

energy overload

by early afternoon, i have cleaned the house, injected cash into the mall, swung by the grocer's, baked and iced a batch of cookies, started a new recipe for dinner, processed three loads of laundry, and done the school run twice, in addition to which i have washed and dried my hair and cleaned up the cookie mess, all entirely of my own volition.

i don't know quite what came over me today.

the biggest one day sale

is actually a two day event, and i present myself within the first hour of the first. there are already lots of other shoppers like me, clutching coupons and navigating by catalog. eventually, in the line with my blanket, i notice many other blankets waiting too. lots of people will be warmer tonight.

cecilia

born over a texas summer, customized product of male enthusiasm super-imposed on lovingly selected online purchases. J1's favorite.

if men stopped trying to fulfil their fantasies of junkyard glory, ebay would be in trouble.

fwedewica

our latest instrument, product of a cigar box, an e-bay squire reject, and male enthusiasm. i'm calling her frederica after dick king-smith's parrot.

incomprehensible joys

Ju is a decade younger at least, lately married and freshly pregnant. she wants to know about the night feeds. i tell her, frankly, i would just enjoy the next few months, it won't be so good again for a long time.

in truth, if people counted the cost, no one would have kids. the perquisites of parenthood are appreciated only by initiates, in the secret places of their hearts. the funny thing is that the amorphous returns of parenthood somehow outweigh the definite pains, but not so you could balance on a ledger and tell it to a non-parent without sounding mushy.

rachael ray

the prototype of our dish for thanksgiving potluck in church. forgive the flaws, we are going for numbers. HOM wants to produce a multitude of these. all i say is, his sweat.

saturday lunch

is rather a bother. i should just serve cereal with milk, seeing as how people rejoin the living around noon anyway, and if you add a fruit we will be nice and balanced to boot.

eureka

the free online language translator.

now i can read that little japanese blog without squinting my way through the occasional chinese hieroglyphs. decoupage et deplacement justes. or corte y goma justos. whatever. just cut it and paste it.

it's going to be christmas

i know this because the mall has started playing christmas songs.

...it's christmastime in the city... quite before we start singing carols on sundays, nice warm feelings are already being evoked by the great marketing machines.

i am convinced that fully half the goodwill of the holiday season can be traced to subliminal encounters with norman rockwell at malls all over the country.

an awful reality

as you do not know... how the spirit enters the body being formed... eccl 11:5

before i formed thee... i knew thee; and before thou camest forth from the womb i sanctified thee... jer 1:5

the thought drives me to my knees, that the author of life holds it in such greater regard than his subjects do. chosen, set apart, fearfully and wonderfully made... how lightly we heed what we hold!

the hunt for the perfect blanket

is revived every morning, as HOM and i trawl user reviews of miracle blankets and wonder wraps after another shivery night.

the ideal candidate must:
1. be big enough.
2. be warm enough.
3. but not too warm.
4. not have little feathers that can be pulled out of its surface.
5. not be a hair magnet.
6. arrive soon.
cost is no longer a major consideration.

the art of the epistle 2

i receive an e-mail trail involving church stuff.

one person closes his e-mail with, peace. the next person closes, blessings. perhaps the next will say, joy, or comforts. i am sorely tempted to jump on the wagon and close secularly, cheerio!

two things i should stop doing

1. do my grocery marketing when i am hungry. i return with irrelevant stuff high in sugar and little else.

2. get caught in a traffic jam on the highway with a faulty gas gage waiting for the orange light to appear.

spiritual aptitude test, or snake oil?

a popular 125-question survey that promises to help identify my spiritual gifts sets me thinking.

the biggest question of all, i figure, is this: are these questions validated? which is to say, is this similar to the which mood are you / what is your love style quizzes on fb? sometimes we forget to distinguish between pretty trinkets and prosaic tools like common sense and wisdom.

art & craft

J1 has an epiphany regarding his sideline. i write better songs, he muses, when i write about what i know...

duh. that's why this blog is not about alien abduction or world peace.

this posting is in honor of my favorite song so far: to a friend.

car maintenance 3

following HOM's dalliance with youtube-guided car maintenance, my toyota now has:

new tires
newly adjusted rear brakes
new alternator belt
new radiator belt
newly flushed braking system

all professionally installed.

youtube

i am painfully subjected to two youtube videos of the self-trumpeting variety, which inspire some thoughts:

1. some topics are fine, e.g. how to change your brake-pads, or how to remove your appendix.

2. the majority is forgettable; pity the hopeful soul who produced it.

3. some topics really should be proscribed, specifically discussion of bodily functions, as bad taste does not improve with exposure.

4. some people sound better than they look; these people should not be on youtube.

5. children should be off too, because immortality can be embarrassing when you grow up.

ode to my jalopy

the cons:
the gas gage is dead.
the seatbelt sensor is dead.
the check-engine-light has a life of its own.
the brakes were dead but now resurrected.
the tires are near expiration.

the pros:
nothing you do could dent it further, short of a total job.
this includes being driven by two sets of raging teenage hormones.
we need a battered workhorse to tolerate Dog and his hair.
i only have to wash it in the rain.
it'll do, quite nicely.

the green years

a bittersweet time this, having emerged from the wilderness of childhood with its incomprehensible fears into uncertain years of daunting dependence to the thunderstorms of developing autonomy, to now, a much gentler time, and i realize this is the final season before we bid adieu to adolescence and family life as we have always known it.

car maintenance 2

it goes.
it stops.
the strange squeak is gone.
yess. heroes.
next: tires.

the art of car maintenance

HOM and i have spent the day trekking the car mechanic trail. our final stop is the auto parts store, where we meet an enthusiastically helpful fellow, as a result of which, we are no longer shopping for a mechanic. instead, over my absolute reservations, we have shopped for the brake pads and rotor as well as brake cleaner grease tools and halogen lamp.

HOM and J1 are now in the garage, fully seduced into the d-i-y brigade. with youtube at their side, they are attempting to give my toyota new brakes.

update: HOM and J1 are making our third trip to the store tonight, for another missing part. update 2: we are back from our fourth trip.

new age religion

the church at the corner is having a service to bless the animals. i imagine that old marmaduke will trot up the aisle as the humans sing a verse from all things bright and beautiful.

this is somewhat similar to the modern day apostles that some churches have appointed, or perhaps prayer marches - strange blips on the radar that hover at the border of doctrinal acceptability and beguile us into unmurmuring assent.

these might be good issues to pose to a disinterested man of the cloth. the answers will sift out the theologians from the empaths.

the torment of intimacy

i gingerly give the new hairdresser a try because my regular lady has upped and decamped to korea. i am called honey and subjected to some touchey feeley pawing, which makes me squirm secretly. at the end of the haircut, i squirm some more. i hope helen comes back soon.

my pet peeves:

1. cab drivers who attempt conversation.

2. hairdressers who attempt congeniality.

agony

there's chinese water torture, and there is the college application process.

the other side

to be fair, loving a whinebag is not easy either.
to love and speak kindly to a whinebag must be a test.

he has done his part.
i would follow to the ends of the earth.
if only the ends were not ithaca.

submission

to honor and to obey.
how difficult when every instinct would rebel.
to honor and to obey without whining is most difficult.

yet not my will, but thine be done.

journey to ithaca 2

ithaca calls at me. i am being inexorably sucked into a bottomless morass of tribal enthusiasm and cultural chauvinism.

i find myself asking, is it reprehensible to be happy with my lot and to be not curious about my beginnings? is it shallow to be satisfied with stories without yearning for the experience? is it immoral to be reprehensible and shallow?

at forty-four, i don't feel like professing heartiness for projects that do not thrill me.

halloween

our neighbor has built a graveyard on his front lawn, complete with tombstones. HOM is unable to believe his eyes. these people, he says, have obviously never met an oriental ghost, of the vindictive korean or thai variety, or the pontianak, or our regular hungry ghost.

back east, half-wits would not consider grave markers a kind of home accessory.

the meaning of cool

i turn up at school to volunteer at the vision test for the year.

J1 sees me in the corridor and accosts me in horror. what am i doing in school? it's so palpably not cool to have your mother where your buddies are.

J2 hears about my session and goes, ooooo can you be there tomorrow when i have my test? that would be so cool!

a time to embrace

today i think, what have i gained professionally in twenty odd years apart from strong opinions and a clutch of qualifications? my friends are the movers and shakers. i stay home and wonder if it is worth the effort to begin again in a new place at my age.

then i recount my gains:

my family, which trumps any professional achievement.

the privilege of quantity with the children, without which quality is a dream.

the great privilege of being able to inform my children's worldview.

the partnership, friendship, comfort, of my lover.

the exhilaration of frivolously, confidently, living, because i know this is non-accidental.

there is a time... my times will change. but i am grateful for these years of building and planting and uprooting and weeping and dancing and loving.

the art of the epistle

people of a certain age remember having to end their letters, yours faithfully, or less rigidly, yours sincerely.

these days emails end with, blessings. or, emmanuel. this seems to be a new, affirming, trend. i favor, regards, which i find un-maudlin and helpfully non-emotional. J1's coach is always energetically, go saxons! some people do not sign off at all, and lately, some have a final line, sent from my iphone.

's okay. st paul's closings are yards longer than emmanuel.

dinner tonight

the building cans of tonight's chili, in addition to the pack of ground meat. dump, then add sriracha sauce, garlic powder, black coffee. this is shaping up to be the most embarrasingly idiot proof of my collection of idiot-proof one-pot high-mileage meals.

ethical inefficiency

where we live seems to repel discounters, so today i make my semi-annual pilgrimage to the nearest walmart, which is like a day trip away.

but the rewards!

1. cheaper even without coupons.

2. i don't have to buy ten of everything.

3. there's (immigrant) eye contact.

4. and marginally sturdier bags.

you can say what you want about low pay and unpleasant working conditions and unfair competition, but i say, if they can sell at these prices it surely does some good too. it's hard to talk ethics when you are hungry.

i'm so glad

it looks like they finally ran out of rain. now perhaps we'll have fall again instead of winter.

stockpiling

tech stuff that we keep in bulk at home:

-batteries, all sizes, but they are pretty old-economy.

-printer ink, thanks as we all know to scrooge sized cartridges.

-norton anti-virus, to feed multiple sequentially expiring units.

norton makes plenty out of us, on account of a steady growth in the p.c./laptop population that has sneakily outstripped the number of live occupants at home.

bathroom shenanigans

on a rainy, near icy night, Dog ventures out to perform his ablutions.

at the end of the path he turns back to the first, largest, most water-logged, bush, burrows under the shower, lifts one leg, then lifts the other.

on a cold, wet night, an indecisive Dog is a dripping, smelly Dog.

american english

i go on a drive to timbuktu today and am reminded anew how beautiful this season is. for all its cold dreariness there is an ineffable, effortless aplomb to the newly changing colors that i know in time will become an festively audacious riot.

this part should never be called fall. it is unapologetically autumn.

martha stewart 2

mmmmm oishi... i contribute the pastry cutter, rolling pin, marble slab for working the pastry, a little sweat equity, and heartfelt appreciation.

martha stewart

me (in euphoric enthusiasm): shall i bake a cake for supper?
J1 (genuine surprise): you can bake?
J2 (superior tone): it's cake mix. (rolls eyes)
J1 (accusingly): it is?
me (with hauteur): a thankless child etc.,
which is wasted on them, because they only know romeo and juliet.

my tribute - andre crouch

the voices of a million angels

could not express my gratitude

all that i am and ever hope to be

i owe it all to thee

just let me live my life

let it be pleasing lord to thee

and if i gain any praise

let it go to calvary

with his blood he has saved me

with his pow'r he has raised me

to God be the glory

for the things he has done

the words, once just impressively poetic, have become personal over the years. as the choir sings it on sunday i will weave my life into the music i play for them. this song should be renamed, my offering.

whoooooo hoooooo

You have met all of the requirements for ECFMG certification.

step 1, step 2 ck, step 2 cs. yessssss. besides, i couldn't go through the agony of revisiting krebs and friends. thank God.

racism

i am chinese and therefore i'm:
1. comfortable with most overseas chinese, as dislocated as i am.
2. fascinated by the sophisticated intricacies of the language.
3. happy to parlay the asian exotica to my advantage.

although it's tough identifying with:
1. the encrusted weight of our confucian philosophy.
2. our modern overweening pragmatism.
3. and nonexistent privacy.

annual d&d

if you follow sgp news, it's time of the year for the annual psle* parents' song and dance about how unreasonable the exam was. every year, end november, these will happen:

1. clever kids weep after sitting certain papers, and

2. their parents indignantly write to the press.

my reflections:

1. the culprits are almost always math or science . never english. but it's the english that is cringeworthy!

2. haven't they heard about the curve?

3. five years on, they'll have forgotten the score. it's really not that big a deal.

4. the real deal is learning to move on when you are stumped - better learnt at the lower end of the food chain.

*primary school leaving exam.

a mother's prayer

but his mother treasured all these things in her heart.

a mother sees, and is amazed, and dreams, and remembers, in the quiet places of her heart, and hopes, like that mother long ago, that her children will grow in wisdom, and learn to live, and walk faithfully with their God.

brrrrrrrr

today's high is going to be 69 degrees, and that's the high for the week. it looks like i'll be nursing chilbains scales cracked lips fissured cuticles and red nose for the rest of the year.

at the back of my mind is this ominous thought - if this is fall and we haven't even adjusted the clocks and the trees haven't shed yet, what more am i going to be able to extract from my closet when winter pops by?

cold weather is unquestionably best appreciated on a postcard.

my song

amazing grace shall always be my song of praise

for it was grace that bought my liberty

i do not know just why he came to love me so

he looked beyond my fault and saw my need

...how marvelous that grace that caught my falling soul...
- dottie rambo

i am thankful that there was one day when grace met the brokennness and, unasked, paid the price for my peace. this is the song i want sung at my memorial service. it is the story of my life.

nobel peace prize

albert schweitzer

martin luther king jr

andrei sakharov

mother teresa

lech walesa

desmond tutu

arafat/rabin/peres

barack obama??

not to belittle anyone, but this guy first appears two years ago as presidential candidate and has yet to show much beyond rhetoric for his less than a year in office. perhaps we should rename it the nobel potential prize and allow the man to go on to an illustrious rest of his career.

stuff i want to have

1. a warmer for the bathing soap. brrrr.
2. a mute button for Dog, to use when he announces HOM's return from work.
3. a magic device that will de-static-ize me painlessly.
4. a vacuum cleaner that will work on animals.
5. a heating system for the toilet seat would help too.

little red dot

what we have is an uninformed beast held in thrall to fear. long before napoleon and squealer and co., there was jeroboam and his two calves, which pretty much summarizes it all.

the elements:

1. a bastardized creed. not jerusalem, but dan and bethel. not YHWH, but his new representatives. not demos, but aristos or pluto.

2. an over-arching fear of retribution. withdrawal of privilege. unholy scrutiny. loss of happiness.

3. a herd of well schooled peoplelettes who believe, all good, some better, study hard, don't rock the boat.

4. and some fringe elements who are idealistic, or courageous, or realistic, or cynical, or have given up.

dedication

to the little japanese cook.

last year, for thanksgiving dinner, we had an iron chef-esque face off between HOM and J2. today i discover the cranberry sauce from the meal at the back of our refrigerator. there are two colors on the sauce which are not native. fungus niger et ravum.

the essence of design

good: ipod touch.
poor: the berry. just a tad too. thick.

good: japanese temple.
fearsome: chinese temple. garish, dreadful ostentation.

so-so: arial.
worse: times new roman. familiarity etc.?

good: the old vw beetle.
forgettable: the new beetle. just a tad too. leetle.

almost okay: fishnet on dark skin.
pure sleaze: fishnet on fair skin. like an overfilled ice-cream cone.

good: the national cathedral.
ghastly: many modern slabs. the chinese temples of today.

my i.t. journey

1. the little black book. literally.
2. palm pda. 3 generations. mff*.
3. ipod touch. sleek, sexy, un-sssssyncable.

*most faithful friend, abandoned only after progressive failure of jacket, stylus contact, hotsync cable and loss of the other cable.

modernism

J2 is rewriting the three little pigs for creative writing into the three mousedeer. instead of pigs going out into the world the mousedeer are fostered by a benevolent tigress who tries to protect them from a forest fire for which she is unfairly blamed. she eventually perishes at her charges' paws/pads. like beowulf, remember?

all i say is, yikes. if you don't watch out, J2, you will become one of those writers i avoid for being incomprehensibly intellectual and existentially depressing.

pssst. she is rewriting the ending. the tigress narrowly avoids a contretemps; everybody has a round table discussion to improve communication. i still say, yikes. give me a full-blooded, escapist, moral-free, happily ever after fairy tale anytime.

psssst. coup de grace - the tigress turns vegetarian. ugh.

rituals

are important to HOM and me.

they gather many threads, spare us from lusty curiosity, coach actions that direct our thoughts, and free us to worship. ironic to think i remember when rituals were unwelcome intrusive presumptions!

and yet rituals are only as useful as they are understood, and i hope that the youth will in time be consciously grateful for the rituals that the older church tries to preserve.

christmas cantata 2

in the natural course of things, J2 declines to return to choir practice following her first, admittedly captive, attendance.

i return to alto, because, naturally, it's one thing to know the note or even to hear it in your head but to hit it is another matter altogether.

the two youth tenors, J1 and W, get to sing the tenor solos, which they do with great enthusiasm.

poooffff

the one time the moon is blue and i give a dinner party and plan a stress-free restaurant-based no-cook menu and the restaurant goes and closes for renovation.

decisioned

amazon.com, my favorite shopping destination.

click the order. sit back and relax. by middle age, the joys of physically shopping have worn thin.

decisions

should i buy a book online (it's out of stock in the store) using my borders gift card to pay for book and shipping, or get it from amazon for cheaper, with free shipping, using HOM's credit card?

or should i just read the many orphan books i already own and have not read or could reread?

or i could get a new read for a fraction from the thrift store, but it would be subject to the tastes of those who donate (mostly popular fiction in disgusting condition, from which i am experiencing a temporary withdrawal).

or i could get off my butt and go for a walk then come back to prepare dinner and get ready for the weekend. or go have a nap.

perhaps a nap.

mushy thoughts

HOM asks me to the in-his-honor company sponsored anniversary lunch, which is quite sweet because he generally doesn't mix business with family beyond the annual picnic. i end up the only piece of froth among nineteen suits.

lovely lunch, seeing as i will love most food that gets served to me. and he makes a touching speech that says one reason he's lasted twenty years is because i have sacrificed so much so uncomplainingly. very blush-inducing.

dolt, i want to say. it's not been a sacrifice. it's been my privileged journey.

eph 5:25a. i'm grateful.

journey to ithaca

the adult vacation trend is to make a pilgrimage to the ancestral village in china and fraternize with one's hitherto unknown kin.

the idea is admirable. what are we if we do not know the reticulated culture that begets us, if we do not preserve the personal humanity of our history? what legacy will we leave, if it starts two generations ago in the new country?

my response is painfully unadmirable. modern city girl who needs her amenities is not going to do well traipsing to the village with wooden houses well water chickens and dust. reserved modern city girl cringes at having to feel the love continuously at unwelcome decibels. sweepingly and totally unfairly, overseas chinese diaspora girl does not feel enthusiastic about the middle kingdom and its inhabitants.

this is uncaring and selfish. but try as i may i cannot feel much beyond instinctive revulsion when i look at people's family reunion photos. sigh.

pre-menstrual diatribe

i receive a goodie pack in the post with christmas stickers, gift tags, calendar, and personalized address stickers, in addition to a heart-rending request to my first name for a donation.

this is like another envelope marked, statement enclosed, thereby ensuring i open it. it contains a thanksgiving statement(!!*#) as well as the bleed-'em-dry plea.

sometimes nickels accessorize the entreaties, because only a cad would keep the nickel and not give more in return. i am an embittered cad who callously removes the coins and discards the paper.

all this organized, unashamed soliciting gets my goat. who are they to presume upon my charity, or my gullibility, or my guilty conscience, or even my amiability? or, in truth, upon my laziness, my ineptitude, and my loose change?

my message to the sponsors: fuhget it. when i give, i make my own considered choice and give directly. when i want gift tags, or address stickers, i get my own and pay for them. and if i like your stuff, i will keep it and use it, and i won't feel bad.

wedding hongbao

there is a newspaper article today about wedding financing, the singaporean chinese way. briefly, there is a going rate for the cash gift you bring to the dinner reception, and woe betide the couple who do not receive sufficient lucre to cover the cost of their reception. also, woe betide the hapless guest who gives a gift instead of cash.

having a going rate for giftings is offensive. it's almost a contract for payment. a donation. not a wedding gift.

what society considers wedding extravaganzas to be de rigeur? what parents insist on palatial banquets? what breed of young men and women commit to expenditures they need to be bailed out of? what kind of misguided idiots actually string profit and wedding together in a sentence?

good grief.

christmas cantata

church is very ambitious this year. a cantata! so:

1. J1 and J2, hanging out with the youth worship band, are drafted to sing tenor and sop, respectively. there is an unbelieving twinkle in their eyes as they practise. indeed the predominant expression on the faces of the youth draftees is disbelief or dazedness.

2. i, a life-long alto, am promoted to sop, on account of there being sufficient altos. they need sopranos who can read notes. i can read. the tricky bit is singing what i read.

3. HOM now spends his sundays after service avoiding the choir, to preempt conscription.

all i say is, it takes courage, faith and a certain guilelessness to dare put up a cantata with such a disparate gaggle as us.

the book of psalms - a (gentle) rant

a beautiful rendering of deeply lived experiences, yes. descriptive of many a spiritual struggle and triumph, yes. a natural response of a grateful or suffering people, yes. the confident song of a man beloved of his God, yes.

i wonder why we have psalms for responsive reading though. it's as random as taking it from the book of job, or paul's letters to timothy, in the sense that these are all individual accounts of privations and defeats and victories and revelations. i would read them to know my God better, but psalms are not any more or less extrapolatable than paul's epistles or the gospels or the prophets.

in fact, the sensible book to read publicly and regularly is the book of proverbs, because the proverbs were written to guide the living we presumably do after church. or we could read all the books of the bible, so that we knew what was in it. just not exclusively the psalms, because i don't get the logic.

a boat in the storm

moving every couple of years takes its toll. what have we gained, i wonder, from such vagrancy?

- much solitariness

- no hometown stability

- memories of many goodbyes, &

- pain of starting over.

there are perks...

- friends in unexpected corners

- many churches we can call home

- enjoyment, and endurance, beyond the usual, &

- no moment of boredom.

it's been a lovely ride. i have been allowed to be wife and mom to a degree of luxury, and known richness of heart and spirit i could not have imagined when i joined my fortunes with HOM's well on twenty years ago now.

but for now, just a bit of me, the cowardly bit, would ask for just a little stability, until the J's have done with school here, if God be willing.

i will say of the LORD, he is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom i trust. -ps 91:2

a tribute to the acer

HOM lives from project to project. the current one, agonizingly dragged out over the past several months, is an attempt to nurse the old laptop back to health.

we have ever briefer periods of temporary remission and now a comatose state out of which he beguiles moments of lucidity. how long, he asks, would you cpr a man? as long as there is hope of resuscitation, i murmur.

and so the heroic measures continue. he deletes, and re-installs, re-boots, and hopes, and repeats the cycle. if you ask me, it's agonal.

history of communication exhibit

it occurs to me that HOM and i belong to the last generation that can personally relate to the history on display.

we used to switch channels by turning a stiff noisy knob. there was one house in the neighbourhood whose black telephone we all used. we have seen the thick cably innards of the 286. we printed on dotmatrix. transistors used to be state of our art. once there was no internet.

to our children these are antediluvian, who were raised on the remote control and mouse and who learnt to power point as they learnt to wield the pencil, who cannot contemplate a pre-networked world.

today HOM and i look and remember and marvel. tomorrow, perhaps, the J's will look and be amused and relieved.

mars & venus, or perhaps just me & him

finally we manage an offspring free museum visit, which immediately frees us to see whatever, eat whenever, speak uninhibitedly, and actually enter a museum without facing vociferous objection.

i am fascinated by: the skeletons the gems the crystals and the hope diamond

HOM is fascinated by: the computers the airplanes and the rockets

actually i am a little disappointed in the enormous gems. perhaps it's contempt from surfeit. the stones are so behemoth that they lose their chief attraction for me, which has always been their elusive twinkly quality. a star twinkles. a luminous elephant gives indigestion.

a middle-aged date

pack the kids to school

look up metro

look up free parking

look up cheap parking

look up food

program gps

and off we go!

vindication

well i never! having paid much good money to mr ali at the driving school, i am greatly relieved that he has indeed worked a minor miracle on J2. this is as close as you can get to inserting raw stuff into a machine and collecting the nicely finished product at the other end.

a couple more try-outs with her, i think, and i will be able to let her loose on HOM. HOM does not handle nascent drivers very tactfully and much grief is sometimes generated.

point of reflection: how do you recognize an embryonic driver?

answer: when the car does not pass pedestrians.

cold comfort farm - stella gibbons (1932)

modern young lady with great good sense meets accursed countryside complete with foggy gloom and efficiently shakes it into shape and cheer. shades of (a young) mary poppins/ jeeves/ simon templar versus the moors of wuthering heights/ jane eyre/ silas marner with the cloister and the hearth thrown in.

this has got to be the most delicious confection of wickedly understated wit that i have had the absolute pleasure of reading in years.

content: 5/5 (i love parodies)

style: incomparable

bucket list

mental capacity assessment - living will - advance medical directive - curative treatment - palliation - life sustaining care - life prolonging care - substituted judgment - best interest judgment

it is ironic that dying, which is the most private of all our actions, must be so hotly debated and inspires such public defence. surely the longer road of life to death's door and beyond carries greater import, and permits more appropriate participation, than the shape or size of this one aperture.

art imitates life

the education bestowed upon flora poste by her parents had been expensive, athletic and prolonged; - stella gibbons

i suspect this is a painfully prophetic description of what will have been bestowed upon J1 and J2 by the time we are done too.

heartsink 2&3

is when the power does a double encore. it is not easy for one's heart to soar at the sight of the excavator.

sleepless in langley

so i stumble downstairs at four in the morning when the power returns in order to start the wash before that pile of laundry spontaneously begets lauderettes.

heartsink

is when the power has been out for five hours and you finally see the lights of the service vehicle chugging in pitch darkness from frontyard to frontyard and realization dawns that they are checking everybody's cablebox to find the answer too.

ezio - handel

benefit of taxi duty on saturday afternoon: i get a long drive home in heavy traffic and no one to stop me from listening to the week's opera offering on the radio.

and today there is actually a happy ending to all that drama! i think this is my first non-comic opera that does not end with the hero and heroine perishing in all their melismatic glory. very satisfying, although, as usual, i have no idea what language it is in.

thankfulness

there are two maple trees at the corner where harvey turns into waverly. i remember the smaller tree from last fall, when it stood stunningly and impudently redder than its elder amid the other trees. today the leaves of the bigger tree have turned copper, a prelude to crimson.

yesss. the mugginess of summer is making way for my favorite season. the long week has become the weekend. my cough is responding to the budesonide. HOM returns today from his trip. a school of blackbirds decides to frolic in my backyard. and a little red robin streaks through it.

anatomy of bronchitis

this is how it feels to be consumed, i think - when every breath is dragged out by head-pounding effort, and yet the expense so little relieves the frightening tightness. i have inhaled so much that my fingers are in fixed tremor, and very unprofessionally i do not recall how many puffs i have had.

when i don't speak, i discover, i feel better. so i slink along, a silently tremulous, hacking ghost. a tremulous ghost with a bad headache.

variations of dinner at home

dinner with company - fully clothed males, iced water, hot dessert

regular dinner - sloppy casual, byo drinks, decent conversation

reading dinner - sloppy, byo books, companionable silence

i have a niggling sensation of maternal guilt at how happily i embrace reading dinners whenever HOM is away on a trip. the story books appear together with the dishes and linger after the food part is over. does this make me a bad mother?

giving up the ghost

back in the day, the euphemism was pass away. today it has become necessary to euphemise that.

the only place a person dies these days is in a formal obituary, and then not every time. everywhere else he passes on. if it were me, i would prefer to die. there is a dignity in unambiguously and accurately expiring.

for that matter, when did expiry date become expiration date? is it pure verbosity, or a cultural distaste for short and blunt?

how to read

what is it? - what?

is it valid? - why? how? good?

what is my response?

to paraphrase grammar, logic, rhetoric.

today i realize that reading will take place over the rest of my life, with no syllabus and no schedule, just many good books some of which i hope to be able to read.

in the land of second chances - george shaffner (2006)

i can't get past his theology. but that does not stop this from being a funny, fuzzy, nice little modern fable that keeps me up past my bedtime, which is no mean feat.

i am captive from the moment i read the jacket, and as i go on i hear the midwest drawl, and the black accent, and the colonel sanders twang. i am transported to a different world - a kinder, full of esprit de corps sort of place, and the ending fits and warms the heart even though, like i say, i can't get past his theology.

this, i realize, is the first male writer of fiction that i've read in a really long while. vive la femme!

so many books, so little time - sara nelson (2003)

the premise catches my imagination - the chronicle of a year of reading. she reads avidly, he reads cookbooks - i can relate. two or more books at a time - me too. she describes falling in love with a book - i know that feeling when a book draws you in and you stand at the stove cooking and reading simultaneously.

sara nelson, i think, is an almost-kindred spirit.

what holds the book back is the awkwardness of her hand. the comic touch is a tad heavy, and her choice of words is iffy. my gold standard for brash american comedy is jenny mccarthy, i think.

i am not finishing this one.

missing you

i love thee to the level of everyday's most quiet need, by sun and candle-light... i love thee with the breath, smiles, tears of all my life.

i am blessed that the wild loves of youth have quietened to a gentler tenderer regard.

ps16:6. not because i deserve the good, but because i have received much grace.

vanity

top cme news this week on my medscape: smoking, high bp, diabetes may lead to dementia; smoking may increase risk of tb; quads strength linked to lower risk of symptomatic knee oa.

why does research seem like so much rehash these days? have we run out of practices to alter? paradigms to shift? startling stuff to discover?

tamoxifen use in ER-positive breast cancer increases risk of ER-negative breast cancer... is a little bit new, i guess, but also a little bit old.

psa screening does not improve survival... uh-huh. dat what we been a-sayin'.

allhat... dash diet... old wine in new skin... duh.

seems to me when we bought the evidence based stuff hook line and sinker and threw out everything else we gave the researchers plenty more studies to milk out of the old cow.

9/11 service

my first, and a reminder of God's bigness and my smallness.

job38:1 who is this that darkens my counsel with words without knowledge? in realizing that God is sovereign it becomes rather silly to ask too many whys.

what i don't get, however, is the way people like to talk about the sacrifice of those who died. the deaths were senseless and tragic, but those who died were victims - wrong place, wrong time, no choice. to label them martyrs diminishes the actions of others who have chosen to pay the price of their convictions.