Sad Anniversary

Judy McCormick

Today is the sad anniversary of the unexpected passing of my favorite mother-in-law, Judy McCormick. Oh, how we miss you Judy! I learned a weird thing recently: the numbers that Judy played for the lottery were 1027 (which is sort of like 1-27, the day she died). When I play, I let the computers pick the numbers.

Can you believe it? More Snow!

I'm at home again today (Thursday) because we had another snow storm. We may be setting a record. Actually, we had a "small" storm yesterday - snowed most of the day and we got a couple inches. Then last night a big storm blew through and I woke up to about 2 feet of snow (see picture above).

When I went out to clean off my car this morning, this (above) is the view that greeted me. Fortunately, it was not icey cold but rather in low 30s and no wind. At this point, our lot had not been plowed.

Here is a picture of what my Ford Escape looked like before I cleaned it off. Note that the snow is up to the bumper and about the middle of the wheels. Also note how much snow is on the front wind shield. You can get an idea of the depth of snow from the picture below that shows a partially clean wind shield.

I spent about 2 hours shoveling a path along the side of my car and cleaning off the snow from the top.  I went inside for a bit when the plow arrived.

After about an hour, I went back out because everyone was moving cars so the plow could clean the lot. I find it quite heartening that so many of us were working together. I enjoyed chatting with my neighbors. I learned that one of my neighbors got sick earlier and the ambulance got stuck in the snow at the front of the building! I ended up staying out for another 2+ hours shoveling around cars and scraping up the melting ice from by the back door and the mouth of the driveway. Snow shoveling - the poor man's fitness club.

As I write this, the crew has returned to finish cleaning the lot with a front end loader.



Note that there are a couple of cars that are virtually buried. There is not a lot of room to put the snow.

The forecast is calling for more snow tomorrow afternoon and Saturday afternoon. Then, we might get another storm next Wednesday to help celebrate Ground Hog Day.

At War!

I've started the 3rd book of Richard J. Evans's triology on the history of the Third Reich. It starts with the Germans invading Poland in 1939. What was done to the Poles and the Jews is horrifying! While it's shocking to read about this treatment, people should not think that this was an abberation, never to occur again. The scarey aspect is that it might not take as much as you think for us to get to a similar mindset.  That is why it is important to know history-so we don't end up going down a similar road.

A Great Time

Yesterday I had a great time by spending the day with my son, Richard.

We had a quick lunch at Boston Market. The Market Pair is $5.99 (and I had a coupon for $2 off) which includes half a (large) salad and half a sandwich. Richard had a meatloaf sandwich and a salad; I had a chicken sandwich and gave him my side of macaroni & cheese in exchange for half of his salad. BM now serves their food on real plates with real (metal) flatware. They bring the food to your table and clean up after.

After lunch we went to the nearby ice rink to watch his high school varsity hockey team play. It was an exciting game that was decided with less than one minute remaining. Unfortunately, our team was not the winner but since both teams were from West Hartford, it was good.

Several on the team were also on the community league ice hockey team Richard played with a couple of years ago. I enjoyed seeing several of those parents.  They were amazed at how much Richard has grown (a smidge taller than me).

In between periods, we enjoyed a few delicious sugar cookies they sell at the snack stand. Richard also was drawn to a newer NHL edition of Monopoly. Ironically, a woman saw that Richard was wearing a Loomis Chaffee jacket and it turned out she knew Grandma Judy. It's hard to believe that she has been gone almost a year.

When we returned to Lynn's apartment, we worked a couple of hours on Richard's school work. Later this month, he will be selecting his classes for next year (Junior) and talked a bit about college and summer plans.  Next week, they start mid-term exams so we went over the study guides for English and American History. I was also impressed with his knowledge in Biology.

I really enjoyed spending the day with him.

The next two weekends will be dominated by his roller hockey schedule. He has games on both Saturday and Sunday so they can finish the Fall season.  The Winter season starts in February.

On to (the) War!

This morning I (finally) finished the second volume of three on the history of the Third Reich, The Third Reich in Power (1933-1939) by Richard J.Evans (see my previous post on January 1, 2011). Tomorrow I will return it to the library and hopefully sign out the third (and final) volume of the trilogy. The third volume covers the war years.

Reading this work has been an immense challenge. Despite the author's intention to make this history more "people oriented," it is a rather dry, academic work. It definitely is not as engaging as Ken Burns's PBS documentary on WWII: The War.

A few statistics about volume 2:

• 941 pages.
• 113 pages of "Notes."
• Bibliography is 73 pages long. Many of the works cited are in German.
• 41 pictures on 16 pages(not numbered) divided into 2 sections. Pictures were not cross referenced with the text.
• 22 maps, also not cross referenced with text. Many of these seemed pointless to me because they seemed to be a way to display statistics rather than clarify geographical issues.
• Published 2005 by The Penguin Press (NYC).

A few statistics about my reading:

• Initially signed the book out on August 9, 2010.
• Renewed book at least 7 times.
• Finished (today) January 16, 2011 (i.e., about 5 months).

I tried to read about 15 minutes each morning.

After all this effort on reading about this period in history, I feel kind of numb. The brutality of the Nazis and their control of the population is shocking and frightening. It would be a mistake, I think, to merely chalk up the Nazis as an abberation of evil. After reading these two volumes, I think (hope) I have a better appreciation for the susceptibility of a population to slide into totalitarianism. In this current "war on terror", we need to be very careful if we want to avoid sliding down a similar slope.

Positive Spin



Actual cover of book.

Yesterday, on the way home from West Hartford, I finished the audio version of George Bush's book (memoirs): Decision Points (see my previous posting on January 9th).  Although I would rather not use this blog space to discuss political philosphy, I have a couple of observations after listening to this book.
First, I am glad that the author was the narrator. Many times, I am disappointed to listen to a book written by a person who is capable of doing the audio version but instead defers to an actor. I think it shows a commitment on the part of the author to do the audio version.

One of the reasons Bush SR. (GHWB) lost his reelection bid was due to a perception that he had lost touch with the average person. There was an incident where he visited a grocery store and was amazed to encounter price scanners at the cash registers. Because many had been dealing with the scanners for a couple years, people concluded that GHWB was out of touch with the average american.

Listening to GWB's book got me to wonder if the President of the United States (POTUS) is inherently separated from the people due to all the security and global issues that are on the table. While GWB seems to have good intentions about what he wanted to do, I wonder if he was able to grasp the reality of the ramifications on the average person on the actions that he took. This arrangement (of the POTUS) may be a supreme example of the application of the "law of unintended consequences."

Bush talks about his intentions in confronting problems and his reasoning behind his solutions. He even admits to making some mistakes and has some regrets about some of his priorities (e.g., social security). It seems apparent to me that one of his objectives for this book is to lay the groundwork for a positive interpretation of his presidency in the future.

More (than enough) snow!

This is what I saw from my living room window this morning at "sunrise." The snow began last night around 11 p.m. and continued for about 12 hours.

My Ford Escape is in the lower left hand corner of this picture. It's sandwiched between two big cars. It's the one that is covered with snow (ha ha).

I'm not sure how much snow we got. The wind tends to blow through our parking lot. But this picture above shows the amount of snow on my windshield ("snow vision"). Weather service was predicting 18-24 inches and that sounds close to what we probably got.

Here is a view from my car (while I was shoveling it out) of the lot being plowed. Many of my neighbors were out trying to dig out their cars. It was nice to see them. Most were trying to help others too. One neighbor dug out the drift behind my car while I cleared off the snow from the car. After I backed out and moved the car, the plow was able to clear the snow from my spot. We used that approach for several cars. Very slippery though. One lady fell and it took two of us to help her up.

This is a view of our parking lot taken from my living room window around lunch time. You can see that my Escape is now at the right side of the picture and my previous spot is cleared open. It has stopped snowing now and the sun is peeking through the clouds as I am writing. Another storm is forecast for end of the week (oh no).



Treasure Island!

I just finished (over two days) watching the 1950 Disney movie version of "Treasure Island." What a fantastic, entertaining film - especially for boys.  As usual, I borrowed the DVD from the local library (for free). Lots of colorful scenary, adventure, and swashbuckling. Contains old fashioned "movie violence." But the bond between Jim and Long John Silver was touching. I shed a tear at the end. One of these days I will have to read the book.  There is also supposed to be a good 1934 movie version by the director of the "Wizard of Oz" (Victor Fleming).

Another Complete

Last night I finished Endless Summers the Cleveland Indians book I received at Christmas from my son, Richard. I really enjoyed it! See my previous post for details.

One aspect that really grabbed me about this book was the impact of stupid business management had on the success of the team.  Many of these errors were due to lack of long term vision and commitment. By cutting expenses, the product was not permitted to grow and mature into a winning product.

I think that good management is so important. If you have a garden, you need to care for it by giving it good well nourished soil, water, and keeping out (bad influences like) weeds. If someone just plants and then doesn't nourish, the results are usually not very impressive. And if one just throws the seed over the ground and doesn't do anything, then there probably isn't going to be much of a harvest.

When the Indians had good "caretakers" they did well.

Baby boomers who are long time Indians fans will enjoy seeing the names of all those great Indian players.

More Snow!

View from LR window of the sunrise Sat Jan 8, 2011.

It snowed again here in Connecticut! We had a major snowfall on Friday (January 7th). We got about 4-6 inches. The commute home was a crawl. It took me 3 hours (instead of 1.5 hours).

I took a different route because my usual way includes winding and hilly 2 lane roads. Instead, I took the highways. This way was pretty clear for the first half of trip. But (black) icey roads resulted in a lot of accidents (including a truck fire and 2 fire trucks totaled by tractor trailers).

During the ride home, I had a nice chat with my mom (whose birthday is Monday). I also listened to disc 1 of the audio version of former President George Bush's book, Decision Points (read by the author!).


This is a spoof cover of the real book.

It snowed a bit more Saturday evening too (just enough result in a white blanket).

Snow covered trees - CT 8.

Saturday morning I drove to Plainville for Richard's roller hockey game. They won 10-5 and he scored a goal. After lunch, we watched  (on TV) the NY Islanders salvage an exciting win over Colorado (4-3) in OT. We also worked on his American History homework in between periods. A very nice day.

Clear

Yesterday I received results of the pathology tests of the polyps removed during my recent colonoscopy (see separate post): adenomatous (precancerous). That is good and something of a relief.

Complete.

In an earlier post, I mentioned my reading projects. Since then, I completed my reading of Arthur Miller's play, The Crucible and my first run through of the Book of Revelation in the Bible. I still have about 80 pages to go on the Third Reich history book.

While I am waiting for our Men's Bible Study group to begin our study of the Revelation, I am reading various articles (e.g., from New Jerome Bible Commentary, God's Word Today issues, Dictionary of the Bible [McKenzie], and a fine booklet from the Knights of Columbus: Revelation: A Divine Message of Hope).

I also have a little book (lent by a friend) that I have read snippets of: Breaking the Code-Understanding the Book of Revelation (by Bruce M. Metzger) that I want to go back to.

I also found a very interestering translation with lots of notes about the Greek (which I don't know) from http://net.bible.org/bible.php?book=Rev&chapter=1

And I am continuing reading about the Cleveland Indians in the book I received at Christmas from Richard:

(my copy is not the "Updated Edition!").

Return to Reality

Vacation is coming to an end. (Actually, Monday is our New Year's Day Holiday). I have one more day to get all the things done I had hoped to do over the holidays. Oh well. At least I started this blog.

Today was a good day. Spent most of the day with my son, Richard. He had a roller hockey game this morning. His team won 4-2.  I enjoyed talking with his mom, my ex-wife Lynn, while watching the game.

We had lunch at Boston Market. Gift card from my mom came in handy.  We are lucky because we have a clean BM.  They use real plates and flatware (instead of paper and plastic). We get the special where you get half a sandwhich and a salad.  I think they have the best salads for the $. Richard had a meatloaf sandwhich and I had turkey.

We stopped at the pet store to look at replacing the gekko that died.  Then we browsed around Home Depot and picked up a set of safety glasses for Richard so he can use the tool set he got from "Santa." Then we ended up browsing around Barnes & Noble and had a cookie as our desert (I had oatmeal raisin and Richard had a sugar cookie).  We even got in a couple short walks. On our back to Lynn's place, we saw a rainbow and drove toward it trying to find where it met the ground (and the pot o' gold).

I wish that I lived closer to him so we could spend more time together.

THREE

I am currently reading THREE books (well, actually five but that doesn't fit in with my theme for today):

• The Book of Revelation (aka The Apocolypse of John) [you know, the last book in the christian Bible].
• The Crucible by Arthur Miller.
• The Third Reich in Power by Richard J. Evans.

I do my reading in the morning, when I get up, and before going to work.  If something is really good, I might even continue reading it at night before bed (but reading at the end of the day typically puts me to sleep very quickly).
 

Les Très Riches Heures du duc de Berry, Saint John on Patmos the Musée Condé, Chantilly.

Revelation I am reading the New American Bible translation in preparation for doing this book in the St. Mark's Men's Bible Study group starting in late January.  Realizing this is a challenging (i.e., bizarre) book, I wanted to orient myself ahead of time.  I have read this book several times over the years but it has been a while.

For supplementary material, I am using The Collegeville Bible Commentary (NT #11) by Pheme Perkins (1983); I am pacing my readings to the December 2005 issue of God's Word Today (focused on The Book of Revelation) by Steven J. Binz. GWT is set up to read a book in one month.  That is a bit quick I think, but at least it is an exposure.

I started December 3rd and it looks like I will finish it in a day or two.  This will give me time to review and look at some other sources before our group starts its study (using the Little Rock Scripture Study Series).



The Crucible
I started reading this because my son, Richard, had to read it for school. They recently finished it but I still have Act Four to go.

I never read this when I went to school, so this is a first for me.

Before starting to read this, I read the Wikipedia entry on it. I also found an audio version at my library.  I listened to this in order to get a feel for the basic story. I knew that I could finish the audio version in a few days during my commute.

The Penguin edition is very good. It has a nice essay at the beginning (which only makes sense if you know what the story/play is about) which has interesting background to how the play was written.

The Crucible is pretty somber and has a depressing ending. Sort of like A Tale of Two Cities (I prefer The Scarlet Pimpernal for the same time period).

Coincidently (I think), Richard's school put on a performance of Lillian Hellman's play The Children's Hour.  This is a more contemporary version of similar subject matter, also based on a true story. Thus, there are a lot of parallels between the two plays.  But both share a common thread of being somberly depressing (and much too adult for high school students in my opinion).  I'm not surprised that there are so many depressed high school students; perhaps schools should lighten up the reading by sprinkling in some comedy (e.g., The Mouse That Roared).



The Third Reich In Power

This is the 2nd of a trilogy about the history of the Third Reich.  The copy I am borrowing from the library has 941 pages.  I started this book August 9th and have renewed it 6 times (I think). I have about 100 pages to go. This is not light reading.

The 1st book of the trilogy (The Coming of the Third Reich) is 622 pages and took my THREE months to read. The 3rd book of the Trilogy covers WWII.

Both books have tons of footnotes (which I look at-kind of a challenge to decipher what a title in German might mean in English).

I started reading this series because I wanted to read a reputable account of how the Nazis rose to power and led a people down the road to perdition. The conventional wisdom is that the Nazis were evil devils that took over the country and fooled the people who had no idea what was being done to their neighbors.

Another impetus for reading this book was another book:  Miracles Through Our Lady (True Stories of Everyday People That Can Change Your Life Forever), translated from the original German by Renate Mross.  It is a collection of true stories that demonstrate how the Blessed Mother was able to assist peiople in distress in extraordinary ways.  There were several stories of German soldiers during WWI and WWII that prayed to Mary for help during the war.  I was intrigued by this because this portrayal of faith goes against the picture of evil Huns that we have been taught. So I wanted to find out more about what the German people were really like during this time.

In a post 9-11 state where our freedoms are being sold for safety from terrorism, I wanted to see if there were any similarities with pre-WWII Germany. My conclusion thus far is that there are and if things continue, we are in for big trouble.

Conclusion:  Surprisingly, these THREE books seem to have a confluence around the concept of fear. 

Revelation has the fear of eternal damnation in the Pool of Fire if you don't meet the requirements. I would bet that most Christians who read this book assume that their name is written in the book of life. If so, a closer reading may be in order. The advice of the book is to Repent (that might be a good New Year's resolution).

The Crucible also revolves around the fear of the devil and eternal damnation. Why, all the folks were trying to do was to keep the devil out of their community. Just a bit of pruning to get rid of some weeds.

Finally, the Third Reich used fear to gain power and control the people. Similar to the folks in the Crucible, they were trying to get rid of what they considered a corrupting influence to their race/country. While the Nazis were not religious, they apparently thought they were fulfilling providence.

The authors of The Crucible and The Third Reich in Power wrote their material in order to try to warn people about the dangers that lead society to destroy people who don't conform to some group's ideal.  Revelation promises that God will destroy all those devils via eternal suffering and torment when it's the right time.

THREE interesting and challenging books. I need a light, humorous book. Fortunately, I recieved a fine book for a Christmas present about the Cleveland Indians.

TWO

My new glasses. About TWO years ago, my eye doctor told me it was time for bifocals. But since that sounded like something for old folks, I ignored him and kept the status quo.  A few months ago, I went for my annual checkup and got scolded for not upgrading my prescription. 

I was somewhat more receptive to his advice this time because I was constantly taking off my glasses (which I need to see far away) in order to read forms and paperwork. Nonetheless, I was not in a rush to spend several hundred dollars on new glasses.

My procrastination came to an end in October when one of the temples broke off my long time wire rim glasses.  Fortunately, I had an old pair I could wear but the prescription was weaker.

I devoted one Saturday to visiting what seemed like every eye glass store along the shopping mall route.  After visiting about 10 places, I was depressed because no one had wire rims and it was clear that I would have to pay several hundred bucks for a frame style that I didn't like.

Well, I tried to look on the positive side - that I would be getting something more contemporary, hip; something that might take a few years away from my graying hair.   HaHa.

I ended up at JC Penney Optical.  My insurance didn't make any difference (actually would have cost more).  On October 30th I paid $250 for a pair of bifocals with all the right coatings and a pair of prescription bifocal sunglasses (i.e., TWO pairs of glasses). Unfortunately, it takes JCPenney TWO weeks to fill an eyeglass order. They didn't tell me that until I had spent an hour there getting everything set.

To make a long story shorter, the glasses didn't work right and I took them back. Then waited. Then picked up the revised sets.  Then took them back. Then waited. Then picked them up. Then took them back (today) but this time they said they can't do anything more. No returns on eye glasses. They suggested checking with my eye doctor about my prescription.

So now it's been TWO months of running back and forth to the mall. And don't get me started about their limited hours of operation. I had to take time off work in order to get to the store before they closed. So now I have spent a couple hundered bucks on TWO pairs of eye glasses that don't quite work right.  TWO bad, I guess.

But I am so turned off by this experience, I have no desire to go back to JC Penney again (even for something besides glasses).

ONE

Today is 1-1-11. (I know, you protest and say that it's really 01-01-2011 but my initial offering is also acceptable, so humor me).  I have long enjoyed numbers as well as words.  Both are placeholders for ideas.  So, I ONEder what significance there might be in the interpretation of today's date?

One interpretation might be the loneliness of being one (i.e., "one is the loneliest number that you'll ever do." [For the Harry Nilsson song, see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=haT8g7oKnns&feature=related ] [For the Three Dog Night version, see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UiKcd7yPLdU&feature=related ] I suggest you open these in a new tab). Is this depressing or what?

Another interpretation might be the divine aspects of "the One." Thus, today, might be seen as having some relationship to/with God. On the other hand, the number one is repeated 4X and the number four typically represents "earthly" concerns (i.e., the four corners of the world: N, S, E, W).


Circumcision of Christ by Rubens c1605

In the (recent) past, January 1st was a Holy Day of Obligation in the Roman Catholic Church in the USA to celebrate "The Solemnity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God." However, in 2011 the obligation to attend mass has been abrogated since the day falls on a Saturday [http://www.usccb.org/liturgy/q&a/general/obligation.shtml ]. God forbid that RCs should be required to attend mass two days in a row. 

January 1, 2011 is also the 44th World Day of Peace (see: http://www.catholicculture.org/news/headlines/index.cfm?storyid=8767 ). Again, this is something many of the RC churches in the USA ignore.  In any case, 1/1/11 is also a First Saturday (which the US Bishops also no longer pay any attention to. And some folks ONEder why the USA is in the shape it is in). 

If you enjoy contemplating numbers, then you might be interested to know that the MegaMillions Jackpot for the Tuesday drawing is now $290M.  And the Powerball drawing tonight (1-1-11) is for (only) $25M. If you win, you can give it all to the church.