42 thoughts on “Our Daily Thread 12-3-12”

  6. I sometimes wonder around here if I am stupid, simple minded, or what, but I just don’t have that much trouble trusting God. Too much has worked out alright in my life for me to not trust. I do believe that I have to “help” a little. I can’t just sit around doing nothing waiting for God to fix it but I figure as long as I take the first step and the second and so on that eventually everything will work out the way it is supposed to.

    Trusting other people on the other hand is more difficult for me. No one has abused my trust in a while, but there are people who have taken advantage of my willingness to be of service. It doesn’t keep me from helping the next person but I do get to the “end of the road” with the ones I feel are using me a lot sooner than I used to.

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  7. Odds ‘n’ ends left over from the weekend:
    Kim, I absolutely LOVE Duck Dynasty
    There was chat about dollar coins; on Saturday, I paid for something with eight of those gold coins (not sure what they are called, but we get a lot of them around D.C. because the Metro dispenses them as change); the clerk said, “What’s this??” and gave me a hard time because she didn’t have a place to put them.
    Random thought in the shower: Why is it that some people have no trouble believing the “science” of evolution and seem to be some of the same people who can totally discount the science that proves that life begins at conception?

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  9. Chas’s comment reminds me that my husband once asked me, rather rhetorically, how people decide what is depraved. My answer was that depravity is whatever one wouldn’t do. If one will do it or likes it, it’s not depraved.

    That’s how morality is figured these days.

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  10. Herein is the quandary Chas. Those that say there is no God or not moral absolutes are in fact worshipers of themselves. In their hearts, they shake their fist at a thrice holy God and say to Him, in effect, I will not have you to rule over me. Thus they deify themselves and become fools before the righteous King of the universe.

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  13. OK, now I can talk since it is 12/3 here. I am giving Donna J the First. 😉

    QoD: I am a little more hard headed than Kim, I trust God for our finances, I just wish it wasn’t so hard! He always comes through, it would just be nice to have some padding if you know what I mean.

    Now people are easier to trust if you look at their strengths and weaknesses. If my neighbor says she will be somewhere at a certain time I know she will be. She can be trusted in that strength. But I also know if someone in the neighborhood has a party she will be drunk by the end of it. I can trust that, so to speak. I can absolutely trust my hubby to do the right thing with the aforementioned finances. I can also trust that he will not change lanes to exit the freeway until almost the last possible second. I suppose trust is about expectations.

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  16. You would love it here AJ. My gunsmith is doing a custom build of a Mosin Nagant. When I took him the parts of my AK for assembly, he was putting in the floor of his new store.

    He is going to put a recessed crown on the new barrel of my AK and set the head space for me and do the final assembly for me. This is going to be a fun rifle to shoot.

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  20. Thanks for you concern Michelle. The house in Ohio, we are probably going to rent it out with the understanding to the prospective tenants that my son will be staying there as our representative. I have decided to stay in Oklahoma. The cost of living is much lower than Ohio and the Laws here are based upon something that is lacking in Ohio (common sense). Cindi will be moving to Oklahoma in the summer after school is finished. She is just not physically able to work in the class room anymore.

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  21. I love O Come, O Come Emmanuel.

    I trust God in most everything, but if there’s an area where I falter a bit in that trust it is in the unseen, long-term future.

    I suppose fears about getting older and mentally/physically weaker and possibly less financially secure — not to mention all those potential end-of-life illnesses (that can really come on us at any time) — are fairly common, especially as we age.

    I’m not there yet, but I’m getting old enough that it’s suddenly seeming not all that far ahead of me anymore, either.

    And it’s those unknowns that can cause me to feel unsettled sometimes, even though I know that God will have ordained all of that — and will provide the grace and strength I will need to endure whatever comes.

    So there you go. I apparently trust God for everything except my health, finances and soundness of mind & body. 🙄 Oy. Maybe I’m not so trusting?

    It’s a rainy Monday and I think is too serious a topic for me on a morning like this where I’m getting ready to return to work after having a week off. 😦

    But it does remind me to thank God anew for my job and for the ability to work and earn my keep … and pay the vet bills …

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  22. On that note, I think I’ll go out and hang some more Christmas lights. 🙂

    Surveying (at night) the lights I put up this weekend, there is actually a gap that I need to fill out and extend — good thing I bought that 3rd string of lights I didn’t think I’d need (but I grabbed it because you just never know … ).

    So that cat’s back in her cone (I’d left it off last night as she was sleeping so peacefully at the foot of my bed). Hopefully it’ll stay on her today and she won’t manage to shirk it off again under the bed like she did yesterday. Her wound still looks pretty raw.

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  24. I did not put up any lights at the house in Oklahoma. Couldn’t see the point with me headed to Ohio on the 14th. I am sure Cindi will have the tree up and the cats will enjoy batting at the ornaments.

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  25. I think the people who accept the “science” of evolution, but not the science of life beginning at conception are the same people who believe the US should not assist other countries militarily when they are threatened by evil, but should be the only country to lower our standard of living due to the “threat” of man-made global warming.

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  26. Last week my wife spoke sternly to me about how I communicate with Christians.

    Before I go on, I should explain that my wife is one tough chick. People underestimate her because she is small (physically) and because she is very polite and discreet. However, if we were attacked in our house by an intruder (which almost happened to us a long time ago in a different place), she would be quicker than I to grab a knife (or other handy weapon, such as the fish bonker that hangs by our door) and react with deadly force.

    Even though she is small (and even though we are both getting old, and even though she doesn’t go to the gym (as I do) she works out vigorously every day and eats very well.

    Anyway, she was speaking of a friend of hers, a Christian. My wife said something along the lines of “I realized that there is no point in saying anything to her” [in regard to how nonsensical religious belief is] “because she really needs to believe. She just isn’t strong enough to face reality. There is no point to trying to disillusion her.”

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  27. (continued from my last comment)

    Now that statement by my wife does sound a little arrogant, does it not? I thought (though did not say), How are you going to like it when you are lying on your death bed, realizing you are not long for this world? But as I mentioned, she is a very tough chick.

    Anyway, what I did say, “Well, it’s a problem when people who fallaciously believe they know what God tells them to do and use their made up beliefs to block perfectly innocent and harmless activities such as getting married to someone of the same sex.”

    Last week, we celebrated 47 years of marriage. As far as I can remember, we’ve only said, “Do you want a divorce?” to each other on two occasions. (The money we spent on relationship counselors was money well spent.) We both know that the reasons we got married were silly and immature.

    We are still both silly and immature. We’ll die that way. However, Christians are as silly and immature, though they are slowly growing up to be more tolerant, though they will deny they are growing up even to the day you die.

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  30. OK, so here’s what I’m getting at with the ‘same posts over and over’ thing, Random. You wrote (for the umpteenth time):

    Christians are as silly and immature, though they are slowly growing up to be more tolerant….

    So I’ll ask for the umpteenth time: How do you know it’s actually “growing up” and not “digressing down”? Or, how do you know that 100 years from now, considering how people change and all, that the majority of people won’t think that that tolerance thing isn’t all it’s cracked up to be and will see it as a bad thing? How do we know the majority of a hundred years ago was wrong when they didn’t accept gay marriage?

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  31. “The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing”

    We’ve actually seen a fox on our property. (It’s now long gone.) I think a fox would be very amusing to watch, though as foxes are very foxy, it would be difficult to keep it in sight for very long. [I don’t know what Ree looks like, but I imagine her as being very foxy.]

    On the other hand, spotting a hedgehog (porcupines might be more likely, but not really in our area either) might be interesting for a few minutes, but after an hour or two (unless someone was really into prickly meditation), most people would be pretty bored. Unless the porcupine was chewing on my leg.

    Of course, there is the old joke about “How do porcupines **** ****?” I found an actual video (dim to being filmed in the dark) on YouTube. Actually, there seem to be at least three videos. One involves a basketball (along with a soundtrack by Brigitte Bardot). Fairly gross! And an even worse one (with some subtitles — not Japanese or Chinese, I don’t think, maybe Korean or Thai? I am not sure) that has some really disturbing closeups. So be careful what you ask for.

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  32. To everyone but Mr. Cake. So I’ll ask for the umpteenth time . . .

    What is “umpteenth?” Is it smaller or greater than a google? When I studied math in school, they did math with “infinities.” I forget the supposed purpose, but I remember calculations involving “Infinity plus 1,” and similar nonsense.

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  33. AJ- Doesn’t WordPress have a way to schedule your posts? On the Google blogger, you can set it to post immediately or schedule it for a later time. I think that is how the old Whirrled Views always got posted at 7AM.

    Solar: Don’t feed the trolls. Modesty Press (aka Randmon Name) has been around a long time and seems to have little to do but bother with us.

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  34. Foxes are a lot of fun to watch. Wolves are amazing to watch. Saw one on our way home again today. It left tracks larger than a saucer. They have very big feet!

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  37. Modesty Press (aka Randmon [sic] Name) has been around a long time and seems to have little to do but bother with us.

    So true. As I mentioned, my wife (who does not read this), chastises me. Christians deceive themselves about their ability to get everyone to believe as they do. (Their ability to do so is immense, but not invincible and like “peak oil” has peaked and is on a downward trend.)

    Christians also deceive themselves about their ability to triumph over their sexual urges. Some individuals can. But for humans in general, “abstinence” has never worked. [Calling Sarah Palin.] Believing in “abstinence” or in people changing their sexual orientation is believing in something that has 1/10 billionth the empirical evidence than evolution.

    Same thing with “don’t feed the trolls.” In theory if a discussion group stop conversing with a person who does not share their values, the “troll” would get bored and go away.

    Sails does seem to have gone away. Quite a few people ignore me most of the time. But Ree is sure (so far) that she can convince me. And Solar? Well, I am not sure what his intent for posting comments to me is. But whatever it is, like most people with sex, he has to give in to the urge.

    I guess your best bet is that I am not as healthy as my doctor says I am. Well, next month it’s off to the urologist. Maybe he’s got my number.

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  39. Peter L Solar: Don’t feed the trolls. Modesty Press (aka Randmon Name) has been around a long time and seems to have little to do but bother with us. .

    Peter: Random- Why don’t you go bother some Muslim blog for a while? [For one thing, I don’t speak Arabic.]

    Solar Pancake: Boy, Random, you sure don’t want me asking you questions, do ya? If you ignore me, I might stop replying to you. Where have I heard that before, like umpteen times?
    But I probably would still post replies to your profound offerings here, just for the (ahem) challenge of it.
    So ignore me or not, your call.

    Peter: Meet Solar Pancake. Solar: Meet Peter L.

    Peter and Solar. Hello. I am a troll.

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  41. AJ: You have the power to ban me. Ree, Solar, and perhaps Sails (who may have already voted with their feet), and a few others have the power to stop posting to me and replying to me.

    I don’t regard it as “nonsense” to point out contradictions. People in general do not have the ability to resist and control their sexual urges. This is simply empirical truth.

    Internet discussion groups (again, in general) do not have the ability to resist “feeding” trolls. This is simply empirical truth, being demonstrated before your eyes.

    If you ban me, does that mean “you win”? Did Worldmagblog “win” by banning me? I think it proves my point. But it’s your call. This is my last comment for tonight. If anyone addresses me tonight, I won’t read it and I may not read it tomorrow. Good night. I sincerely hope everyone is well.

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  42. Hmm. He seems to regard me as important enough to keep referring to me in his posts. No idea why.

    Isn’t that weird, guys? Right after he’s asked why he keeps posting the same nonsense over and over, he posts the same nonsense he’s posted umpteen times. I mean the *exact* same stuff.

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