This is Alpha, the first-born, when he was 2YO.
This is Beta, the second-born, when he was about 2YO.
This is Gamma, the third-born, when he was about 18MO.
Sep
21
2010
You know what they say: a foal and his money are soon parted.
The photo of the mare and foal is courtesy of someone I don’t know. All I did was add the captions.
Now when he had spent everything, a severe famine occurred in that country, and he began to be impoverished.
Luke 15:14
Sep
20
2010
Wife: Which one of these dresses do you like better?
Husband: That one.
Wife: Why?
Husband: The other one has an empire waist, and I’m not a fan of the empire waist.
Wife, possibly glaring: My wedding dress had an empire waist…
Quiz:
What should the husband say next?
A. Oh, hey, look at the time! I gotta go to my (insert excuse here).
B. It did? All I remember is how beautiful you looked that day.
C. Umm…
D. (nothing, just back away slowly and leave the room)
Answer:
There is no right answer, of course.
The aforementioned conversation might have been hypothetical. Any resemblance to real people, living or dead, is strictly coincidental. No husbands were harmed in the making of this blog post.
It was given to her to clothe herself in fine linen, bright and clean; for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints.
Revelation 19:8
Sep
16
2010
I never had to diagram sentences for school.
I think it’s something I would have liked, so I’m giving it a shot now. These might not be done correctly, so let me know if I got any wrong.
I sentence you to a fine of $10,000.
I sentence you to one year in rehab.
But that doesn’t look right, because the punishment is rehab, not a year. Let me change it so that the object is rehab, like it should be.
(more…)
Sep
14
2010
This post is where I expand on step 3 from my earlier post on how to fix a water heater.
The water heater heating elements are tightened very well by the factory. I could not get that thing to budge.
I had read that there are special wrenches/sockets made for loosening water heater elements, so I bought one ($5).
It has a hole drilled in the non-business end so that you can get some leverage. It is not a very big hole, so all I could find to fit in it was a large allen wrench or a screwdriver.
I tried for an evening to take out the element. No luck.
Someone suggested Liquid Wrench to help loosen it. Maybe it had rusted or corroded in place.
One evening of that. No progress.
Another evening of that. Still no progress.
Then I decided that I needed more leverage. So I strapped a crowbar to the wrench. I used about a two-foot length of 10-gauge steel wire. The allen wrench was still through the element wrench, so I wrapped the wire around the allen wrench and crowbar.
The element came free on the first try.
Leverage is your friend.
I think I didn’t need Liquid Wrench at all, because the threads were fine. If you are trying to loosen water heater elements, your first step should be more leverage, not special solvents.
Especially because you don’t want those solvents in your supply of drinking or cooking water.
Truly I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven.
Matthew 18:18
Sep
13
2010
The older two kids went with me to a baseball game this past weekend. They appreciated the game in two different ways.
Beta watched as much as he could and enjoyed it, asking when we could come back. This was his first baseball game.
Alpha read as much as he could and enjoyed it. This was his third baseball game.
And they both ate as much as they could, despite the fact that we had a regular dinner just before leaving for the game.
All the home-team players get introduction songs. Whenever a player comes up to bat, the stadium operation plays, at full volume, a particular song for that player.
I noticed that they are all hard songs. Not difficult hard, but edgy hard. Hard country, hard rock, hard rap, etc.
I decided on what song I would want, should I ever become a professional baseball player – Christmas Eve in Sarajevo.
Next on the list: football. We’ll probably start with a local high school game, since college and pro tickets are a bit expensive.
Then David spoke to the chiefs of the Levites to appoint their relatives the singers, with instruments of music, harps, lyres, loud-sounding cymbals, to raise sounds of joy.
1 Chronicles 15:16
Sep
9
2010
This post is where I expand on step 1 from my earlier post on how to fix a water heater.
You need a multimeter. You must be able to measure resistance somehow. I know, it’s futile. Just ignore the bellowing guard.
Here goes:
Sep
8
2010
… from their own mission statements.
Of course, no one is perfect. But, if a school district is going to put its mission statement on its website for the whole world to see, you would think they would make it a good one.
For your reading pleasure (and because Arby has me looking for typos now) (and because school is starting so I’ve been looking at official school information), I present to you eight different mission statements from various school districts in the area.
___ Schools are committed to providing a quality educational experience for all students in a safe, orderly, healthy, and nurturing environment.
Nothing too bad there. Although if I were nit-picking (which I am), I would note that the schools are not committed to providing a quality education. Rather, they are committed to providing a quality experience.
Me: How was school today?
Child: Great! I loved it!
Me: What did you learn?
Child: Nothing! But I had a great experience!
Oy.
Realizing that each child is unique with varied experiences and opportunities, we will strive to promote an intrinsic desire to learn and gain the skills necessary to achieve academically. The ___ school community will nurture a sense of self-worth and self-discipline for all students to provide an excellent educational environment.
A lot of fluff, although I suppose it could be worse. Plus, what else do you expect in a mission statement?
If you look at what they are really saying you see that all the district wants to do is to cause your children to desire. I don’t see that the district wants to actually educate the kids.
We don’t want your kids to learn – we want your kids to want to learn.
No, wait… They don’t want to cause your children to desire; they just want to promote that desire.
No, wait again… They don’t want to promote that desire; they just want to strive to promote that desire.
Let’s see how far we can go here:
I think I’ll stop there. I’m sure the committee meant well when it produced that mission statement.
One more thing: the child is going to “achieve academically.” I really dislike the intransitive use of “achieve”. Some verbs can be both transitive and intransitive, but there is usually a good implied object for the intransitive case. Why not “achieve academic success”? Just put a noun in there for an object – the sentence would be much better.
Okay, the sentence would be a little bit better.
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