I annoy myself with Peter, Paul, and Mary

I have been listening to the TC-631 out in the shop. Yesterday I found a reel with folk music from the 1960's. It features Peter, Paul, and Mary and Joan Baez and probably someone else but they really all sound the same.
Now here's the deal...
When I was a wee lad I thought "Puff the Magic Dragon," was an awesome song. But I don't know if I ever made it all the way through a full album.
After 120 minutes of pain I actually can't believe people really listened to this crap. It is smarmy, self congratulating, shallow drivel. "Oh look at me, I'm young and white, and self aware, and war is bad, and I've been given everything I ever wanted and I want to be a commie, but not a real commie, and oh boy, it is up to us to change the world. I think it is the "it is up to us to change the world," BS is what gets me the most. Other than that clever guitar picking. And Oh my! Another folk song! They put down the people from their own heritage who were singing about real pain. (Think Hank Williams)
I listened to PP & M sing "Blowing in the Wind," and I had to think about the corruption that has totally become the hallmark of their generation. All that high minded coffee ship drivel and they are sellouts.
So...
For those of you who grew up in the 1960's I ask you... How could you listen to this crap without scratching out your ears?
Was it to nail the hippie chicks? (I can understand that)
Did you just really like coffee?
Were you absolutely stoned out of your mind the whole time?

And I ask myself, if you were recording stuff from the mid 1960's why not (never thought I would say this) The Greatful Dead!
Or Ramblin Jack Elliot, or be the first one to follow Townes Van Zant, or Bobby Wayne (Harold's Super Service) or Ian Tyson, or rather than hear Joan Baez earnestly style another folks song, join the Army and volunteer for Nam...

I had to listen to the Legendary Stardust Cowboy to clear my eardrums of congealed sugar and little pink and fluffy butterflies that looked like Che' on his Norton.

I annoy my family with easy listening music

Below is a photo of my pristine Sony TC-230 reel to reel. I say "pristine" with some reservations. It looks good and was well taken care of. But, it is 40 some years old and it was well used.
I wanted it because it has a phono stage and I thought I could use it to record scratchy 78 rpm records and 45s to my computer. However, my 78 rpm record player has a ceramic cartridge and that requires a different preamp and one thing led to another and it all got complicated and now i don't really care all that much anymore. I do need to take it apart and do some more cleaning and lubrication. I usually do this late at night when everyone is sleeping. I like to use the Old number seven cleaning fluid with a lot of ice. This does not help the reel to reel as much as it helps me.
I have a number of boxes of reel to reel tapes and have been listening to them. The family has demanded a stop to it all. It would appear that they do not care for the genre of music that includes "Leaving On a Jet Plane, Bridge over Trouble Waters, or the theme from "Midnight Cowboy," set to strings and lots of lady back up singers.
Well, perhaps I should clarify that. They don't care for 120 uninterrupted minutes of such exquisite stylings.
It is interrupting the Hogan's Heros marathon that is now the sound track of our life. "I know nothing..." (I have been trying to get the annoying Austrian fellow who sometimes buys hay from me to say, "I know nothing." I ask him questions he doesn't know the answer to or ask him for opinions about weird subjects but he refuses to bite.)
Anyway, here is the current object of my affections...

There are no Atheists in the Foxholes revisited

I am a horrible fisherman. I have no patience. I never know when I am about to get a bite. I usually screw up when setting the hook.
Sooo... when I have a success, no matter how puny I like to celebrate.
I caught a fish. (read the comments or read the cut and paste quote below)  I shouldn't post this as I may catch more. But, I'm bored with the whole thing and may go back and change the title to remove it from the search ranking.
I know it is pathetic to troll but on the other hand what is even more pathetic than trolling is actually spending time doing a google search for "There are no Atheists In Foxholes," so that you can show people how superior your enlightened Atheist Religion to fools who believe in silly myths, and yes people do that.
I give you just such a fellow and his insightful post which in no way goes down the list of Atheist talking points.

Doug IndeapJan 29, 2012 02:32 PM

"Why you would direct your ire at someone like Jessica Ahlquist who seeks to uphold the Constitution, rather than those flouting it is not apparent. It is important to distinguish between "individual" and "government" speech about religion. The First Amendment's "free exercise" clause assures that each individual is free to exercise and express his or her religious views--publicly as well as privately. The Amendment constrains only the government not to promote or otherwise take steps toward establishment of religion. As government can only act through the individuals comprising its ranks, when those individuals are performing their official duties (e.g., public school teachers instructing students in class and principals hanging banners in schools), they effectively are the government and thus should conduct themselves in accordance with the First Amendment's constraints on government. When acting in their individual capacities, they are free to exercise their religions as they please. If their right to free exercise of religion extended even to their discharge of their official responsibilities, however, the First Amendment constraints on government establishment of religion would be eviscerated. While figuring out whether someone is speaking for the government in any particular circumstance may sometimes be difficult, making the distinction is critical.

A word should be added about the common canard that this is all about people easily offended. We’re not talking about the freedom of individuals to say or do something others find offensive. We’re talking about the government weighing in to promote religion. Under our Constitution, our government has no business doing that--REGARDLESS of whether anyone is offended. While this is primarily a constitutional point, it is one that conservatives--small government conservatives--should appreciate from a political standpoint as well. While the First Amendment thus constrains government from promoting (or opposing) religion without regard to whether anyone is offended, a court may address the issue only in a suit by someone with "standing" (sufficient personal stake in a matter) to bring suit; in order to show such standing, a litigant may allege he is offended or otherwise harmed by the government's failure to follow the law; the question whether someone has standing to sue is entirely separate from the question whether the government has violated the Constitution.

Oh, and yeah, there actually are atheists in foxholes. Indeed, the horrors of battle lead some to and some away from belief in god(s). But then, that has nothing to do with separation of government and religion."

I am a little sad that Doug Indeap does not have a blog but it was nice of him to care enough to comment.
Now you may ask the difference between my rants in defense of mythology and his rants in defense of stupid high school girls who think they have invented truth and have a cause, I will answer that.
I know I am full of crap half the time and I don't do Google searches for phrases like, "farmers are stupid arseholes," and "dynaco amplifiers sound like crap," and then post impassioned defenses of my little pet ideals.

Care to discuss Faulkner?

The Left Bank of the Charles guy got me off onto a whole different train of thought this morning and as a result I was late for doing my hay and feed and now I'm eating lunch at 3 p.m. which is really coffee break time. Of course it had nothing to do with the topic of his post...
He had a wonderful quote from William Faulkner which says a lot about life. I've thought the same thought in a different context. It is sort of like the guy who jumped off the bridge and said he had 30 seconds to think about why he didn't want to die and why he wished he hadn't done that. But, that one moment between anticipation and regret was something else!
I can't imagine walking across that field into the Yankee guns but I guess I do it every spring... No wonder I'm an emotional wreck...

There are no Atheists in the Foxholes...

I was looking at Michael Savage to see what is wrong with the world and I came across this article about a teen who was offended by a written prayer hanging on the wall and took the school to court.
For me it was another one of my moments where I realized 1. we are always making the wrong argument and 2. the general level of reasoning in the 21st century is not all that high.
Perhaps someone can enlighten me.
What does a written prayer full of vague generalities that has been hanging on the wall for 60 years have to do with the separation of church and state?
No one is forced to recite it or read it or do anything with it. I suppose you are not allowed to shoot spit-balls at it but you can't even shoot spit-balls anymore I have heard.
If the prayer said "divine spirit" instead of heavenly father?
It is fundamentally different from a "ritual" spoken prayer because there is no participation. It is a static display. At this point more of historical significance than anything else.
The article had a poll whether prayer should be allowed in the classroom. I don't think this was a prayer. And I think freedom of speech should allow prayer in the classroom. For my child I would rather no prayer than a prayer with subject matter that I would find theologically offensive and I do not want the schools actively reprogramming my kid's religious beliefs. But, I am not offended by reprinted fake Native American prayers on dream catchers or on inspirational posters or ritual Muslim prayers on wall hangings as long as they don't explode.

Anyway,  the girl says she did not notice the hanging until a friend pointed it out, so in fact it was not an obvious sort of "offense."So, do we not study "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" in literature class anymore? I bet we don't... Answered my own question.
I think I will get my daughter to look for books with scripture in the in the School library and then sue. I wonder if the Atheist society would give her $30,000 for a scholarship?

And, the girl says she lost her faith at age 10 when her mother got sick and when the girl called on God he was not there to help her. So the whole thing is a vendetta over a misunderstanding of her own mythology religion at age 10? Great, more amateur theology. More amateur constitution law.
And she is now a little hero with "great strength of character."

But what can you expect from the courts. The USA now tortures prisoners, can lock you up and hold you forever on suspicion of witchcraft wrong politics being a Christian, being an Atheist, looking at a midlevel government employee wrong, being a terrorist, so the whole country from top to bottom has no appreciation for the constitution, civil liberties, or even understands what you should be offended about. (Like the TSA)

Since I have a diverse range of 39 readers my questions are.
1. Do homilies/written prayers in books and wall hangings have anything to do with the separation of Church and State?

2. Should you be able to sue for anything that offends you?

3, What about the girl's anger at God? Why does her personal problem have to become everyone's problem. Or rather if you really don't believe in God then why do you have to "convert" every one? Is that not the flip side of being a missionary? Or perhaps I should say, why do you care if people want to believe in mythology?

I also lost my faith at age 10 or somewhere around there. I found a book of sermon illustrations in the Bible Book Store in which I read word for word the illustration the revivalist had claimed as his own the night before. It was all a lie...

This whole thing could have been avoided if someone would have just used the phrase, "God works in mysterious ways," and then given her a short course on rationalization.

Now she has to be Carrie A. $%^&*ing Nation, Rosa Parks, and Susan B. Anthony and give the Atheist society woodies. A poster child, "Whoop! Whoop!" There is nothing quite like the earnest sincerity of a kid who has never been hungry and is standing up for something that doesn't matter.

Is there no real suffering in the world?

I went to the North West Ag Show

I went to the Northwest Ag Show in Portland on Tuesday. It was interesting.
I may become a dealer for a mineral supplement. If I think I can make money with only a 15% mark up. I am not sure this is good thing for me as I tend to knock a few dollars off for people just to build empathy.
You can check it out at www.grolicks.com
I am interested as there is nothing really like it on the market. It lets you give grass fed beef a little extra protein, minerals, and energy in the winter when the grass is not so good. Grass fed beef is what sells here. Grain fed is bad. Unless I am eating it... Grass fed is marketing BS...
Speaking of Marketing BS, right next to the grolicks guy were these guys who sell a device which exposes your irrigation water to magnetism. That is why I got started talking to Mr. Grolicks. I got bored with their speech after I found out the price.
They had photos and charts and all sorts of proof that it works. It does sound amazing. It softens hard water and I am sure it would grow the hair back on my bald spot that is always covered by a cap.
We listened to the speech and my brother held up one of the devices for a 1" line. They had them for 1" up to 8" water lines. They were little tubes with permanent magnets in them.
The fellow said it was "six" for the one my brother had and "8" for the big one. Or something like that. It was not $6 nor was it $60 or even $600. Not it was $6,000 and $8,000. And that is where he lost me.
I would rather $6,000 down on $30,000 worth of lime than $6,000 on a magnet in a plastic tube.
After hay selling moisture testers at the ag show for years and listening to people complain about the price of something you have to have, I was incredulous at the magnet booth. Actually, I bet you could make more money off spending $500 on a Delmhorst soil moisture tester and a couple boxes of gypson blocks and doing a good moisture management program than you could running your water through a magnet. Or $850 on an Acquaterr hand held probe which also has a built in pH meter.
But I digress...
Here is an example of the magnet scam...
Here is another discussion from HempUSA.com. (I think it is kind of funny)
Here is a disagreement...
I think I will try hooking up a few magnets to the water supply and see what happens. It will probably attract aliens. I worry about aliens...

New stereo in the shop

I was "gifted" a huge pile of reel to reel tapes and two Sony reel to reels.
Lots of classical music, a little easy listening from the early 1970's. Not exactly HiFi.
I guess I just didn't realize you could stuff 120 minutes of muddy sounding bland music on a reel to reel. I had a two-track from a radio station that used the whole tape and was fairly high speed. It sounded very good.
This makes good music for me to listen to whilst miss-measuring boards I am cutting for a pallet scales I am making.
Actually I gave the nice person some cash to take her kids sledding. And I saved her a trip to GoodWill.
Today I am going to dig out the reel of old Country and Western hits from 1971 which I found at a GoodWill in Eugene some 15 years ago.  120 Minutes of Conway Twitty should put me in fine form.