otoh

This is inspired in part by some recent posts by Lime and in part by memories of my own childhood.

Ginger makes construction paper disciples.

Fred leans over his Life-of-Christ coloring book looking for the Jesus-colored crayon.

Mommy is glad to have them out of the house for half a day all this week.

Who was saved?

This is a vignette.

Fred and Ginger bounced happily along the sidewalk talking excitedly about the book they had just read. On impulse, Fred tried to kiss her cheek but buzzed her neck instead.

“Ech,” said Ginger. She stopped and looked at him sideways wiping her neck with her fingers. “Don’t do that.”

“Sorry.” He looked down then up again. “But… why.”

“You know,” Ginger turned away, “Algebra.”

I don’t know what it means. Just rattled out of my head into here. Maybe if she had said chemistry….

Of course it happened inside my head, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?

No spoilers here. Just finished the last Harry Potter Book today.

And had the windshield replaced in my vehicle today. Just a couple weeks after having extensive hail damage repaired. If bad things happen in threees, I hope that the third is simply that I forgot to renew the license tag before leaving town so I’ll be returning with an expired one….

Visiting family for a few days. And, you know, juggling.

I’m hoping it’s true that

Everything’s temporary if you give it enough time

I’m biding my time. Waiting.

Hmm, that sounds overly dramatic. It’s just a lot of (mostly) little stuff I’m juggling right now. And boy, are my arms tired….

With my deepest apologies to Sir Paul. Will you still read me?

When I get older if still posting here
Many years from now
Will you still be adding me to your Blogline
(Technorati tags are just fine)?
If I’ve been off-line for a few days
Would you delete my link?
Will you still read me, will you still feed me
When I’m sixty-four?

You’ll be older too
And if you say the word
I could guest post you

I could be handy, mending a script
When your links have gone
You can crop an image with the Photoshop
Half Nekkid Thursdays might never stop
Sharing Del.icio.us, Digg-ing the news
Who could ask for more?
Will you still read me, will you still feed me
When I’m sixty-four?

Every summer I can make a gallery on my website
Photos I must share
We shall print and save
computer on my knee
I’m a laptop slave

Send me a comment, drop me email
Stating point of view
Indicate precisely what you mean to say
Yours sincerely, wasting away
Give me your answer, fill in a form
Mine for evermore
Will you still read me, will you still feed me
When I’m sixty-four?
Ho!

These bits of songs are rattling through my brain lately:

You know I’d go back there tomorrow
But for the work I’ve taken on
Stoking the star maker machinery…
~Joni Mitchell

If ever a system cried out to have “cluster-” as part of it’s description, this is it. The state of Florida is pushing for some type of performance-pay plan for teachers. One version of that is called STAR (Special Teachers Are Rewarded) and it was replaced by MAP (Merit Award Program) even before it was fully implemented. Today (on my own time and at my own expense) I sent two registered letters as part of the appeal procedure in my district’s (poorly planned and more poorly implemented) version of STAR. Aarrrgghhhh….

I hear you knocking
But you can’t come in
I hear you knocking
Go back where you’ve been
~Gale Storm

In addition to my site having been offline for several days recently I have been locked out of the administrative functions until today. Generally, my web hosting company provides reliable service and tech support has been quick and effective when there were problems. Until this time. I can get in now, but I still have no explanation for why I was locked out or why it took seven attempts before they finally reset my password. Aarrrgghhhh….

I’m not the kind of man who tends to socialize
I seem to lean on old familiar ways
And I ain’t no fool for love songs that whisper in my ears
Still crazy after all these years, still crazy after all these years
~Simon and Garfunkel

Except, of course, that I am frequently a fool. Aarrrgghhhh….

The official border between North and South Korea (the Military Demarcation Line or MDL) lies roughly along the 38th parallel of north latitude. The Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) is the area two kilometers on each side of that line. Civilians are not allowed in the DMZ without military escort.

The Joint Security Area (JSA) in Panmunjom is the only place where the two sides stand face-to-face. [The village of Panmunjom doesn't really exist any more, but the JSA is in about the same place.] The USO office in Seoul arranges tours of parts of the JSA. Photography is not allowed in some areas for security purposes.

In 1953, the United Nations Command (UNC) [supporting South Korea] and the Chinese-North Korean Command signed an armistice agreement to end heavy fighting and created the Military Armistice Commission (MAC) to supervise implementation of the armistice. In the JSA a few buildings including the MAC conference room lie directly on the MDL. This video is inside the MAC conference room. Our escort refers to the guards as ROK soldiers [ROK = Republic of Korea].

USA — spreading democracy one acronym at a time….

If the embedded files above don’t play, you should be able to watch it here or here.

Here’s a stroll down one aisle in a market in Seoul, South Korea. It’s mostly fish and other ’seafood’. Warning: The last scene is pretty graphic.

I was really tempted to put the song “Fish Heads” on it, but decided that would just be wrong….

I’m trying both YouTube and Google Video until I can determine whether either really works better than the other. [I'd appreciate feedback in the comments.]

If the embedded video isn’t working, you should be able to view it here or here.

Hmmph! I had hoped to post some videos. But I need to do some editing on them and Movie Maker has decided to stop working. I bought a replacement today, but haven’t installed it yet. (MM wasn’t all that great to begin with so I always planned to replace it eventually….)

So instead, here’s a little souvenir from a walk on the beach last week. I’m not much of a beach person — rather a shame in a way since there are several beaches only one to two hours’ drive from where I live. I wouldn’t have been on this one except that my brother and his son were there. Since I moved away from home we get precious little time together. [If one of your kids frequently torments another, there is hope that they may still end up on friendly terms. But that's another story.]

On this particular morning I was up early and walking [yeah me]. There was a dead sea turtle that would be reclaimed by the sea when the tide got a little higher. [I didn't take any photos of that.] There were a few other people out — shelling, jogging, walking. And one of them [not me] left this footprint in the sand. So I shot it. Maybe I should have just posted the photo and let you all make up your own stories….

This was on the beach before the fireworks last night. [I don't know who the girl is, but since she's unidentifiable I'm not likely to get in trouble for not having a signed release....] I was playing around with manual exposure settings. This was f5.6 for 2 seconds.

I think my favorite shot of the night is this one though. This was f8 for 1 second.

I hope everyone in the USA and Canada enjoyed their respective holidays!