Necessary Roughness

two kingdoms, hundreds of thousands of miles

Archive for December, 2006

Visit to Picktown Lights
Saturday, December 30th, 2006

Saturday evening we visited Picktown Lights, a neighborhood Christmas light display.
This was featured in the December 21 edition of CBS Sunday Morning. The first half features a house in Utah, the second half this exhibit involving 15 houses in Pickerington, OH.
This is not a beer commercial!

The lights are synchronized to audio broadcast over a [...]

What’s the Up Side on Cloned Meat?
Thursday, December 28th, 2006

The Washington Post reports that the FDA says that milk and meat from cloned animals is just as safe as the same products from normal animals.
But it represents a crucial milestone for the handful of biotechnology companies that see cloning as a welcome opportunity to sidestep the vagaries of sexual reproduction and instead mass-produce some [...]

Pushing Tin
Thursday, December 28th, 2006

It’s hard enough to believe the tots will be turning four in less than two weeks. It’s even harder to believe the Mrs. and I have been married for ten as of today.
After our marriage turned seven I remember being told, “you’re past the age now where most men have mid-life crises.” Deo gratias, that [...]

I think Bolivia, Ecuador, and Peru would be understanding if Senators Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Harry Reid (D-NV) wanted to postpone their meetings a week or so.
AP reports that Durbin, Reid, Kent Conrad (D-ND), Judd Gregg (R-NH), and Ken Salazar (D-CO) are headed to South America, stopping at Machu Picchu along the way.
What a class [...]

Iran’s Oil is Drying Up
Wednesday, December 27th, 2006

Something else Iran has in common with Hugo Chavez…declining oil fields. The Washington Post reports that a National Academy of Sciences journal projects Iran’s oil income could be gone by 2015.
Iran’s economic woes could make the country unstable and vulnerable, with its oil industry crippled, Roger Stern, an economic geographer at Johns Hopkins University, said [...]

Pope Benedict’s Urbi Et Orbi
Tuesday, December 26th, 2006

Pope Benedict XVI writes very well, and one can appreciate his preemptive efforts to head off a full religious war with those who follow Islam. During the Christmas Mass, the Pope delivered his “Urbi et Orbi” message, which had some good ideas and some that should be challenged or clarified.
I do like his point that [...]

The Higher Things FFL’s Schottenheimer
Monday, December 25th, 2006

In 1995 the Kansas City Chiefs under coach Marty Schottenheimer went 13-3 in the regular season, skipping the first round of the playoffs with a bye, only to be knocked out by the Colts in the first playoff game they played. The Schottheimer era for Kansas City and San Diego meant plenty of regular season [...]

Merry Christmas!
Monday, December 25th, 2006

Jauchzet, frohlocket! auf, preiset die Tage,
rühmet, was heute der Höchste getan!
Lasset das Zagen, verbannet die Klage,
stimmet voll Jauchzen und Fröhlichkeit an!
Dienet dem Höchsten mit herrlichen Chören,
laß uns den Namen des Herrschers verehren!
Shout ye, rejoice ye, come praise ye this feast day,
triumph, today your Redeemer is born!
Banish your fears and forget your lamenting;
tune all your voices [...]

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