It isn't a new concept....

Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick
themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened.
-- Sir Winston Churchill


The word of 2005 according to the Amerian Dialect society, is the one Stephen Colbert used to decribe his Comedy Central show, Truthiness. Not what is true, he explains, but what you feel in your heart Should Be True. Facts? I don't need no stining facts, in other words. But as Churchill points out, people have been seeing exactly what they want to see for years. Lifetimes, even.

I bring this up, after a long, loud conversation with a fourth grader who told me that his goal in life was to join a gang. But he couldn't tell me why, except that he wanted to. The epitome of being led by emotions, but having no clue of what they are and where they are leading him. He said that he was tired of having to listen to everyone at school. But, I asked him, does that mean you'll be in charge of the gang, or do you just want different people telling you what to do? He didn't have an answer for that either. Go figure.

Turth and logic, Fox news aside, are getting rarer and rarer. I can see things in the education system that are in place to help kids understand their feelings, and all that, which is good, because no one at home is teaching them that. But no one is teaching how to think, how to reason out the consequences. How to find out what is truth and what is only truthiness.

The Ultimate Reason to lose weight now...

Want to lose weight? Kill someone. It's easier to lose weight for a trial than for a prom or wedding, or even a class reunion. The new Jenny Craig Watchers comes with a patented knife and an exercise program designed to build upper body strength.



I'm following a local murder trial. At first I ignored it as the ususal domestic violence out of hand murder, but when an acquaintance of mine was supeonaed and I had to go work for her, my interest got a bit piqued.

The defendent is accused of killing her allegedly abusive boyfriend. She testified that she thought her very life was in danger there in the kitchen, so she grabbed the closest knife and beat him to the punch, so to speak. The victim's wife testified that the man himself was prone to being abusive.

Here's the kicker for me. The prosecution accuses the defendent of being coached. Hmm, if I was an undereducated woman of color facing a panel of my "peers" and a bunch of white male attorneys and judges, you know, I would welcome some coaching, wouldn't you? It doesn't take much to walk in this woman's flip flops. She's on trial for her life and the prosecution says she is being coached. Of course she is being coached. Sitting on the witness stand isn't something that comes naturally to most people. I'm sure the ADA "prepped" his or her witnesses as well. The question is, when does prepping become coaching?

But that, in itself, is not the real thing that gets me. The prosecutor accuses the woman of, (I am not making this up) Losing weight on purpose to look better for the jury. As in, Hmm, I'm the defendent in a murder trial next month, I should lose a few pounds. Is there a Weight Watchers group that meets at the County Jail?

If you have EVER tried to lose weight for an event, a STRESSFUL event, you know it's plum near impossible. You would think that if you're the type to put on weight under stress, the idea of having to lose weight to save your life, would be enough stress to undermine the whole process. Not to mention the fact that the jailhouse food most likely isn't the most conducive to weight loss. Just a guess, I've never eaten there, although now I'm curious. If she indeed lost weight that fast to impress the jury, she has a new diet book out tomorrow and it will be a best seller.

Of course, the opposite thing is what I think. If you're facing a trial and 99 years in prison, I'm thinking it's kind of a natural appetite suppressant.

The implications of the ADA's question are stunning:

You can't get a fair trial if you are an overweight black woman. Large women look guilty. If you want to be found innocent, you must look thin and therefore successful.

You can easily drop weight under the stress of trial preparation with minimal effort. No problem. Anyone can do it. Just do the jail house version of Atkins. Ask any woman how easy it is to lose weight for an event. They will gush that whenever there is a major event in their lives, weight just falls off - NOT. Maybe for those people who don't eat when their depressed, but not for stress eaters. I'm thinking that losing weight, while surely helping in personal appearance and first impressions, is more like a symptom than a goal. I'm sure that if I was on trial for murder, losing weight would be the first thing on my mind. And that alone would be a good excuse for the insanity defense.

Retreat....

As I was sitting in church last Sunday, I was treated to the multi media, uh, powerpoint with music, presentation of the promotion of the latest women's retreat. Lots of photographs of well dressed, nice women, looking like they're having a great time. It's billed as a great time away, a time to be silly, not too draggy and spritual, a time to relax and make new friends.

I've been to several retreats. I must be retreat impaired. I meet and get to know many new people, but once we get back to the real world, I never see them more than two and half minutes at a time again. Must be me.

I was thinking of the message of the ads though. It is billed as a place to relax, have fun, etc. Not too heavy and spiritual. This is what confuses me. I mean, I need a place to be heavy and spiritual. I can be silly at home. I can relax at home. I can be myself at home. Why go to this retreat where the prevaling value is who can be more outrageous? Or the other value, who can cry at small group time?

The more I think about it, the more I really want to go to one of those silent retreats. The ones where you meet with a spritual director in the morning, really the only non-Jesus person you get to know during the weekend, and then spend the rest of the day in silence, listening. Maybe some worship time at night. To me, that seems more relaxing than the frenetic pace and competition of a Ladies, We're going to wild and crazy and you may even learn something retreat.

Of course, the speakers this year come from the house of the Grand Inquisitioner himself, which probably fuels my skepticism. Two women who wrote a book about family life, etc. So you retreat away from your family to learn how to run your family spiritually. Or the way God would want you to. I hesitate to use the word Scripturally , since there aren't many families in Scripture I'd want to emulate. I think the main problem I have with Focus on the Family is the word Family is capitalized and the The isn't. We should be focused on The Family, as in God's family, not just the little nu-cleer family that seems to be so worshipped. And the problem with that is, like anything else, you don't get to pick your family. You don't get to decide who is in God's family. He does. And if you don't agree, tough. Just like His work should be first, so should His family. Now sure, our little families are a part of it all. But not the end all, be all.

Executive summary. I'm not going to the silly retreat. I'm looking for a silent retreat. I'm sure the world would appreciate me not talking for a whole weekend.

The collection grows....

Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's
character, give him power.
-- Abraham Lincoln

I have always had an awareness of power. I don't know if it was because one of my father's favorite responses to a question was rank has it's privileges or what. But it's there. My fascination, obsession, with it doesn't always find fellow travelers. I once mentioned in a Bible Study that I thought one of the biggest problems people had with Jesus was sibling rivalry - we were jealous that He got to be God and we didn't. I don't remember seeing that many blank faces staring at me before. I might have been accidently speaking in tongues, for I know. A big no no at our Bible Church.

Research has included Barbara Ehrnreich's Nickel and Dimed, on (Not) getting by in America. She basically takes a few months out of her life, works minimum wage jobs and tries to make a living, you know, pay rent, etc. She has the advantage of having PH.D in Biology, of course, but apparently knowledge of the multiplication of one celled life doesn't matter when you're a Merry Maid in Maine. It's quite a fascinating book. In the very beginning, she mentions that her family isn't that far from its blue collar roots. Her grandfather, or father, was a miner, and her husband did factory work until he got on as a union organizer. Thing is, it wasn't that foreign a culture for her. But for the rest of the "rich" the life of the maids that clean their houses are just as different as the life of some Muslim prince. Here in America. Difference is, the upper crust doesn't have as much awareness of it, at least not a truly compassionate understanding. Just haven't been there.

More fodder. We'll see where it goes.

More quotes on power

A good man would prefer to be defeated than to defeat injustice by evil
means.
-- Sallust, 'Jugurthine War,' 41 B.C.

The highest proof of virtue is to possess boundless power without
abusing it.
-- Lord Macaulay, review of Lucy Aikin, 'Life and Writings
of Addison,' 1943

So the proof of lack of virtue is to possess boundless power and totally abusing it? Or maybe proof of humanity. I had a social studies teacher, Mr. Novak, in 9th grade. He taught the second half of the year, American History. Which was tough for him. It was 1979 and the man still could not say Nixon's name without stuttering. He was the mayor of North Plainfield, when he wasn't corrupting young high school minds with his democratic ideas. I remember several things about him, his large aviator style glasses, his longish, light brown hair. Thinking about those things, I realize he wasn't exactly old, but when you're a high school freshman, everyone is old. But he was most likely in his thirties. Anyway, his other favorite old saw was "It's nice to be important, but it's important to be nice." He said that one every day, along with the famous, Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. I wonder whatever happened to him. It's funny how some teachers stick with you. Unfortuneately, google doesn't help much here. The two teachers I remember the most, Novak and Smith, there's nothing on them. The one I disliked the most as useless, he's the interim superintendent. Figures, those who can, do. those who can't, teach, those who can't teach, administrate.

I don't know how well it would go over these days, to have the mayor of a local town as a high school teacher. I do know it gave us a great perspective of local politics and the way people in our towns thought. Or didn't think, as the case may go. Most political decisions, it seems, are made by emotion rather than careful consideration of facts. Something the protagonists in my new book with work with extensively.

So I can find these quotes later....

I'll put them here. I find them inspiring to the new project.



I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us
with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use.
-- Galileo Galilei

You will find that the State is the kind of organization which, though
it does big things badly, does small things badly, too.
-- John Kenneth Galbraith

I improve on misquotation.
-- Cary Grant

Every nation ridicules other nations, and all are right.
-- Arthur Schopenhauer

Today at church, we had a guest speaker, a fellow from Dallas Theological Seminary who wrote an Anti-Da Vinci code book. He was a great speaker, and it was quite lovely to be treated like a grown up with a working brain at church again. It's been awhile. But in the back of my mind, the whole time, I was a bit envious of Dan Brown. How cool it would be to write a book that caused that much backwash! De-bunking his book has become a cottage industry for the Christian press, on top of the movie, the books, the coffee table editions with the Renassaince art, etc. Dr. Bock talked about how Brown changed his website and intros to go from saying he believed it to all be true, to a more moderate stance. The man may be a liar or not, but he is a marketing whiz.

Red plus Blue equals Purple...

I have been thinking that I would make a proposition to my Republican
friends... that if they will stop telling lies about the Democrats, we
will stop telling the truth about them.
-- Adlai E. Stevenson Jr., Speech during 1952 Presidential
Campaign

Sure there are dishonest men in local government. But there are
dishonest men in national government too.
-- Richard M. Nixon

At least we know, there has ALWAYS been a gap between the R's and the D's. I mean, sure it might get wider now and then, but I'm starting to think that W's right, he may become a unifying factor after all. By the next election cycle, we might all be very afraid of the man and his staff. It's no so much the basic, the conservatism etc, but the imperialism that bothers me. They seem to have the line down, "We're from the government, we're here to help." I'd love to somehow make this into some kind of warped, modern version of the Brothers Karamazov. You have the whole Inquistion, which can be our little wire tap thing, and all kinds of other, "People don't want to be free, they want to be secure thing." Of course, it would help if I would reread the Brothers. Put that one on the summer todo list.

Getting the modern information isn't so much a problem. But a modern retelling would be a fun project. The brothers Bush, and it would be about W and Jeb. I'm starting to really like the idea, actually. I might start actually making some notes about it. Start some free writing, that kind of thing.

Of course I know that this blog is SO durn popular that some famous author could come take my idea and make it his own. Stay away, Dan Brown. I know you're out there.

Storm Structure...

I've been reading, or rather, re-reading, a book by Natalie Goldberg called Thunder and Lightening. Go figure, it's a book about writing, and surprisingly, a book mostly about writing fiction and her struggles with it.

Most appropriately, I'm reading it during the spring storm season. The biggest storms come when organized systems crash into each other. That's something to ponder for a while when it comes to putting conflict in fiction.

One thing Ms. Goldberg talks about in this book is the need for structure in fiction. And though she briefly talks about outlines and her inability to use them, she does talk about her laissez-faire upbringing and her innate need for structure growing up that led to her study of Buddhism. Her mother was strictly hands off and uninvolved, not the typical Jewish mother. I thought it rather ironic myself that a Jewish woman would grow up to seek structure in Zen. But her past displayed the structure of Judaism, (and most likely Christianity) as something imposed from the outside and not organic, coming from within. Goldberg attributes the seventies' growth in the Eastern religions as part of the desire of that generation for an inner structure.

I think we all desire that inner structure. The church I go to, after struggling with "issues" has dealt with the problem by imposing outer structure. Issues? Ok, it struggles with sex. The problem of outer structure is that the rules and rituals themselves can easily become the very methods of heaven. Because the act of doing, of following the rules, can make the follower feel "clean." Like the very act of stepping through the door of a church could save. Which, I guess it could, if that's the best you could do faithwise.

Legalism grows in the the soil of desire for structure. Part of our church's "structure" is understanding. You must have understanding to be saved. Belief, sure, but understanding? Can you be truly "saved" in the evangelical sense and not have a clue to what you are saved from or by? Some can never wrap their brains around the theology, does that preclude them from heaven? Maybe this is where God uses the "foolish things" to confound the wise. Can "so great a salvation" be readily explained in four easy steps? And if it can, is it that great?? If you don't/can't understand, does that mean you're not?

Like the famous Kennedy Questions. If you die tonight, how sure are you that you'll go to heaven? 50%? 99 96/100's? According to theology, you can and should be one hundred percent sure. There's scripture to back that up, of course. It ignores the section where Jesus talks about people who will be surprised and say Lord Lord, and Jesus tells them He never knew them. Where are the percentages here?

Is it possible to doubt theology without doubting Christ? I sure hope so. But I feel in some way that those around me are trying to box Jesus in, contain Him, control Him, by understanding. As if, a while back, we let Jesus get out of control and bad things happened. It's a fine line between freedom and license and too easy to cross. Back away from the canyon. There's no protective barrier, unless you build your own.

So, that's what churches do. They put up a wall and a border patrol they are comfortable with. But a life lived in fear of sin is awfully small and tight. Growth is restricted by structure, rather than guided by it. Outer imposed structure stunts. Inner structure, guides. And God wrote, "I will write My Law on their hearts..." Sounds like inner structure is His choice as well...

At the foot of the master

There's no trick to being a humorist when you have the whole government
working for you.
-- Will Rogers

Says the master political humorist. He would certainly enjoy the current state of political affairs. I still cannot believe how many gung ho anti terrorist neocons have absolutely no problem with a foreign government running key military ports. Asinine. One had the gumption to say, we shouldn't hold it against the company DP if a few bad apples passed through their country. Ok, if you feel that strongly about it, why not let them take over White House security as well? That would free up a few more Marines and Secret Service guys to go fight the civil war in Iraq. Shoot, let's let them secure all our embassies as well. That'll free up even more Marines. I mean, DP is safe, right? No reason they can't run the White House and a few embassies just because a few bad apples passed through.

Some one else compared it to the Oklahoma City bombing, like American Companies can't run the ports either, since they are tainted by Timothy McVeigh. Please. Like there isn't a difference between some nutcase driving a rental truck of bomb next to a federal building and the coordinated efforts of a bunch of foreign nationals to hijack and crash five passenger jets and crash them similtaneously into key targets.

I wish I could understand the thought processes going on here and how letting DP run the ports is a good thing. The military doesn't seem to think so, and I think we ought to listen to their opinion on this one. Otherwise, doesn't matter how many vests they wear, they have neon targets on them.

The sad thing, is I don't even think Master Rogers would find any of this funny.

The Quotable Peach

One of my hobbies, besides writing unsellable historical fiction, watching the dog sleep, and playing spider solitaire (whew, I'm busy!) is collecting odd quotes.

Got some doozies today:



Nothing is more conducive to peace of mind than not having any opinions
at all.
-- Georg Christoph Lichtenberg

Blame someone else and get on with your life.
-- Alan Woods

A liberal is a person whose interests aren't at stake at the moment.
-- Willis Player


And my favorite....

If the automobile had followed the same development cycle as the
computer, a Rolls-Royce would today cost $100, get a million miles per
gallon, and explode once a year, killing everyone inside.
-- Robert X. Cringely, InfoWorld magazine

Isn't that the truth!!!

Packing for a move...

Some one offered to email me something about an upcoming soccer party, then back pedaled. "I forgot, you're moving, you'll have the computer packed up."

Where were her priorities. When moving, this is it:

Hook up fridge - oh, wait, that's done, it conveyed.

Hook up washer and dryer - done, also conveyed.

set up beds - like I'm really going to sleep?

set up computer

but all I have to do is plug in my wireless dsl router and turn on my laptop and we're surfing. If Verizon does their job. And they will, because if they don't, they will be the victims of the most brutal bloggings since Rush Limbaugh's America Held Hostage them of the Clinton administration. And blogging is even better than talk radio for reaching people who don't remember the Clinton Administration, because they were still watching Blue's Clues and Dora the Explora.

It's all about Priorities...

The Philosophy of Crafty Peaches

There are several theories floating around about the philosophy of Crafty Peaches. Or is it the psychology of Crafty Peaches? No bother. But, in the form of a top ten list:

10. If it come as a spam message, it is fodder for anything Crafty Peaches to write about. Humor is optional.

9. If something is offensive to you, you don't have to read it. Even if you are my friend. Hopefully, tomorrow, I'll bother someone else.

8. Most of these posts will come before coffee in the morning. Use that information as a filter.

7. There may come a day when there are too many blogs in the cyber world. A day when there are not enough words left to populate the files of every wannabee writer on the internet. A day when servers will crash and disks will err. But not this day, this day we write!

6. Did I mention that this is an experiment to see how fast I can get my crafty peaches blog to the top spot on the Google search for Crafty Peaches? So naturally, I will use the words Crafty Peaches as much as I can in each and every Crafty Peaches post. More value for you the reader!

5. If you would like to meet the rest of the produce department, there's http://the randomtalentedfruit.blogspot.com. The Random Talented Fruit generator. Like a old pub where the locals go to argue about politics and soccer rules.

4. Yes, you are correct. I am spending too much time on the whole Crafty Peaches universe. But wait until you see the t-shirt.

3. Why, yes, I AM Crafty Peaches. Please don't confuse me with Crappy Pleasers, who meet for a self-help assertiveness training group at justsaynodammit.blogspot.com

2. That was a lie. There is no justsaynodammit.blogspot.com But it's available and I won't even charge you. Consider it one more instance of the excellent customer service that will be a part of each and every post here at Crafty Peaches.

1. Crafty Peaches. Crafty Peaches Crafty Peaches Crafty Peaches Crafty Peaches Crafty Peaches Crafty Peaches Crafty Peaches Crafty Peaches Crafty Peaches Crafty Peaches Crafty Peaches Crafty Peaches Crafty Peaches Crafty Peaches Crafty Peaches Crafty Peaches Crafty Peaches Crafty Peaches Crafty Peaches


Are we there yet?

I couldn't resist...

Crafty Peaches is getting SO very much spam at my email address that he/she/they need their very own blog to comment on it all.

Today, in fact, Crafty Peaches was sent a delightful invitation to find singles over thirty (Thirty days? that's really old for fruit, unless it's well preserved)

And the address of a website that would let Crafty Peaches train for a job in the field of Health. Because we all would feel better knowing the person on the other side of the stethoscope trained online, between adventures on Runescape.

Now, to find out how many people google Crafty Peaches each day....