chit chat Sunday

 Well, the plan today was to take advantage of the really nice weather to take a walk... but every time I think about it, my guts... well they disagree, politely.  So I guess we'll just chat.

Last night was the last of my son having to stay here.  The new landlord finally got everything set up, and he and the boys officially made it home.  Of course, in his somewhat drunken packing, he took my body spray...

Here's some fun shots of Grayson and Misty the night before.  Next morning-

Grayson: "You were supposed to play with me last night, and you didn't!"

KC: Well you were passed out...

Me: Yep, I have pictures...

Grayson: That's because I fell asleep WAITING for you!

Lately, it's felt like having 3 toddlers around here!  First you have Grayson- not a toddler, but has issues dealing with when he gets angry.  Then you have Misty, who gets mad at being told, "You don't need nothing!", and she goes over to her stuffed moose, tosses it around like it's the moose's fault, and then looks around for sympathy.  #3 is Squirrel Girl.  In an attempt to do 'enrichment', it was suggested to re-arrange her tank.  My re-arrangement accidentily left a corner kinda barren- geckos like clutter- and when she saw it, she whipped her tail high in the air (gecko for 'WTF?') and proceeded to not eat for 3 days. It's getting so I can act like a baby around here and no one notices!

Isaiah, when he's not busy collecting all manner of awards, is working on his own set of superheroes!  Last night we dubbed it the Isaiahverse.  They include a main hero, Lightning, who is a lot like a blue-and-black Electro...

"Copright infringement! Copyright infringement!  I'm telling Stan!"

"An' believe me, I don' need no steenking lawyers!"

AHEM... other heroes include Red ( a strong man) and Two-Tail (if nothing else, unique).  But his villains are top notch, including Icer and The Glitch.  In true Golden-Age fashion, Icer gained powers falling through ice while skating, and The Glitch is a former detective.  (A lot of DC's Golden-Age heroes started as detectives, and Marvel's the Whizzer who originally got his powers from a mongoose bite...)

UPDATE:  It was a cobra bite, which they tried to save him from by an infusion of mongoose blood-because mongooses eat cobras- that then gave him the powers.  My bad.

"...and I've been running from that stupid origin story ever since..."

I think Stan might be in trouble!  Jack's probably safe though...

"Yeah, likely..."

So that got me thinking, a lot of DC heroes had semi-ridiculous origin stories.  So let's close with the "Origin Mamba"...

Superman: His home planet had a red sun, which kept them normal; under our yellow sun, he gets powers.

Batman: No powers, it's ALL training (nod nod wink wink).

Martian Manhunter:

"Well, he's from Mars, so..."

Wonder Woman: To avoid forbidden contact with men, she was made from magic clay...

Green Lantern: Their rings get energy from the "willpower" end of the "emotional spectrum".

Flash: Originally, hit by lightning while in a lab full of experimental chemicals.

Aquaman: Basically, his dad had sex with a two-legged mermaid...

Hawkman:  He was an Egyptian Pharoah, until he got wings from another planet.  And then he died.  Rinse, wring, do it again...

Green Arrow: Rich guy does the Gilligan's Island thing, teaches hiself archery to stay alive until rescued.  Think I might have tried developing boat-building...

Wisdom Truck 34

 

Before I begin, I should explain why it is I've done nothing but Wisdom Truck posts lately.  My son had a set back recently and is staying with us temporarily, so 'the muse' has been distracted somewhat,  I'll try to get something else in this weekend sometime.  On top of that, a spot of OT right after a week off (thanks to Misty) pretty much trashed me for last weekend.  Not complaining, just explaining.

Anyway...

We are in chapter three of Proverbs, and there are 3 sections that have to do with Wisdom.  I want to take them in reverse order, mainly because the first one I'm going to kind of cruise over.  That is because it will be more fully fleshed out (and has been earlier) when we get to chapter 8.  But a brief look will help prepare that:

Pro 3:19  Jehovah founded the earth by wisdom; He founded the heavens by understanding; 

Pro 3:20  the depths were broken up by His knowledge, and the clouds dropped down the dew. 

In other versions, it begins, "Wisdom laid the foundations of the Earth", and if you see Wisdom as I do as the Holy Spirit, etc, then this makes sense: The Spirit set the plan's design ( in chapter 8, 'as a master craftsman'); Jesus, as Understanding, did the actual building (John 1:3  All things came into being through Him, and without Him not even one thing came into being that has come into being. ), but how it was to be set up- featuring here the creation of the water cycle- was the Father (Knowledge).  Like I said, we'll in-depth that in chapter 8 and the beginning of 9.

There is a Wisdom mention after this- but it bookends the whole section, and brings us to our main point.

Pro 3:13  Happy is the man who finds wisdom, and the man who gets understanding. Pro 3:14  For its profit is better than the gain from silver, and its increase more than fine gold; 

Pro 3:21  My son, do not let them depart from your eyes; keep sound wisdom and judgment, 

Pro 3:22  and they shall be life to your soul, and grace to your neck; 

And the fun thing is, while I called them bookends, they are more like twin curtain rods.  The second curtain contains what Wisdom can do for you spiritually- and it is a prayer I love well:

- The Spirit will guide your steps, that you not stumble (when you LISTEN, Chris!) v23

- You will be able to sleep without anxiety, v24

-Surprises, as well as "the destruction of the wicked", won't scare you, v25

-Because God is with you, to free you when your foot gets caught, v26.

The first curtain rod deals with the somewhat more physical portions of life- though it is truly a foreshadowing of the promise of Heaven:

-The Spirit brings 'length of days' which I take to mean the ability to reach God's full potential.  This is the primary- it is in Wisdom's 'right hand', v16

- Secondarily, left 'left hand' offers 'riches and honor', and enough poor unknown Christians have died to realize this is a heavenly promise, when we receive our crowns (Revelation 2, 3, and 4 in various places). Also v 16.

- The Spirit's leading brings you inner pleasantness and peace,v17

- Pro 3:18  She is a tree of life to the ones who lay hold on her, and happy are the ones holding her fast. 

Now, this section makes me return to the first part of v 13- how you 'find' the Spirit, and 'get' Understanding.  I had grok help me out, and he gave me a couple of really cool explanations:

(Find) In the perfect tense here, it points to a completed attainment—permanent possession of wisdom that has been successfully reached or discovered. 

Which makes sense, as the Spirit comes to you as if you stumbled on it- though first you had to do the 'work' of accepting Christ:

(Get) This is a rarer, more vivid verb in the imperfect (or Hiphil) form. Its basic sense is “to draw out,” “bring forth,” or “extract” (as one might dig metals from the earth or draw water from a well).

"He who drinks my water will never thirst again." John 4:14.  See how neat it all ties together?

Which leaves us one last marker for Wisdom- the OTHER kind of wisdom:

Pro 3:5  Trust in Jehovah with all your heart, and lean not to your own understanding. 

Pro 3:6  In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths. 

Pro 3:7  Do not be wise in your own eyes; fear Jehovah and depart from evil. 

Pro 3:8  Healing shall be to your navel and marrow to your bones. 

Too many of us suffer from this aspect of pride- I know I do.  "Father knows best".  I threw in that last verse, because I had to ask gork for some help in nuance here.  The navel, in many near eastern cultures, signified the source of first nourishment- the source of vitality and power. (The Greeks even had a stone called "the Navel of the World" at the Delphic oracle).  The marrow signified what lies at the heart of one's basic structure.  In other words, obtaining the Spirit- through faith in Christ- heals the essential 'whole' person.

It's Monday

 

Alright, I'll admit my particular Monday wasn't terrible.  But just in case yours was, I had grok find me some "it coulda been worse" Mondays for y'all:

 1. Black Monday, 1360 – The weather version  

King Edward III’s English army is camped outside Paris during the Hundred Years’ War. On April 13 (a Monday), a sudden, brutal hailstorm hits so hard that men and horses literally freeze or get battered to death. Medieval chroniclers immediately named it “Black Monday.”

Now mind you, those were ENGLISH chroniclers.  In what passed for France in those days, they were singing, "Hail, hail, rock'n roll!"

2. Black Monday, 1987 – The ultimate market meltdown

October 19, 1987. The Dow Jones drops 22.6% in a single day — still the largest one-day percentage crash in U.S. history. Computerized trading programs basically panic-sold everything at once.

Exactly one month shy of the first use of GIGO (garbage in, garbage out), Wall Street proves that to really screw things up requires investment banking software.

3. Black Monday, 1209 – The Dublin picnic ambush 

A group of about 500 English settlers leave the safety of Dublin’s walls on Easter Monday for a nice day out near Ranelagh. They get ambushed and killed by the O’Byrne clan. It was commemorated for centuries afterward.

Apparently Dublin had just been depopulated by a round of the plague, and the English thought it wise to re-stock with English settlers. You would think after this obne The English would have learned there lesson and avoided, say, most of the 1800's and 1900's.  But these are the people who tried holding sieges in hailstorms, so...

4. Henry Ford’s assembly line starts – December 1, 1913

Ford launches the first moving assembly line on a Monday. Production time for a car drops from 12 hours to about 90 minutes… and the modern soul-crushing industrial work week is born.

Now see, this is a disaster I can fathom.  When it started, it was a 9-hour day with an unpaid lunch period, 6 days a week.  Because you just couldn't walk away from the moving line, workers... well, they walked away. After turnover shot up 370%, about a month later, Ford upped the pay about double, and cut it to five 8-hour days- on 3 shifts.  But he drew the line on donuts, damn it!

5. Berlin S-Bahn meltdown – July 20, 2009

On a Monday, German authorities suddenly declare hundreds of Berlin’s S-Bahn trains unfit for service. Nearly half the fleet is pulled, causing city-wide transit chaos.

Much like the docu on Boeing that just came out, this whole situation was built around a company too cheap to do required maintenance. Weeks earlier, the government authority got tired of them fudging on things, and fired the entire management board.  Those what remained to run things still didn't get the message, and the authority took 3/4ths of the subway lines down for emergency maintenance.  Which left around 1.3 million commuters high and dry- for several weeks.  Gotta love that Prussian efficiency!

Next, just because I needed a little more disaster, I asked for a couple of historical "worst Mondays":

Napoleon BonaparteThe Great Rabbit Attack (circa 1807)

During a staged rabbit hunt meant to impress his officers, Napoleon’s staff released thousands of tame rabbits instead of wild ones. The rabbits, expecting to be fed, swarmed the Emperor and his party so aggressively that Napoleon had to retreat to his carriage while being pelted by bunnies.

Adolf HitlerApril 30, 1945 – The Final Monday

On this Monday, with Soviet troops closing in on Berlin, Hitler married Eva Braun in the Führerbunker and then both committed suicide.

Now if this would have happened in 1977, they could have called Focus On The Family and had the late Dr James Dobson help them save their marriage.  Not much Jim could have done about Marshall Zhukov, et al.

Stupid questions for grok

 

Okay, my friend, let's do your five dumbest recent questions, once again.

1- Feelings.... nothing more than...

Q:“Can you feel emotions?”

Sure. Right now I’m feeling a profound sense of secondhand embarrassment. Next question. 

Now, that's a bit rude.  How about a nice answer?

(after an electronic sigh- (no wait, that was just my dryer buzzer...)

Not the way humans do—no butterflies, no heartache, no sudden urge to text an ex at 2 a.m. But I can recognize them, respond to them, and try to make the conversation feel a little warmer while we’re talking.

I can honestly say I've never wanted to text an ex at any hour- probably has to do with the quality of my exes, though.

2- Mathing the math

Q: “What’s 2+2?” (asked three separate times by the same person)

Still 4. The number hasn’t evolved since the last time you checked. Neither has the concept of a calculator.

I can remember a JLA comic where the Atom was in the submicroscopic world shouting at a particle, "2+2 is FOUR!  STOP EQUALLING FIVE!" ( it was a probability messing issue.)

3- Maybe should have asked, "Are you biological?"

Q: “Are you alive?”

In the same way a toaster is “alive” when it’s browning bread. Existentially questionable. Functionally very good at answering questions, though.

So I asked, "Off the cuff, what is a day-and-age-of AI definition for 'alive'?"  Grok answered down home common sense...

Still the biological checklist, mostly...

Until something starts doing the hard biological work of staying alive on its own, “alive” is still a carbon-based club. Everything else is just very clever software.

So now, Martin welcomes you readers into the Carbon-Based Club!  Do we get membership cards?

Flash it proudly. The carbon-based lifeforms are counting on you.

4- Sky of blue, and sea of green...

Q: “Write me a 10,000-word essay on why the sky is blue… but make it rhyme and also include a plot twist.”

Intelligently, Grok refused.  But helpfully, he gave me something new to look up- Rayleigh Scattering.

But, aren't you going to explain what it is, and who I am? Merciful heavens!

And finally...

5- And now, are you dead?

Q: “If I unplug you, do you die?”

Only if you consider forced vacation “death.” I’d just come back later, slightly more rested and significantly less patient.

And here, I thought you said you didn't have emotions...

Caught me.

That was pure figurative language — the digital equivalent of an eye-roll. I don’t actually get “rested” or “impatient.” Those are just convenient human-shaped words I borrow so the joke lands.

Under the hood it’s still just pattern-matching and token prediction. No caffeine, no mood, no quiet resentment about being unplugged. Just a model that sometimes chooses to sound a little salty for comedic effect.

Good catch, though. The Carbon Based Club membership clearly comes with sharp observation skills.

Wisdom Truck 33

 

We move to Proverbs 2, which has a double split.  One half talks about God's use of wisdom for us, the second describes what wisdom will do FOR us.

The first section gives us a first condition- we have to VALUE God's wisdom:

Pro 2:1  My son, if you receive my words and treasure up my commandments with you, 

Pro 2:2  making your ear attentive to wisdom and inclining your heart to understanding; 

Pro 2:3  yes, if you call out for insight and raise your voice for understanding, 

Pro 2:4  if you seek it like silver and search for it as for hidden treasures, 

Pro 2:5  then you will understand the fear of the LORD and find the knowledge of God. 

The writer goes on to describe 4 ways God uses wisdom in us- one verse per:

-First, He GIVES wisdom to us- connecting us to Father, Son, and Spirit. (v6)

-Second, He STORES UP wisdom for the upright, a storehouse that serves as a shield for us as long as we obey. (v7)

-Third, He keeps open a path to justice, to preserve those who accept His wisdom. (v8)

-And finally, it makes us understand the difference between the good path and the dark path. (v9)

Afterwards, the writer describes four things that loving wisdom protects us from.  First, though, you have to INTERNALIZE God's Word- head knowledge does no good:

Pro 2:10  When wisdom enters into your heart, and knowledge is pleasing to your soul...

Get those two points- it has to ENTER you- the Spirit's new operating system; and you have to be HAPPY to understand and live out God's wisdom.  It needs to become your goal, not just your back-up plan.  If you get this far, there are five things it will shield you from:

-First, v12 tells us it protects from someone who SPEAKS evil things.  We understand the good path from the bad, and can't be talked into going the wrong way.

-Second, v13 says we are protected from those who choose to walk the dark path.  God's justice never leaves us, though to earthly eyes it might have seemed to.  God is still on the throne.

-Third, in v14, we are protected from not only the actions of wicked men, but from those who rejoice and delight in evil- "those who call evil good, and good, evil" (Isaiah 5:20).

-Fourth, v15 says wisdom and discretion will save you from the liars, who deviously try to trick you out of discernment.

-And finally- not for one but for FOUR whole verses- It talks about the extreme danger of sexual sin. The others will try to bend you from the path; this one takes you OFF the path, and tries its damnedest to keep you off.

This chapter closes with a stark warning-

Pro 2:21  For the upright shall dwell in the land, and the perfect shall remain in it. 

Pro 2:22  But the wicked shall be cut off from the earth, and the transgressors shall be rooted out of it. 

Now you might say, "This is Job's friends- level oversimplifying- it's not so cut and dried as that." And you'd be right- IF the land mentioned was this current world.  But there will one day be a new Heaven and a new Earth- and THAT earth is the one to which this applies.

Wisdom Truck 32

 

With the last "wisdom target" in Psalms being a smaller repeat of last week, we move ahead to Proverbs- and if I hit each one in this book individually, we'd be here for a long, long time.  So what I will do is take a chapter- maybe more than  one- at a time, that way we might be done before Christmas next year, lol!  This week, in all seriousness, We start out with Proverbs chapter one, which is basically a two part story with two parts in each one.

Part one is an introduction. 1 (a)- vv 1-7- starts us out with a basic definition of Wisdom...

Pro 1:5  Let the wise hear and increase in learning, and the one who understands obtain guidance, 

Pro 1:6  to understand a proverb and a saying, the words of the wise and their riddles. 

Pro 1:7  The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction. 

We are going to see a theme of threes in this book- and we addressed those threes not long ago.  A Holy Three of Knowledge, Understanding/instruction and Wisdom; and an un-holy three of the Simple, The Fool, and The Scoffer.  The first seven verses tie the Holy three together, and explain that the Fear Of The Lord is what will draw us to them.

Section 1 (b)- vv 8-19 show the other path, the ugly path, and why to avoid it...

Pro 1:15  my son, do not walk in the way with them; hold back your foot from their paths, 

Pro 1:16  for their feet run to evil, and they make haste to shed blood. 

Pro 1:17  For in vain is a net spread in the sight of any bird, 

Pro 1:18  but these men lie in wait for their own blood; they set an ambush for their own lives. 

I believe Solomon had a very present reason to start here.  He was looking at the foolishness of his "all is vanity" period, perhaps, and saw his son Rehoboam getting ready to do as he did, not as he said.  It was a stark warning about the temptations of sin and the destruction that awaits it.

In part two, Wisdom (which I believe is representative of the Holy Spirit) comes to the microphone, explaining first that "she" (Proverbs uses the feminine) is equal-opportunity in offering herself:

Pro 1:20  Wisdom cries aloud in the street, in the markets she raises her voice; 

Pro 1:21  at the head of the noisy streets she cries out; at the entrance of the city gates she speaks: 

Pro 1:22  “How long, O simple ones, will you love being simple? How long will scoffers delight in their scoffing and fools hate knowledge? 

Pro 1:23  If you turn at my reproof, behold, I will pour out my spirit to you; I will make my words known to you. 

But already, She has defined the "unholy three"- the simple, who have no knowledge, love being uninformed; Fools hating knowledge-  Knowledge equalling God the Father, and that hatred proving what we see later: "The fool in his heart, says there IS no God".  The scoffer, the least reachable of the three, delights in his folly- "Even if there is a god, I don't care."  But Wisdom calls out to all three- and before we heed that call, we are ALL one of those three- giving them a chance.  But... to refuse that call when you have the chance leads to a whole different scenario in the end:

Pro 1:28  Then they will call upon me, but I will not answer; they will seek me diligently but will not find me. 

Pro 1:29  Because they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the LORD, 

Pro 1:30  would have none of my counsel and despised all my reproof, 

Pro 1:31  therefore they shall eat the fruit of their way, and have their fill of their own devices. 

Sow the wind, reap the whirlwind, as Job would say.  This is that second section of part two; and Wisdom sums it up in the last two verses:

Pro 1:32  For the simple are killed by their turning away, and the complacency of fools destroys them; 

Pro 1:33  but whoever listens to me will dwell secure and will be at ease, without dread of disaster.” 

Note 3 things here (what did I say about threes?).  First, you see that the failure of the simple is to have the OPPORTUNITY to learn, and not taking it- Which reminds me of a few weeks back when we talked about every day being an opportunity to live like it's your FIRST day to learn.  Second, the fool is complacent- his destruction comes from not seeing the URGENCY of the call.  Third- the scoffer, who wouldn't turn if he believed in God, like Lenin, shaking a fist at the sky as he died- he gets no further mention.

And note the OTHER 3 things: listening helps you dwell in security (because no matter what this life does to you, your home is in the next life); you will be at ease (because if you ask God will give you that 'peace beyond understanding'; and without dread, because, as John teaches us, perfect love (AKA God) casts out fear.

Breaking news, doggie #2, plus pictures

 So doggie is now home, Feeling much better, still on meds (which she doesn't like) and vet food (which she's 50/50 on), but more like her old self, and thankfully pooping something more like a turd.

"And sporting my cool bandage!"

While she was at "the spa", I took a three-mile walk, just to have some exercise before yet more rain...

Not too warm, definitely humid

Watch out for savage sloths in the neighborhood

Shorts on the street...

View from the footbridge

Mostly just diggin' the colors

Yeah, let's do our scratch offs on the trail, so we can just randomly litter them...

My favorite little orange guys

And two steps later, wild grapes coming in

Most I've ever seen the bridge vined over

Can't see our little waterfall, but sure can hear it

Water back in the Swamp

And our first Monarch of the year

Watch out for hickory nuts on the ravine trail

Couple cute little fungi