The feast of Purim, the story of Esther

While I am not a Jew, as a Christian I feel it's important to study the old books. It's where our heritage comes from. Jesus is a Jew, and there is so much more understanding of what He did when we know the old scriptures. In the next week on the Jewish calendar is the celebration of Purim. It comes from the story of Esther, a truly fascinating story. And as happens so many times, the stories repeat themselves. The names of the players will change and sometimes one player may be played by a group. Today we are living the story of Esther. The book is 10 chapters, it's a pretty easy read. I encourage everyone to take the time to read it, either before of after the blog, I am certain that you will learn something from it.

The story has four main characters, king Ahasuerus, Mordecai,  Esther, and a politician named Haman.

Let's now look at the character and actions of our main characters. 

King Ahasuerus was a weak king. He had a poor ego and needed to please everyone. I equate the spirit of Ahasuerus to today's liberal society. Constantly blown by the winds of the current fad. Always seeking approval from peers and not wanting to offend people. Or at least people with the same mind set. Very easily influenced by outside pressures.

Our next character is Mordecai. While I can't find an exact title pr position for Mordecai, he was a Jewish elder of sorts. A wise unbending man to whom many sought for guidance and instruction. Certainly not a person blown by the whims of society, keeping focused on God's law and common sense. Today I place President Trunp in the place of Mordecai.

Our next character is Esther, after whom the book is written. Esther was an orphaned Jewish girl who was raised by Mordecai. I'm not sure what the relationship actually would be called, Esther was the daughter to Mordacai's uncle, so I would guess a cousin. Most commentaries that I've read consider Mordecai to be Esther's uncle. In any case they are kinn. Esther's primary claim to fame is that she is a beauty. But unlike some of today's beauties, she is quite intelligent and shrewed.

In this timeline today, the spirit of Esther is in the people who are truly seeking the truth. Not blown by social causes, or blindly accepting the word of government of news agencies.

Our final character is Haman. Haman is a boot licking politician. The absolute best description of a politician is a line from the movie "Hunt For Red october".

"I'm a politician, which means I'm a cheat and a liar. And when I'm not kissing babies, I'm stealing their lollipops. It also means I keep my options open."

Yes this is Haman. Haman needs his ego stroked constantly. He wants everyone to recognise that he is above the dregs of society. And Haman hated Mordecai, because Mordecai would not recognize that Haman was superior.  Today the spirit of Haman is in Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Shumer.

Again, I encourage people to read the whole story, I want to pull out some highlights here. One character who had a minor part was Ahasuerus's first wife Vashti.

She too was a beauty, what some would call a trophy wife. One time when Ahasuerus was in a drunken stupor with some friends, he commanded Vashti to parade around before his friends so he could show off his trophy. Some commentaries believe that his request was for her to be naked, except for her crown. The dress is not important, as Vashiti responded to the kings request, in Persian of course; "Kiss my ass". This response cost ther her position as queen, and most believe that it cost her life. I believe that Vashti was right, no man should ask his wife to parade around for any reason.

This left a vacancy on the throne for a queen, and so it was decided to hold a kingdom wide beauty pagent for a new queen. And the winner of this was Esther.

This is how she came to be queen. Well at least part of it. After winning the contest, Esther was taken to the king's palace and educated and pampered. When it came time for her to entertain the king (for lack of a better term). Esther was wise in that she asked members of the court what turned Ahasuerus on. That combination of beauty and smarts earned Esther the crown.

In the course of events, there were some evil men who conspired to kill the king, and as fate would have it, Mordecai learned of the plot. Mordecai got word to the king through Esther and the plot was foiled. But apparently king Ahasuerus never really understood from where the hot tip came. 

Meanwhile Haman is making a name for himself, but Mordecai is a thorn in his side. He conspires to kill not just Mordecai but all Jews. Through flattery and bribes, Haman convinces the king that a "certain" people (Republicans today) need to be removed. And as the king is weak to the flattery and bribes, he agrees. This makes Haman quite glad and full of himself. He returns home bragging on all of his accomplishments.

While Haman is celebrating and having a party, king Ahasuerus is having trouble sleeping. I believe that The Holy Spirit was working on him. So the king calls for a scribe to read the minutes of the court. Think about someone reading to you the minutes of some official court meeting. That should put anyone to sleep. But as fate would have it, the scribe reads the story of how Mordecai saved the king form a plot to kill him. At this Ahasuerus wakes up, and asks who this was and if he was rewarded. The king is told it was Mordecai and no he was not rewarded. Again as fate would have it, or perhaps divine intervention, Haman arrives in the king's court at this exact moment. Haman is quite happy right now as he has plans to hang Mordecai. King Ahasuerus asks Haman what he should do to honor a man who did the king a service. As Haman is filled with conceit, and convinced of his greatness, he is certain that Ahasuerus is referring to him. Here we see how God has such a great sense of humor. Ahasuerus tells Haman to go and all do of those things to honor Mordecai. 

I want to pause right here because this is where I'd like us to be. We the people actually are on the edge of being destroyed, the king in today's story doesn't realize it yet. But conspiracies will come against all people eventually, including the "woke" of today. We need some sleepless nights when people can look at where Mordecai (or President Trump) has saved them from so much evil. Just as in this story, Haman has tried twice now to hang Mordecai and failed. 

The final events in the story of Esther reveal the plot of Haman to the king. Of how he plans to kill all of Esther's people, all because of the hatred of one man, Mordecai (or today Donald Trump). Haman had so many chances to do what was right but did not, he ended up hanging from the same gallows that was constructed for Mordecai.

I was recently moved to re-read this book and I believe it's pertinent for our time. God is moving across the face of the earth. I am certain that He has anointed President Trump to do a specific task. And just as in the story of Esther, God's people are to be saved.  Be encouraged today, while we see so much evil, God is still in control. And while we may not see all that He is doing, in His time and in His ways, the evil will both be revealed and removed.

The donuts story

If you came here from a Facebook post, you can skip the next paragraph as it is the same as what was posted. If you just found the page, I hope you can get something from it.

Just passing on a little bit of trivia for anyone who might be interested. How a donut got it’s name. It is curious how a circle of fried dough came to be called a donut, or more correctly doughnut. It’s really quite simple. At the time when donuts were first introduced to the English speaking people, the shape resembles an O or a zero, and another name for zero is naught. So they were called dough naughts, and over time the name has evolved, or devolved, whichever you prefer.  That’s the simple part of the story, for more information, check my blogspot page.

So here is the rest of the story. What I wrote above and on FB is total bull, I pulled the whole story from thin air. I did this several years ago at work as an example that if someone says something with an attitude of authority, and the story sounds plausible, people will simply believe it. And this today is a problem. So many posts are shared as fact, or a quote from some famous person, then the post is simply forwarded or shared on and on and on. There is a word for this, it’s called gossip, it’s also perpetuating lies. If you want to know how a doughnut got it’s name, go do some research. And the next time someone posts a quote by Abe Lincoln, or Charlie Brown, go research that too, odds are it’s just as bogus as the donut story above.

Using religion as an excuse for hatred

For most people, the term religion stirs the image of churches or some form of clergy, and while there is certainly a lot of churches and clergy who fall into the category of religion, it's not exclusively the same. Religion is ritual, it's sometimes believing something in the face of evidence that it's not true (like global warming, that's a religion). It is also used as a excuse to compare ones self to others, or to compare the sins of two people and to judge one as better than the other based on this religion. And it's being used to excuse the outright hatred of our current president. I've heard and read in the last several years so many commentaries on how totally evil President Trump is, yet the evidence does not support this. Lately I read a commentary by a religious man who condemns people for following the president because he's allegedly told lies. (And I say allegedly only because the things that he's supposed to have lied about, he really didn't).  Here's a news flash for you, you are a liar, so am I for that matter. In fact I have never met a person who has never told a lie. So for the self righteous writer who is passing judgment on the president for telling lies, have you sir never done so?  That would be quite an achievement and I seriously doubt it. The claim is that President Trump lied about the Chinese virus, in various ways. But I have looked back at the time line. I find no-where that there is a lie. What I do find is a lot of misinformation was spread around between December and February, and still there is a lot of misinformation being spread today although not as much and people are starting to realize that so much of what we were told before was incorrect. (I'm not sure if that was intentional or not. If it was, then those were certainly lies).

Looking back at news releases, at different speeches, what I find is that the president was saying pretty much the same things that the media and doctors were saying at the same time. He is being blamed for over 200,000 deaths due to the virus, but that is certainly a lie, or at the very least a half truth. That 200,000 people have died this year is fact, that they HAD the virus may be fact, (we know for a fact that many hospitals were attributing all deaths to the Chinese virus regardless of the cause). So in essence there were people who died not necessarily due to the Chinese virus, but died "with" the virus. There is no way to tell how many would have lived or died had the virus never spread. What we really don't know is how many died explicitly due to the virus. And as it's been politically weaponized, we may never know. The initial news releases, back in December through mid February was that this is like a severe flu strain, maybe it is, maybe it isn't. It was also stated that for people who's immune system is not compromised, the probability of survival is quite high. In fact the survivability rate is above 96 percent. 

I know that the socialists wanted President Trump to lock down the country back in late February-March. Believing that the virus could be stopped. It's a virus people, once released you can't stop it. I also know that a lot of people hoped that he would do so as it is an unconstitutional act and would actually be grounds for impeachment. What our president did was exactly what he was supposed to do, gave control to each sovereign state. Allow the governors and legislatures in each state set their own guidelines. And we saw, and are still seeing just who the dictators are. 

I recall the initial reasons for restricting movements in the country, it was to flatten the curve. To prevent a huge influx and overwhelm the hospitals. The initial objective was not to wipe it out, you can't wipe it out, it's a virus and will be with us forever. But somewhere along the line it seems that people now believe the lock downs were to give time to find a cure or vaccine. Not! 

But something else happens when a country is locked down, the economy begins to collapse. And thankfully our current president has enough business and economic sense to know that that is at least as deadly or more so than the virus. At some point one must make a decision, what has the potential to do more long term harm, and that is a very hard choice. The U.S. economy does not just affect those of us who live here, we are a world power and if our economy collapses there are global consequences. Plunging the country into a deep recession or even a depression would cause a significant amount of deaths also. 

To date I cannot understand why so many people that I know hate our president. And don't try to tell me that you don't. I hear it in your voices when you talk about him, and it's evident in the things written and the gossip continuously spread. This is where the religion comes in. It's mostly self-righteous folks that I know who spew the hatred. 

President Donald Trump is a flawed man. He has probably made some shady business deals, I'm certain that he's lied about some things. I don't know if he's cheated on his taxes, more likely simply manipulated the system as it's so complicated and hard to understand. I am also certain that he will do other things that people wold consider "sin". But I also believe that he has the best interest of this country in his mind and heart. 

There was a man in history who committed adultery. Then he conspired to have the husband of the woman with whom he had the affair killed. Pretty much everyone I know today would condemn a man for such actions, yet King David is celebrated as a man after God's heart. 

President Trump is flawed, no-man may know the heart of another. Put aside your hatred and pray for him.

Beekeepers are a little nuts

 I admit that I am a little off, well OK a lot off. Beekeepers need to be a bit off to actually enjoy keeping boxes of bugs that sting us. I currently have bees in six locations, because state regs limit how many I can have at a residence. Our club has made an arrangement with someone with some vacant property to keep some bees there, so I have some colonies and some mating nucs. We also use it as a rehab yard of sorts. If someone has a nasty hive, an evil queen, we can put them there, remove the queen and re-queen. There are two colonies that I consider demon spawn, and right now it's not a priority to re-queen. I figure a couple of nasty hives might discourage vandals. 

We have a member currently with an evil queen in the rehab yard, haven't had a chance to re-queen yet but that is now a priority.  

The grass was getting pretty high, I try to cut it once a month. Last month things went fairly well, I avoid the demon spawn until the end.  

To give you an idea of how this yard is laid out, imagine the state of Florida about 100 yards from top to bottom. We have bees along the west coast, from Naples up to Ocala, and a stand over in the panhandle, say just a little west of Tallahassee. 

This past Saturday I went to cut the grass. I start on the east coast, south of Miami. All the way up to Georgia, then make a turn and go past Tallahassee, down the west coast and back around. Using this visual, the demon spawn hives are in the Gulf of Mexico. I made it all the way up the east coast with nothing to note. Made the turn towards Tallahassee and a pretty good sized cluster came out of the largest hive, they bumped me a few times but not too bad. When I made the turn to go south, they left me alone. I proceded down west side, behind of most of the hives, again with no significant problems. Then I came to the newest demon spawn hive. It's just south of Tampa. It's kind of on the coast so I can't go behind it. I made another turn to pass this hive and I think every flyer came out. There was a pretty big cluster hanging under the box. I wish at times like these that I was wearing a body camera. I saw the bees come off the bottom, it looked like a large cloud and they were coming straight for me. I also saw bees coming out of the hive, like a water hose just spraying. By the time I reached the stand that they are on. I was nearly totally covered in bees. I could not see my hands. I am so glad my vent suit protects the way that it does. I took a few stings through my jeans. It takes about 6 laps around the yard to cut everything, I made about 3 1/2 and they found a hole in the tape around my ankles. Several bees made it up my leg and I decided to finish another day. 

Sunday I spoke with the owner of this demon spawn hive, we'll meet up later this week and de-thrown her. In the conversation I commented how I found it humorous how my arms and hands were covered with bees, how watching the swarm come at me was reminiscent of a Winnie The Poo movie. And the fact that we are willingly going to go through this box in a few days. Yes we're a little nuts.

Dark spots are all stingers. The gloves were taped to my suit. Good thing. 

Celebrating small victories

 So much has gone so wrong for so long, some days it becomes very difficult to believe that anything will get better. Yesterday (Friday October 16th) we got some more bad news. Nothing new here. 

I needed to do my yard and part of my son's yard. (I have bees there so I cut the grass sometimes). The mower was running a bit strange, I dismissed it as the grass being high and wet. In the process of cutting his grass, I hit a tree stump and bent one blade, put the front of the mower up on the trailer, and with a large adjustable wrench and a pipe wrench I was able to get the blade straight enough to finish. I left his yard and went to cut the grass at the club's out yard. when I got there I noticed gas dripping from the carburetor. My initial thought was some debris in the float valve. So I took off the bowl, and checked the valve and as assumed there was dirt. But I also found that the O ring that seals the float assembly was broke. I found the parts on-line, fairly cheap ($4) but it would take 5-7 days. Found a local place that was already closed, figured I'd call this morning (Saturday). 

So today I slept in a bit, got up at 6:20.  My plans were to take off the bent blade, go get the gasket kit, straighten the blade and finish the grass. 

Trying to remove the blade, I broke the shaft. The end is threaded, 5/8 -11 I think. The nut was rusted enough that I snapped it right off. A slight change of plans. 

Fortunately I have access to a lathe. Took off the shaft, went to the mower shop when they opened and got the gasket O ring set. Off to the shop where I faced off the shaft, drilled a hole and tapped it for a 3/8 bolt. Back home, put everything together and the mower will not run right. I thought maybe I pinched the gasket. Took the bowl back off, checked things and noticed that the main jet, which is housed in the float assembly, was missing. 

No idea where or when I lost it. The mower shop does not sell the jet, only a complete kit, ($45.00).  I can replace the carb for less. So I was resigned to wait until next week.  Started thinking of who I might know with some old mower parts. Vicki's mom, we replaced the carb on her generator two years ago and I remember keeping the old one in case we needed to move a mounting bracket. (The replacement was bought on Ebay). Went over there and sure enough it was still where I put it. Not exactly the same size but the main jet did fit in my carb. Put things back together and the mower runs. Not perfect but well enough to cut the grass in our out yard.

So with the bent blade straight(er) and the mower running fairly well, I was off to mow the out yard. 

(At least most of it, the bees were excessively mean today).

So it was a little victory, having the skills and tools available to fix the shaft, and the old carb parts to make the mower run. 

I also got another bee colony today. Feral bees under the floor of a storage shed. Five nice pieces of yellow comb (Brazilian Pepper in bloom). Found the queen 10 minutes into the removal, caged her in the box, went back at 7:30 and all of the bees were in the box. Got 1 sting in my truck driving home after placing the nuc in the new yard. There is a whole lot in life that still really sucks, but today I had a small victory.

Messing with a liberal census worker

 I had a visit from a census worker Wednesday evening. They felt that there were errors in the form I filled out on-line.

Apparently checking the box "native American" set off some flags. So as we are standing in front of my door, she looks at me and asks,

"You checked that you are native American, did you have your lineage checked?". My reply was that I did not need to check anything. My father was born on the US, my grand-father was born in the US and I was born in the US. According to a simple definition of "native", I am native. She tried to explain how the term did not mean that. She went on to say things like the original inhabitants, the indiginous people. I said that I am an indiginus person, having been born here with at least three generations being native. I could see that she was struggling trying not to say Indian. So I said, "You mean American Indian".  She said that we're not supposed to use that term. So I asked her what my choices were, she read a list, white was on the list. I told her that I am certainly not white, her paper was white. I've only met a few people who are "white". Just put me down as "other". The next question was about my sex, how do I identify. I asked her what choices I had. I don't remember all of the responses, something about non-binary was one of them. I just told her that I was male. She then asked if anyone else lived in the house. When I told her yes my wife Vicki, she asked what race she identifies as. I hesitated a moment, I could see in her face that she was a bit troubled, I said just put other there too. And the last question was about Vicki's sex. I really wanted to say something like she's a space alien or a toaster or something else absurd, but I could see by the look on this poor college student's face that the lubrication to the gears in her brain was failing, so I just said female. Common sense is a thing long gone. Maybe we can bring it back in the next generation.

Oddities happen when things wear out

 This is one of life's anecdotes. it's a story about our dryer.  Our dryer is old, I don't know how old, I bought it used at least 12 years ago so probably pushing 20?  It still works, so no need to replace it. But yesterday Vicki (my wife) came and told me the dryer stopped working. I went out and checked the clothes, yup still quite wet. Started the dryer, it's spinning. I looked over the back. There is a little crack between the sheet metal pieces that if you look at just the right angle you can see into the element housing, and if it's on, there is a red glow. Yup I see a red glow. Dryer is working, walked away. Went back an hour later to move laundry and the clothes are wet. Odd eh? Went through the same process, yes it seems that everything is working. So this time I was piddling around in the garage and I heard a strange clunk, after which the dryer stopped spinning. Hmm?  Again I restart it and this time stood and watched. It took about 2 minutes and I saw it. The door opened, maybe 1/2 inch, but just enough for the dryer to stop. Apparently the little latch that keeps the door closed is wearing out. Vicki was drying a pair of sneakers with her clothes, I took out the sneakers and tried again. Success!  I guess I'll replace the latch this week.