Not all Junk Mail is Junk

Today I looked over an annual report from one of my favorite charities, World Relief. Ordinarily I am tempted to throw this stuff out because I can’t imagine how the contents could be information I don’t already have, and I can’t see how it would change my mind about anything. But I felt I should take a look.

It’s remarkable. Two things struck me. First, the abject misery of many of the people they help. Second, the amazing things very small amounts of money are doing for these people.

As an example, let me point to their loan program in Burundi. They call the program Turame. The average first loan is $47, and subsequent loans range from $80 to $160. The report says 1% of these loans are considered at risk of default. Maybe they should be running Fannie Mae.

Loan recipients sometimes use the money to bulk up their small businesses, such as shops. One lady mentioned in the report added flour and soft drinks to her inventory, so now her earnings are up. And she supports five kids. That’s a great return on such a small investment. And it’s not even a donation; the money is going to come back to World Relief.

They have another program in Rwanda, where many of the men have been killed by genocide. World Relief has rounded up 200 widows, and they’re growing flowers for the essential-oil market. Being a widow is tough anywhere. In Rwanda, it must be a hellish existence. But these ladies are getting help.

In Mozambique, World Relief is improving irrigation and teaching people to grow things like papayas and mangoes. And they’re learning how to manage the soil so they have a future.

The report says 89% of their assistance goes to women. They cite several reasons. Women are more likely to be exploited in prostitution or human trafficking. Women have less access to banks and so on. But there’s another reason at which the report only hints. Many African families are fatherless. Fathers die in war and from AIDS, and there is also a serious problem with African fathers abandoning their families. It’s not PC to say it, but it’s true; Africans themselves complain about it.

Fathers are important. To people who say you can raise fine children without a father present, let me respond: you can also lead a long, fulfilling life with no legs. That doesn’t mean it’s how people should live. Some people grow up and prosper in spite of absent or inadequate fathers. On the other hand, many do very poorly.

Reading the stories and looking at the photos, you can see how little hope these people have when left to their own devices, and how much it means to them when someone shows up and enables them to help themselves.

The world is a peculiar place. One of the worst kinds of evil is to do someone else great harm in order to reap a small benefit. To pull an example out of thin air, think of a wealthy man who drives a family off of a small property in order to take the land and add a tiny percentage to his own income. On the other hand, sometimes you can do someone else a great deal of good by doing something that has a trivial cost to you. Forty-eight bucks? That’s dinner for two at Outback.

The International Fellowship of Christians and Jews is also doing great work. They put $2 million into the restoration of 32 bomb shelters in rocket-plagued Sderot. They’re flying Jews to Israel from all sorts of miserable places. They send workers to help poor Jews in the former USSR, including elderly Jews who are alone and live in utter squalor. They’re helping West Bank settlers who apparently have more faith in God’s promises than in their government’s hopes of appeasing Israel’s hostile neighbors.

I had no idea how big their budget was. They took in around $78 million last year! And almost all of it came from American Christians who were thrilled to donate. It’s too bad the IFCJ can’t attract more money from Jews. Even the Israeli government acknowledges the IFCJ’s gigantic impact. They’ve made Rabbi Eckstein (the IFCJ’s leader) their goodwill ambassador to evangelicals in Latin America, which has traditionally been a hotbed of anti-Semitism. Now Christians down there can hear him on the radio, and they are sending support.

Here’s something weird: Rabbi Eckstein has a bona fide ministry…to Christians! He puts out DVDs explaining Christianity’s Jewish roots. They’re very good. What a strange time we live in.

Socialism, with its oppression, totalitarianism, and hatred of God, comes to those who deserve it. These days, when I criticize the government for taking our money and using it to addict the undeserving poor to vote-buying handouts, I am careful to remember that unless private charity steps up to the plate, Americans will look very bad, complaining about entitlements. In the past I haven’t done what I should. I’m glad there are so many opportunities to correct that.

Griddle Beats the Broiler

Last night, I was spirited off to Ruth’s Chris for a free dinner. And I was scared. Why? Because I keep saying my steaks are better than theirs. What if my memory was wrong? Ack.

Today I am feeling smug, however, because I was right.

I had the cowboy ribeye (bone-in with the meat removed from the skinny end), a baked potato, a Caesar salad with anchovies, and a Chopin martini. I’ll give you my evaluation.

First off, the meat was more tender than my ribeyes. I think. It may have been that it was just juicier. I dry-age, and maybe Ruth’s doesn’t. Dry-aging reduces the water content somewhat. They may be wet-aging; women like it because you get a really wet steak. Regardless of what the deal was, the texture was a little bit like a big piece of Jell-O.

I wasn’t too excited by that. People who don’t know anything about beef think tenderness equals quality, but that’s wrong. A steak should be tender, but it shouldn’t be like eating tapioca. It shouldn’t jiggle. That’s a little off-putting. A steak should be juicy, too, but that doesn’t mean it should be so juicy that it tastes watery.

My rib eyes are very tender. They come apart with very little effort. And they’re juicy; a gorgeous red-brown fluid comes out of them, inviting you to dip bites of potato in it. But they still resemble meat. You can feel something in your mouth when you chew. In my opinion, that’s how steak is supposed to be.

The flavor of the Ruth’s steak was not what it should have been. They use some kind of strange seasoning; I can’t tell what it is. It’s all you can taste. The flavor of the beef doesn’t really come through. Furthermore, they serve the steak on a hot plate (very nice) surrounded by added butter (very nice) which burns (not nice at all) while they bring the steak to you. The flavor of burned butter is very strong, and it’s not pleasant. I’ve used tiny amounts of burned butter as a flavoring, but generally, you want to avoid letting butter brown too much.

The meat itself was low on flavor. I don’t know why. Maybe wet-aging is to blame. They failed to brown the beef properly; that would have helped. Steak should never be served grey. It should be dark brown, and it should not be brown here and there, but all over. Browning means flavor. Another thing: a cast-iron griddle or skillet used only for steak will develop a seasoning on it that flavors the meat in a way no gas broiler can imitate.

They also put way too much salt on the steak. I was dipping it in the burned butter, trying to rinse the salt off. And I salt my steaks very heavily at home.

I know I sound like I’m ripping their steak to shreds, but it was very good. Ruth’s is a wonderful restaurant. You have to understand, I’m comparing their steak to steaks that are so good I actually make moaning noises while I eat.

They served me a baked potato with butter, sour cream, and chives. I asked for butter, sour cream, and salt, but that’s not a big deal. I tried it. Guess what? Not nearly as good as my potatoes. Not even close.

For one thing, they soak the jackets with some kind of lube. Butter, I suppose. The jacket seemed very, very thin and delicate, and it was completely wet. On the inside, the potato itself seemed wet. I don’t know how they do that. Maybe they use a steamer. It wasn’t airy and light; it was heavy. My potatoes are sort of fluffy. Also, they chintzed on the toppings. If you’re not going to put at least six ounces of sour cream on a potato, don’t waste my time with it.

Another problem: they don’t burn the potato at all. My potatoes typically have a little bit of browning inside the jacket on one side. This is marvelous; it adds complexity, and it goes great with the sour cream and butter.

The butter Ruth’s uses doesn’t have garlic in it. Arggh. MISTAKE.

I didn’t finish the potato. It was very nice, but compared to my potatoes, it was sort of civilized and limp and bland. I admit, I was trying not to be a pig, and I didn’t want to finish it. But with one of my potatoes, I would have been helpless. Willpower would have wilted before it. It always has.

I like Ruth’s, and I would never turn down a Ruth’s meal. The food last night was great. But their dinners can’t compare to a home-aged steak cooked on a griddle, next to a baked potato cooked with no foil, with salt water applied to the jacket before baking. Ruth’s is not in the same class.

One more thing: my steak arrived at the table sizzling from the heat of the plate. Looks like the unfortunate “resting” fad hasn’t spread to every cook on the planet.

Try my recipe with confidence. If you like the flavor of beef, not burned butter or herbs, and you like your potatoes fluffy and light with dry, salted jackets that cry out for garlic butter, sour cream, and beef juice, you will not be disappointed.

I feel tremendous satisfaction, having succeeded in beating the pros. I worked a long time on this, and I’m thrilled at how it paid off.

More Shelves

I am installing more shelves in the garage, in the concrete. That means I get to use the rotary hammer and a 1/4″ SDS Plus bit.

I knew jobs like this were ahead when I decided to buy this thing. I wondered if it was worth it, lugging a 10-pound drill (a rotary hammer is a kind of drill) up a ladder over and over, to drill very small holes.

Boy, is it worth it. First of all, my cordless hammer drill, which is what I would have used but for the rotary hammer, is not that much lighter. Second, the hammer drill has no depth stop. Third, once the hammer action starts, it takes about five seconds for the rotary hammer to drill a hole 2″ deep in a concrete wall. Fourth, you don’t have to apply much pressure to a rotary hammer. You just hold it against the surface, and it does all the work.

With my hammer drill (which is a very nice Bosch), I had to lean on the handle for maybe a minute per hole. I also had to pull the bit out from time to time because it didn’t eject the dust very well. Forget all that; the hammer drill goes in, I pull it out, and I put it down and move on. And when you put up shelves, you have to drill a lot of holes.

This thing is a miracle tool, like the impact driver. I’ll bet a smaller model would be great for most people. I went with a Makita HR3000C because it seemed like a good step up from the Bosch, and it was big enough to do jobs other than drilling. And I found a ridiculous price. But most people would do great with something smaller, for a couple of hundred bucks. Get one of these plus a Panasonic 12-volt impact driver, and you will wonder how you lived without either. You’ll never need to touch your drill again. And many times you’ll be able to avoid using a screwdriver or socket wrench.

I’m enjoying myself a lot. Using tools is fun, IF your tools are adequate. Tools used:

1. Impact driver
2. Rotary hammer
3. Claw hammer
4. File
5. Dry cut saw
6. Level
7. Electric leaf blower

I have finally realized that if I’m going to use the blower to clean up swarf, I need to do my metal-cutting way out in the driveway and wear eye protection. Otherwise, half of the swarf goes back into the garage, and I have to keep my eyes closed.

I am not all that thrilled with Closetmaid shelving. I don’t even use the shelves. They’re wire, so things fall between the wires, and it’s hard to move things without picking them up off the shelves. And it’s hard to put anything heavy on them, so the advertised strength of the supporting stuff is wasted. I make my own shelves from wood. They’re smooth and strong. The Closetmaid hardware isn’t made to work with wood, so you have to improvise a fair amount. But it’s all sturdy, so it seems like the best choice, given what I can find.

Home Depot lumber is pretty bad; I suppose it’s like that at every store. Sometimes I have to go back several times, weeks apart, to get decent wood. And I still have to clamp it, glue it, and screw it when I put it together, to force it to do what I want.

I have a radio in the garage playing country music, and there’s a fan on the wall on a special shelf I built for it. It’s very pleasant out there. Sure beats watching TV.

Or Maybe Name Them

When I was working on the kibbutz back in the Eighties, I saw an interesting tree. I was working in the almond fields at the time. Almonds are close relatives of peaches, cherries, apricots, plums, and so on. Before you get an almond, you get a green fruit that looks like a plum. The fruit has almost no flesh; it dies and falls off, and then you have a pit, and inside the pit is the almond.

One day on the way home, the kibbutzniks made a stop. I and another volunteer were in the Jeep with them. We got out and approached a tree. It had peaches on one side, plums on another (I think), and apricots on another. The kibbutzniks started eating the apricots. They told us to have some, too. They called them “mish mish.”

Once Mish Weiss was done with the chemo and radiation that will prepare her for her bone marrow transplant, I felt it was appropriate to ask her a question in her comments. I.e.:

Does this mean you were named after a piece of fruit? If so, why?

Finally, why an apricot and not something more impressive, like a watermelon?

She has posted a reply on her blog.

Incidentally, Israelis are nuts about watermelon. I remember when the melons got ripe. All over the country, there were little trucks loaded to the top with round green melons, on their way to happy Israelis.

Yesterday Aaron told me that Jewish tradition holds that the Gentile Yom Kippur starts on Sunday night. I thought that was nice, in view of my recent good news.

Tired of Coffee Grounds Between my Toes

Help me out. What’s the best stick vacuum for wood floors? Has to be cordless, and has to be capable of sucking up the occasional dead 2″ roach. Should also be able to get into fairly tight spaces.

It Happens

It’s easy to get discouraged by problems that seem impervious to your most persistent efforts. Things like addiction and grudges and so on can appear impossible to fix. But that’s not true.

Here is more evidence.

How to Get Attention at Home Depot

I am trying to organize my brain so I can get out of here and do stuff. This strikes me as a great time to procrastinate. Which I have done, by playing with my new Gerber Gator II knife.

Two things: the action was a little stiff, so I blasted it with dry silicone lube. Seems to work. Also, it turns out you can open the knife by flicking your wrist while you hold the knife in your hand. Good to know, if you feel like freaking someone out. More impressive than a switchblade.

Looks like a nice knife. Gerber used to make stuff that was uniformly great, but my Cold Steel knife is way better than the last plastic-handled Gerber I bought. I give Cold Steel props; you can carry one of their knives every day for years, and it will always look like you just bought it. But a Cold Steel knife this big would have been so expensive, I would have kept it in my pocket to avoid damaging it.

BBQ in Space?

Interesting story on Drudge today: space smells of fried steak. Suits worn in space come back carrying the smells of steak and hot metal. Kind of makes you wonder

Yesterday I was thinking about the temple in Jerusalem. They sacrificed a huge number of animals there, and many of them were cattle. And–correct me if I’m wrong–a lot of these animals were eaten afterward.

So wouldn’t going to the temple be a lot like going out for barbecue? It must have smelled wonderful in Jerusalem, all the time. Seriously. How could it not have, with all those cattle and sheep being roasted?

Space is in the heavens, and so is that fried-steak smell. Here’s a question for you religious scholars: is this where the aroma from the temple ended up?

NOT

Today just feels right. I feel like I am mutating back to my old self, except for having it more together with regard to religion. Actually, I was headed this way back when I went to Israel, so maybe this is where I was supposed to end up. I will spare you the Jonah metaphor.

I just moved two big but sickly pepper plants to the yard, where they will surely benefit from not having to depend on me and the watering can. I am wearing my crappy Old Navy cargo shorts with the concrete-patch smear on the back pocket. In one front pocket, a loaded Glock. In the other, a brand-new Gerber Gator II. My shoes are IDF commando boots. My sunglasses? Non-nouveau, anti-yuppie Ray Ban aviators. And I am wearing wool socks in Miami. If I were any less appropriately dressed, I would be Walter Sobchak.

Everything here has to be difficult. You would think moving two plants would be a cinch, but when I dug the holes, I came up with a lot of oolite rocks. Several pounds. They make digging impossible, because they stop the shovel. Landscapers and builders here love them. I think that’s because they’re free, and because leaving the rock in a yard, just below the topsoil, saves work. Every time you build a house, you have to remove enough oolite to put down dirt for a yard. And you have to haul it away.

I have not been checking up on Mish Weiss the way I should. This is her last day of chemo and radiation before her bone marrow transplant. And she is having a bad time, as you can imagine. Hair loss and fatigue and so on. She will rest a few days. Then they’ll shoot her full of donor marrow, I guess. Don’t quit praying.

Her friend Uri covered for her on her blog today. His parting sentence: “Sorry my English is very bad and they make me post.” I guess Mish is still pretty tough.

I found my old Israel photos this morning. Me and Aaron, in the Promised Land. The other day I emailed my old kibbutz and asked if they still accepted older volunteers. I got nowhere with that. The site is in Hebrew. For all I know, it says, “Send an email to this address, if you love Ahmadinejad.” I absolutely have to go over there again.

I am going to the hardware store to buttonhole whoever smells the most like manure and make him tell me how to kill my St. Augustine grass.

I Think I’m Recovering From a Long Illness

Because I’ve been fooling around in the yard so much, and doing so much with tools, I came to realize I could no longer get by with my little Cold Steel Voyager pocket knife. I had to upgrade.

I went to the Sports Authority. No knives, except for fileting. Figures. Those wimps have completely caved to the forces of wussdom. I went to Home Depot. Nothing there that a sane person would buy. I finally had to give up and go to Bass.

The selection was not phenomenal, but it was good. I got me a big honkin’ Gerber Gator II. It’s heavy as lead, but it should be tough enough to handle manure bags and so on, and it’s not so expensive I’ll be afraid to use it. My last couple of Gerbers were not wonderful, but then this is a yard knife, so who cares?

I felt so great at Bass. They had bass boats and flats boats and weird ATVs on display. They were playing country music. There is a whole lot of bad country music, but still, it’s nice to hear it again once in a while. I am not kidding when I say walking into Bass is like walking into church. I wonder if the company has any Christian connection.

On the way home, I had to pass a guy who was driving really slowly, and I got irritated, and then I realized his car was probably acting up. I felt like I should stop, but I had absolutely nothing I could use to help him. And it occurred to me that as much as I enjoy the T-bird, a pickup would be a much more responsible choice. I could keep a few tools in it, and I could actually be of some use to humanity on occasion. I remember helping build my old church. Try hauling plywood in a T-bird.

Geez, I want out of here. I think I’ve milked this town for all it’s worth. I want to go to bed and hear absolutely nothing through my windows, except the inevitable nature sounds. I want to be able to kill anything on my property that bothers me. I want room to walk around. I want to burn my Italian suits.

I am going to work on it for real. Maybe the Good Lord will give me a good opportunity.

Here is the fish tank at Bass. Not a great photo. I altered it to bring out some details.

Man, I wanted to murder those fish! The big ones in the middle of the window are yellowtail snapper, and they’re the size of salmon.

There is Life Before Noon

I know you’re dying to find out how applying epsom salts to my plants worked out. This sort of news fascinates you. I am completely convinced that is why people come here every day.

Yesterday I bought 150 pounds of cow manure, plus 6 pounds of epsom salts. I buried my banana and plantain trees in manure, and I hit pretty much everything with the epsom salts. Sadly I put some on my sage, which I have now learned is a mistake. Oh well.

Epsom salts–I have to quit using the plural. Maybe it’s a Southern thing–are supposed to help plants grow bigger and greener, especially in certain parts of the country. And my citrus has been looking yellow, and so have my peppers. Which I have neglected. I need to move them into the ground so they won’t have to rely on my daily visits.

It looks like this stuff works. Big time. Today my tangerine and lime trees have a bunch of dark green leaves on them. It’s weird; some leaves are still yellowish, but some have greened up overnight. My older banana trees look dark, too. Maybe that’s from the fertilizer I applied a couple of days ago.

I believe the banana guy said the manure was supposed to produce something called humic acid, which kills nematodes. Whatever. I’m just glad to be done handling it. Cow manure is remarkably pleasant and inoffensive, as manure goes, but on the whole, I would prefer not to spend my days begrimed with it.

It may be time to consider composting. I hate doing anything hippies do, but Acidman used to do it, and he was no hippie. Although now that I think about it, he had certain hippie characteristics.

Supposedly one of the best things you can mulch live banana trees with is dead banana trees. And that’s convenient, because they only live a year, and they’re big, and you have to do something with them when they die.

It looks like the pups from my first pair of trees are going to be enormous. The first trees were maybe eight feet high, including everything. I have one now that’s considerably bigger and hasn’t even produced that thing at the top the bananas hang from. If they’re the variety the banana dude thinks they are, they’ll be anywhere up to 14 feet high. I may have to move one cluster; they’re getting so tall, they hit the tree above them, and they’re getting more shade than they should. Luckily, moving a banana pup is a ten-minute job.

He said that when banana trees are young, they look around to see what the deal is, and if the nutrition and water and sun are right, they decide to produce a lot of fruit. Otherwise, you get a long doodad with a few hands of bananas on it and then a big empty bit that hangs down below it.

I guess I sound like a banana fanatic, but I’m really not. It’s just that they’re cheap, easy to grow, very productive, and extremely useful. And they don’t take up much room. So why not have a few trees?

And talk about good for you. If, like me, you hate getting up in the morning and eating a big wad of refined carbs, but you want your fiber, bananas are a great thing. Without being too descriptive, let me just say they get the job done, and they don’t seem to give me the blood-sugar bounce and hunger rebound I sometimes get from cereal, and they’re way lower in calories. And yard bananas are much better than store bananas, which are mealy and low in flavor.

I’m not as excited about the health benefits of plantains. The ripe ones are pure sugar, and the green ones have a way of sitting in your stomach like a potato. But they’re very useful in the kitchen, and timing the ripeness of the ones from the store is hard, so it’s worth it to grow them.

The banana guy says my bananas are cooking bananas, so while you can eat them raw, they won’t fall apart when you heat them. He says they make great tostones. So I’ll have to try that again.

Okay, I just looked it up, and it turns out plantains have about 50% more carbs than bananas, per unit of weight. I guess my stomach does not lie. The fiber is comparable, but bananas have an edge. On the other hand, plantains have twice as much vitamin C.

Man, those cooking bananas may be the answer to a prayer. Not literally, but I may be able to make single-portion-size patacones with them, with less carbohydrate.

It has been an hour and a half since I checked the plants and trees; I was out there at something or other past eight. And I had been up for quite some time. I am training myself to get up early and prepare for the day, so I’ll be ready when the rest of the world comes to life. I may as well tell you about it. My Christian readers will like it.

My sister–I still cannot get over the fact that we’re getting along–turned me on to Perry Stone and his ideas about having private communion every day, and I gave it a shot, and I really enjoyed it. Some Christians think it’s a stupid idea; but at worst, it’s an excuse to spend time with God. It can’t possibly be a sin. If–when–I join a church, I’ll be doing it there, too, so I won’t be substituting wrong for right.

For a very long time, I’ve been spending an hour or so in prayer every morning, as soon as I get up. Literally lying in bed, because when I wake up, I always feel like I am fastened to the mattress. That’s not satisfactory; it’s no way to live. In the morning, you need to get your butt vertical. And a reader left a comment that made an impression on me; he said he knew a disabled woman who took communion every morning, and that it meant a great deal to her. So I thought maybe I should start rising early, doing communion, doing some study, and praying. In the quiet hours before the world can decide how, on a given day, it’s going to try to kill me and generally ruin my existence.

It’s a good deal all the way around. For one thing, I have to go to bed earlier. And in my opinion, nothing worthwhile happens after ten p.m. If you think about it, a lot of temptations and problems happen when people stay up late. If you don’t go to bars or clubs, and you don’t sleep around, and you don’t lie in front of the boob tube like a dead person, with your brain absorbing garbage, what are you doing late at night? Probably sleeping.

I believe today is my third day on the new schedule. I am determined to start getting up at 6 or 5:30; so far, I’ve managed 6:30. You really have to organize the last part of your evening if you want to get to bed early, and I haven’t gotten on top of it yet. Maybe tonight.

After my religious obligations are taken care of, I fix up the birds and go out and check the plants. My mother always said parrots were like babies; at their best in the morning. That’s when they want to talk and socialize. Plants are definitely at their best in the morning. It’s cool, and everything is fresh, and you get your first look at the changes that have taken place since the previous day.

It reminds me of Israel. I used to get up at 5 and get dressed and throw my grapefruit bag on my shoulder, and then I’d walk to the dining hall and hop on the wagon, and the tractor would start, and they’d take me and the other grapefruit guys on a winding ride to the fields, where we would find our ladders where we had left them, lying in the cool grass. And in the spaces between the rows of trees, the cubic-yard boxes we were to fill that day. Three per picker.

Now that I think about it, I have a grapefruit tree now! Not really the same, though. It’s five feet tall.

I better post this. It has been sitting on my screen for what seems like forever.

The IRS Loves You

Can I tell you something crazy, since it’s Tax Day? I actually enjoy paying my taxes. I mean, sure, I like money. But America does a whole lot for me, and I like contributing. Somehow that’s true, even though I know taxes are too high, and that they are killing productivity and leading us to socialism. When in doubt, I deliberately overpay. I just hope they took my money and spent it on really big guns.

I don’t mind the government having money. I wish it could pull in ten times the amount it does now. But I also wish they would quit spending it on stupid things, and that they weren’t leaving so little for us. And those wishes don’t go together too well.

Writing the check is not that bad. What I hate is the work, and the knowledge that if I screw up AND someone in the government figures it out, my life will be hell until the situation is resolved.

Plants Dosed

Home Depot sells magnesium sulfate for eight dollars, and the container is smaller than a liter Coke bottle. I went to CVS (chain drugstore), and they had a bag containing about six pounds, for four dollars. Plain old epsom salts.

Guess which one I bought.

My plants will be green, and if need be, I will have instant regularity.

What a Deal!

Isn’t there something fundamentally wrong with buying excrement?

Think about it. Money is a reward for time spent working. So whatever your money is worth is also what your time is worth. What does it mean if you take your money and buy excrement for it and consider it a good deal?

I just bought 150 pounds of excrement. My grandfather, who raised cattle, would be turning over in his grave.

The guy I bought my plantain and banana trees from said compost was important for plantains. He said horse manure was the way to go. Darn the luck. My horse is constipated. No, it’s even worse than that. I don’t even have a horse. Unless you count my motorcycle apparel, cordovan shoes, and A-2 jacket. I checked Marv’s and Maynard’s cages. They do what they can, but I just don’t have that kind of time.

The guy said cow manure was okay, too, so today I went and bought three bags, and I just distributed them under my trees. Not just the plantains. Bananas, too. They’re nearly the same thing, so I figured it could not hurt.

I wore my Israeli commando boots. I was looking sharp out there. I didn’t want to experience the all-too-familiar sensation of noxious gardening substances falling in the gaps between my socks and tennis shoes.

While I was at the store, I noticed they had MAGNESIUM SULFATE! It’s supposed to cure yellowing leaves, which can be a problem here. I thought I might try it. Only eight bucks for about a pint and a half! Wow!

Wait. Isn’t magnesium sulfate epsom salt?

I’m fairly sure you can get a half gallon of epsom salt for about a dollar. Good for your plants, and I guess it could also help with the situation I mentioned above. If you’re not shy. Maybe the drugstore is the better option.

I guess I could get tons of free manure for nothing, if I knew where to find it. We have race tracks, but they’re not close by.

I continue to be fiercely envious of the banana guy’s life. Not just the room and the greenery and the peace. I envy him, having a business which is so morally neutral. It’s tough to practice law without damaging society, and writing has its temptations. It would be fantastic to grow plants, put up a website, and sell them. You would never have to ask yourself, “Gee, was it right to sell that guy the musella lasiocarpa?” I suppose every person who works has moral issues to worry about, but some jobs are less troubling than others. I’d sleep better growing alfalfa or running a hardware store than doing plastic surgery or practicing tort law.

I hope this work pays off. My plants have many problems, and I am tired of watching them languish.

I still want to kill those squirrels.

Jackson Exposes the Agenda

Here’s a big DUH for everyone who supports Obama. Especially Jews.

Jackson is especially critical of President Bush’s approach to the Israel-Palestine conflict.

“Bush was so afraid of a snafu and of upsetting Israel that he gave the whole thing a miss,” Jackson says. “Barack will change that,” because, as long as the Palestinians haven’t seen justice, the Middle East will “remain a source of danger to us all.”

“Barack is determined to repair our relations with the world of Islam and Muslims,” Jackson says. “Thanks to his background and ecumenical approach, he knows how Muslims feel while remaining committed to his own faith.”

Yes, what we really need is to see to it that the world’s 12 million Jews quit bullying the world’s 1.2 billion Muslims, who are actively financing terror around the globe.

Liberals will say Jackson doesn’t speak for Obama. No, but he’s part of the same crowd, and according to Jackson, Obama is very close with Jackson’s boy. And Obama spent twenty years in an openly anti-Semitic church, and he was very close to the pastor, whom he called on to officiate at his marriage. Jesse Jackson didn’t pull this notion out of thin air. He knows Obama better than we do.

Go look at black forums on the Internet, and you will discover something America’s Jews don’t know. There is a very serious problem with black anti-Semitism in America. It’s very common. There is no shame or repentance connected with it. It’s vicious. And it’s not just the Muslims. Get out there and look; don’t trust me. For that matter, you can look at the records of prominent black leaders, such as Jesse “Hymietown” Jackson, Crown Heights riot-inciter Al Sharpton, Jeremiah Wright, and Wright crony Louis Farrakhan.

American journalists ignore it, because as far as they’re concerned, criticizing the bad acts of a minority member is equivalent to racism.

You may think Obama is above pandering to the anti-Semites. But is he? Has he yet found a population segment to which he is not willing to pander? You have to realize something. He’s getting over 90% of black votes. If he’s elected, he’ll need those votes again. There is no way he’ll give them up. And he will risk losing many of them if he supplies Israel with unwavering support.

Obama will want to hold onto Jewish voters, too. They make up about 2% of the electorate, though. And many Jews are self-haters who will go along with a turn against Israel. Blacks and Muslims pack a much bigger punch at the ballot box. If he has to make a choice–and he will–who is he going to capitulate to?

This nation is already helping destroy Israel. We are partial to Israel, but we and the secular Israeli government have nonetheless embarked on a strategy of appeasement. We’re taking big chunks of God-promised land and handing them over to Muslims who use them as bases to attack Israel. And there is no possibility that it will bring peace. The Jews are interested in peace; the Muslims are not. They have proven it time and time again. If they were, they would stop the shelling and the suicide-bombing. Israel is not getting a return on its rebellious investment.

What’s going to happen to us if we elect a President who is partial to Israel’s enemies? What if Obama accepts and acts on the Western European notion that the world’s problems can be solved by abandoning Israel? This country would be punished horribly, and we would deserve it.

All of Obama’s promises regarding Israel have been weasel-worded to prevent them from obligating him to do anything. You can’t say that about John McCain. He says Jerusalem will not be divided, and he wants to put an embassy in Jerusalem. Obama has admitted that he is willing to cut Jerusalem up. Warning bells should be going off in every Jewish home in America. Regardless of how safe America seems at the moment, Jews have only one refuge in times of trouble. And it’s not Skokie or Manhattan or Miami Beach.

We ought to be grateful to Jesse Jackson for jumping the gun. Maybe Jewish voters will wake up and remember who their real friends are.