So I'm gunna use this for a little more conventional communication. Maybe I'll get a little esoteric. (After proof reading I got real esoteric, be warned!)
As the title mentions I want to mostly address the canoe trip. I will give my thoughts on that as well as some side commentary as to my tertiary thoughts on the topic.
I'll start at the beginning. Brother Chris and I took a trip to the BWCA last year and it was very nice (read very nice as Borat would say it). When we saw groups of 4 and 6 canoes loaded with old men and women and very young children easily pass us in our kayaks we thought that this kind of trip would be great for our kids. We thought that this has the potential of being a trip that all The Brothers could do with there loved ones all in tow. It could be a great family bonding experience and something that could easily become a tradition with us.
The planning began immediately. We are currently cementing the planning. Of course this cement is still wet and pliable, which leads me to this posting.
It was going to be e and Eileen with The Twins and Chris and Sue with The Boys. Cliff was an unknown factor with The Rosie even more unknown. Archie and Barbie where pretty much out of the planning loop, just too damn far away to consider it. As is par for The Paulson course, smuch has stranged. Well, not smuch, but things have stranged a bit.
The current status is that Sue has bailed, using Alex's work scheduling as an excuse. This rather upsets me as my Lady needs another woman on the trip. I seriously considered bailing myself and my crew. I thought about it a lot, and have come to the conclusion that I was stupid for thinking it and that thinking has driven me to write this post, more on that thinking to come later. Also in some jello like stasis is Clifford. I talked with him on the phone and he sounded quite dispassionate about the trip and even made a statement that if it was too much hassle or extra expense that he could easily be excluded. (I will have to give him a couple disclaimers, he had several beers in him when I talked to him and he really hasn't been in the planning of the whole thing so he didn't have much idea of what was going on.) By the time you read this Cliffy your plans are probably more set in this regard, that is the advantage you have of not reading this until many days after it is posted. Cliff is currently trying to figure out if it is going to be to much work and hassle to bring The Rosie, I hope, when you are reading this, that The Rosie is part of The Posse.
Here are what I believe to be the nuts and scrapings (huh?) of the trip to be. We spend the night of 8/3 in Ely, MN in a hotel. We rent canoes for the next 3 days. On the morning of the fourth two adults, maybe a kid get an early start and find a camp site and claim it. This is our camp site for both nights of camping. We make the trip as easy and enjoyable on the kids as possible. They gotta learn the hard stuff of canoe camping, portage, camp clean up, etc., but it's gotta be fun and enjoyable. We pack out Thursday and head home, maybe hit the Dairy Queen for a Blizzard on the way. If it proves to be a positive experience I envision us doing it with our children and grandchildren.
To my thoughts on bailing out myself... First off, I have put those thoughts aside as silly, I am far to excited about the possibilities mentioned above. But, I will admit to being quite upset and even depressed after speaking with Chris and finding out about the loss in his parties' size and also with Cliff and his seeming dispassion. I was thinking that this meant too much to me, that my Brothers did not have the care about being together in this way and I did. I'm a Tard, I know. It just that I have no friends, as I have mentioned before, all I have is you. This is why I wanted to use this damn Internet to help my relationship with you, I knew a blog would be mentioned and Skype is kool, maybe I'll get back into Go or some other game to play with you in the e-world. Now that Archie is in WI at least we all have a better proximity to each other. I would rather have physical contact with you, where I can touch you, connect with you, and put you in a head lock! I know it is silly but I have ideas of us all being together again as old men, maybe retiring in some condominium complex in Costa Rica or Arizona.
Damn, I've gone on too long. I'm tired. I've spewed enough for now. I've got more thoughts but I'll save them for anyone who can be bothered to respond to this drivel. I will conclude with a thought for Archie. I know it's out of your planning, but if there is a way, you might want to think about this trip, hopefully it will go well enough that you can go next year.
Luv,
Brother e
PS. I guess I ain't done yet. I have a dog now. She is cute as hell. She just came into my garage one day when I was cleaning out the car and hasn't left, that was a month ago. She follows me everywhere, the kids and Eileen love her. Also, for about the last 3 months or so I think about shooting myself in the head every night before I go to sleep, sometimes it's the first thing I think of when I wake up, I do not think about it during the day. Don't worry, I won't do it, I got too much going on that's good. I know I am needed and loved. I think about it none the less, it's fucking weird. I just wonder what the fuck life is all about anyway. There is so little of it, life that is. What difference does it make if you are alive for 45 years or 100? I really need to evolve into a computer and live for a few centuries or eons. OK, I'm done now, I'm fantasizing and swearing, gotta go.
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Dong!!!!!!!!!!
Can you believe that 50% of Paulson boys don't know that Vietnam's currency is the dong?!? How has this factoid gotten by us? My son actually pointed it out to me.
Friday, May 22, 2009
Religion
OK y'all. Here is something to chew on. This is essentially what my final essay in religion was on. It is my professor's summary of the final chapter in the second of our two texts (this one attempting to summarize the beliefs of the "world's religions."
What do you think? If you would like me to go first, I will, but I would like to hear your thoughts. I could also post or attach my 4 page paper, but it isn't very good and it is written for the professor so it does not necessarily pertain to this conversation.
Any way you look at it, there is some good fodder here. Take a bite and let me know how it tastes to you.
Cliff
Drawn from The World's Religions: A Guide to Our Wisdom Traditions, by Huston Smith.
After his brilliant discussion of the world religions, Smith asks the question: What do we make of this?
To answer this big question, he asks three particular questions.
1. How are we to pattern the religions of the world--what is the relation between the religions?
A.We could try to argue that one is superior. We hear less of that today than previously, but the question should not be dismissed out of hand. Smith states: "Nothing in the comparative study of religions requires that they cross the finishing line of the reader's regard in a dead heat."
B.We could argue the opposite--that they are all alike despite particular differences. There are enduring truths that all subscribe to and this is what is important. But this position is difficult to maintain because there are essential differences and beliefs that traditions say are non-negotiable. It is impossible to have a single world religion.
C.Smith believes that the way they relate can be likened to a stained glass window whose sections divide the light of the sun into different colors. This analogy allows for significant differences without pronouncing their relative worth. We see different angles of how religious truth is perceived. To draw on theological language, if God is to be revealed, it must be through the idioms, cultures, and values of the respective hearers. A passage from the Qur'an is relevant here: "We never sent a messenger except with the language of his people, so that he might make [the message] clear for them."
2. Do these religions have anything to say collectively to the world at large? What wisdom do they offer?
Science discloses the nature of reality but not all of reality. Scientific truth applies only to the empirical world. The ultimately worthful aspects of reality--its meanings, values, and purposes--go beyond science.
Where can we turn for counsel concerning things that matter most? We must recognize that these religious traditions reflect old cosmologies, social mores, and the like, and these must be reassessed in the light of science and contemporary life.
So don't get trapped in this. You are not the community of Corinth, Smith tells us. You are not the followers of Muhammad in seventh century Mecca.
Thus it is best to "pass a strainer" through the world's religions to lift out their conclusions about reality and how life should be lived. This is the winnowed wisdom of the human race.
Here are the specifics of that wisdom, according to Smith:
a.In the realm of ethics, the Decalogue tells the cross-cultural story. We should avoid murder, thieving, lying, and adultery.
b.But what should we be like? What should we strive to be, in positive terms? Certain virtues are cross-cultural: humility, charity, and veracity.
c.However, there are obstacles to achieving these virtues. Buddha identified three: greed, hatred, and delusion. If eliminated, we find selflessness (humility), compassion (charity), and seeing things in their suchness (veracity).
What about vision? About the ultimate character of things?
A.First, we have difficulty seeing the really big picture; that is, the full picture of reality. It is like a tapestry which we face from its wrong side, so that we see only knots and threads, and it seems chaotic. The religions of the world are efforts to see on the other side of the tapestry, to discover the pattern which gives meaning to the whole. And in so doing, we see unity in the universe, a grand design of some kind, the Unity of all things.
B.Second, if things are pervaded by a grand design, they are not only more integrated than they seem; they are also better than they seem. Another allegory: if astronomy helps us understand that the universe is bigger than human senses disclose, then the world's religions tell us that it is better than our sensibilities discern. The religions have an ontological exuberance. The human self is more than what it seems; Atman/Buddha nature, for example. Humans born in the image of God is another example, from Judaism and Christianity.
C.Third, reality is steeped in ineluctable mystery; we are born in mystery, we live in mystery, and we die in mystery. The more we know, the less we know. "The larger the island of knowledge, the longer the shoreline of wonder." Things are more mysterious than they seem.
So we are left with this: things are more integrated than they seem, they are better than they seem, and they are more mysterious than they seem. Something like this emerges as the highest common denominator of the wisdom traditions' reports.
And when we add to this that they also help establish for ethical behavior human virtues, "one wonders if a wiser platform for life has been conceived."
At the center of religious life is a particular kind of joy, the prospect of a happy ending that blossoms from necessarily painful beginnings, the promise of human difficulties embraced and overcome. There are only hints of this, but they are all-important.
3. So what do we do? How do we live in such a religiously pluralistic world that is at the same time growing more secular?
If one of the wisdom traditions claims us, we begin by listening to it.
But we also listen to the faith of others, including the secularists. The planet grows smaller, and we must seek to understand others. The marvelous scientific advances of our age must be matched by advances in human relations.
Understanding brings respect. Understanding can lead to love, and love can lead to understanding. The two are reciprocal.
So we must listen to understand.
Thomas Merton said that "God speaks to us in three places: in scripture, in our deepest selves, and in the voice of the stranger."
Said the Buddha, "He who would, may reach the utmost height--but he must be eager to learn."
What do you think? If you would like me to go first, I will, but I would like to hear your thoughts. I could also post or attach my 4 page paper, but it isn't very good and it is written for the professor so it does not necessarily pertain to this conversation.
Any way you look at it, there is some good fodder here. Take a bite and let me know how it tastes to you.
Cliff
Drawn from The World's Religions: A Guide to Our Wisdom Traditions, by Huston Smith.
After his brilliant discussion of the world religions, Smith asks the question: What do we make of this?
To answer this big question, he asks three particular questions.
1. How are we to pattern the religions of the world--what is the relation between the religions?
A.We could try to argue that one is superior. We hear less of that today than previously, but the question should not be dismissed out of hand. Smith states: "Nothing in the comparative study of religions requires that they cross the finishing line of the reader's regard in a dead heat."
B.We could argue the opposite--that they are all alike despite particular differences. There are enduring truths that all subscribe to and this is what is important. But this position is difficult to maintain because there are essential differences and beliefs that traditions say are non-negotiable. It is impossible to have a single world religion.
C.Smith believes that the way they relate can be likened to a stained glass window whose sections divide the light of the sun into different colors. This analogy allows for significant differences without pronouncing their relative worth. We see different angles of how religious truth is perceived. To draw on theological language, if God is to be revealed, it must be through the idioms, cultures, and values of the respective hearers. A passage from the Qur'an is relevant here: "We never sent a messenger except with the language of his people, so that he might make [the message] clear for them."
2. Do these religions have anything to say collectively to the world at large? What wisdom do they offer?
Science discloses the nature of reality but not all of reality. Scientific truth applies only to the empirical world. The ultimately worthful aspects of reality--its meanings, values, and purposes--go beyond science.
Where can we turn for counsel concerning things that matter most? We must recognize that these religious traditions reflect old cosmologies, social mores, and the like, and these must be reassessed in the light of science and contemporary life.
So don't get trapped in this. You are not the community of Corinth, Smith tells us. You are not the followers of Muhammad in seventh century Mecca.
Thus it is best to "pass a strainer" through the world's religions to lift out their conclusions about reality and how life should be lived. This is the winnowed wisdom of the human race.
Here are the specifics of that wisdom, according to Smith:
a.In the realm of ethics, the Decalogue tells the cross-cultural story. We should avoid murder, thieving, lying, and adultery.
b.But what should we be like? What should we strive to be, in positive terms? Certain virtues are cross-cultural: humility, charity, and veracity.
c.However, there are obstacles to achieving these virtues. Buddha identified three: greed, hatred, and delusion. If eliminated, we find selflessness (humility), compassion (charity), and seeing things in their suchness (veracity).
What about vision? About the ultimate character of things?
A.First, we have difficulty seeing the really big picture; that is, the full picture of reality. It is like a tapestry which we face from its wrong side, so that we see only knots and threads, and it seems chaotic. The religions of the world are efforts to see on the other side of the tapestry, to discover the pattern which gives meaning to the whole. And in so doing, we see unity in the universe, a grand design of some kind, the Unity of all things.
B.Second, if things are pervaded by a grand design, they are not only more integrated than they seem; they are also better than they seem. Another allegory: if astronomy helps us understand that the universe is bigger than human senses disclose, then the world's religions tell us that it is better than our sensibilities discern. The religions have an ontological exuberance. The human self is more than what it seems; Atman/Buddha nature, for example. Humans born in the image of God is another example, from Judaism and Christianity.
C.Third, reality is steeped in ineluctable mystery; we are born in mystery, we live in mystery, and we die in mystery. The more we know, the less we know. "The larger the island of knowledge, the longer the shoreline of wonder." Things are more mysterious than they seem.
So we are left with this: things are more integrated than they seem, they are better than they seem, and they are more mysterious than they seem. Something like this emerges as the highest common denominator of the wisdom traditions' reports.
And when we add to this that they also help establish for ethical behavior human virtues, "one wonders if a wiser platform for life has been conceived."
At the center of religious life is a particular kind of joy, the prospect of a happy ending that blossoms from necessarily painful beginnings, the promise of human difficulties embraced and overcome. There are only hints of this, but they are all-important.
3. So what do we do? How do we live in such a religiously pluralistic world that is at the same time growing more secular?
If one of the wisdom traditions claims us, we begin by listening to it.
But we also listen to the faith of others, including the secularists. The planet grows smaller, and we must seek to understand others. The marvelous scientific advances of our age must be matched by advances in human relations.
Understanding brings respect. Understanding can lead to love, and love can lead to understanding. The two are reciprocal.
So we must listen to understand.
Thomas Merton said that "God speaks to us in three places: in scripture, in our deepest selves, and in the voice of the stranger."
Said the Buddha, "He who would, may reach the utmost height--but he must be eager to learn."
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
County information
Hey Guys, No time to chat but ran across something for everyone. If you want to know about your neighbors or are looking into a community these GIS maps are great resources. Wisconsin is really in front of most states on this. Gotta get back to work,
erd
http://coastal.lic.wisc.edu/wisconsin-ims/wisconsin-ims.htm and
erd
http://coastal.lic.wisc.edu/wisconsin-ims/wisconsin-ims.htm and
Sunday, May 17, 2009
Dropbox
I found a nice way to exchange files -- easier than remotely managing Mom's machine. It's an online storage service that's free for accounts up to 2GB. It functions (in Windows, Linux and Mac) just like a normal folder on your local hard drive. You can add and remove stuff from the folder, and it synchronizes its contents with the online storage. It is handy for sharing files among friends, and/or for sharing a common folder at home and at work (as well as for backup if you pay for more space).
It's called dropbox. If you sign up via this invite (https://www.getdropbox.com/referrals/NTExMjQyNjg5), I think they'll give you an extra quarter-gig of free storage. On that page, you can click the 'screencast' link to see a short video demo of some of the features -- much easier than me explaining.
After you get an account and install the client software, make a folder to share and let everyone know. Should be a nice way to share tunes and other stuff.
Write a comment if you set 'er up, then we can trade some files, or if there are any problems, questions or concerns.
It's called dropbox. If you sign up via this invite (https://www.getdropbox.com/referrals/NTExMjQyNjg5), I think they'll give you an extra quarter-gig of free storage. On that page, you can click the 'screencast' link to see a short video demo of some of the features -- much easier than me explaining.
After you get an account and install the client software, make a folder to share and let everyone know. Should be a nice way to share tunes and other stuff.
Write a comment if you set 'er up, then we can trade some files, or if there are any problems, questions or concerns.
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Happy Birthday A and B
Hey Dude and Dudette-
Happy Birthday like thing to the both of you. If I know you two, you are out lavishing gifts on each other. Anyway hope you are enjoying life's gifts, at least. Love you both,
Cliff
Happy Birthday like thing to the both of you. If I know you two, you are out lavishing gifts on each other. Anyway hope you are enjoying life's gifts, at least. Love you both,
Cliff
Monday, April 27, 2009
Why?
Can you tell me?
Bet you can't.
You might ask why what? How can I respond? It's just...Why?
My only answer is...Why not? Of course, it is another question, not an answer.
There are no answers, only choices. The beauty is that you get to choose.
Make good choices.
Bet you can't.
You might ask why what? How can I respond? It's just...Why?
My only answer is...Why not? Of course, it is another question, not an answer.
There are no answers, only choices. The beauty is that you get to choose.
Make good choices.
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