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Carved Copal Art By The Cruz Family of Oaxaca
December 7, 2016
— 1 Comment
I had the pleasure of meeting Agustín Cruz Prudencia and his nephew Jesus at the Tucson Botanical Gardens yesterday. The copal wood carvings they brought to Tucson for sale are lively and brightly colored. I fell in love with the figures instantly. I am officially on restriction from buying any art, but I could not pass up the chance to own a piece of their stunning work. I was in a pinch for time, but made a choice to buy the frog that is happily decorating my living room now. It goes with all the art in my house, and yet has a unique quality that makes it stand out. It will be a prized momento from my encounter with these incredible craftsmen.
They are Zapotec from a tribe that lived, and still lives in a remote part of the state of Oaxaca. Agustín’s father moved his family to the capitol city of Oaxaca in order to make a living by selling his art. They now have a workshop that employs about 15 family members carving and painting the folkloric figures. The super fine painting is done without stencil or straight edge. They develop the ability to create super intricate geometric patterns by eye, by hand. The apprenticeship to learn this craft takes a long time. It is easy to appreciate all the fine work that goes into each piece. With both delicate carving and intricate paint designs these little characters pop with personal style.
They are going home for Christmas to be with their family. They will be celebrating with banana leaf tamales and other special seasonal dishes. They are very proud of their culture and cuisine, and rightly so. Both of my new young friends had spoken their native mother tongue as children, but have lost the ability to speak it after years in the city. They suffer from heavy discrimination against indigenous tribes in the city, so speaking it is dangerous. They still understand their mother tongue when they hear it. Their elders dressed in traditional clothing, and those members of the tribe in remote mountains still do. Modern Zapotec life as an artist is complicated, and includes borders and customs. I am glad they made the effort to bring this unique folk art to Tucson. I hope the sale works out very well for them so they will return. If you are in Tucson this weekend you can make a purchase at the United Nations Association of Southern AZ on 10 and 11 December. They have gifts in all price ranges for all art lovers.
Copal carvings
Oaxacan folk art
Oaxacan folk art
Oaxacan folk art
Copal carvings
Copal carvings
Copal carvings
Copal carvings
Copal carvings
Copal carvings
Cruz family carvers
folk art from Oaxaca
Copal carvings
my new frog
my new frog
Godfrey Ragsdale Jr. And The Jamestown Massacre
December 6, 2016
— 30 Comments
memorial
My 8th great-grandfather was born in Virginia Colony in 1643. His parents were both killed in the Jamestown Massacre when he was an infant.
Godfrey Ragsdale I was the first generation emigrant to America. He came sometime before 1641. He and his wife were killed in an Indian massacre on April 18, 1644. Their baby, Godfrey II, was spared. He evidently came at his own expense with intent to inhabit the land, for no grant has been found to him, but there is a record of a purchase of 300 acres of land by deed from John Butler, 25 Feb 1642. This land lay on the north side of the Appomatox River in Henrico Co. Virginia. Source: “Godfrey Ragsdale From England to Henrico Co. Virginia” by Caroline Nabors Skelton; 1969; and Henrico Co. Records; Bk. 6; p. 21.
Godfrey Ragsdale II (1643 – 1703)
8th great-grandfather
Ann Wragsdale (1659 – 1724)
daughter of Godfrey Ragsdale II
Benjamin Abraham Vesser (1740 – 1779)
son of Ann Wragsdale
Samuel Harris Vassar (1757 – 1846)
son of Benjamin Abraham Vesser
Mary Vessor (1801 – 1836)
daughter of Samuel Harris Vassar
Margaret Mathews (1831 – 1867)
daughter of Mary Vessor
Julia McConnell (1854 – 1879)
daughter of Margaret Mathews
Minnie M Smith (1872 – 1893)
daughter of Julia McConnell
Ernest Abner Morse (1890 – 1965)
son of Minnie M Smith
Richard Arden Morse (1920 – 2004)
son of Ernest Abner Morse
Pamela Morse
I am the daughter of Richard Arden Morse
The Ragsdale family name is said to come from Ragdale, England, meaning either “valley at the pass” or “dweller in the valley where the lichen grows.” Henry Ragsdale was born in Leicestershire, England about 1450, his son Robert was born about 1485 in Ragsdale, Leicestershire, England. He died about 1559 and some of his children were Henry, Thomas R. and John R. Henry was born about 1510; he married Elizabeth Oglethorpe about 1532 , and their children were William, Dorothy, Elizabeth, Margaret, Owen and Catherine. Henry died in 1559. William was born in 1575; he married a woman named Heathcote, about 1615; they had a son, Godfrey I, who married Lady Mary Cookney and they both came to America.
Godfrey Ragsdale I and his wife, Lady Mary Cookney arrived in Virginia some time late in the summer of 1638. They were some of the first Ragsdales to come to America. Godfrey Ragsdale I ands his wife, Lady Mary Cookney lived in Henrico County Virginia on a 300 acre plantation on February 25, 1642, upon the north side of the Appomattox River.
On April 18, 1644 afterwards known as “Opechancanough Day” the Pamunkee Indians and several tribes in the Indian Federation went on a rampage. There was a carnage that was greater than the one in the Norfolk area in 1622. The Indians slaughtered no less than 500 Englishman. This massacre fell almost entirely upon the frontier Counties at the head of the great rivers, and upon the plantations on the south side of the James River. Both Godfrey I and his wife Lady Mary were killed and scalped.
From documents we know that Godfrey and Lady Mary had a son named Godfrey Ragsdale II, who was born in 1644. Because his mother and father had been killed in the “Jamestown Massacre”, Godfrey II’s next door neighbors raised him and later became his in-laws. Historians say that most Ragsdales in America came from Godfrey II.
Ragsdales in Virginia
#WeekendCoffeeShare Set For The Season
December 4, 2016
— 10 Comments
high notes
front yard decorated
candles
front yard decorated
If we were having coffee this morning I would serve you any hot or iced tea you might like or a cup of medium roast coffee. For those of you arriving at cocktail hour from other continents I have some cranberry vodka for cocktails. It is pretty and tasty at the same time. Have a seat, put up your feet on the fireside ottoman and tell me what is happening with you. I have the room seriously scented with lavender and citrus essential oils. The wood stove is a perfect diffuser. I need to replenish the moisture it sucks out of the air, so I position two containers of water on top to continually evaporate. It is a little bit shocking to see how much goes into the air. I dump substantial amounts of essential oils in those vessels, which become my giant air fresheners all winter.
Citrus is the scent of the season for me. I have purchased a full set of citrus essential oils for December which are going quickly because I love using them liberally. Now I am rocking sweet orange and mandarin, mixed with a lot of lavender. These are all high notes in aromatherapy, or uppers if you will. The idea is to extend comfort and joy in the atmosphere. I have my ceramic gingerbread diffuser rocking the scent with a scented candle as the heat. This is the only time of year when I burn wax candles in my house because it does pollute the air inside that we breathe. I am not worried about the amount of pollution a few tiny tea lights will emit. I also have my digital candles with remote control LED lights that change color. They make me very happy. My decorating theme is not exactly geared to a modern religious holiday but to the winter solstice, and a celebration of light that seemed to happen universally in ancient times around the darkest night of the year. I am fully ready of Old Man Winter. We are stocked with wood for the fire and I have mounted all manner of solar twinkle lights in the front and back yard. We are warm and, if I do say so myself, lit.
If we were having coffee and American politics came up I would tell you that yesterday I attended a meeting to organize a satellite protest march to show support for the Million Women March on Washington, 21 Jan. Many American women are traveling to DC to march on the mall to protest the inauguration of the Donald. I have much sympathy for this movement, but not enough to travel to DC. I decided to find out what the Tucson group looked like, and what they planned to do. I live streamed the event to my FaceBook page. The meeting was at once very uplifting and disconcerting. The median age of the women in attendance was around 55 or 60, with very few under 40, and I saw nobody under 30. They debated the language of protest and how to best express the outrage they felt. They talked about Gandhi and Martin Luther King, which was predictable. There were 3 men over 60 in the crowd. One with his wife, one with Occupy Tucson, to convince the group to join their march, and one who had very good sense who came out of nowhere. He suggested the group use positive rather than negative language. A lot of women wanted to show off and talk about their previous political involvement and how they knew Trump supporters who were poor and underserved who needed to be converted. When I asked them if they knew how hashtags work I was told they planned to find high school girls who would instagram and hashtag the whole thing for them. These old ladies have missed the point. They can march until the world looks level and will have little sway on national politics. They need to learn how to lobby, how to hashtag, how to trend, and how to relate to the youth. The times they have been are a changin’ and they need to acknowledge that the problem here is not HOW Americans voted, but that half of Americans did not vote at all. I am in favor of their march and movement, but the medium is the message. The most efficient and effective mediums must be exploited along with the labor intensive.
If you were relaxing by the fire today I would now end my observations of politics and society in general and find out what you have been doing. I have a killer nutloaf of spinach and almond with a nice parsley sauce. Let me heat up a slice and serve it to you while you enjoy the fire. I have almost used up all the nuts from last year, but am still pitching the nuts to guests because they are so healthy and tasty. Thanks for stopping in today. You are welcome to take a nap by the stove after your snack, especially if you have a long trip home. Alexa is loaded with Amazon unlimited music, so please ask her to play your favorite music. Just say her name and tell her what you want.
Ending the year with this sophisticated group of digital coffee drinkers is a pleasure. I appreciate knowing you, sharing with you, and learning about your writing journeys. Thanks to Diana for keeping the party going from New Orleans even week. Drop in and comment, post, or just enjoy the coffee. Cheers!
Christmas cactus
Season’s decorations
scent diffuser
Progress Through Procrastination
November 27, 2016
— 2 Comments
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- fresh foods
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- fresh foods
In the month of October I took the #OctoberUnprocessed challenge as I have for a few years now. Each year I give up fake meat products, chips and crackers for the month. I eat pretty well, but those products have been prominent in my diet forever. I also bought two small packages of sugar, one brown and one confectioners, and vowed to make them last until 2017. I am happy to report that both of those sugar bags remain unopened. I probably will open one today for banana bread, but I have used no sugar in the kitchen for almost two months. The other progress I made was to adapt to life without bags of chips and boxes of crackers. I made one tasty batch of home baked crackers in October and then just forgot about them. I decided that if I go to a great Mexican restaurant once a month that makes tortillas in house I never really need to buy bags of chips. So far, this is working too. Instead of answering each and every whim I have to eat nachos, I am practicing delayed gratification by anticipating much better nachos in the future. There is no way I want to give up nachos forever.
I have stumbled upon a positive way to use procrastination. This word means putting off necessary tasks. I have reversed this process by putting off bad habits without giving them up once and for all. It is brilliant. I will admit I am back on the fake meat. I was wolfing down bacon bits on the fist of November like they were going out of style. Maybe next October I will break that habit. There are far worse things to which one can be addicted to than fake chicken McFriedFood and veggie burgers. I can accept myself with this silly exception to my almost all unprocessed diet. I am feeling good about the cracker conquest. They have no power over me any more. Do you have a processed food that you can not bear to stop eating, gentle reader? What is yours? I have to have really good taco salads in my life:
tortilla fix
Weekend Coffee Share, Thanksgiving Edition
November 26, 2016
— 11 Comments
Friend for lunch
holiday buffet
Govinda’s Thanksgiving
holiday buffet
Govinda’s Thanksgiving
If we were having coffee today I would tell you our week was almost perfect here. Welcome to my home this lovely mild weekend in Tucson. If you are living up north I hope you packed your bathing suit so you can go in the jacuzzi and get some sun on the deck before you head back home. These are the perfect weather days that make Tucson so popular as a winter destination. Help yourself to tea or coffee, and please enjoy a snack from the sideboard laden with food. I know many of the Americans will be weary of even seeing food, but for those of you who live in other countries we are serving pecan sweet potatoes, mini-croissants, green beans almandine, homemade spicy cranberry ketchup with chunks of ginger to compliment a large cheese tray. In the center of the table is a mega plate of raw and pickled vegetables, olives, pickled peppers of every kind, and 20 different sauces in which to dip them. If that does not overwhelm you with the colors and flavors of the fall season, there is nothing more I can do. Please make yourself at home and eat as much or as little as you want. Tell me what has been going on in your life. Pull up a chair and stay a while.
If we were having coffee I would tell you about our day on Thursday. We went to Thanksgiving lunch at our local vegetarian buffet run by the Hare Krishna community. They have a great selection, beautiful outdoor patio, a band, and a live turkey. This is the perfect place for our celebration. We ran into an old friend we had not seen for years and ate our meal with her. That was pleasant surprise. I chose not to overeat at lunch because I could take the leftovers home in a box and keep going later. It all tasted great cold, especially the green beans mixed with mashed potatoes and gravy. I dump the carrot gravy on all my food because it is the thing that pulls the whole meal together. I could drink this gravy as a beverage. We write down what we appreciate most on a piece of paper to enter a drawing to win a free lunch. It is not important if you win the lunch, but writing your gratitude and putting it in the jar with the other papers completes the group intention. It is simple yet effective. They would love to encourage participation in their religion, but never solicit or recruit patrons of the restaurant. The old days of aggressive Hare Krishnas chanting in airports are gone. Now they make fabulous food and finance their temple feeding Tucson. They announced a new delivery service they are launching which I will surely use, even though I live right up the street. They will bring me delicious food as well as any clothing, incense, wall hangings, or books I might need in the future.
As we drove to Govinda’s we were stopped at a red light when we observed two cop cars and two cops running around in a shopping center next to us. One cop approached a Native American man who was waiting at the bus stop on the corner. We rolled down the window to listen to the conversation between the two men. The cop asked the native man if he had seen anything in the area. We did not clearly hear his response, but he seemed to indicate the he had seen someone enter one of the locked, closed businesses. The cop asked him for ID. The man asked why he had to show ID. The cop told him “I don’t know who you are…” The light turned green and we drove on thinking that must have been some Twilight Zone Thanksgiving re-enactors back at that bus stop. Why should a Native man at a bus stop have to show ID to Tucson Police Department employee? I thought about Standing Rock and the military vets who are self deploying to protect the sovereign rights and water quality of the First Nations in the Dakotas. The violence being used at Standing Rock reminds me of the Indian Wars, and that reminds me of Harvard being founded to convert the local Native Peoples to a particular brand of christianity. All that reminds me of Wounded Knee. Our history is highly genocidal. The irony is wildly significant on our “how we bonded with the Indians” holiday.
On a lighter note, my Thanksgiving cactus started blooming right on cue, on the very day. I am proud of her. Please check out her rapidly unfurling flowers next to the front window. Thanks very much for visiting on this busy weekend. Please check out our other coffee sharing friends who gather at Diana’s site, here. Post, comment, or just enjoy the coffee.
Visit To Plymouth Plantation
November 23, 2016
— 6 Comments
cannons above church Plymouth
Pilgrims
Pilgrim
miller’s take
mill pond
When I visited Plymouth Plantation to see how my ancestors had lived the Mayflower was out of town being repaired. That did not bother me. I filled my day visiting at the museums of the living culture, including the grain mill extension in town. The details are fabulous and the actors doing the recreation are very knowledgeable and professional at their work. My personal ancestors were not on hand the day I went, but I did see the recreations of their homes. I also spent time in the cemetery and the church. The whole town is kind of preserved, with a definite Mayflower Pilgrim theme.
I was most interested in the Wampanoag section of the display. I thought for years I was a descendant of Quadequina, a member of the first Thanksgiving party. I was thrilled to be a Wamp, but later my first cousin discovered an error in my research. I had to cut that branch from the tree and begin again in the 1700s in South Carolina. I was super distressed at this news, which at first I was unwilling to accept. I was furious at my cousin, but had to face the reality that I had based my conclusions on specious data. I had mistaken one John Taylor in South Carolina for another, and that was all it took to lead me astray. It was a bummer. I was just a wanna be Wampanoag after all. It was a sad day when I had to admit that.
I stayed on Cape Cod where many of my ancestors moved after they had had it with the Plymouth bureaucracy and religious police. The whole area is filled with history. Even though my dreams of being a Wampanoag were dashed I enjoyed learning about the tribe and their struggle today. My relationship to them is purely intellectual, but I still love the People of The First Light. I love them more than I love the Pilgrims, who turned out to be pretty religious crazy. That whole story about religious freedom and Plymouth has been stilted quite a bit. They had no use for religious freedom other than their own specific brand of religious practice. They forced everyone to go to their church and obey their church’s rules. That is why many of my ancestors left for Cape Cod and later for Rhode Island. Those oppressive Pilgrims were just too intrusive to have as neighbors.
I hope to go back to Plymouth some day. I now have done more research and more people to find in the vicinity. I also hope I will revisit Williamsburg, VA because many of my ancestors were living down there in the 1600’s too. If you have a chance to go see the exhibits at Plimouth Plantation Thanksgiving will never be the same for you. You will see a clearer picture of what really happened in history.
Healing Through Hedonism
November 22, 2016
— 1 Comment
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- vinegar face
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- helpful staff
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- blackberry ginger balsamic
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- perfect gift
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- Alfonso’s
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- lunch
Without further ado I dedicate the rest of 2016 to pure pleasure. If politics is the malady, happiness and personal fellowship is the remedy. The election will not dominate my December. The inauguration and the results will come soon enough for me. What I do best is cook and entertain. The drudgery of politics not only bores me, but usually astounds me with the futility of it all. I have spent some time trying to change the political horizon during my life, but I now look upon all that time as a monumental waste. I could have been just living my life in the most pleasurable way possible at the time. This investment would serve me better than taking time to convince others to participate in political causes. Being happy and free is where it is at.
When I use the word hedonism I mean only fun. I do not mean overindulgence to the point of ruining all the good times. This common mistake has given fun a bad name. Addiction is perhaps the shadow side of hedonism, but it is not pleasurable. Fun is only fun when it is well managed. Well executed pleasurable pursuits provide stimulus to all the senses and a feeling of time well spent. It can be a week in Thailand or a walk around the block. The difference between the ordinary and the hedonistic is attention to detail. Wear what you want, see what you like to see, eat what delights you, linger over what intrigues you without trespassing on the pleasure of others. Travel to your own happy place. This will require that you get to know your own true preferences, which will naturally change over time. Self care for a teen is different than it will be when that person turns 65. We must evolve with our own best interests in mind.
My good friend and neighbor and I have opposing political views. We never need to talk about politics at all. If we do we joke about how crazy people are. We have much in common, including an interest in cooking and cuisines. To celebrate Heidi’s birthday we visited one of my favorite stores in Tucson, Alfonso’s Olive Oil, for a tasting of their vast selection. It was a blast for me to introduce her to this wonderland of flavor and my great pleasure to buy her first bottle to start her own specialty oil and vinegar collection. We tasted all over the store for a long time before she came to a decision. She wisely selected the classic best unflavored dark balsamic vinegar because she can infuse it herself if she wants. The vinegar she chose is exquisite, deep, complex, fruity….everything you want in a vinegar. I was happy to buy the gift, but more happy to introduce her to someplace she did not previously know. Then we had lunch, also very good. The balsamic birthday will go down as a complete success with little effort or expense on anyone’s part. It was all about the discovery.
I suggest you look into your heart and decide what makes you happy. Just do that, gentle reader. Start with that.
Clulusion-The Sinister Fusion of Cluelessness and Collusion
November 21, 2016
Judgement
If we make it through this Thanksgiving week without a flood of car traffic invited to park outside our front door to donate to a charity scam it will be the first time since I have been in my home. Our HOA has forced the homeowners here to host a donation drop off in the fire lane of our private property for the entire time I have lived here, almost 15 years. Literally thousands of cars have passed by my front door to leave junk, or food, or volunteer hours preparing food for the public for a fake charity. The HOA board has a fiduciary (legal) responsibility to protect the property value of the corporation, but they see fit to use our property to show off their own fake philanthropy to the neighborhood. They operated these scams all year, and solicited donations in various ways. They used the US Postal service to solicit funds from the neighbors, which was incredible. Holidays were special times when we had non-stop cars drive through and park for hours to donate to the charity scams.
The most amazing feat they accomplished was to go to court and get a restraining order from a city court judge. They told him they were “giving back” and need to restrain the people who live here and own the driveway with the fire lane they occupy from stopping the charity scam donations or food prep. We tried for years to stop it through our official Tucson Police Department neighborhood watch, but the cop was in favor of both filling the fire lane with cars, and inviting the public to drive through this driveway we have to pay to pave in order to keep the white collar criminals happy. She did not even know them, but wanted, in general, to make this a shittier place to live. She encouraged the HOA board to trash the environment and break federal revenue law. It seems she was just untrained or not paying any attention. There was no way to know what she was thinking because she simply refused to respond when we reported the crime. She was able to influence the whole city government to refuse to enforce the fire lane law here for reasons known only to herself…or more likely to nobody, since it was a mindless clueless action. Cluelessness is contagious and soon the whole city government was too clueless to even collude with each other. They had manifested the ultimate willfully blind untrust. They unknowingly were the biggest promoters of obvious crime in front of all of us in the area. They stuck to their guns for more than a decade, and last night there were 4 cars in the fire lane and 1 in a neighbor’s driveway without permission. If a fire had broken out they had blocked people into their garages who would be trapped while the fire truck would be blocked. They don’t see any reason not to expose us to that kind of risk.
After being forced to live with this full time donation drop off site in my front yard for years, the neighbors and I petitioned the newly elected mayor, who is a lawyer. He refused to respond, and in fact since the first petition in 2013 he has not been willing to respond to the citizens here who petitioned his office to halt the charity scam activity that freaked the whole neighborhood out. His office thinks it has a right to remain silent while refusing to give us any law enforcement services for more than a decade. They are not trying to refuse to perform. This is the extent of the ability they have. They send out a cop to promote charity scamming and filling the fire lane of the property with as many cars as possible, and then refuse to respond when we ask for at least a clear fire lane. No can do. I have pointed out the total number of nights our fire lanes have been clear in the last 15 years. The number is stuck at 6 nights total. They passively aggressively pretend that this law enforcement task is impossible for them, so they can’t do anything to improve this situation. They manage to keep the fire lanes clear downtown. They do know how to write these expensive tickets. They prefer to ignore the issue. They have fully trashed our hood as well as trust in the police with their actions. I still can’t get them to repair the damage because it would include admission of an error. They are sticking with deeper clulusion. This is why we can’t have nice things.
Winter in Arizona
November 7, 2016
— 2 Comments
margarita
Enchiladas
Our state is attractive to tourists because we have sunny warm weather. We call them snowbirds because they come down from some wintry place to stay in our area while it is miserably cold up north. Some own second homes, and others are driving RV’s on the annual pilgrimage. They provide much-needed economic boosts to the places they visit, and then head north in the spring. Arizona depends on their spending to support not just hotels, but service industries and retail stores as well. The tourist represents a segment of the economy we can grow. What we have to offer is in competition with all other destinations for traveler’s attention. Here are some features I believe make a vacation in Arizona in winter great:
- Classy resorts from the past such as El Tovar at the Grand Canyon or the Arizona Inn in Tucson
- Natural wonders, state and national parks with extensive outdoor recreation opportunities
- Preserved history in towns like Tumacacori, Tubac, Jerome, Tucson, and Phoenix. Both history museums and living exhibits teach the history of Arizona
- The best Mexican food in the world. Some people might dispute this, but I can assure you that our Mexican restaurants bring it.
- Tucson Gem Show in February is the most extravagant shopping opportunity on earth.
This year when snowflakes begin to fall on your front yard, book your flight and come on down to Tucson for outdoor adventure and some awesome tamales. We welcome you to our part of the world.
Weekend Coffee Share, Defining Intelligence
November 5, 2016
— 10 Comments
Cyclovia
bike cops
If we were having coffee I would tell you all how happy I am to be able to visit with all my invisible friends around this coffee table and around the world each weekend. Sharing a few details of our personal lives shifts the attention away from politics and impending doom. Please select a tea of your choice from the wide selection of white, green, herbal and roiboos. I am drinking white strawberry tea on ice because I had plenty of coffee earlier. Help yourself to a cup of medium roast coffee, or some hot spiced apple cider. Apples and nuts are here for our snacking pleasure. Make yourself at home and tell me how your week has gone. Did you have an eventful Halloween?
Here, the Halloween decorations are down and the cover has been removed from the wood stove. I have removed curtains for the winter to let in extra light during the day. I found some solar lights on super discount at Amazon and responded by ordering three new strings to go with the purple ones I had in the front yard for Halloween. Now my front and back yards are all a twinkle when the sun goes down so early. This somehow makes me very happy even though we may be hurdling toward the end of days of our political system. I can count on the solar energy to delight me with twinkling even if our electrical grid is attacked by hackers. I am easily amused, and that is a damn good thing. I am making the most of the comedy available in the political situation. The agony and the ecstasy of this time is unprecedented because there is plenty of information, but intelligence is hard to discern.
Intelligence has two distinct meanings as a noun. It means the ability to acquire skills and knowledge, as in one’s native intelligence. Intelligence is also used to refer to the collection of information of a political or military nature. We have a federal bureau to handle the collection of domestic intelligence. It is called the Federal Bureau of Investigation. We have WikiLeaks for leaking evidence to the public. We have political parties to dig up dish on the opponents and scorch the earth. There is no time remaining before the election to sort out fact from fiction. The assault of too much information does not result in intelligence. It simply overflows the available space with claims and contentions. It may be the antithesis of intelligence.
I voted as soon as my ballot arrived, so my focus has been on enjoying my community and friends to the max right now. I ran into an old friend last Sunday at our community bicycle event, Cyclovia. We had a great time biking around to the different venues. Her mom lives along the route, so we stopped to visit there as well. We went to the display and blind water tasting at Watershed Management Group, right near her mom’s home. We scored free tickets to a cocktails and cuisine event inspired by rainwater. We each get a free rainwater cocktail on Nov. 29. I look forward to that unique party. I think my friend’s mom may become a volunteer there too. It was a fun and educational exhibit. We biked on and ran into some bike cops who restored some of my faith in authority. They were joking around and having fun with the crowd. This is the kind of community event that unites all ages and walks of life to have a good time meeting each other. If you ask me, that is intelligent. We could use some bigger doses of this kind of intelligence.
Good luck to all coffee sharers surviving this next week. I look forward to hearing what is happening where you live. Check in with Diana to keep up with the coffeeesharing. Join us by writing a post, or just leaving your 2 cents. What is up with you, gentle reader?
model of watershed
my decorated bike
free rainwater on tap tickets
mermaidcamp 