Good morning GH. I wouldn't be up now, but the train went by and shook the house, as usual. Not really a bad thing, but sometimes just enough to wake a person, well at least me. The current view out the Weather Window is dark as always at this hour. But even though I didn't actually see the train, I know that it had two locomotives and not as many cars as it often does.

Our current temperature is 36 degrees, and we are expecting a high in the mid forties. No rain today, but tomorrow, with a high in the upper fifties, we are also expecting a 60% chance of precipitation. With those temperatures, I think that walking in the rain could be fun.

A bit of bad news. We had to put in a call to the electrician to make an appointment to get our chandelier in the dining room repaired. He has yet to return our call, but I think I managed to turn off the correct circuit breaker in the man-cave. It started when one of the bulbs burned out. I changed it, and then the chandelier no longer worked. Go figure. We may be paranoid, but Mary and I felt that turning off the circuit breaker was a good idea. The circuit has one of those fancy dimmers and that may be the problem. That's why we need an electrician. A man has to know his limitations, to borrow from Dirty Harry.

Otherwise, the day went fine. The new car is running great. I have to get some super glue, or maybe Adam will email and tell me we have some here and I don't know where it is.

I heard from a former student who is living in California. He wanted to know about a paper that I wrote for my master's program years ago about the right to carry a bazooka. I had started at limiting or eliminating guns and ended up at everyone owning a bazooka. As I said to him circular logic, but that is why writing allows you to do some serious meta-cognition. The paper was well researched and about personal rights and freedoms remaining unlimited. So, in spite of my initial misgivings, I recognized that the need to protect the rights of all extended to a need to protect the rights of all. As I said to this former student, rights are not easily given, but too often easily restricted or taken away. I would never own a firearm personally, but if we want people to be able to marry freely, or to assemble, etc., then we have to allow people to do things we may find personally distasteful. Of course, there are some exceptions like: carrying a loaded weapon into a bar, church, school, library, or whatever. What was it that Benjamin Franklin said, "Those who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." While not the exact quotation, the words are pretty close and still applicable today.

Otherwise, not much on tap for the day. We have to drop off Mary's pet cactus, Spike jr., for re-potting at his adoption agency. It may take a few days, but they know what gloves to wear, how big the pot should be, and what soil to use; all things that can affect the health and well-being of Mary's pet. We did very little to her last pet cactus, and he grew in our old home for over twenty years. In fact, he grew so well, that we had to cut him down three or four times to allow him to clear the ceiling. OUCH! You may have noticed that that I used the masculine pronouns for her pet, but since he is definitely taller/longer than he is wide. Well, you get the idea.

We stopped in to see Sally at the post. It was quiet when we got there, but they were having a Swiss steak dinner last night. People started to come in around 5:00, PM, for a 5:30 - 7:00 PM dinner. We saw the first platefuls, and for $7:00, it looked good. Not our cup of tea, but still, it looked good. We had cheese quesadillas for dinner, which I washed down with the last of the home-baked bread and peanut butter. 

Well, it is time for rest and relaxation and lying in bed in the early hours of the morning. Then, it will be...Tea time, and hopefully we will hear from the electrician about getting that chandelier repaired. A quick mention that I didn't get to see my student last evening, as he called to break our session time. I am done. More on that in the future. Ciao.