Sep 20, 2010

Great-Grandpa Goodwrench's multi-tasker

The "Hawkeye Wrench,"  from Marshalltown,  to help you keep your Maxwell Mascotte  in shape.

The alligator jaws  handle various size nuts. The center  holes are dies for chasing 5/16 -- 3/8 -- and /2- inch threads. Note the screwdriver on the left jaw and the deep marks suggesting an early mechanic found it a useful hammer, also.


Sep 19, 2010

My Sunday Sermon

A girl I love married an astute man, and I sometimes discuss government with him, mostly in an effort to cleanse him of a few notions which I find insufficiently anti-statist.

When ever I think of him and of government in the same paragraph, I am heartened,  even though he still insists it is good that taxpayers underwrite athletic stadiums. That is because, in a fit of disgust at theocratic politicians, a disgust I share, he once remarked loudly that these guys do not comprehend that "a government is not a religion."

Leading us to this morning's text.

Which opens thusly:

Whereas, Almighty God hath created the mind free; that all attempts to influence it by temporal punishments or burthens, or by civil incapacitations tend only to beget habits of hypocrisy and meanness...


Out of rhetorical compassion, I  omit the remainder of my written harangue this Sabbath. 

Sep 18, 2010

Transition

The first substantial fire of the season dances in the wood burner. This annual milestone marks the first day of the year when I begin consuming wood faster than I cut and split it.

If a man can put aside thoughts of approaching continental winter at 43 north,  this is a fine time. A few sticks of maple raise the Camp J quarters  to near 80 degrees, even with a couple of  windows open to the fresh air.  Altogether pleasant.

There will come a day when the  body revolts at the brute labor of wood, and I will join the fossil-fuel world.  I will miss the subtle hint of wood smoke. It is one of the great atavistic delights.


Sep 17, 2010

You can quit worrying about your credit card debts.  His Obamaness rides to the rescue, another czar in tow.  

Elizabeth Warren will organize a new consumer protection bureau to shield  Americans who can't read contracts from  the wrath of credit card companies who wish to have debts repaid.

We are cheered to observe that she is a Harvard professor, hence prefectly qualified to function within the Ministry of Plenty.
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