The New American Bible for Catholics: With Revised New Testament and Revised Book of Psalms by Confraternity of Christian Doctrine
Book Reviews
Complete Idiot's Guide to Learning French, 3E (The Complete Idiot's Guide)
Author: Gail Stein
Rating: 4
Review: Over all the book is pretty good. (Especially the 4th Edition, which is what I read and listened to via the interactive CD that comes with it from AV Books!) I do have some issues with how some of their tables were set up. It didn't appear that they followed a clean pattern to learning and that they were trying different styles out. That said, good book, and if you are going to France or any French speaking country/area, I'd recommend that you buy the 4th edition to this book and it's accompaning CD!
Final Authority
Author: Joseph S. Dobransky
Rating: 4
Review: (I actually read this book a few months ago, and just realized I hadn't written it up!!) This was a fairly well written book. It was somewhat guessable in some cases, but over all I enjoyed the story line, and liked the book. If you want some semi light reading and like suspense stories this book may be for you!
St Thomas Aquinas Summa Theologica (translated by Fathers of the English Dominican Province) (5 Volume Set)
Author: Thomas Aquinas
Rating: 4
Review: WOW! Be serious about the desire to read this book. It was hard to read at times, and required a lot of time and concentration to "get it". That said, it is used by the Catholic Church as the foundation for the current teachings of the Church, so it is an important read. Gets a 4 of 5 because of the way it is set up, which makes it hard to read.
Well back in Dec of 2006 I set goals for 2007. I didn’t fair too well…
Goal1: Get weight down to 210.
Status 1: Not so good.. I got down to 220, and over the last three months, got “lazy” and am back up to 260ish…
Goal 2: Finish and Publish my first book….
Status 2: Started studies in Theology and Philosophy, and have basically changed my life plan significantly. I think I’ve written about two chapters in my book… Contemplating getting a Ghost Writer…
Goal 3: Re-Establish connections from the past.
Status 3: Again, not as great as I had hoped. I’m talking to about three people of the fifteen or so I wanted to get back in touch with. Partially attributed to my studies, but not fully…
So, Goals wise, my year was not so good. Else wise, I had a pretty good year. Made some new friends, such as Debbie, and several people at Saint Henry’s Catholic Church. I have gone to some great shows with the folks at St. Henry’s, and I have spent some great time with Debbie getting to know her and her family!
One other sad thing that happened this past year is that I lost my great friend, companion and pet, Kodi, whom I loved dearly. I will miss our jaunts to the malls, movies, and search and rescue calls.
So, what are my goals for 2008:
Goal 1: HIT 210 lbs!!
Status 1: Working out already, and eating better already…
Goal 2: Become confirmed in the Catholic Church, and live a more religious and righteous life.
There are a couple of other goals I am contemplating, and will update this post, or post a new post when I get them worked out.
Hope you all (what probably two readers?) have a great New Year, had a great Christmas, and that you and your families are healthy and happy!
I still have Kodi to work with and train with for Search and Rescue, my Ph. D. dissertation (which hasn’t gotten too far), walks on the beach (been a while for that), and playing on the boat (although I missed the last three cruises because I needed to work..).
Last night I received a call from a lady I had talked to about 4 months ago about Kodi and SAR (Search and Rescue) training. She was calling to tell me that one of the local teams she was on had access to a building that was being torn down and would Kodi and I like to “come out and play”. I would need to be a victim for a couple of searches, but Kodi would be able to do a search or two as well.
I of course accepted! She even offered to come get Kodi and I and take us to the event. The building was a fairly large building that had already been knocked mostly down, and the fire department had already done their drills there (in breaking into areas to get to people, fire management training, etc.), so we had the building for several hours of hiding people and finding people. When we got there others were just starting to show up as well. There were already two people (and about four spotters ranging about) “buried” in the building as well.
After introductions and a briefing a dog went on the pile to do a search. They spent about 30 minutes on the pile covering about half of the building, but came off the pile without any find. As visitors, Kodi and I were on the pile next with a local observer. After about ten minutes (in the same area the other dog had just gone over) Kodi alerted on her first find for the night. I tagged the location, called down that help was on the way, and Kodi and I left the pile. The “Rescue Team” went in and helped the person out of the hole for a breather. The observer liked how I handled Kodi, which is basically letting Kodi do her thing, and how I read her signs.
Over the next few hours I was buried a couple of times, and Kodi got to search the pile two more times, both times making a “live” find. In fact, of the whole night, Kodi was the only puppy to actually make finds, which made me happy, but not the rest of the team there.
Over all good training day for Kodi and I, and I enjoyed getting back into it!
Over the past 15 to 20 years I have been involved in Search and Rescue of missing people. For many years I watched K9 teams on the search and enjoyed watching the teams work. I always thought that was a better way to search, with the dogs able to find people better than people could find people.
So, 5 years ago, I searched for the right dog to be my partner and I found Kodi :
Kodi is a Belgian Malenois (I always spell that wrong, but you get the idea. ) and she is now almost 5 years old. She has made 9 live finds for missing people, 5 in disaster events (which is our specialty), and 4 in “wilderness” events. She and I have done hundreds of hours of training to get to that level.
Kodi is also a retired Marin County, California Reserve Deputy Sheriff. She has 5 felony arrest on her record. (The only reason she was retired is I moved out of the area, and they retired her. She’s not happy with my move though. She misses the work.)
This has probably been my most rewarding work I’ve done in life to date…
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) and she is now almost 5 years old. She has made 9 live finds for missing people, 5 in disaster events (which is our specialty), and 4 in “wilderness” events. She and I have done hundreds of hours of training to get to that level.