An update!

Been “out of it” since the 10th when I had my surgery. The days immediately following the surgery I seem to have slept off (for the first three days anyway) and I don’t remember a whole lot from surgery day till Thursday afternoon. Wednesday just kinda vanished!! Thursday afternoon I felt like I had had my surgery the day before, and that I had gotten home just yesterday. I BARELY remember the ride home, other than sitting on the recliner when I got home. Don’t remember getting up to go to bed or anything!!

By Saturday I was pretty much clear headed from all the drugs/trauma/etc., but was still on the pain pills and such. By the end of Sunday I had pretty much had it with the drugs and stopped taking them. Early Monday I started feeling like I had a fever, but was unable to take it, as I didn’t have a thermometer, and no one I called did either! I’ll have to get one. Anyway, after a few times of feeling like I was burning up for an hour or two at a time, and then going into cold sweats, I decided I was having a fever, and called the Doctor’s office, but was only able to leave a voice message. (Never did get a call back, two days later…)

Yesterday morning I woke up in a cold sweat that later turned into feeling like I was burning up again. I called a friend and we were off to the ER. After making sure I didn’t have a clot (blood) formed/forming in my leg and checking my blood stats, it was decided I was probably coming down with a cold and sent home.

Luckily there was no signs of infection in the left knee, which would have been VERY bad! Still feeling kinda “uh” aside from the knee, which is swollen again (too much hobbling yesterday?), but at least it is not an infection!

So, back on track today, and things will be back in line by the end of the day in the direction of goals, plans, writings, readings, etc. I’M BACK!!

Oh how true… And we are headed that way…

I received an email from a friend that said this:

THIS IS TRULY THOUGHT PROVOKING.

There was a chemistry professor in a large college
that had some exchange students in the class. One day
while the class was in the lab, the Prof noticed one
young man, an exchange student, who kept rubbing his
back and stretching as if his back hurt.

The professor asked the young man what was the matter.
The student told him he had a bullet lodged in his
back. He had been shot while fighting communists in
his native country who were trying to overthrow his
country’s government and install a new communist
regime.

In the midst of his story, he looked at the professor
and asked a strange question. He asked:

“Do you know how to catch wild pigs?”

The professor thought it was a joke and asked for the
punch line. The young man said that it was no joke.

“You catch wild pigs by finding a suitable place in
the woods and putting corn on the ground. The pigs
find it and begin to come everyday to eat the free
corn. When they are used to coming every day, you put
a fence down one side of the place where they are used
to coming.

When they get used to the fence, they begin to eat the
corn again and you put up another side of the fence.
They get used to that and start to eat again. You
continue until you have all four sides of the fence up
with a gate in the last side.

The pigs, which are used to the free corn, start to
come through the gate to eat that free corn again.

You then slam the gate on them and catch the whole
herd. Suddenly the wild pigs have lost their freedom.
They run around and around inside the fence, but they
are caught.

Soon they go back to eating the free corn . They are
so used to it that they have forgotten how to forage
in the woods for themselves, so they accept their
captivity.”

The young man then told the professor that is exactly
what he sees happening in America . The government
keeps pushing us toward Communism/Socialism and keeps
spreading the free corn out in the form of programs
such as supplemental income, tax credit for unearned
income, tax cuts, tax exemptions, tobacco subsidies,
dairy subsidies, payments not to plant crops (CRP),
welfare, medicine, drugs, etc. while we continually
lose our freedoms, just a little at a time.

One should always remember two truths:

1) There is no such thing as a free lunch

2) and you can never hire someone to provide a service
for you cheaper than you can do it yourself.

If you see that all of this wonderful government
‘help’ is a problem confronting the future of
democracy in America , you might want to send this on
to your friends.

If you think the free ride is essential to your way of
life, then you will probably delete this email.

But God help you when the gate slams shut!

AMERICA ,The home of the Free
Because of the Brave.

I don’t want to get into the truth or not (as posted on Snopes.com, etc.), but on the basics of what the “student” says.

What he has to say here VERY much is what is happening here in the US. And I think we have three of the four fences up already, and the fourth is close to being put into place.

It is time to take a QUICK step back, look at what is going on here in the US and put the brakes on and move things back to a Government of and for the people, not of individuals for the individuals.

When our nation was formed, the government “staff” was to be of the people, who kept their day jobs, which back then was mainly farming, and related work, and came together every so often to take care of business that needed to be taken care of. The pay was next to nothing, as they had their “Day Jobs”, and there were no benefits. They were there to take care of important issues as they came up that HELPED the people of the nation and settled disputes in the nation.

The reason our Congress gets so many long breaks at certain times of the year, was so that the original people could go tend their farms, etc. Since they don’t have day jobs, why do they need so many breaks? They don’t!

BUT, that said, let’s go back to the original intent of our Congress, which is of the people, by the people and for the people, and not of politicians with a personal agenda.

I’m fed up, and voting this year will show that others probably are too, I just hope enough people are waking up and smelling the dung coming from the east coast, and the rest of the US, and lets this Nation get back to being a strong and powerful nation OF THE PEOPLE!

State of the US…

Over the last few years, I have felt more and more that the US needs to step back from the world to an extent and look at itself a little closer. We are spread out all over the world in other nation’s business, but we are not taking care of our own business here in the US.

As a nation we appear to be more worried about the sick, hungry and homeless around the world, and less so with those here in the US. We have many many people here in the US that are without work, hungry and homeless that we should be taking care of. We, as individuals and as a nation, tend to send a ton of money to other nations to help their homeless, hungry and those without work. I have no problem with helping others, and I highly recommend helping anyone we can, anywhere, but why are we forgetting our home front? Can’t a good portion of that money stay here and fix our own ailments?

Part of the reason we have so many homeless and hungry people here in the US is the cost of pretty much everything. Due to our

As our military continues to shrink, we continue to send troops to nations all over the world. We have our presence all over the world, and we try to control those areas any way we can. While our people are in these places, in many cases, dangerously so, we have many issues going on here in the US that require attention. Let’s bring our troops home, strengthen our boarders to stop attacks on our great nation, and work on ourselves instead of worrying about other nations, unless they, as a whole nation call us for help, and agree to foot the bill for us coming over to help. If a nation wants us there to help, let’s go to a process where they pay us to do so. And let’s only go if they ask us to come, not if we feel that we need to help them out to become more like us. (Being more like us is not always a good thing….)

The reason we have so many people out of work and homeless is the cost of pretty much everything in the US is too high. This is because each person wants to make more money than we probably should make. We need to look at the cost of making things, lower our wages (or freeze them were they are now), which will help in reducing the cost of producing new things. We need to then look at the cost of medical care. And not the way the President is currently doing it…. I also think that we could very much go back to more barter sales. They are there now, but it could grow!!

Many of the Christian Churches here in the US are busy sending their “Missionaries” to other nations in order to bring more people into their faith. I agree with the concept, very much… But I say we have MANY people in the US that need to hear the Word as well. Why are we sending our resources overseas, when there are many people in this nation that need us as well? What is a better way to taking the Word overseas is to train people from that Nation here, in the US, and then let them go back home and spread the Word to their people “their” way! Makes a lot more sense to me to go this way…

Many people are going overseas to adopt infants and small children. We have many, many kids in the system here in the US that are very much in the need of being adopted by a loving, caring family. We are we going overseas and taking kids from their heritage when we should be helping these kids locally? Yes, I know that the laws here in the US make it very hard to do so here in the US. But that can be fixed. We need to look at these laws and make it so that adoptions can happen in the US in a better manner, and with a bit of an easier path.

While I am not 100% behind bringing everyone home and locking down the boarders and totally closing in on ourselves, as I think International trade is important, but I do think we need to put most of our focus on US and not on other nations… Let’s regrow our nation into a strong, united nation and get all of us in the US in valid housing, be it hospitals, apartments, homes, etc, being feed daily, and cared for by the right people. Let us dig into why people feel the need to do drugs, as from where I sit right now, that is a key problem here in the US. We need to clear up the drug trafficking, and the only way to do that is to stop the users from using it, and to do that, we need to get a strong grip on why they do the drugs, and then snip that need…

Ok, sorry for the rambling and soapboxing. Had to get it off my chest…

A Conversion Story from the past, brought current! (A Book Review)

Saint Augustine lead a life of sin and “corruption” for many years back in the early 400ADs, including living with a lady for many years. His mother, a Catholic, prayed for him to find the Lord daily, and with tears and pain. It took many years, but Saint Augustine finally accepted the Lord into his life and he changed his ways, becoming a leader in the Church, a Doctor of the Church, and a great Theologian.

The book “No Turning Back, A Witness to Mercy“, written by Rev. Donald H. Calloway, MIC, chronicles the Author’s life, which closely mimics Saint Augustine’s life.

He starts out with excitement of his arrest at 15 in Japan, and subsequent deportment back to the US, with a stamp on his passport stating he can’t come back.. He then jumps back in time and begins telling his story from roughly 10 years of age on up to around 20, and the trails and tribulations he creates for his family and himself. He tells about the drugs he took, the people he hung out with, and the problems he caused. He goes into detail about the deportation and his going to rehab for the first time, and then his immediate return to drugs, booze, and women.

During this time, his Mother finds the Catholic Church and the rest of his family converts to the Catholic faith, which he declines and continues on his way. His mother begins to pray for him daily, and frequently to find peace in the Lord, placing prayer cards in his cloths when he is home, under his pillow, etc. He ignores these attempts to convert himself, and continues on in his ways.

As he nears 20 years of age, he throws a BIG drug/booze/women party at his parents house and begins to feel like things are not right. After kicking everyone out of the house, and attempting to clean up the house, he begins to see things differently.

One night, several months later he picks up a book on Divine Mercy, about Mother Mary, the Mother of Jesus, and starts feeling that he must change his ways. He reads the book all night, and when his mother gets up he wants to know more, and runs off to the post Chapel to begin his “official” conversion, which had already happened internally. As time progresses he ends up becoming an Ordained Priest in a Religious Order dedicated to Mary, the Mother of God.

This is a VERY compelling book, that I HIGHLY recommend to everyone and anyone interested in learning more about the good Graces of God!

This review was written as part of the Catholic book Reviewer program from The Catholic Company. Visit The Catholic Company to find more information on No Turning Back (book). I was provided with a free copy of the book in exchange for my honest opinion of the book.

Homeless..

For the past twoish years I have been apostatizing amongst the Homeless People here in Pompano Beach, and somewhat in Ft. Lauderdale. In apostatizing, I mean I spend a lot of time walking with them, talking with them, and hanging out with them. We talk, in some cases we pray together, we may read the Bible together, we talk about God/Jesus, or we just “hang out”.

In this two years I have come to understand the homeless situation much better than when I started looking at the homeless. My initial impression of homeless was that they were drunks, druggies and lazy.

Many of them ARE drunks or on drugs, but not for the reasons many of us think. Many use alcohol as a means to “stay warm” (or cool), forget their worries, or ease pain in the body. Same thing with the drugs. And both tend to become addictive as we all know from the news, books, press, etc. But many of the people I’ve been talking to want OFF the drugs or booze, if they were able to get cleaned up and land a paying job. The problem is being able to spend a couple of months getting cleaned out and still live, and then find a job.

As to the lazy tag. Many of these people, wandering the streets, are far from lazy. They spend the day walking, or riding a bike, from point A to Z and back again looking for money. They spend hours on the streets begging for money. They stay busy all day to stay warm (or cool). And they do tend to drink a lot, when they are able to buy the beer.. But most are not actually lazy!

I know one guy, who has a booze problem, and rarely a drug problem, that is a “Weaver”. He walks along the beaches climbing the palm trees and cuts down the dead palm fronds, living coconuts, then he takes the fronds and weaves hats, belts, skirts, and other things for the tourist. He shaves the coconut and opens it up, serving the coconut milk. He will add rum to it if you want, for a great tropical drink. He stays sober while he works all day. He works into the evening, making roses for the ladies from the fronds, selling them to the guys for their dates. Once he has his roses sold, he goes and buys some beer (or other booze) and drinks the rest of the night away. This man if FAR from lazy! He got into this life after doing some prison time and no one wanting to hire him, because he was a felon. Now he gets harassed by cops daily, and arrested often. He would be HAPPY to “Get a real job”. (Although his job is real, and much appreciated by the locals and tourist that go to the beaches down here.)

There are some homeless that just plain LIKE living on the streets. I talk to one that has been on the streets for about 14 years now. He isn’t a heavy drinker (only drinks of Fridays and Saturdays, and not heavily), doesn’t do drugs, but does panhandle and other wise work the streets, and sleep on the streets. He doesn’t want to change his life, and doesn’t plan on changing his life. He lives by a very strict set of personally made rules about where and how he sleeps, where and what he does, and how he panhandles. He had to see me walking around on the streets with other homeless for over a year before he would even talk with me, as I was outside of his rules. We now talk often.

Another class of homeless is what bothers me. There are MANY on the streets that belong in mental institutes for sever mental problems. The problem is, there are so few psychiatric hospitals out there, and someone must pay for those, so that leaves that these people out running around on the streets fending for themselves. Several years ago we had many psychiatric hospitals for mentally unstable people. Over the last 20+ years our political system has had these places shut down because of the cost of keeping them open. (Bipartisan, not just one side or the other!) I know of one facility that closed a few years ago in Annapolis MD area. When they closed, they moved less than 1% of the patients to another facility (that was closed a year later), family members moved another 25-30% to other facilities on their own, and the rest were given the option to be on the street, find their own place to be, or try to get back with family. In some cases there was no family to go back to. These people pretty much ended up on the streets. On way day they had a home, the next they were shown the door, given what little they had in possessions, and told to leave. I watched this happen myself!

I have heard many people say that they would give the homeless on the side of the street money, but the person would then use it for drugs or alcohol. IF you were going to give someone money out of the kindness of your heart, does it matter what they use that money for? It shouldn’t. For these people that alcohol or drug might be what they need to stay alive at that time. It is not for us to judge what they do with their lives. Now, I’ve heard others say that they will give them coupons to McDonalds, etc. This is good, but then you are telling them what they need. Is it your position to tell them that? Again, aren’t you judging for them?

For many of these homeless people, living on the street, or trying to, is the only thing they can do. Many want to be there, as the other homeless are their only support. And that support is shaky at best! Today someone can be your best friend, tomorrow they are not! But it is better than none!

You may ask why they don’t go to the various shelters and programs out there? Well, from what I am seeing, first there aren’t enough programs out there for the number of people on the streets. Second, getting into these programs can be VERY hard, especially if you have an alcohol problem or drug problem, and many COST the homeless money to be there. (They wouldn’t be homeless if they had money…) The programs, at least here in Pompano Beach/Fort Lauderdale, that help bring in people from the streets, dry them out (from either drugs or alcohol), give them beds, food, clothing and work to do, are almost always full. They may have frequent openings when a person can’t get through the withdraws of their habit, but those openings are grabbed quickly by people wanting to try. Many of the “Graduates” from these programs get back into productive life. Some don’t.

The “half way houses” out there that I have seen are jokes. These are supposed to be places where a person can go to get shelter, and attempt to get their life back in order. The person must get a job and pay “rent”. Yes, the rent is low. But in many cases, the house “manager” is a street person still on drugs or alcohol and is not better at managing a business (which these houses are, very profitable, for the owner, businesses) than he is manage his own life. There are more problems in these houses, more drugs, more booze, more issues, than there should be, by a long shot. I have yet to see one that is clean, orderly and well run. (I’m sure they are out there, but the ones the people I have been dealing with have been trying to go to have not been good.)

Then you have programs like this one down in Miami that works it’s way throughout Miami-Dade County and Broward County. This guy brings the vagrants in, gives them a place to crash, takes any income they have (social security, etc) and their food stamps from them each month. They are to pay an extra $50 a week for food (on top of the food stamp money they already have given through the cards!). He then gives them a “Route” to work as a panhandler or a “product” to sell. He demands 80+% of what that person brings in. He puts some of it in a “in house” bank for the homeless guy, but from what I hear, it can be pretty hard to get that money out in the end, and it often stays with this guy. And this guy is backed by the local government. He teaches no skills, just takes, and barely gives back. Add to that, I hear the housing is pretty pour to boot!

So, when you see these people on the street, think of our system for helping the mentally insane, think of our system for helping these people, and consider giving them a hand. Let them figure out how to use that hand!