Latest items always at the top.

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5.We just received word that my 1st Cousin & Amish School Classmate Esther (Graber) Yoder , passed away in Windsor, Mo. today.(May 05-2013).There were 4 of us that started in first grade in Aylmer Ont. Canada ,and went all the way through 8th Grade together  . Esther Graber, Mark Stoll ,Raymond Marner & I , And Isaac Fehr (deceased)was also in our Class the last 2 years . Esther may have been the only girl , but she easily held up her own end of it.

I still may have lead in my back from when she would punch me with her lead pencil ,when she sat in the old fashion desk behind me……maybe I deserved it.

RIP, Cousin Esther.

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4. And thanks for checking back with us…Our site was down a few weeks. Don’t feel bad that you couldn’t access this fine and informed site , we couldn’t either …….May 01-13

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3.The game of Chess is a very hard game to grasp,especially if one starts late, as after the teenage years.
One good way to learn a very rudimentary knowledge of it is by playing the free online versions of it.(sparkchess).
We  admit to dabbling with it a bit now & then . And Ahem-mm , we do admit we never have won past “Cody”, who is the most elementary one , the learning stage one..And probably will not for the foreseeable future…

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2. What in the World is North Korea up to , the foremost hater of all things American ? Threatening to annihilate the US with nukes is hopefully a Bluff, but who knows , they may take a shot at it, literally. There are many educated military minds that think a single high altitude low-level ”output” , could damage a good part of the US’s power-grid  infrastructure .And they do have one little very crude satellite circling the earth now, so they do have a chance of launching something ,sometime….Apr 03-13

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1. In Anabaptist-land there is quite a bit of interest in the possibility of a renewed  Military draft , to fill up the ranks of the Armed Forces.

Throughout history, this has been a serious problem for Anabaptist, especially in the time of The French empire’s rising under Napoleon

Forty years ago , The USA had a Military Draft to face, once a young man turned eighteen years of age.

In today’s USA , the probability of a thing like that is very , very remote , though not impossible . Today’s very downsized Army , with all the technology it has , has no room for draftees . and their problems …….Look for buggy-whip factories to come back first…. Apr.02-13

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The town of Due West SC. is the home of the renowned Erskine College , and sometimes  referred to as ”The Holy City” , because attached to the regular College  is a full scale seminary , to train Preachers.

We have always desired a house to work on in this small college town , but until the recent Real estate meltdown , were always outbid.

Art deco style in Buildings means a somewhat boxy look ,with almost flat roofs and odd shaped open porches.All masonry and brick , of course , for outside and even inside walls. This house has Character and background galore.

234 S. Main Due west SC.,has lingered for most of a year  on the real estate market,empty but still reasonably sound and dry from the weather. Vandals had removed the AC  unit , and about all the Electrical wiring that could be reached by a bolt cutter , that was out of sight from the sidewalk. The original galvanized water pipes still hold water without leaking , but barely a trickle comes through , they are almost entirely corroded shut. That must explain why the last occupants had rolls of gallon milk jugs full of water lined up in the bathroom.Galvanized water pipe has an estimated life of 40-50 years , so at 61 years we are well past replacement time.

It was advertised on the real estate sites as a ”Former Doctor’s Office” built in the 1950′s, and included a full 2 acres of woods in what is referred to by the local citizens as ”Poverty Hill”.

And so we aptly named the new challenge as ”Poverty Hill Manor” ,with a somewhat crudely  constructed temporary sign in the front yard.

Some research and a few interviews with local oldsters later , we surmised that It never was a Doctor’s Office ,that was a made up cachet to sell the property .

According to our information ,a local somewhat reclusive farmer & town employee had married his 2nd wife in early Spring of 1918, his first wife having died after childbirth in 1914,a day after the never-named child died too.

He enlisted in a US Army infantry division  and ended up in the trenches  of The Great War in Europe in the summer of 1918 .Going ”over the Top”,and surviving , several times in that War ,now referred to as WW l ,Left him in a perhaps more eccentric and reclusive state then before.

In about 1948 , this Childless Couple decided to build this particular house,at 234 S. main St ,built his way.They had lived on a farm a mile down the Lindsey Cem Rd..(Elmer Hershberger Farmhouse). They moved into the new house  in the summer of 1952 . He died in 1955 ,and his wife almost immediately sold the house . Perhaps she did not care for it after all,or needed a change. She died in 1971.

Known as the ”Flat roofed house at Due West”, it was owned and lived in by a Religious Writer and Seminary professor,and his family  ,for over 3 decades .It was then sold and entered the rental market until it was no longer Rent-able because of the water trickle and some notoriously rowdy tenants.

In The past week ,A now retired lady that had graduated Erskine College in 1956 and went on to acquire an architectural  degree in New York City, stopped in at the house and requested that we ”Please make no architectural changes” to this house. Several other notable locals also expressed that sentiment.

Some  local  friends and colleagues would express exactly the opposite tactic. ”You’ll have to put a roof on it’ ,is a very common comment from some, meaning a roof one can see from the ground, of course.

Anabaptist & Mennonites  are probably among the most architecturally backwards folks around. We would include ourselves in that , too. How many times have we seen pretty side porches closed in ,as an awful example of ”making more room for a growing family”?

Some were still putting that grungy gray vinyl siding  on houses several decades after everyone else went back to the White….And painting over all those beautiful old brick walls,too.

All while wearing those plastic clothes of the 1970′s well into the 1990′s . Polyester is supposedly coming back into style now in 2013 ,too.

May 08-13

We have dug the Electric line in to the New 200 amp Box. We’ll do a total Re-do of the wiring after we examined the old wiring, a good bit of which had been bolt-cuttered out by copper thieves.

The water pressure was almost zero ,though no leaks were apparent ,after the turn-on. just a very slow drip of water ,seeping through . Obviously the last tenants  several years back were dealing with the issue the best they could , lining up  milk jugs to catch the water , they were still there,many still full of water.

We removed all the old 60 year old galvanized piping  under the house, which was all  pretty well filled with ugly gooky corrosion.Galvanized pipe of this size has about a 40 year life ,so it was overdue. We lean towards CPVC pipe , that old hot-cold workhorse . The result after installing a bit of it was , almost zero water pressure.

The next step is examining the 1 inch galvanized line to the street. We took a new one-half inch sewer snake, reamed it ,the water supply pipe, out good . Still almost zero water pressure.

Next we dug up , and replaced the 2 pipe corner sections , almost all the way to the water meter, the pipe being only about a foot in the ground makes that easy. Needless to say the Meter apparatus was carefully assembled and disassembled several times , with lots of pressure there . Still zero pressure inside.

At length after due consideration,we recalled that the snake had not gone quite all the way to the water meter at the street while cleaning the pipe, stopping perhaps a foot short of it .  So back to the shovel ,on the house side of the water meter.

About 6 inches down in the dirt  we pop off the lid of something , which after examination proves to be a pressure reducing valve , inside a buried casing .

The pressure screw is turned all the way out , completely stopping the water flow ,except for the slight seepage.

We have a good bit of experience with watts pressure reducers , hence we know that when these things go bad ,they always open up ,not close down….We wonder how long the prior owners were filling the empty milk jugs with water from the slight drip from the faucets.  They must have had at least one enemy that got even with them,and good….

A few turns In , and the house water is at 50 lbs pressure.

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Like all such literary efforts ,a successful read is when one can find something to inspire ,and or, motivate oneself , if not necessarily others.

He lays out 30 practical points everyone needs to examine oneself in to be  more fulfilled and useful. We would like to mention a few of them here , with our own comments added.

Point 1. ”You become what you value”

In this one he points out that one has to have values in order to  to practice them . Values are very basic and very personal ,if they are to make a difference .Very basic things like Stealing, or not Stealing, and loving and helping one’s “neighbors” are noted as biblical values .

As Anabaptist, we tend to call these things ‘Convictions” , and tend to try to apply them corporately , or as a group. As a result , we can end up with few if any personal values , just group ones , which we tend to call ”Beliefs”. And they don’t work , never have ,never will,if not personal. But that does not keep us from trying.

I have always been Intrigued to observe folks that ”Step up” ,in the Anabaptist World . Some Drop everything , and do the opposite of what they were supposedly taught ,or believed as a group before. .

Others try to pretty much Parallel what they lived before ,with a few more ”improvements” added . Still wear a big black hat and suspenders, but step up to a Car, for instance.

How much of either of those has to do with inner values or beliefs, or the lack of them, is the big question.

Point 2. “You become what you say”.

Wow, we may be in trouble here. A recent national news story quoted a study that most Men talk about 7000 words a day , most women about 13000 words a day ….

We would tend to think that in the Anabaptist Amish & Mennonite World this would run about equal , since in a Nutshell , men are valued higher then women in our circles. The more conservative the setting ,the more that tends to be so.

To be continued…..

Latest items always at the top .

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WE ARE FORD PICKUP FOLKS

11. We have owned and driven Ford F150 Pickup trucks ,since the first new one we bought in 1977.

Our latest new one we have owned is a 2003 with a 4.6 engine , the smallest V8 they offered .We did not back then like how the 2004′s were due to look ,they were coming out just weeks ,after we purchased our 2003. And the small V8 seemed just  fine to us .

A rather fortunate combination it has been ,looking back 150 K miles and about ten years,of engine size and year model..

Ford has had huge problems with it’s 2004-2009 lineup of pickup trucks . A spark-plug change in them,because of poorly designed engines can run into several thousands of $$$. Some Ford dealerships even refuse to do the Plugs.Some are reported to be  charging for spark-plug changes and then not doing them….

After running our 2003 almost 150 K miles, we decided to get the plugs changed . I bought the plugs ,and got a local top rated mechanic to do them after work ,he brought some funny looking tools home from his job.And Yeah,we watched…It took him all of 30 minutes ,  at a very reasonable $20….It helped that he is living in a house we manage.   Mar 27-13

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The Bogey Man May Not Be Who We Think

10. And now we make a rather bold assertion about the old fraternity association called Freemasonry ,(Shriner’s ).

We would not encourage anyone to join it ,simply because it can be a distraction,of one’s limited time .

Religious bigots ,including Mennonite ones ,have been calling them the Devil’s own spawn for hundreds of years , stirring up simple folks needlessly when the Devil’s handi-work is mostly a lot closer by then that . Spiritual Confusion and the inability to discern Good from Evil is a work of the Devil.

Mostly ,Freemasonry is today a shrinking club of very old men , who get together very occasionally to think up do-good community projects to try and get the public’s attention , so as to get more members to survive as a Club. They are losing members ,and probably will continue to do that ,as the younger generations have other interest.

All the Shriners I have ever known are Nice folks ,with no ulterior motives at all , concerning those activities…….Mar. 25—13

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BANKS DO NOT MAKE ONE HAPPY

9.The island country of Cyprus Bank Crises story has been going on a while .The EU seems to be working ,holding this little bitty country from defaulting . Some of those very rich folks who stashed money there are taking a shearing ,though , and it is hard to find anyone that is sorry about that……

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TIME SAVER -TIME WASTER

8. We got a little hardback book with a bright catchy title of “500 Terrific Ideas for organizing Everything ”. It is touted as ”The best Techniques and tools for organizing Anything and everything in your life”.

Needless to say , It is all about very detailed To-do lists , Setting 2 alarm clocks so one is sure to arise early ,etc & etc..All kinds of nonsense like that .

I seem to think this type of book would go over big up in Yankee Mennonite Lands ,like Ohio & Pa.  So many folk there are  so constantly busy , like Turkeys getting ready for the Thanksgiving Platter…….Mar 19-13

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7.One year ago today we were camping ,at our local State Park . A Beautiful weekend it was .

So we have a late Spring this year ,and it looks like they are expected to have a good winter storm next week ”up North”. They are welcome to it .

Mar 15-13

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THERE WAS A TIME BEFORE CLOCKS

6. Fast time (DST) is coming March 10th  this year, the earliest ever . Spring forward, Fall back.

DST In the USA came in in WWI in 1918 , it faded out after the war , and was brought back In WWII , under President Roosevelt.

The Idea was to make more productive daylight hours ,using less energy.

With today’s Lights and air conditioning and stores that hardly ever close , there is really no reason for all that . except for those who shun modern things like Electric lighting.

There are still a good number of stricter Amish who will have nothing to do with this Worldly Idea. I once had a Conversation with a Nice very old Amishman , Ben E Wagler , now deceased at age 92.

He informed me that he knows of several peers of his that still go by Old, Old time on their personal watches. I never could figure out what that was, or the why of it.

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5. SHALE OIL A BUBBLE ?

It’s looking more and more like the whole Shale Oil thing is a huge bubble about to pop.Turns out the wells just do not produce nearly enough to get anywhere near paying off.

What is different this time, is that it is the big guys who spent those Billions of $$$$ that will lose it. The little guys that happened to own land that paid off big for them on those leases are the winners….Good for them.

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4. MERV values on  house Air Filters….

If you have a furnace in your house ,you should study up on what is the best air filter for it.  Most AC men want you to get the cheap fiberglass ones that rate from MERV 1-3. “Don’t try to make an air purifier with your furnace fan” ,is their usual line.

We have mostly used the baffled hardware store ones , that rate about MERV 5 or 6. Since we run the fan most of the time we tend to change them regularly.

We recently purchased several MERV 9 filters off EBay  ,(3 for $16), the kind you cut to size yourself . We cover about 90% of the filter holder with it ,the Idea being that some air can still whoosh through easily so as not to make the fan motor work too hard.

The higher the MERV number ,the more contaminants will get trapped in the sticky part of the filter. They go all the way up to 20 though those get very expensive . Maybe if one covered half the filter area with a High MERV filter , and half with a cheap one, You’d have the best of both Ideas. Both moving a lot of air easily ,and Cleaning it too.

We suppose If you don’t have a forced air furnace ,you could take a 20 inch box fan , tape a good filter to the receiving side, and clean some air that way. If you ever see dust mites floating in the morning Sun ,you never forget it.

Mar. 05-13

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BURGLARS END BADLY

3.We were recently called upon to temporarily repair the solid wood front door of the house of a well Known & respected local citizen .Some criminals came to the house and entered forcibly ,when they discovered no one answered the doorbell. We marvel at how really easy it is to kick in a good solid door like that . That particular house was really ransacked in a very short time .Beds hurled about and all drawers skewed on the floor,in a huge mess.

A PIGGERY OR AN EATERY ?

2.We recently ate at the local ”all you can eat”’ place called ‘the Golden Corral” in Anderson,SC. for the first time a several years. Now this upstate SC city is somewhat known as the center of the ”Rednecked ,or Mountain Folk ” crowds , for eating and shopping purposes.

This is a huge place ,seating up to 500 (Just a guess).We noticed the parking lot was about chock full , which meant there were a lot of folks eating at 3 P.M. on a Saturday afternoon.The prior times we have eaten there , there were not that many fellow diners, today it is packed.

The food was really very good , tables and tables of  fried food , desserts , even a nice salad bar , and a cotton candy dispenser, and an Ice Cream machine.And excellent waiter staff ,who brought us our coffee ,afterwards , like Canadians do. For the 2 of us ,it was a reasonable $16 , and then you are on your own .

To watch some of our fellow consumers , many of whom were obviously having the happy part of their day , was worth paying the money for. Obesity and sheer Gluttony is very common to observe here . Throw in wastefulness of food too.

We had recently read in WSJ that this type of eatery is fading out throughout the USA . (Maybe it is because it’s regular clientele is pigging itself to death).

The original mass market ‘all you can eat” Idea was first marketed into the general public in the 1970′s . A place called ‘Duff’s” had this huge wheel that turned in front of you with the food in little stalls , you picked out what you desired as it went by . The food is of much better quality today . But it is still a matter of choices , that the eater makes.often it does not appear to be the healthy choices.

In this particular establishment , it looked like it was doing very well,not fading out .

We suppose it will be a few more years before another stop there.

March 02-13

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WHAT IS AN OPEN MIND ?

1. We noticed a saying in an Amish monthly magazine recently(page 9). ”Minds are like parachutes ,unless fully opened ,they cannot function properly”.

I cannot think of a proverb that is less in tune with the Amish way of life then that one …               Mar. 02-13

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He was 7 months older then I am , and I have counted him a  friend since 1974 , when we first met , at the time I lived in Daviss County ,Ind.

An inspiration to many ,he lived a life that is an example of following Jesus in all our daily pursuits.

When I called him last fall to congratulate him on his birthday, I mentioned that we would be considered old men now , at least to anyone under 30.

His funeral procession met and passed the Amish funeral procession for the 9 year old Amish boy who died in the hayloft. Probably a hundred buggies in that one.The county Sheriff had that whole road blocked off , for the two funerals.

We enjoyed our visit there, winter weather notwithstanding, the last night there we were snowed in at the motel , an icy blizzard kept us in and away from the visiting we desired to do.

We stayed again at the Gasthof, an Amish themed motel-restaurent complex a mile north of Montgomery Ind.

The motel was nice and comfortable ,and a very reasonable priced $59. (The funeral rate), though it is getting shabby in some ways .For instance the wind was blowing shingles off the roof ,I examined one in the parking lot that appeared to be original late 1980′s . They’ll need to make a decision soon on that one.

The Restaurant there was newer , and had real Amish girls working there. We were the only ones eating there at that time of the evening ,in this huge dining room that seats several hundred diners,they had just got the word to close up early because of the ice storm that kept the customers away anyways. They did not rush us , but did suggest we may take our desserts in to-go boxes , which we did then.

We chatted a bit with an Amish waitress ,after a bit we learned she was a Stoll (A pepper). Her mamma was a Raber (A cash). Those are Amish Nicknames .I asked about my first cousin Sara Catherine wagler (Banty) that works there during the day .

Montgomery ,Ind is the site of the huge St. Peters Catholic Church ,which towers high over the small town of 350 people. It was built in 1869 ,a year after Amish arrived in Davisss Co. This thing is huge for the small town , dominating the skyline.

The Parrish in Montgomery was started in 1818 , and was the site where a number of friars started a small Catholic College . The Bishop in Vincennes ,Ind.protested ,as there was already a college there in Vincennes.

The Friars then went off to South Bend Ind. to start up what is today Notre Dame University.

My dad recently told me a story of when he was a boy growing up there north of Montgomery on “Banty hill’, in the early 1930′s.

Their next door neighbors there were practicing Catholics , possibly part of the Montgomery Parrish.

The little Amish boys kept noticing the local Catholic priest’s Ford Roadster parked at the Neighbor’s ,a young English couple, quite regularly .After a while they noted that the Priest’s visits always happened while the husband was at work.  Some things,like the hearts of men, never change ,it seems.

to be continued

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12. THE POPE RESIGNS….. A very important thing going on today is the resignation of the ”Supreme” leader of the 1.2 billion Catholics worldwide……The oldest Christian Religion by far is The Roman Catholic one. Feb 28-13..

And how many Mennonites are aware of this ? At least one, so far ,we are trying to expand that ..

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11. The meteor that impacted on a sparsely populated area of Russia , a 750 ton or more thing , is absolutely amazing . No one saw it coming , or had a clue.

That it did not hit the USA , is a wonder indeed . The Asian land mass is so much bigger , they always seem to hit there. We do not believe it was just chance , God allowed it to happen there,this time.

It would have been interesting if it would had impacted the USA ,you would have heard a thousand times more about it…Feb 16-13

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10. We were chatting with some retired folk , sitting on their nice but not elaborate cloth couch.

”We are going to let the couch set go back”’ , they mentioned. ”We are paying $179 a month for the couch and loveseat , and we are tired of it now, we’d like to get a futon type set.”

I think they were talking about the rent-to-own furniture people ,that you see driving about with those bright colored trucks…….Feb 05-13

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9. This is the season for chimney fires ,for those who burn wood . That a chimney can be a problem ,is often discovered during a hot burn-out , often referred to as chimney fires.

Several years back,we noticed the local chimney service people were installing stainless steel liners into chimneys that looked a lot like overgrown dryer vent pipes .At about 3K or more a pipe.

We ended up installing about a half dozen of them for friends and customers,after becoming curious about them . The national stove-pipe companies sell them on-line ,most have stores on E bay. No, we are not in that business in any particular way , as we are now afraid of heights.

Only one of them has had a burn-out since then, when I was dumb enough to install the supplied cap. I removed it to let the smoke shoot straight up and away instead of clogging up at the cap.

The best part of this is that the folks that we installed them for now have a safer chimney for $1200 instead of the 3K . They claimed they could not have afforded that .

The kits cost between $300 to $400 delivered to your door.They take between 3-6 hours to install . Most of mine were 6 inch ones without Insulation , these are not made to be stand-alone, but need to go inside some sort of chimney.

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8. The US war in Afghanistan just does not seem to wind down . We recall President Bushes’ assertions that ”They will welcome us with their hearts , and embrace Democracy”. Nothing of the sort happened .

A bigger scandal is the many US and multinational companies paid extremely well to supply the US troops . Most are totally corrupt , many US civilians hired for big $$$ to work over there ,don’t last long over there , and return home very disillusioned .   Jan..23—13

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7.We Just returned from Daviss Co. ,Southern Ind . From the funeral of Fannie (Raber) Wagler,aged 96 ,on Jan.11 2013.

She was buried in her black wool wedding dress ,she was married to My uncle Noah L Wagler in 1937.He died in 2008. Her daughters suggested we feel the texture of the wool dress , and we did ,.

Back in 1987 , during their 50th wedding year ,we submitted the appropriate info to the White House ,like 4 months ahead of the occasion . In due time they received a nicely worded congratulation card from President Ronald Reagen and his wife .

Noah and Fannie were awed and pleased by that .   Jan 14-13

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6. On Jan. 01 2013 , in the afternoon , it was exactly 150 years since President Abraham Lincoln carefully signed the Emancipation Proclamation into US law. to set all Americans free , in rather dry legalese prose . A Lawyer , he was concerned that no Court would or could overturn it . It was entirely written by him ,and he made the professional scribe rewrite the whole document because he had left out one word in it.

It was in the PM because he had just spent the whole forenoon shaking the hands of thousands of New Years well-wishers at the White house. He is noted to have carefully massaged his then numb hands so his signature would be steady.

The USA population in 1860 was a bit over 30 million people. It is now well over 300 million people……10 times as many folks, no wonder the Interstate roads are so crowded now….Jan 05-13

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5. At our small New Year Gathering that ended at 10 P.M. ,Someone mentioned that the Dec 2012 setup of days of the week will not be repeated for 823 years . Sure enough ,that falsehood is all over the Internet , which is good enough for lots of folks to call it true.

I went to look for the “‘Perpetual Calender”,and could not come up with one on -line.I had to dig out an old “Information Please Almanac” , from the early 1990′s to come up with the Info that 2012 repeats itself like about every 28 years . All years do , in different patterns or lengths of time .

The 823 thing pops up regularly as a  fake thing , and also usually involves passing on ”good luck” to others if it is re-posted.Jan 01-13

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4. And are we all destined to get ID  Chips put in our arms or wherever when the dreaded Obama care is enacted ?

It depends who you believe on this, we do not think that it is a viable fear………..Not true,in other words.

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3.H Norman Schwarzkopf ,the driving genius General behind the 1st gulf War, has died. Bush I at least kept the USA out of a protracted War then.

Schwarzkopf’s father was the lead State Police investigator in the early  1930′s In New Jersey, during the ”Lindbergh Baby Kidnapping” case. This was a huge story ,captivating the world news for months and months , and the perpetuat0r was eventually executed.

Schwarzkopf  himself was CO of the military unit in Vietnam in 1970, highlighted in the book ”Friendly Fire’,'written by an embittered anti-war Mom named Peg Mullins.

Through it all his stellar personal character prevailed……    Too bad he never ran for President.

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2 President Obama is  more poplar today then anytime in the past 3 years.  Some say he is just lucky, and it may be…Yes, he is for more Government control ,and thinks that Government has a lot of good answers.

His badly defeated rival for the office of President of the USA, Mitt Romney seemed to think that Business men had better answers to problems . We believe the truth lies in between those opposing views somewhere.     Dec 28-2012

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1.So much is better today then even 20 years ago.Cars & Trucks are built much better today ,they are more dependable, and are safer . The national human Road-Kill rate is the lowest ever per million miles driven.In spite of texting …

The information age has exploded ,although it is noted that it does not make anyone smarter to be that well informed.

Face-book we would not consider true info, just a fad that will even itself out.

And the problem with stuff, or excess belongings , is appalling to all true hoarders. There is simply too much of it ,even at yard sales and such.

Old antique Furniture , the big stuff , is going for pennies on the dollar compared to what it used to sell for. People’s taste on furniture seems to have changed to smaller movable stuff.

Old cars ,the Model T’s and Model A’s  are not considered that desirable now ,they belong in Museums.

We took a short Vacation to Edisto Island SC , to a beach house over the New Year . It was scheduled for 3 nights , but was bumped to 4 nights by popular demand.

About the third afternoon I was getting bored with the beach ,and discussing a minor issue with someone from back in Abbeville SC….

“”I may be coming back this afternoon , or late tonight “” Was my comment over the phone. Unknown to me , there were about 3 people listening on my end of the line. And that Idea was nixed immediately…

We do not have TV at home ,and are a bit confused with all the channels available there. We became somewhat engrossed with shows like ”Storage unit Wars”,”trucking Wars”, and ”This old house” . After we got home I researched these supposed ”reality” shows. Sadly, very little about them is real , it is all staged ,and big time staged….

The storage buying teams are paid 20K per episode for the put-ons. The house buying couples are even more faked , as the houses they look at to buy are often not even up for sale….  Jan 15-13

54%Obama      46% Romney Aug 01 -12

53%Obama      47%Romney Aug 07-12

51%                      49%     Aug 26-12

52% Obama       48% Romney  Sept. 04-12

53%                      47%   The Dems clearly had a better convention going…..

54%Obama       46% Romney( Sept19-12)

50%    —–50%   Oct 29 -12

In one of the most astounding comebacks in recent decades, for one so far down  this late in the Presidential race, Romney has propelled himself to a possible winning position ,if his momentum keeps on .

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Oct 04 update …Romney had a clear ”win” in the 1st debate . Whether this can translate into votes is to be seen ….The major news media is livid about it ,watch them.

(Sept 19-12 update) This is starting to look like a rout , In what may be the poorest run attempt in recent history to unseat a sitting President , the Republicans need to re look how they come up with their candidates for President,

(Aug-12)On winning the presidency in November. Obama has the upper east and the complete West coast areas locked up,especially the complete west. If Obama takes Pennsylvania, Ohio, or Florida, Romney may as well get out his Golf clubs , he’ll have lots of spare time, and the money to spend it on.

It is not the popular vote of this country that elects a President , but the electoral vote process, with each state able to effect the matter . One of the wisest things the Founders set up which is as effective today as at the beginning .

We have always said that gas prices can foretell a part of it.They are dropping now , till after November .(July 10) …Going up now ,(Sept-12) …Romney will have a hard time explaining about his own private money making machine , Bain Capital , they killed  jobs for Americans.It is not the number of jobs he cazoodled ,it’s how he did it. Slash and Cash out,fire them all, that is how.

In any case , most of  public perception may be set by September. The public’s perception , that is.President Bush I lost in 1992 even though the economy was roaring back then. However , he was running against a very Charismatic opponent , Bill Clinton.

Romney seems rather unfocused now , like Nixon in 1960 and Gore in 2000 .

Al Gore actually won the national popular vote , and if he had taken his home state of Tennessee, would have been President.

The News Media is now , and always has been in President Obama’s corner , all the way . Many of the Polls are in Obama’s corner ,trying to slant things, too.

Why are the vast majority of Anabaptist -linage folk so vehemently opposed to Obama?

Update Sept. 04-12…There is an article in WSJ that points out the amazing amount of $$$ that is being transferred from the government to people of all sectors.Poor and rich alike .And this has left the USA 16 Trillion in hock.

The amount transferred is now 100 times what it was in 1960 ,and has doubled since 1998.(In today’s dollars).

The only people I am aware of that try to avoid this are the Amish , and even they take it through the tax deductions . We are not sure if they take ” earned income ”credits , or not.

This cannot continue for that long .Neither Pres. Obama nor aspiring Pres. Romney will or can reverse this trend, though the perception is that Romney would try and slow it down . This may cost him the Election , as everyone , big or little, rich or poor , wants theirs.

1.We just returned from a trip to Canada ,to Aylmer, Ont . specifically.The first time we have been to Canada in 12 years…

While there ,we got to see the famous ”Wagler Bell”. Famous to Waglers, that is, at the Anabaptist historical place ,operated by David Luthy.

It is a decorated oversize Cowbell ,made  in the early 1800′s,that was brought over with the original Waglers from France .The provenience is fairly easy , as it has Christian Wagler’s full initials on it ,and a date too. It was found at some point on the farm where he settled in Canada ,discarded because it had a crack in it  and cannot ring with any authority , but sure looks good ,just hanging there in the glass case.

To all the Waglers out there , the oldest known Wagler Family  Bible has somehow disappeared ,or at least it’s location is not known at this time. In the late 1960′s It was sold to a book collector in Stratford Ont. A medical doctor Named Dr. Struh, for the then astounding sum of $500.

It was at the estate sale of a Michal Wagler ,put on by what would be distant low-grade relatives of ours . The collector that purchased it  kept in touch with the Waglers over the years, and even allowed them to photo copy the many written inscriptions in it . Him and his wife both have died since, their estate dispersed. It would be nice if  more responsible Waglers could locate it.

To the Wagler historians ,Christian Wagler, who immigrated to and died in Canada ,was the Giant Character in our backgrounds. John S. Wagler, his son and our own  Great-Great Grandpa, perhaps was a rather marginally gifted operator ,in other words not the brightest axe in the toolshed…..

Opon further inquiry about the Family Bible , It is a large 1545 folio Froschauer Low German Bible .It is Luther’s final translation, only 6 copies of which are known to exist intact  today. So we guess we won’t ever get that one back…..C. Froschaur’s clearly printed German bibles were in great demand by the Anabaptist, the smaller editions easy to hide , on their persons…

Booksellers have a habit of splitting these very old ones up and selling them by the Page. This one would have sold for at least a $100. per page….

A good number ,if not all of the Canadian Amish burn wood for the winter heating season. A 100 foot long stack of wood , seasoned and covered on top , is not at all an unusual sight to see there.

The Aylmer Amish people do not allow electric ,or even kerosene refrigerators. So that means ice,lots of natural ice ,  Stored every which way.

The neatest setup we saw for cooling food,was a former friend who had just built a new house . Right off the kitchen, in the garage he had constructed a 12 by 12 foot well insulated ice-house ,which he chocks full of ice in winter , and it lasts all summer. It still had ice in it now,though not much.A small door opened from the kitchen to set food into it in the nearby shelves.

Many  Amish settlements in Southern Ontario were originally started a half century ago because of cheap and good land being available .

This whole concept has been set on it’s head by restrictive government laws against splitting land parcels , and high taxes on buildings and land.

As a result ,large swaths of good Southern Ontario land are being De-populated ,large AG concerns are buying up the land and razing the farmsteads.At 10-12 K per acre , young Amish families cannot start up ,and many are relocating to the far North of Ontario ,where they raise oats and chop wood .

The ”Mt Elgin’” Amish from near London are closing down and leaving there now , for that reason….The Amish Life can be a very hard dead-end life, and mostly it is..Simple non-Amish people sometimes extoll that way of Life , and thereby display their own ignorance of that way.

And now to the subject of the ”Aylmer Amish Bears” .We never did run up against an active one ,though we expected to .

We aren’t sure who coined that phrase ,but it is an apt one ,’Bears’ who self-piously, self righteously  refer  to another who should be judged, executed ,and possibly cast immediately  into hellfire ,on the grounds that they may be having a better time ,now that they are not strict Amish.

Women are objects in every way to them, and that thinking often brings a moral corruption with it.

They had about a 50 year run of that thing in the Aylmer Amish. Most have mellowed a bit , possibly because some of their own now grown children have ranged rather far into the modern World.

At least one is selling real Estate in Costa Rica to gullible Americans . A number have married to “English” partners. And several other situations.

I had a rather candid conversation with one of the major”Bears”somewhat mellowed down now, who lamented that the people there are now unzufrieda,(Unrestful). And that the young Amish people can no longer start up to farm , because of high start-up prices….. What goes around ,comes around ,we once heard …..

We assume the “Amish Bears ” would think would think they are Children of God’s Kingdom. We are not to Judge , although the Fruits do not look too hopeful on that.

I have been looking at that subject some over the summer ,with Churches in confusion. About Children of God’s Kingdom , and the Devil’s Children . How little outward difference there can be , to where those involved are  fooled . I’m thinking those who are serving the devil are perhaps the most confident, (See matt. 7-23)

That dividing line may be invisible to man ,but is always known by God…..

Oct 06-12

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Latest items always at the top……

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9. We recently got a few London, and Irish Daily Newspapers. It gives a different perspective to the news sometimes..

In London ,England , some folks are upset by the National Healthcare system …One woman took her 80′s mother in to address ailments. Several days later she noticed she had been moved to a smaller room with no IV’s attached , just a Morphine  drip… She had the knowledge how to investigate her mother’s care , and to her horror discovered that attending Doctors had decided that since her Mother’s life quality was no longer worth it in their estimation  , they decided to end it , by withholding food and liquids, but keeping her sedated.

This is actually fairly common in the USA , though usually with the families’ consent. (We once observed that taking place with an older acquaintance)      Oct. 16-12

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8. TSC means a retail store that stocks farm supplies. There are several in the upstate ,over 1100 in the USA, full of farm feed and equipment , and smelling of leather.

They sell mid-priced farm equipment for the small farmers too.

The one outstanding  attribute we have noted over the years is that the Staff is consistently unhelpful and stand-offish ,even downright unfriendly. We have noted that in every TSC store we have ever shopped in , in different states. Maybe that is a company policy …….sept. 21—12

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7. The ”Diamonds are forever” mantra has got to be taking a hit, to it’s supposed values.

The Russians have admitted they are sitting on a 3000 year supply of Diamonds, that are twice as hard as existing mines can produce…….it is from a 60 mile wide crater in Siberia somewhere.   Sept 19-12

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6.Our power company is offering to buy up the older fridges for $30 . Supposedly to save money. The thing about older refrigerators is that they tend to run, and run and run. Unlike the newer ones of the last 10 years or so ,who are knocked out by the slightest glitch ,or sensor  gone bad. …Aug 22-12

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5.We haven’t followed the case of Mennonite Preacher Ken Miller’s trail in Vermont that closely , but it appears the jury got it right on the conviction. The conviction was apparently not about the right or wrong of that situation , but if Preacher Miller knew what he was aiding and abating was illegal. Of course he did , and a reasonable jury came to that conclusion rather quickly.

What he may need is a better lawyer , and better legal advice then he has had so far..especially if he wants to skimp on the Truth,

The Legal Professions and Courts will surely take close notice of this one, what it insinuates…..Aug 15-12

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4.Daniel Webster, was about  the smartest US politician that never made President of the USA, though he wanted it.

He missed it perhaps because of his own conceit . In 1840,future President  William Henry Harrison ,asked Daniel Webster to be his Vice president . Webster’s answer ,” I would rather not be buried until I am dead” declining it. Most Vice-Presidents sink into obscurity rather quickly.

Harrison went on to win the 1840 Presidential race, made such a long  inaugural speech in the blowing snow that he took Pneumonia, and died a month later.

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3.Eating Suckling pig Has historically been a big thing throughout the World,for thousands of years. It is a piglet between 3 and 6 weeks old that has only had sow’s milk, that is killed,gutted , and then roasted whole in an Oven or on a spit thing . Sometimes they are propped up ,looking rather life-like , and then they cut jags of roasted piggy off with a knife….Nasty tradition ,we must say ,the little piggy deserved a longer life then that.

We recently read in an old farming magazine how a pig farmer was trying to bring that idea back. He himself raised a thousand little piglets a year ,with very short lives , and was hoping to revive the tradition . He complained that the Turkey had taken over the Piggy’s spots on the holiday tables.

He is right on that , and it is hard to feel sorry for a Turkey , and we are glad his Idea did not catch on again……08-08-12

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2. Pumping gas after dark at a somewhat  seedy gas station . In this area they are all like that . The Dude,whom I did not know, at the next pump ,was trying to strike up a conversation of sorts with me , and it wasn’t “clicking”   with me. Usually ,if you get just one word , and expand it from there ,you can figure out what is being ”axed’ of oneself. I didn’t even get that , and made the mistake of looking agreeable ,perhaps even nodded my head a bit.

After we both finished pumping , he approached me . “I trys to tell you,Got Lortab 10′s here, want some ?”….Back pain pills….Crazy world,indeed……Aug02-12

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1. A hot summer brings out a lot of bugs and little critters around and even in the houses.Even fleas and such .

We’ve always sprayed insect control stuff , with varying degrees of success. We use the Lowe’s or home Depot’s concentrated bug sprays , about $9 to $12 a quart .

This hot summer that stuff is not quite doing it , so we have stepped up to the  ’38% permethrin, Hi-yield 38 Plus” . About $39 for a quart , well worth the extra cost . you can even spray in the corners inside , if the house is empty a few days , though that is not recommended.  It only takes 1.6 ounces per gallon.

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