Toyah

saturday i enjoyed a thanksgiving dinner with a few families from church. the turkey was deep fried and excellent, and the flavor was enhanced by an ohio state victory over michigan. with the monday-thursday off, i went to visit family. tuesday was our family thanksgiving dinner with parts of mom's and dad's family. thursday i drove back down here to have thanksgiving dinner with jennifer's family. after dinner jennifer's dad wanted to go rabbit hunting, but her brother's didn't go....just me and her dad in the woods with shotguns. i happy to report that our republican ties do not go as far late night jokes about the vice president. i hope you all had wonderful thanksgivings, and have a great weekend.

So my brother was kind of enough to send me an early birthday/Christmas gift of cash, which he specifically told me to use for my Lego castle. So I did. That means I have more money to spend on books this month: we each get an allowance each month to use for ourselves, for whatever we want. I usually use mine for books and Legos, like you might expect. I got a book catalog in the mail this afternoon, which made me think about what I ought to be adding to my collection. Ironically, they weren't cheaper than Amazon, so they didn't actually get my business! Unfortunately, I didn't see Phil's comment on my last post until just now, so I won't be reading any Milton Friedman just yet.

Anyway, here's what is coming my way:

• NIV Ministry/Pew Bible


• The Surgeon's Mate - Patrick O'Brian


• New Strong's Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, Classic Edition


• Through Blood and Fire at Gettysburg - Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain

Rather eclectic, no? I've always noticed you can tell a great deal about someone from their library, and my collection---even as seen here---is no exception, no doubt.

Labels: books

Sadly, I have never read a book by Milton Friedman. For someone who believes very much in the cause and principle of liberty, this is rather shocking, no? No doubt this is a serious flaw in my reading list which I ought to remedy as soon as possible. Although he wrote so many books that picking one to start with could be difficult...any Toyahites have a recommendation?

Here's a fun memory of Friedman: he sounds like a very rare breed: a great mind and a congenial soul.

Looks like the Democrats won control of the House, which does not surprise me. They need three more seats to get the Senate, and with only four toss-ups less, I think that's unlikely. I can't remember a divided Congress in my lifetime, although I'm sure it's happened before (I would guess not for more than two years at a time, however).

If these results hold up, my sense of politics is that Democrats did not win tonight; rather, Republicans lost. So Democratic gains this election cycle are by default, by being the other party. I don't get a sense that the electorate likes Democratic ideas, but clearly they are unhappy with Republican actions. I don't think Iraq is the only issue: I think Republicans would still be in trouble this year without Iraq, although probably to a lesser degree.

What that means, if I am right, is that Democratic control of the House rests on...pretty much nothing. Just an absence of Republicans. The GOP still has more and (I think) better ideas than the Democrats: if they can learn from this loss to stick closer to their ideas---and ideals---then it's quite likely that they can win back the House in 2008.

For anyone that's interested, I've finally had time to add to my Lego castle, and now I have some updated pictures!

A study is charging that tobacco-funded anti-smoking ads are actually leading to a higher rate of teen smoking. Critics are outraged and want the ad campaign ended.

It doesn't take a genius to know that you don't hire a wolf to build a safe pen for your sheep. What did the anti-tobacco lobby expect? Hilarious.

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