Kitchen remodel -after

New kitchen

And now it is done.

Yesterday we signed the final invoice and cut the final check to our contractor upon completion of our new kitchen.  Honestly, the entire ordeal was not nearly as painful as I had been led to expect.  Yes, we ended up spending more money than we had originally intended.  Yes, we spent 5 weeks without a kitchen.  Yes, at times, our nerves were frayed, causing some tense marital moments.

But we're very pleased with the results.  Have a look for yourself.

Before

After

The contractors had not even left the house before Maty was in there organizing and setting up. Also, cooking. As she organized the cabinets and arranged where things would go, she simultaneously cooked ném for one of her Senegalese friends.

Before

After

When you consider how much Maty loves to cook (and how much I love to eat) this new kitchen is an investment that will certainly pay off.  (And that's not even considering how we have improved the market value of the house.  Not that we're planning on moving any time in the foreseeable future.)

Alder cabinets and brand new appliances

Anyway, we're pleased as punch with the results.  Maty is cooking even as I write.  She's happy, and therefore, I'm happy.

Every honest man likes for his wife to be happy, yes?

New specs, new kitchen

Everything comes apart

Spun around the orb enough times to know.
Everything comes apart in time, in time.

Foundations bend, foundations do crumble--
Rain melts clay men shaped with love and care.

Roseate dawns birth hope and joy and fear.
Dusky sunsets evoke both grief and peace.

You can't hold it against anybody.
Not you nor he nor anybody else.

There's no mystery, no puzzle at all.
Worlds will fall my friend.  Worlds will ever fall.

Happy 52nd, Senegal!

52 years of independence

April 4th is Senegal's Independence Day.  On that day, in 1960, France signed a transfer of power agreement that awarded Senegal and other French territories in west Africa their independence and political autonomy.

Senegal's status as a republic, with an elected government, came under duress last year when former President Abdoulaye Wade, nearing the end of his second term as president, amended the country's constitution to allow himself to run for a third term.  Autocracy is not uncommon in Africa.  All too often, African republics evolve into dictatorships or fall victim to coups d'etat.

Senegal, however, overcame the danger.  Last year, students and other political activist groups began demonstrating against Wade's amendment.  Touch-and-go for a while.  There was some rioting and the threat of escalating violence.

But then, in February of this year, Wabe agreed to comply with the results of a national election that replaced him with the new and current president, Macky Sall.  A victory for democratic politics in this young republic!

M'barou, Maty, and Nadiya setting up for the feast

As I've mentioned before, there is an active Senegalese community here in Portland.  Every year they have a party celebrating Senegal's independence.  As the husband of a Senegalese immigrant, I've become part of that community and thus, attended the party this last Saturday.

This year's party was smaller and more somber out of respect for one of the Senegalese families in town which is struggling with a child's illness.  This is a close-knit community and it didn't seem appropriate to have a big bash while one member is gravely ill. 

Senegalese ladies in their finery

Nonetheless, the Senegalese folks got together for a feast and a little music. The festivities started off with a call for donations to help the family in need and a singing of Senegal's national anthem.



Then came the food and the dancing. Good times.  Senegalese folks know how to party.

Happy Independence Day, Senegal.

Agnostic query on Easter Sunday

There are very few areas in the vast, mind-boggling expanse of the Christian creed upon which its billions of adherents have attained enough agreement to achieve any kind of coherence.  Easter celebration, the discovery of an empty tomb in Golgotha, is one such, however.  Christians choose this day, arrived at through an archaic calculation involving the first Sunday following the full moon that occurs after the year's vernal equinox^*, to celebrate the day that Jesus rose from the dead, revealing Himself as the Christ. 

It's a fascinating and wondrous story with moral and spiritual meaning worthy of a lifetime of examination.  What is the significance of Christ's death and resurrection?  As Judas Iscariot asks in the 70s rock opera, Jesus Christ Superstar, "Who are you?  What have you sacrificed?"

Seeking the answers to those questions is fascinating and rewarding.

But, in order to be Christian, one must believe in the literal truth of the story.  One must believe that the broken and tortured body of Jesus was restored and reanimated and walked again among the living before ascending to Heaven.  In fact.  Actually.  To be Christian, one must believe that, had you been there, you would have seen the healed wounds, might have witnessed Jesus being lifted from the Earth.  For yourself.  With your own eyes.

In other words, in order to be a Christian, one must believe something which is counter to everything we perceive in the world around us.

Why?

The Gospels tell us that Jesus, Himself, revealed His wisdom in the form of parables.  He told stories that conveyed lessons for those who would learn them.  The literal truth of the parables was not important.  What was important was the wisdom, the Truth, that the parables revealed.

So, why is the Resurrection story different?   If one spends one's life pondering the story of Jesus' death and resurrection, examining it for meaning in one's daily life, striving to see how it reveals truths that might be otherwise unattainable, why does the literal truth of the story even matter?  The same holds for the Virgin Birth, and for Jonah and the Whale, and for Noah and the Great Flood.

Respectfully, Christians, I have to ask:  Why must the story be literally true?  What difference does it make?   

^*The tie to the equinox is a dead-giveaway that the early Christians supplanted the Pagan vernal celebration with Easter as a way to facilitate conversion, ce n'est pas?

Santorum's Last Stand

I'll say this about Rick Santorum:  the dude is a true-believer.  He's putting it all on the line in Pennsylvania.  If he doesn't win the Keystone State primary on April 24, his presidential ambitions are dead.  Not only for 2012, but for any and all future presidential races.

Consider:  Republicans have a tendency, in their presidential politics, to nominate the candidate who is deemed to be "next in line;" the candidate who came up short in the previous cycle.  There's plenty of historical evidence.   

• In 1976 Ronald Reagan lost the Republican primary to Gerald Ford, but then won the nomination in 1980.
• In 1980 George Bush the Elder lost the Republican primary to Reagan, but then won the nomination in 1988.
• In 1988 Bob Dole lost the Republican primary to Bush the Elder, but then won the nomination in 1992.
• In 2000 John McCain lost the Republican primary to Junior Bush, but then won the nomination in 2008.
• In 2008, Mitt Romney lost the Republican primary to McCain, but now appears to be on the verge of winning the nomination in 2012.

Using this pattern as template, Rick Santorum would seem to be in prime position to win the nomination in 2016.  (Or 2020, were Romney to win the Oval Office this year.)  

But Santorum could blow it all by losing the primary in Pennsylvania.  It's his home state.  If he doesn't win his home state (which even Newt Gingrich managed to do earlier this year) it is hard to imagine that anyone will ever again see him as a viable national candidate.  Keep in mind that when Santorum lost his Senate seat in 2004, Senator Bob Casey blew him out by 18 percentage points.  So, Santorum is already on shaky ground.

Polls currently show the primary to be neck-and-neck, with Santorum leading Romney very slightly.  But Romney's got lots of money and, judging by the results of Tuesday's primaries, it appears that rank-and-file (emphasis on "rank") Republicans are bowing to the inevitable.

Despite all that, Santorum soldiers on.  He's taking positions that are anathema to much of the voting public.  (Who but he really thinks contraception should be an issue?)  His rhetoric toward Romney is scalding.  He's playing it as if there is no tomorrow.  If he wins Pennsylvania, it stills seems nearly impossible that he'll get the nomination.  If he loses, he's done forever.

In 1876 General George Armstrong Custer, who some say had presidential ambitions of his own, charged into Sioux Territory spoiling for a big victory.  We all know how that turned out.

Or do we?  Has anybody asked Rick Santorum?

Nice wins, Mitt, but there's a problem...

 

Aw, you kids!

Well, Mitt, you may have finally done it.  Your victories tonight in Wisconsin, the District of Columbia, and Santorum's own next-door neighbor state, Maryland, might just mean that Republicans are coming home to roost.  Santorum made some defiant noises in his remarks tonight, but I wouldn't let it worry you.  He's fading.  Everyone can see it.  In the end, he didn't make the sale.  The koo-koos weren't convinced.  They were never really for him, anyway.  No more than your supporters are for you.  Republicans aren't for anything.  Republicans are against.

It's smart to be out doing events with Paul Ryan.  He's as close to a rising star as exists in the GOP.  Young, reasonably photogenic.  His relative youth is a great accent to the gray at your temples.  Give you that distinguished air of savoir-faire.  He dresses like you.  Nothing says "vice-president" better than a kid who's smart enough to dress like the boss.  He's got a budget problem, of course.  And he's an Ayn Rand disciple.  But at least he comes across as intelligent.

There are other problems, though, Mitt.  You may have won over the rednecks, but you pissed off a whole lot of everybody else while you were doing it.

Women, for example.  It's bad enough that you wouldn't stick up for Sandra Fluke, the young woman whom Rush Limbaugh called a "slut."  It's bad enough that you had nothing to say about that sickening, monstrous "vaginal probe ultrasound" legislation that they tried to pass in Virginia.  But stating that you'd "get rid" of Planned Parenthood, the country's largest provider of reproductive health services, blows the top off it.  That kind of "show her who's boss" crap plays well with the rednecks, but it'll have women stampeding to the ballot box for Obama come November.

Then, there's Latinos.  Senator Marco Rubio can say whatever he wants to try to reassure them that you didn't mean it when you said you'd veto the DREAM Act.  Or when you called that oppressive Arizona legislation which allows local police to demand immigration status papers from anyone at anytime a "model for the nation."  But, you know, no matter what Marco says, people get touchy.  Especially when you suggest the Federal government should start deporting their families.

So, okay, tonight's your night, Mitt.  Congratulations.  These primaries have been a dog fight, and it looks like your dog is the only dog that's still breathing.  But, man, we got a good look at your ugly side.  And it is ugly.

Willamette River decides not to flood --this time

Willamette Falls after 3 days of solid rain

The Willamette River crested today after last week's Pacific Northwest downpour.  Three days of steady, heavy rain.  The National Weather Service says that the crest reached 16.28 feet in Portland.  Just about a foot and a half below flood stage, and nothing at all like the Flood of '96, when the river crested at 28.6 feet, surpassing flood stage by a full 10 and a half feet!

But the Flood of '96 was itself dwarfed by the Great Flood of 1861.  The Great Flood completely drowned some townships, including Champoeg, the site of the first organized government of the Oregon Territory.  The Great Flood was so massive that, at its peak, the volume of water flowing in the Willamette River surpassed that of the Mississippi River itself.  The Great Flood is the biggest Willamette River flood in recorded history.

The first Oregonians, the Chinook, the Clackamas, the Long Tom, the Yamhill, who bequeathed their names to the Willamette's tributaries, came here some ten thousand years ago.  In those days, before recorded history the Willamette still flooded, but there were backwaters and sloughs to absorb the floods so they wreaked less destruction on the valley floor.  The floods were less severe in those days before civilization channeled and deepened the river.

But a few thousand years before mankind first came to Oregon were the great floods.  These were the floods  that came from the north and east.  They were caused by the melt of retreating glaciers.  The first and greatest was the Lake Missoula Flood which came when a glacial dam broke open and unleashed an entire ocean of water through the Columbia Gorge, scouring the earth.  Over the next few thousands of years, scores of floods literally scrubbed eastern Washington of its topsoil and deposited it in the Willamette Valley. The land still bears the scars of those great washings.

Clear demonstration of two truths, I suppose:  the Willamette River is a flood-prone river.  And recorded history really isn't much time at all.

I'll tell you this, though:  the water made an impressive sight.  Roaring and rioting over Willamette Falls.