She's Leaving Home

I see this reference to some new "version" of Blogger. Any idea what that is?

There wasn't a URL referred to in your above comment, however it seems as if the new blogger beta is "invite only" - no mention of GA date.

http://googlesystem.blogspot.com/2006/08/new-blogger.html

Faster posting is promised due to not having to republish indices or something.

I use docs.google.com to make blog post updates, this is the old www.writely.com company that Google acquired, it's a nice editor, although I haven't worked out how to make the titles of posts stick.

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Have been doing Christmas shopping this weekend and will be writing a few cards to the family today, it's such a circus!

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And that might very well be the downfall of human civilization.

The downfall of human civilization and humans is, in my opinion, inevitable. I think I once mentioned that I was sitting in a pub .. heck it was last New Year's eve and here is part of my post:

Things are always changing aren't they?

This was brought home to me one day when I and a friend nipped into a pub in London during a rainy summer lunchtime in 2001. As I was enjoying my pint of Guinness, I looked at the water droplets slowly evaporating from my umbrella. I was spellbound. It gave me great comfort to see it. I am not sure why. Just to know that the clock is ticking, that change is always among us, even if we don't notice it - that nothing stays the same no matter how much we wish it would. For me, a "perfect" moment. Thank you Guinness :-)

That really was a "lightbulb moment" for me in life, in seeing that we humans have some kind of inbuilt desire for things that we like to remain constant but that they just will not. This includes things like civilizations, which clearly rise and fall, and "humanity" which I believe will change into something else. Humanity has a few paths it could take

1. Die out completely (an extinction by a large stone - "The Wormwood", global war that wipes out all life, etc)

2. Evolve into something else (perhaps after a not-quite-extinction-level-event in 1, perhaps through the radiation of a nuclear war)

3. Become a hybrid augment of human + computer

4. Just end when Judgement Day comes

5. Something else

Now, the Bones-me will say that (4) above will definitely happen. The Spock-me says that, having found a way to avert (1), then (3) above will definitely happen, so I am in a quandry :-) Do we need techology? For sure, because of The Wormwood. Do we need religion? I don't know, it causes friction between different religious groups, but does provide hope to many. Besides, it may well be the Absolute Truth, but which religion to choose? It's not like you can measure it for Truth, it comes down to a personal choice, and one in which where you are born has 99% of the influence in the choice you make. Imagine if scientific theories and experimental results were dependent on where the scientist was born? That's funny, how would the scientists ever get other labs around the world to reproduce their results? So nothing would move forwards. Do we need "one religion" or "no religion" or something else I wonder?

Note: There are different scientific theories for sure, but I don't see classical Newtonian believers throwing bombs at Einsteinians :-)

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If the devil is "prince" of this earthly realm, and his goal is the cast humanity into chaos and destruction, what could possibly be his gain?

Well, putting aside the fact that humanity might well change into something else for one moment ...

Tough questions, you have to place yourself in the frame of mind that the Earth is this battleground between an omnipotent being (God) and one of his turncoat superbeings (The Fallen Angel Satan), and that anything that happens on this battleground happens with full knowledge and foresight on behalf of the omnipotent being and that the turncoat superbeing knows that whatever he does comes within the plan of the omnipotent being. Ok I think that covers the "If" at the start of your question :-)

What could be his gain? I really don't know. Because whatever his game is - it would fall into the plan of the omnipotent being, therefore he is stuck. Whatever the turncoat superbeing does, even if he "does nothing" falls within the plan, so the turncoat may as well get on with it and stop complaining. He is perhaps caught in a pointless rage against the omnipotent being.

This doesn't sound very likely I know. What are your thoughts to his possible gain?

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"She's Leaving Home" - this is a lovely McCartney song from Pepper. I did a version on acoustic guitar but my voice is nowehere near that of Macca's - still it kinda works and I would love to have heard McCartney do it on an acoustic. The reason I dug this song out is that I had a "meeting" with Alice and the girls to discuss why Katherine wanted to come and live with me, as now Alice has agreed to drive the girls to their old schools everyday.

Katherine still wants to move in with me and the reason she gave at the meeting is that she doesn't trust her mother. Things have been said and not delivered, important promises have been broken. I watched Alice intently as she got this feedback from her daughter and I saw the emotions of anger and rage! The red line in the song below just popped into my head! The current plan is for my daughter to move in with me on my birthday, next Saturday December 16th and then for her to spend one night a week at Alice's (Thursday) and every other weekend there, we'll see, it's happy times but also very sad. The song:

Wednesday morning at five o'clock as the day begins
Silently closing her bedroom door
Leaving the note that she hoped would say more
She goes downstairs to the kitchen clutching her hankerchief

Quietly turning the backdoor key
Stepping outside she is free.

She (We gave her most of our lives)
is leaving (Sacrificed most of our lives)
home (We gave her everything money could buy)

She's leaving home after living alone for so many years. (Bye, bye)
Father snores as his wife gets into her dressing gown
Picks up the letter that's lying there
Standing alone at the top of the stairs
She breaks down and cries to her husband "daddy, our baby's gone."
Why would she treat us so thoughtlessly?
How could she do this to me?

She (We never thought of ourselves)
is leaving (Never a thought for ourselves)
home (We struggled hard all our lives to get by)
She's leaving home after living alone for so many years. (Bye, bye)

Friday morning at nine o'clock she is far away
Waiting to keep the appointment she made
Meeting a man from the motor trade.

She (What did we do that was wrong)
is having (We didn't know it was wrong)
fun (Fun is the one thing that money can't buy)

Something inside that was always denied for so many years. (Bye, bye)
She's leaving home. (Bye, bye)

The E to Bm/D in this song is so equisite, the way the melody just dips it's shoulders, that happens on the words in blue above.

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Congratulations to you Mr. Senior Cert. Well deserved :-)