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When I visited my lady Kari in the county jail yesterday morning, she asked me where I would have Thanksgiving dinner today? I said the soup kitchen is serving at 1 p.m. today, I expect to be there. When she asked what else I would do today, is said I would get out today’s post at goodmorningkeywest.com and maybe I would take in a movie. Otherwise, I wasn’t looking forward to Thanksgiving, because the angels have for many years made Thanksgiving and other “holidays” extra rough on me internally. She said she really misses holidays, they used to be really important to her. I said it was that way for me, but now holidays are just days with a lot more hard work. I can’t possibly begin to imagine how hard it is for Kari and other inmates, being in jail, on Thanksgiving, or any day. Normally, there is visitation in the jail on Thursday afternoon, but not on holidays.
In today’s Key West Citizen, my interjected thoughts in bold italics, I added some pics.
Thursday, November 26
GIVING BACK
Volunteers prepare for Thanksgiving Day
BY ADAM LINHARDT Citizen Staff
alinhardt@keysnews.com
ROB O’NEAL/The Citizen
Volunteer Bart Steingraber continues carving the 29 turkeys cooked to feed the masses on Thanksgiving Day at the St. Mary’s Star of the Sea Soup Kitchen on Flagler Avenue.
St. Mary’s Soup Kitchen volunteer Bart Steingraber was up at 1 a.m. Wednesday morning cooking 29 turkeys in preparation for the charity’s annual Thanksgiving meal for those in need.
Bob and other dedicate volunteers keep many homeless people fed pretty darn good, day after day, in Key West, for which many homeless people are truly grateful.
He and the rest of the volunteers were still busy Wednesday afternoon preparing some 40 pounds of mashed potatoes and untold amounts of corn, stuffing and cranberry sauce.
“I got the giblets and chicken necks going right for the gravy,” Steingraber said while he and other volunteers cut up several turkeys.
“We have a good time in the kitchen,” said fellow volunteer Kate Fernstrom.
Service will begin at 1 p.m. today, three hours earlier than the kitchen’s normal service at 4 p.m.
“We serve seven days a week,” Fernstorm said. “We even served during a hurricane.”
Volunteers bustled about, asking for knives and where to store items in the multiple refrigerators.
“I always wanted to give back and this is a great way to do it,” said Lou Dawson. “Plus, I really like the people here. The people we serve are always very grateful and it’s nice to see them.”
Dawson’s 16-year-old son, Oliver, was outside preparing the tables for the 4 p.m. service, which looked to be Mexican fare.
“Just down from Jupiter to visit my dad and helping out,” he said while putting away a water hose.
One of the signs states that patrons must wear a shirt and shoes to receive food.
“Sometimes we provide that, too,” Fernstorm noted, with a grin.
Those on the frontlines of local poverty said the holiday season doesn’t stand out for those living on the streets.
The soup kitchen was started by Dorothy Sherman out of her and her husband George’s own pockets. Dorothy’s wake in the Mary Stat of the Sea nave on Truman Avenue, Valentine’s Day, 2004, was standing room only, weeping was visible and heard throughout the mourners and celebrants of Dorothy’s passing and her life. In his eulogy, lay minister Peter Batty said Dorothy was a living saint, which was true, and he asked who among us would step forward and continue her life’s work? Many people stepped forward, and continue to step forward, giving and giving and giving, asking for nothing in return. Their reward is great. “It is more blessed to give than to receive. Even as you did it to the least of these among you, you did it also unto me,” a homeless man once said.
“It’s really just another day,” said John Miller, executive director of the Southernmost Homeless Assistance League, which manages the city’s overnight shelter. “We’re doing it every day and our clients are just getting by.”
Two KOTS clients have died over the past several months due to poor health, Miller said.
“Some of it is self-inflicted,” he said. “But they walk and walk and walk all day long. It’s just not a good setup for health.”
Soup kitchen worker Linda McCrardle said she volunteers for that very reason.
“I feel bad for them, but I think what we do here is wonderful and I love doing it,” McCradle said.
Amen, and thank you. Thank you. Jesus knows your names.
Gwen Filosa contributed to this report.
alinhardt@keysnews.com
Also today, from the Citizen Editorial Board, I added the pic.
Thursday, November 26, 2015
Thanks and giving
For centuries around the globe, festivals and feasts celebrated the autumn harvest, giving thanks for a plentiful growing season.
The American version of Thanksgiving is said to have its origins in 1621, when the Pilgrims shared a feast with Native Americans of the Wampanoag tribe, who taught the colonists how to plant crops and hunt wild game. Without their help, the Pilgrims may not have survived their first harsh winter.
Hmmm, I wonder how Native Americans today feel about the Wampanoags giving the Pilgrims a helping hand?
Over 100 years later, President George Washington’s 1789 Thanksgiving Day proclamation recommended “to the people of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many favors of Almighty God, especially by affording them an opportunity to peaceably establish a form of government for their safety and happiness.”
And in 1863, President Abraham Lincoln, in the midst of the Civil War, declared a national day of thanksgiving, therefore establishing Thanksgiving as a national holiday. In his proclamation, Lincoln implored the “imposition of the Almighty hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it … to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquility and union.”
A common thread of these presidential proclamations was the clear religious tone, as both leaders encouraged Americans to pray and to thank “Almighty God” for their gifts, including those of freedom and union.
Not surprisingly, these proclamations fueled the ongoing debate of separation of church and state.
A terrific idea, given the history of European countries run by Christian religious sects. I read once of Republican big whigs traveling to Illinois to meet Abraham Lincoln, who was shaping up to be the Republican candidate for U.S. President. When one of the big whigs told Lincoln, it was said he did not attend church, Lincoln replied that was true, but he would if he could find a church where God was in charge. I read another time where Lincoln said, if the Lord wanted him to do something, then He found a way to let him know; and if the Lord didn’t want him to do something, then He found a way to let him know. The U.S. Declaration of Independence contains 5 separate references to a Deity from Which’s authority the Declaration is derived, none of which 5 references to a Deity remind of the Bible, nor of Christianity. I read once where Thomas Jefferson, who authored the Declaration of Independence, with input from other men he knew, led the charge, successfully, to defeat a drive to make Christianity the official religion in his home state of Virginia’s Constitution.
Over the decades, Thanksgiving has become both recognized as a day of religious celebration as well as a secular celebration as feasts, parades, football games and kicking off the holiday shopping season have captured the interests of many Americans.
Thanksgiving, like an old friend, has been with us through thick and thin, good and bad times. We have celebrated Thanksgiving in times of prosperity and peace, recession and war.
However, at its core, Thanksgiving remains the day for family and friends to gather together in a spirit of “thanks and giving” as we share food, thankful reflections and, most importantly, love for our fellow man and the bonds we share.
This year, Florida Keys residents have plenty to be thankful for.
The Keys economy continues to improve and we all have benefited from a very welcome string of quiet hurricane seasons.
For those who seek work; it’s worthwhile to note that the Monroe County has the state’s lowest unemployment rate at 3.6 percent.
Unfortunately, in the midst of this growing economy, some members of our community continue to struggle.
The lack of affordable housing coupled with the high cost of living continues to be a significant challenge to many members of our workforce.
Maybe a year ago, when Don Craig was Key West’s City Planner and ran the city’s Planning Department and chaired the city’s Planning Board through which all new development and redevelopment must pass muster, he told the City Commission the city was short 6,000 affordable housing units. The reason: that many people in Key West could not afford where they then lived, their rent or mortgage payments were too high for their income. The simple solution, therefore, was lower rents and lower mortgage payments. Fat chance landlords voluntarily lowering rents, fat chance mortgage companies voluntarily lowering mortgage payments. Plan B became a push to build new affordable housing units, mostly rental housing, which would be affordable to people who could not afford where they currently lived, and would provide competition to landlords and, hopefully, result in rents coming down citywide. The only way I see that working is for the city to build as much affordable housing as possible on city land, using the Housing Authority to bring it off and manage the affordable rental housing. Where can the city build new affordable rental housing on city land? On the city’s Mosquito Control Board property, on the city’s Easter Seals property, on the city’s Poinciana land where there already is affordable rental housing, on the city’s fallow land in front of the Steam Plant condominiums, on the city’s fallow Truman Waterfront land, on the city’s Sigsbee land. All added up, I bet 1,000, or more, new affordable rental units could be built. Then, maybe competition from that would lower rents citywide. As might lower rents in Peary Court, the city puts its new homeless shelter across the street on the city transit terminal land, after the transit terminal moves to Stock Island. Affordable rental housing was the runaway #1 issue in the recent city elections.
However, residents of our island communities’ reliance on the interdependency of family, friends and neighbors to improve the quality of life of others has often offset some of the financial challenges of living in the Keys.
That’s how many people get by in Key West, because they cannot afford to rent a place of their own, in which to live.
For in the Keys, we all know firsthand the importance of lending a hand.
We ALL?
As we enter this holiday season we ask that you remember those among us who are still struggling even as our economy continues to improve.
We have some suggestions for this holiday season, including shopping at local merchants and dining at local restaurants.
Our local charities continue to face difficult times due to residual effects of cutbacks in funding; this as the need for their services often remains outpaced by their ability to provide them.
We ask those who are able to consider digging a little deeper in their pockets to help those in need, and ask all to consider providing volunteer time or in-kind services.
Amen.
However you choose to celebrate Thanksgiving, we can all give thanks to our forefathers who gave us a gift of “thanks and giving.”
Unless, perhaps, we are Native Americans, or African Americans?
— The Citizen
Moving to the national capitol, more often today called the capital…
Sancho Panza, cleverly disguised as a demon, replied to the US wannbe be presidents part of yesterday’s prison time because someone is homeless? … Peary Court officer and a gentleman skeletons … 2 wannabe Key West homeless czars hold forth … can any of the wannabe presidents lead America through World War III? post at goodmorningkeywest.com:
“I don’t think either of them [Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton] are capable of shepherding America through WW III. Nor are any of the Republican candidates. Hell, Baby George Bush is Jeb Bush’s foreign policy adviser. I’m 73 years old, WW III don’t scare me. But it will impact my children and their children, and their children, and America is just throwing more gasoline on the flames in the Middle East. America should be totally out of the Middle East in every way; using its troops and navy and air force to seal its borders and harbors and air space, and not letting anyone into America, who is not an American, and then not letting any one in, even if he/she is an American. And hope the oceans provide sufficient natural defense. American troops should seal the borders between America and Mexico, and between America and Canada. America should suck it up, tighten its belt a lot, and live solely within its own means and natural resources, perhaps for a very long time.”
Are you fucking serious? And here I thought you were the only sane man left in America!!!! People can’t even save themselves from the shitty mess they’ve made out of their own toss of the dice… how the fuck is anybody born of the beast, capable of “saving” BABYRICA from planetary Armageddon? Do you know how many Americas there are? You would need help from “The One Ring to Rule them ALL”! I know you better, Lucifer… I know you’re just messing with those Yahoos on Facebook… thy kingdom come, thy will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven! 
A true lover of wisdom has hands too busy to hold on to anything! He learns by doing and every pebble in the path becomes her teacher! Oink
Don Quixote gleefully replied:
Actually, Sir Demon, what you quoted, which I admit I wrote, was the best Earthling defense I could think of, after some thinking, for America. Note, Sir Demon, I said the best Earthling defense. You did notice elsewhere in my ravings to the Facebook lost in their own delusions Earthlings, that I gave them the Jesus option, in case any of them claimed Jesus already had saved them through some magic spell Jesus himself never heard of back in that day.
Yes, there are actually 3 Islams, as there are, for example, 3 Christianities. There is mystical Islam, the Sufis, who understand all too painfully well that the true jihad is internal, the internal war between good and evil, between the animal man and the evolved man (or woman); read up online on the famous Sufi Rumi. Pretty much the same stuff Jesus taught his disciples and any who would listen in the Gospels, the internal jihad, although Jesus did not use that word. There is mainstream Islam, which is ritualistic, like mainstream Christianity, but has little, if any, direct engagement with the “other realms”, such as, hmmm, angels, demons, at least not consciously. The advanced Sufis engage those realms, consciously. There are the radical Moslems, who perhaps can be likened to the Christian crusaders who invaded Palestine when it was Islam’s domain, something Islam has and never will forget. Something, the Crusades, Jesus never would have condoned, just as Jesus never would have condoned Christian Baby George Bush’s wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
I am sort of like the Sufis. I am in ongoing congress with angels and am ongoing engaging demons, usually through their human proxies, but sometimes directly. My perspective is, therefore, not “normal”. Understatement. But then, Jesus’ perspective was not normal, either. And he trained and continues to train me, with Archangel Michael and Magdalene Melchizedek taking turns with me. I mean, such utterances as, forego an eye for and eye and a tooth for a tooth; resist not one who does evil; turn the other cheek; love and forgive and to good to and pray for your enemies; if a man takes what is yours, ask not for it back … Heresies in Jesus’ day, and even now. So, you see, I think Christianity is lost, too. America learned nothing from Vietnam. And it learned nothing from the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. Having learned nothing, America seems fated to continue learning nothing, thinking it knows what it is doing, like the Bushes thought they knew what they were doing, like Obama thinks, even still, he knows what he is doing.
And, I gave them this photo op prayer, without saying it was a prayer.
However, a massive angel injection of “estrogen” into the aforesaid presidential wannabes, and into all Earthlings, would have a remarkable effect.
Which, naturally, is what really punched every last one of your buttons, Sir Demon, since my recommendations to the children of the face book had gotten progressively more distasteful to your one world order domination dream :-).
I confess also, I had to scurry into the Google Dome and look up the great wondrous ring you invoked, and this was revealed to me, which left me … hmmm … unable to squeak … for a moment 🙂
From Wikipedia
In The Lord of the Rings and the posthumously published The Silmarillion, Tolkien provides a detailed internal development from the forging of the Ring to its destruction. In the fictional context of Middle-earth, these events take place during several thousand years in the Second and Third Age of Arda.
Description[edit]
The One Ring was forged by the Dark Lord Sauron during the Second Age to gain dominion over the free peoples of Middle-earth. In disguise as Annatar, or “Lord of Gifts”, he aided the Elven smiths of Eregion and their leader Celebrimbor in the making of theRings of Power. He then forged the One Ring himself in the fires of Mount Doom.[1]
Sauron intended it to be the most powerful of all Rings, able to rule and control those who wore the others. Since the other Rings were themselves powerful, Sauron was obliged to place much of his own power into the One to achieve his purpose.[2]
Creating the Ring simultaneously strengthened and weakened Sauron’s power. On the one hand, as long as Sauron had the Ring, he could control the power of all the other Rings, and thus he was significantly more powerful after its creation than before;[3] and putting such a great portion of his own power into the Ring ensured Sauron’s continued existence so long as the Ring existed. On the other hand, by binding his power within the Ring, Sauron became dependent on it—without it his power was significantly diminished.[1][3]
Appearance[edit]
The Ring seemed to be made simply of gold, but it was impervious to damage. It could be destroyed only by throwing it into the pit of the volcanic Mount Doom where it was originally forged. Unlike other rings, the One Ring was not susceptible to dragon fire.[4] Like some lesser rings forged by the Elves as “essays in the craft”—but unlike the other Rings of Power—the One Ring bore no gem. Its identity could be determined by a little-known but simple test: when placed in a fire, it displayed a fiery Tengwar inscription in the Black Speech of Mordor, with two lines from a rhyme of lore describing the Rings:
Three Rings for the Elven-kings under the sky,
Seven for the Dwarf-lords in their halls of stone,
Nine for Mortal Men doomed to die,
One for the Dark Lord on his dark throne
In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie.
One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them,
One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them
In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie.
The lines inscribed on the Ring (in boldface above) were pronounced by Sauron when he forged the Ring. The Elven smiths heard him chanting them, and thereupon became aware of his purpose and took off their own Rings to foil his plan.
A person wearing the Ring would enter a shadowy world revealing the physical world from a different aspect, and from which physical objects were harder to see. The wearer was mostly invisible to ordinary beings, like Men, but highly visible to the Nazgûl. The Ring dimmed the wearer’s sight, while at the same time sharpening the other senses.
The enigmatic Tom Bombadil appeared to be unaffected by the Ring and to have some power over it; when he wore the Ring, it did not make him invisible, and Frodo could not become invisible to him by wearing the Ring. Also, Tom played with the Ring like a conjurer borrowing someone’s watch for a trick, seemingly making it disappear and reappear.
The Ring slowly but inevitably corrupted its bearer, regardless of the bearer’s initial intent. For this reason the Wise, including Gandalf, Elrond, and Galadriel, refused to wield it themselves, but determined instead that it should be destroyed. The corrupting power of the ring was apparently stronger on individuals more inclined to evil and selfishness: it took almost immediate hold of the greedy Sméagol as soon as he saw it, and corrupted Boromir after a few months of near proximity, while its effects were only starting to be seen in the noble Bilbo after 60 years of his owning it.
The Ring had the ability to change size. As well as adapting to fingers of varying size, from Sauron’s to Frodo’s, it sometimes suddenly expanded to escape its wearer.[5]
P.S. to Sancho:
Of course, you are right. If America tried to do what I suggested, seal itself completely off from the rest of the Earthlings, then that would be akin to tenting and fumigating a house for termites, they would have no one but themselves to vent their frustrations and aggression against, maybe they would exterminate themselves, and maybe the world would be better off, although the radical Moslems might be a while feeling they wuz robbed of their God-ordained duty and right to personally exterminate all Americans, which, perhaps, would then put them in the shoes, sort of, in which Jonah in the Bible found himself after God told him to go to Nivea and tell them God was going to kill them all for their evil ways, and after much avoidance and finally being swallowed by a whale, which, of course, was God, Jonah surrendered and went and did as he was told, and lo, the Niviaites all believed him and repented their evil ways and God did not kill them all, or any of them, with hell fire, and boy was Jonah pissed at God about that, and when that story ended, it was not clear if God had persuaded Jonah that God can do any fucking thing God wants to do, regardless of prior promises, and, besides, the Niviates had changed, they were no longer doing evil, so why kill them?
Sancho wrote:
errata
If I had to bet… I would say that not much is going to happen, no WWIII, for sure… there is probably a select group of very powerful(Rich) people that sort of oversee the children’s play (like in Greek mythology) and will settle things down before it gets out of control… without money very little gets done in this brave New World. Think about the last century… what has REALLY changed, politically? As a matter of fact, I could make the case that the Roman Empire is still pretty much around and that what we see Today is not that much different from the same struggle between the rulers and the ruled that has always existed.
Islam vs Christianity? All Organized Religions are but joint ventures between Church ato keep the Yahoos in control (Fear and Hope are powerful tools for compliance)… sports, mind altering drugs and entertainment are newer additions to their arsenal. The Bible is meant to be contradictory and obscured… all the holy scriptures are written that way, so they can be open to “interpretation”… you see in them whatever the priests wants you to see… you’re a lawyer, you know the skill involved when pleading a case before a jury… the jury in this case is a whole nation and the indictment is against the absurdity of their lives… the priest, as the defense lawyer, must prove the importance of adherence and allegiance to the status quo.
We should give thanks tomorrow, and always, that we live in a country settled by people like Benjamin Franklin, one of my heroes, and that we still have a constitutional form of government… what you said before about disentanglement from The Roman Empire, is something BF would have agreed with you on… but he would have reminded you that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure… we should have never being involved with any of it, any of it at all… the bedroom and the stairs are on fire now… what are we to do?
Don Q replied:
This world war is out of the “illuminati’s” domain, they have zero control over it, or how it progresses, about like humans in the “Alien” movies had zero control over the cuddly alien monsters and how they progressed. America’s fearless leaders, governmental, corporate and military, fucked up big time, the bedroom and the stairs are on fire now, and how it goes from here is anybody’s guess … for sure, the current POTUS wannabes don’t have a clue how it’s gonna go, nor do their human puppet masters; I suppose the Devil has a general inkling, and the angels I know somewhat probably ain’t totally head up in the ass or down the rabbit hole in this arena, either. Well, they did tell me as I was leaving the local US Post Office, probably not coincidence, a few days after they had asked me to make the pre-9/11/2001 prayer for a Divine Intervention for all of humanity, that America should get out of the Middle East altogether and let Israel and Islam work it out or fight it out. Being Jewish, maybe Bernie Sanders, genetically and tribe-wise, has a more realistic view of the world war and the enemy, but then, maybe not. Can’t say we don’t live in interesting times.
A youngish homeless man here in Key Weird, whom I chat up at the soup kitchen, is a bit wired differently, hears things, and has a very big science, mathematics, physics intellect and knowledge, said he was told, and he figured out to some degree, about a year from now everybody is going to have a major experience, in the watershed sense. He didn’t elaborate, he said he felt he was not authorized to elaborate. They stoned prophets in the old days, regardless. He said today that he had spent some time near Fayetteville, Arkansas. I asked if he’d read Robert Heinlein’s STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND, in which the human who came back from the Mars colony ended up in Fayetteville, I think. He said he didn’t know of that book or the author. Oh, his name is Jacob. When he first told me his name about a month ago, I said that had Biblical implications. He smiled, we started taking about stuff I doubt he talks about with anyone else around these parts. I sometimes think you’d like talking with him about the science, mathematics, physics stuff, and maybe the ET stuff :-), but probably not the angel stuff. He, for instance, said string theory and entanglement theory are not theory, but are for real. Which, perhaps, would interest Ben Franklin, but might drive Albert Einstein around the bend :-).
Jubilee!!!
sloanbashinsky@outlook.com
