Vindication

I've just been told that vindication is not quite the most appropriate word, but I think that's what I'm feeling.

Some ten-fifteen years ago there was a movement to unite the four major conflict resolution organizations under one institutional roof. Those four would have been the Academy of Family Mediators, The Society of Professionals in Dispute Resolution, the teachers group that promoted conflict resolution programs in public schools, and the National Association for Community Mediation.

As a member of NAFCM at the time, I felt strongly that the interests of NAFCM would not be served by joining the new organization, which was to be known by the name of Association of Conflict Resolution, ACR. The issue was discussed with passion and conviction at the NCPCR meeting in Phoenix, and NAFCM did not join ACR.

I am not truly surprised to learn that the Academy of Family Mediators has now decided to pull away from ACR and re-establish their former independent organization. I can only surmise that the attempt to meld their goals into the larger organization did not work out in the long run.

A Resounding Crash

We all know what it's like when a computer crashes. It's not a pretty picture. Last week, it was just a personal crash. I just crashed. Was immobilized. I've heard of people who were so traumatized they couldn't even get out of bed in the morning. My situation wasn't that bad, I did get out of bed. Where is my energy, drive, motivation? I sure hope I can find them again pretty soon.

WHY DO I NEED A ?

Why do the html experts make it so hard to create an extra space between words or elements? If I need an extra space here or there, I have to remember  . Can't the coders let us designate one simple character to make a space? And who can remember the combination of  ? (Looks like Popeye cursing, if you ask me.)

S/he Just Doesn’t Get It

Sometimes people are so dense, so thick-headed, they “just don’t get it”.

I used to see it in small claims court, plaintiffs or defendants, who were totally incapable, and always would be, of understanding their opponent’s point of view. Of course, in most small claims cases, they did not want to understand where the other person was coming from; they had a profound fear that any exposure to the other person’s position would weaken their own.

You feel sorry sometimes for someone who “doesn’t’ get it”, and you wonder what never-going-to-happen circumstance it’s going to take to open their minds to other opinions. There are times when you fault yourself, and believe yourself to be a failure when you cannot find the exact words, or any words, to create a bit of enlightment.

And if you’re truly honest, you’ll wonder if there are times when a friend or acquaintance or associate looks at you in bafflement and wonders why “you don’t get it”?

Can e-books save civilization?

“Not only did St. Patrick bring Christianity to Ireland, he instilled a sense of literacy and learning that would create the conditions that allowed Ireland to become ‘the isle of saints and scholars’ – and thus preserve Western culture while Europe was being overrun by barbarians.”

Remember that best seller – How the Irish Saved Civilization: The Untold Story of Ireland’s Heroic Role from the Fall of Rome to the Rise of Medieval Europe – written by Thomas Cahill?

“Not only did St. Patrick bring Christianity to Ireland, he instilled a sense of literacy and learning that would create the conditions that allowed Ireland to become ‘the isle of saints and scholars’ – and thus preserve Western culture while Europe was being overrun by barbarians.”

Cahill tells the story of how Europe evolved from the classical age of Rome to the medieval era. Not only did Irish monks and scribes maintain the very record of Western Civilization – copying manuscripts of Greek and Latin writers, both pagan and Christian, while libraries and learning on the continent were forever lost . . . when the seeds of culture were replanted on the European continent, it was from Ireland that they were germinated.

Another artifact of incomparable historic significance is the Rosetta Stone. When finally translated, the Rosetta Stone gave the world a glimpse into civilizations far older the the Roman Empire.

Words laboriously copied by the monks and scribes onto parchment, the Rosetta Stone, are all tangible records, solid things you can hold in your hands – or touch, since the Rosetta Stone weighs about 760 kilograms.

Technology is both ephemeral and ever-changing. Will our present civilization be preserved forever on electronic books?

Twenty Minutes or Twenty Days?

Which is the best course? I love to knit. I hate to sew the darned things together. Some knitters hate the sewing together so badly they hire someone else to do it for them.

But, which is the better course? Spend twenty minutes seaming up the anklewarmers after I've finished the knitting part, OR, let the unsewn anklewarmer nag at me for twenty days while I keep postponing and procrastinating?

MY WHITE COFFEE HOODIE

Took me years to find the perfect white hoodie. YEARS. AND YEARS. Yesterday, somehow, coffee got spilled on my precious white hoodie. I wasn't even wearing it, In fact, I don't know when it happened. I set my plate of sunflower-seed cookies on the table, and took my hoodie off to hang on the back of the chair, and that's when I noticed a huge stain on the left front.

A regular wash cycle left an obvious stain. This next wash cycle has bleach. If it doesn't work, I'll try to dye the whole garment with coffee. And I'll start another lengthy search for a white hoodie.