A bit of a gripe

As anyone reading my political commentary can probably tell, I'm a conservative. Every day, after I get my son up, dressed and fed, read my Bible, and the little man and I do the day's lesson, I manage to find a bit of spare time to engage in one of my 3 hobbies: reading, crochet and politics. I don't have a ton of time to hang out on the internet and I don't tend to post a lot, but I do have a few sites I visit regularly because I enjoy their "quick hits" links for the news and they usually have excellent commentary.

Over the past week or so, with the Rush non-controversy rolling, one of my favorite blogs has gone all Hot Air on me and it's got me pretty peeved.

I can deal with differing opinions on a conservative blog. We're all human beings and we're not always gonna see eye-to-eye on everything. What I have a problem with is when the moderators on a site post what they consider "red meat" over and over and over in order to get traffic to their website and then proceed to chide the commentors for their passionate opinions on the subjects that they themselves post about. It's hypocritical and annoying. If you don't like Sarah Palin, don't post about her. If you are an atheist and don't care to see people of faith get riled up about something, don't post a faith-bashing thread. And if you think everyone should just move on from the Rush non-controversy then for the love of God, STOP POSTING ABOUT IT!!!

Hot Air is notorious about doing this exact thing (which is why I call this type of behavior "going all Hot Air") and it's so annoying that I've gone from checking over there daily to a brief look once every week or two.

So, yesterday I go to my favorite blog after being offline for most of the weekend. The very first post I see is one from the site owner calling everyone out for being so angry over the Rush thing. Of course, what's sparked the conflict on this site is that the owner and at least one of the mods refuses to acknowledge that the issue isn't just a matter of defending Rush's statement but of standing up for conservative principles and values on the whole; something which the GOP has failed miserably at in the past 8 years. That issue aside, I then look at the preceding posts for the day. The 3 post immediately before the one I've just described are all about the Rush thing, or some "cocktail party elitist" slamming Rush, or some website or another agreeing with the site owner's own view on the subject.

For an entire week every post about this issue has gotten a pretty significant backlash so if the site owner and mods had an issue with it- they claim to just want the whole thing to go away- you'd think they'd move on to something else. Alas no. We get 3-4 posts on this topic every day then a nasty diatribe about how unreasonable everyone's being. It's just too much.

As I stated earlier, I don't have a ton of time to hang out on the net. I get most of my news and commentary from a few select sites. So to see my favorite site engaging in what I can only imagine as traffic-whoring, and of the worst kind, it gets my hackles up a bit.

Anyway, I think I'm going to start frequenting Manly's Republic more often in place of my current favorite. Manly seems to have a good head on his shoulders and so far I haven't seen him traffic-whoring, so hopefully I'll find a new lurking home over there.

End rant.

Jay Nordlinger: Rock on!

Laying down the law at the NRO.

Thank you, Mr. Nordlinger, for putting things into perspective. Here's a taste:

There are many things wrong with the Republican party today, and Rush Limbaugh, in my opinion, is not one of them. Donald Rumsfeld (another pet bogey) used to say, “America is not what’s wrong with the world.” That is true. And Rush Limbaugh is not what is wrong with the Republican party.

Frankly, Secretary Powell is more like what’s wrong: If he can’t discern the superiority of John McCain to Barack Obama, where the presidency is concerned, who needs him?

And there's this:

Rush Limbaugh is a Reagan conservative who thinks that what a united Democratic Washington is now doing is wrong and alarming. I agree. And conservatives would be a lot better off if they stopped spitting at Rush and stood up strong against Obamism.

I mean, here is a man who is putting Charles Freeman and Samantha Power and Dawn Johnsen in power. And we conservatives have our knickers in a twist about Rush?

YES!!!!!!!

An excellent articulation

Check out absentee's blog over at Redstate. It's excellent and proves that we Mongoloid Conservatives can be just as "intellectual" as our elites. Here's an excerpt to whet your palate:

It is on that basis that conservatives look at the failed War on Poverty and expect to be able do something better. We will consider, unlike liberals, ideas which do not start and end in the Treasury. We dare look outside the trappings of Great Society and New Deal. We believe in our time-honored institutions and traditions. In churches and charity and people. Not merely because we believe that often they can work better, but because they enhance liberty rather than limit it. The simplest of minds can understand that given is better than taken, and it is a sign of how pervasive the left’s dogma is ingrained in society that such a statement is neither heard nor would it be considered, despite that those who we oppose perversely insist they pursue “fairness.”

The real war on poverty ought to be against a poverty of thinking. It ought to be against surrendering to the absolutes on the left. We can no longer allow their witch-hunt methodology to quiet us into retreat or send us quivering to the New York Times for scraps of approval. We must do as Rush has done. We must point people to the truth with a loud voice and refuse to cower. The future of this nation, of our children and grandchildren, will be decided by how well we can accomplish our goal. We must, at long last, fight the fixing of liberal ideologies as inviolable truths of nature into the hearts and minds of Americans with our every breath.

I love reading and hearing the tenets of conservatism articulated so eloquently. Especially in the post-election war-like atmosphere generated by the newspaper-and-magazine-writer moderates.

It seems that the self-appointed "elites" and "intellectuals" who claim to be on the right side of the political fence can't understand why conservatives are so against big government intervention. They appear to be laboring under the impression that we are all Rush-ed up zombies who only rally behind a mantra like "We think taxes is baaaad, 'mkay." The likes of Frum, Brooks, Dreher, Parker, Noonan, et al, believe we aren't capable of thinking for ourselves and we need them to moderate our tone and set the agenda for us because they, the thinking class, know better.

Man, does that sound familiar. Wait a sec! That's right. That's the same sorry tune we get from the left ad infinitum. As the saying goes, with friends like these....

This attitude may be why you're getting so much "hate mail", Ms. Parker. It may be why most of us want you thrown out of the tent, Mr. Buckley. It could possibly explain why you've received so much disdain from readers and bloggers, Messrs. Dreher, Frum and Brooks. We get enough of this garbage from the left. The LAST thing we need is these and their ilk under the tent.

A good piece of advice: stop with the circular firing squad. Stop belittling the common conservative by labeling our beliefs as "oogity boogity" and our people as "mongoloids". No matter how you try to spin it after the fact, we still understand that your intent was to insult and slander those with whom you claim to have some political affinity.

So, for pete's sake, either stop it or get ye yonder to the liberal's tent; which is where we suspect you belong anyway.

Vinegar + Sponge = Miracles

For your cleaning consideration, I present: White Vinegar. Yes, it stinks. Yes, it really stinks. However, anything I can buy at Wal*Mart in a 2-quart jug for a dollar is a definite win.

Vinegar is also environmentally friendly, which I don't particularly care about; however since I have a small child, the less in the way of harsh chemicals I'm introducing into my home, the happier I am. I've never heard of small children dying after drinking from the vinegar jar. Gagging, maybe, but not dying.

There is an entire page devoted to cleaning tips using white vinegar- VinegarTips.com- so it must have something going for it. My personal favorite uses are for cutting grease on my cook top and for getting gunk out of corners and creases and in between tile.

I will be honest and tell you that I'm not particularly excited about my home smelling like a salad bowl. But when you consider that the smell dissipates within a few hours, leaving behind a clean, mold and germ-free home- that bottle of Lysol or Windex doesn't exactly leave a very pleasant smell either and the fumes can be poisonous- I think you'll find it's well worth using.

Case in point: I am the proud owner of beautiful Pembroke Welsh Corgi that I love very much. Unfortunately, my beautiful dog loves to rub himself up against my light-colored walls on a daily basis. I'm sure this is considered normal doggie behavior and is just him self-grooming or some such thing. What I see is him leaving his dog-funk all over my wall.

Dog-Funk

I clean this bit of wall about once a week. So the last time it was wiped down was last Thursday, right after I bathed the dog. Said dog has managed to inundate it with that much funk in a week. Here is my wall after wiping it down with white vinegar and a sponge.

No Dog Funk

It's a miracle!

And it costs 12.5 cents per cup (if you get the half-gallon jug at Wal*Mart for $1). A bottle of Lysol runs a bit over $3 for 40 fluid ounces. 128 fluid ounces is a gallon, so you would have to buy 3.2 bottles of Lysol to get a gallon of cleaner. That's around $9 for a gallon of Lysol, which averages out to a bit over 56 cents over cup.

If you use straight vinegar to clean instead of pre-bottled cleaners, you save on average about 43.5 cents per cup. If you dilute the vinegar- which I recommend doing most of the time- the cost per cup of vinegar is even less. That can add up very quickly, especially if you clean a lot. I'm a stay-at-home mom and housewife, so I clean every day. Needless to say I use a lot of vinegar!

In review: use vinegar to clean everything from mold to grease to dog funk, to shining your sink and cleaning your grout. Vinegar is where it's at.

Calling All Cheapskates! or, We have a new format

As I haven't posted lately...well since December actually... I figured I'd give things a bit of a re-vamp. In addition to chronicling my dailies, I'm also adding some hints, tips, and tricks that I've stumbled upon in re: saving $$$$.

I wasn't always a cheapskate, mind you. Hubby and I lived things up quite a bit prior to having the little man. Unfortunately, between the bottom falling out for about a year in hubby's business and the expenses of having a baby, we fell on some hard times financially. We're back on track now, but that's due to lots of praying and being extremely frugal with our money.

I've become an expert at crochet, which has allowed me to save literally hundreds on gifts for special occasions over the past two years; it also helps cut out stress, as I crochet all year round and am done by late October, removing the last minute shopping rush. I have also spent countless hours scouring websites like HillbillyHousewife.com and LivingOnADime.com, finding cheap recipes, hints on freezer cooking, cheaper and safer cleaning supplies (vinegar and baking soda are the best!!), and shopping tips. I've also started shopping almost exclusively at Wal*Mart; where I have the double bonus of saving tons of money and irritating hippies at the same time.

All of this knowledge, dear reader, I will be departing upon you, in addition to my other ramblings. Excitement for all!

Also, I'm going to be blogging on occasion on a beloved interest of mine: politics. If that's not your cup-o-tea, then feel free to skip out on those. But since I keep myself pretty well informed on issues of national consequence as well as issues of consequence to tight-wads, I figured I'd impart some of my knowledge to my dear readers on those topics as well.

Cheers!

Yaweh- The Faithful One

As I was reading my Advent Devotional this morning, a particular passage spoke to me. The author says, speaking of the name Yaweh and the passage in Exodus 20 where the Lord reveals this name to Moses:

"I AM WHO I AM" What do these mysterious words mean? Was Moses as bewildered as we are by God's self-disclosure? OR did he realize that God was assuring them he would always be present to his people-Listening for their cries, answering their prayers, showing his power on their behalf, responding faithfully even when they acted faithlessly?

I stopped to ponder this for a moment and felt compelled to offer up prayer and praise for this wonderful revelation! This afternoon, I was reading The Anchoress' post on her podcast and apparently this same concept was impressed upon her as well.

The Lord is faithful. Think about that. That's a very powerful statement.

I must honestly admit that I am not very faithful to God. Oh, I try to be and I always start off doing really well and inevitably my efforts fizzle out somewhere along the way. My Christian walk has been fraught with a fair amount of backsliding and procrastinating on heavenly things that can be put off til tomorrow while I focus on the earthly worries of today-except that tomorrow provides yet more earthly worries and I find myself putting God off permanently.

No, I am not very faithful to God.

But he is always faithful to me- a mere human being. We are really very loathsome creatures, constantly choosing to put the flesh ahead of the spirit. Yet, He loves us and never leaves us.

Whenever I think of God's love for us, I think of my love for my son. In fact, the Bible tells us He is our Heavenly Father and that we are his created children- so the parent/child relationship is an appropriate analogy to a point.

But think about your own children; as much as I love my son and will always love him no matter what he becomes, will I always be faithful to him? Is there anything he may do or say that could cause me to abandon my support of him? They are very few, but there are some things that would cause me to be unfaithful to my child. If he were to fall into a life of crime, I could no longer support him. If he were to choose a sinful lifestyle, I could not support him. Some actions are extreme enough that I would probably cut off all ties to him.

I would never fail to love my child; but I may not always be there for him while I am alive depending on circumstances. And I know that when I pass on, I will no longer be there for him either.

Throughout the Bible, there is example after example of God's people being unfaithful to him. Yet he remains with them always.

Our Heavenly Father is ALWAYS here for us. He is ALWAYS with us, ALWAYS supports us, ALWAYS behind us. He loves us so much that there is absolutely nothing we can say or do that will cause him to leave us.

That's significant.

God is FAITHFUL.

Avent Begins

I'm not Catholic but I happen to love the season of Advent. It is a season of longing and preparation for the coming of our Messiah; both past and future. Even though my particular Baptist church does not recognize Advent or its customs, I personally practice as many of the traditions as possible.

I can remember very distinctly when I stopped being excited about Christmas. As soon as I found out that good ole Santa was really good ole Mama, the Christmas season lost its luster. It became less about the "magic" and more about the me (ie, the things I wanted). Inevitably, Christmas became a big disappointment to be repeated year after year.

Since becoming an adult, I've longed to recapture the spirit of Christmas but I didn't know how; that is until I began observing Advent. I've found that spending this four-week season reflecting helps me to reclaim a significant chunk of those excited feelings and intense anticipation from my childhood Christmases.

As today is the first day of Advent, I would like to share some of the things we did for anyone who would like to participate in this season of joyous anticipation.

For the little man, we kicked off Advent by reading the Annunciation account in Luke, as well as coloring some pictures of Angels. We also "lit" our first "candle" on our Advent Wreath craft, found here.

Today I spent some time online reading this Advent devotional, which specifically targets the 4 Sundays and the lighting of the candles. I also read a lovely piece of personal reflection by The Anchoress.

I will also be reading daily from this book with my son, as well as following the directed activities. And my own personal tradition is to go through the book Immanuel: Praying the Names of God Through the Christmas Season. It is a wonderful guide to Bible study and reflection upon the first and future coming of our Lord during this wonderful season.

God Bless!