What I get in my email

from parishioners....

This is how it all began!

In ancient Israel, it came to pass that a trader by the name of Abraham Com did take unto himself a young wife by the name of Dot. And Dot Com was a comely woman, broad of shoulder and long of leg. Indeed, she was often called Amazon Dot Com.

And she said unto Abraham, her husband, "Why dost thou travel so far from town to town with thy goods when thou canst trade without ever leaving thy tent?"

And Abraham did look at her as though she were several saddle bags short of a camel load, but simply said, "How, dear?"

And Dot replied, "I will place drums in all the towns and drums in between to send messages saying what you have for sale, and they will reply telling you who hath the best price. And the sale can be made on the drums and delivery made by Uriah's Pony Stable (UPS)."

Abraham thought long and decided he would let Dot have her way with the drums. And the drums rang out and were an immediate success. Abraham sold all the goods he had at the top price, without ever having to move from his tent. To prevent neighboring countries from overhearing what the drums were saying, Dot devised a system that only she and the drummers knew. It was known as Must Send Drum Over Sound (MSDOS), and she also developed a language to transmit ideas and pictures - Hebrew To The People (HTTP).

And the young men did take to Dot Com's trading as doth the greedy horsefly take to camel dung. They were called Nomadic Ecclesiastical Rich Dominican Sybarites, or NERDS.

And lo, the land was so feverish with joy at the new riches and the deafening sound of drums that no one noticed that the real riches were going to that enterprising drum dealer, Brother William of Gates, who bought off every drum maker in the land. And indeed did insist on drums to be made that would work only with Brother Gates' drumheads and drumsticks.

And Dot did say, "Oh, Abraham, what we have started is being taken over by others." And Abraham looked out over the Bay of Ezekiel , or eBay as it came to be known. He said, "We need a name that reflects what we are." And Dot replied, "Young Ambitious Hebrew Owner Operators." "YAHOO," said Abraham. And because it was Dot's idea, they named it YAHOO Dot Com.

Abraham's cousin, Joshua, being the young Gregarious Energetic Educated Kid (GEEK) that he was, soon started using Dot's drums to locate things around the countryside. It soon became known as God's Own Official Guide to Locating Everything (GOOGLE).

That is how it all began. And that's the truth.

We SO do not need this

HAZARDOUS WEATHER OUTLOOK
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE BURLINGTON VT
502 AM EDT THU SEP 29 2011

THIS HAZARDOUS WEATHER OUTLOOK IS FOR NORTHERN NEW YORK…CENTRAL VERMONT…NORTHEAST VERMONT…NORTHWEST VERMONT AND SOUTHERN VERMONT.

.DAY ONE…TODAY AND TONIGHT.

OCCASIONAL SHOWERS WITH AN EMBEDDED THUNDERSTORMS WILL BE POSSIBLE TODAY ACROSS THE NORTH COUNTRY. THESE SHOWERS WILL BE CAPABLE OF PRODUCING LOCALIZED AREAS OF HEAVY RAINFALL…ESPECIALLY ACROSS THE HIGHER TERRAIN OF THE ADIRONDACKS OF NEW YORK AND GREEN MOUNTAINS OF CENTRAL AND SOUTHERN VERMONT. LOCALIZED RAINFALL AMOUNTS OF 1 TO 2 INCHES WILL POSSIBLE…WHICH MAY CAUSE RISES ON STREAMS AND RIVERS BY TONIGHT.

.DAYS TWO THROUGH SEVEN…FRIDAY THROUGH WEDNESDAY.

A DEVELOPING COASTAL LOW PRESSURE OVER THE WEEKEND WILL HAVE THE POTENTIAL TO PRODUCE ANOTHER MODERATE TO HEAVY RAINFALL EVENT ACROSS THE NORTH COUNTRY. AN ADDITIONAL 1 TO 2 INCHES OF RAINFALL WILL BE POSSIBLE BY MONDAY…WHICH WILL CAUSE RISES ON AREA STREAMS AND RIVERS.

FURTHERMORE…ENOUGH COLD AIR ACROSS THE HIGHER TERRAIN OF THE ADIRONDACK MOUNTAINS IN NORTHERN NEW YORK AND PARTS OF THE GREEN MOUNTAINS IN VERMONT…MAY SUPPORT SOME WET SNOW. A FEW INCHES OF SNOW ACCUMULATION WILL BE POSSIBLE BY MONDAY ABOVE 2000 FEET.

Another theme song

this one from Howard Jones, New Song

I've been waiting for so long
To come here now and sing this song
Don't be fooled by what you see
Don't be fooled by what you hear

This is a song to all my friends
They take the challenge to their hearts
Challenging preconceived ideas
Saying goodbye to long-standing fears

Don't crack up
Bend your brain
See both sides
Throw off your mental chains

I don't wanna be hip and cool
I don't wanna play by the rules
Not under the thumb of the cynical few
Or laden down by the doom crew

The resurrection and all that

From a New York Times article on increases in health insurance costs:

'The increase in premiums was striking because in a poor economy, many people put off going to doctors, to avoid co-payments and higher deductibles. Despite a decrease in the use of medical services, companies have defended higher premiums — and their high profits — reasoning that their costs would rebound once the economy recovered....

'The increases now under consideration in New York would affect 1.3 million of the 3 million residents in individual and small-group plans; the amounts vary considerably depending on the type of policy. The increases requested by Aetna, for example, range from 8.9 percent to 53.6 percent, while those from United Health Group/Oxford range from 13 percent to 34 percent, according to the State Insurance Department....'

This is obscene.

They just want us poor suckers to die early. They'll get their wish as the practice of medicine continues to respond to crises rather than preventative and the great masses put off the preventative tests that could save lives.

'Since last year, the Insurance Department has posted more than 4,000 policyholder objections online. In one typical letter, a small businessman, citing six years of annual increases of more than 15 percent, raged, “There are no words to express how utterly greedy and unconscionable another double-digit increase in health care costs are to the world of small companies and those employed by them.” '

No kidding.

It makes me spit nails when looking at the cost of premiums. It is nothing short of highway robbery. (Why should a bunch of lab tests which consist of taking some blood cost more than $1000? But they do and I respect the people who read them, but still... insurance covered $200.)

My theme song these days

From Argent (1972)

And if it's bad
Don't let it get you down, you can take it
And if it hurts
Don't let them see you cry, you can take it

Hold your head up [woman], hold your head up
Hold your head up, hold your head high

And if they stare
Just let them burn their eyes on you moving
And if they shout
Don't let them change a thing what you're doing

Hold your head up, hold your head up
Hold your head up, hold your head high

Here we go again

Into gradual semi-controlled chaos... cela va vite dégringoler dans la pagaïe.

The view from my desk to the left corner of the office

To my right

To my left

And what I look at most of the time as it is straight ahead.

All this stuff will have to be packed up and moved... a rocking chair, four chairs, the Afghan saddle bags, the material, the stuff on the wall, the rug in front of my desk, the rug in the chapel... the office will revert to a fairly drab state. But that won't happen just yet.

Meanwhile...

The first of the many, many boxes there will be... these are for long-term storage, most likely in the attic over our garage where there are mice.

Four piles: immediate use wherever, semi-storage, long-term storage and give away.

I feel as though I just did this.

Just in case you think Vermont is quiet

From Vermont Today:

LINCOLN — Vermont State Police say an armed man involved in a car crash tried to get away in a fire truck that responded to the accident, and his dog bit a trooper.
Police say 30-year-old Trevor Burton of Warren was a passenger in Wednesday’s car crash in Lincoln. They say he got into the fire truck with his pit bull terrier and threatened to drive off, but firefighters talked him out of it.

Police say Burton handed the magazine to his handgun to a trooper and left the truck, but his dog bit the trooper’s finger.

Burton was charged with driving under the influence, operation without owner’s consent, and driving with a suspended license.

The car driver, 41-year-old Michael Farnolo of Warren, was charged with leaving the scene of a collision.

Five years...

of blogging and in the past two, my efforts here have greatly fallen off... partly because of wasting so much time on Facebook, partly because of having a more demanding job, partly because of a general state of being distracted.

Four years ago I hiked up Hunger Mountain on a gorgeous September afternoon and came home to take the plunge and create this blog. I miss that hike. We only got out one night this summer. What a change from last year of tromping 166 miles on the Long Trail.

But life being what it is, we don't always get to do the things we want to do.

And once again, my life will be in total upheaval this winter as I leave Trinity and hunt for another congregation somewhere, somehow... that all means packing up again (haven't unpacked everything wondering if I was going to have to move; it was a premonition... I don't have everything to pack up because I lost a good chunk of it in 2009 when the cellar flooded), and more so, trying to figure out where to live in between calls. It is almost hopeless trying to find rentals on the web because in this neck of the woods, all one can dredge up are vacation rentals where the website only allows plugging in $750/week. You've got to be kidding. I am thinking more in terms of $750/month. (Dream on.)

Meanwhile, I think of those who have totally lost their homes in the wake of Irene three weeks ago. Our state of Vermont looks very different now and our streams and rivers have carved out new beds. We'll adapt, once we get through our loss.

So shall I.

Oh, the heartbreak

Farmers have such a special relationship with their animals... from an article about how Vermont farmers have suffered from Irene:

It was while the rescue boat was ferrying the Severances to safety that they saw some of the cows from the pasture floating down the White River.

Some made it alive a few miles down the river, Buddy said.

“People were calling — they said they heard cows in the river bawling, just going down through,” he said. “We know that they made it at least that far alive. I would have rather seen them, at least the ones that did go down the river, I would have rather watched them drown than have them go that far and suffer.”

Where I called home for 14+ years

Vermont is a state I love

Vermont is a state I love... I love Vermont because of her hills and valleys, her scenery and invigorating climate, but most of all, I love her because of her indomitable people. They are a race of pioneers who almost impoverished themselves for love of others. If ever the spirit of liberty should vanish from the rest of the Union, it could be restored by the generous share held by the people in this brave little State of Vermont. — Calvin Coolidge, after the floods of 1927

Cold River

Today I finally got out of Rutland and headed back to the AT/LT at Cold River and the Clarendon Gorge.

I thought I could get further on Rte 7 before getting the road back but couldn't even get past LaValley's. The orange posts showed that already there was a problem.

The sign astutely reads, 'ROAD CLOSED.'

The detour on back roads avoids this bridge collapse on Rte 7.

This photo of the Cold River is how it looked prior to 28 August; I took it two weeks ago.

Here is another 'before' photo.

Trees and all manner of things that washed down river and got hung up at the bend.

More junk.

This is now what the river looks like. It has shrunk greatly.

These rocks used to be covered by water.

This tree is stuck in the river just below the bridge.

The river now flows in a narrow channel.

This summer there were a bunch people camped out here. Good thing they had decamped or they would have been washed out permanently.

There's silt and broken trees where there used to be a place to camp.

As far as the Green Mountain Club knows, the abutments to the suspension bridge are still OK. It is a moot point since the National Forest is closed.

Another view from the bridge of all the stuff that washed downstream.

A tire got stuck in a tree.

Excellent Photos of Vermont

Go here for some amazing photos.

Vermont Flood Hi-Res Gallery - August 2011

Photo credit: Lars Gange & Mansfield Heliflight
Free for editorial use. Call 802-238-7809 for additional usage questions.

Here are a couple of photos to pique your curiosity.

Killington Rte 4 looking west.

The Rte 4 cliffs in Mendon... note all the excavators in the riverbed.

The paradox of destruction on the road, a house with its swimming pool intact and the beauty of the Vermont Green Mountains (Pico and Killington).

A woman in Pittsfield waves to the plane as it flies overhead. She stands in the midst of her possessions spread outside to dry.

Day Five

Elsewhere I read how someone snapped at his wife for no apparent reason other than he had been blogging all week about the disaster in Vermont. It's time for psychological first aid for the entire state... of course for those directly affected but, in time, for the whole state of Vermont which is still reeling from the massive flooding Sunday and the frustration that even last night there were flash floods that took out some of the tenuous temporary roads that had been put it.

We used this chart with the clergy and lay leaders of l'Eglise Episcopal d'Haiti last year in the CREDO Strength for the Journey program. I have back-translated it from Creole to English but you get the gist.

I'd say we are somewhere along the hill up or at the top: people are helping out one another, there has been incredible esprit de corps at work in all communities, particularly the isolated ones that now at least have one goat path in/out. Communities all have their emergency response teams and have organised themselves into traffic patrols, limiting access in and out of the village; putting up the water and MREs that the Illinois National Guard has dropped; communicating with the outside world by cell phone to folks with full internet access.

But, even the hardiest people will get weary. And that's where the long slog kicks in. As we kept telling the Haitians: You can't sleep at night? That's normal. You are tired? That's normal. You don't have an appetite? That's normal. You're running on fumes? You need to put some gas in your tank.

It is what one calls the 'new normal.' Things won't be the same as they were Saturday 27 August. Our landscape has been greatly altered; people have lost everything they have.

But the human will to survive, the human spirit is a remarkable thing. And Vermonters are tough and Vermont will rise again.

Major distraction

My beloved state of Vermont. We will rise again... words I remember that the Episcopal Diocese of Haiti used for their 2010 diocesan convention post-earthquake. Oh, our floods are nothing like the Haitian earthquake but they have changed life in the Green Mountain State in ways we don't yet realise.

These are all photos that Compa took in our small hamlet.

You want rocks? Come 'n get 'em. For free.

This is what our road looked like on Monday. It has been filled in to make one lane. But if it rains hard this weekend....

Here is our road a bit further down as it looked Monday. Again, it has been half-filled in.

I can't tell you how many countless times I have driven this section of Rte 100 between Plymouth Union and Tyson... without thinking. Now, to circumvent this hole, one has to take a goat path through the woods, a gravel pit and someone's property to get back on pavement.

Now, multiply this hundreds of times throughout the state and you'll see what lies ahead of us... repairing a trashed road and bridge system.

Unfathomable.

The sign on the house says, 'Please stay out. This is all I have left.' This house is in our village, too. Sadly, upstate there has been looting of people's property out to dry.

Irene was tough but Vermonters are tougher. So there.