IT'S STILL CHRISTMAS - 11 (YESTERDAY)

Yesterday, I completely forgot to note the eleventh day of Christmas, and today is the twelfth day of Christmas.  Tonight, which is Twelfth Night, the revelry begins in New Orleans.

"Grace dances. I would pipe. Dance ye all."
....
Down a gothic nave
comes our Pfarrer now, blessing the West with water:
we may go. There is no Queen's English
in any context for Geist or Esprit; about
catastrophe or how to behave in one
I know nothing, except what everyone knows—
if there when Grace dances, I should dance.

(W H Auden "Whitsunday in Kirchstetten")

The post turns rather serious, thanks to Marthe, who reminded me of Auden.

The image is the cover of a book, Eleven Pipers Piping, a Father Christmas Mystery. Since I'm using the cover as my illustration, the least I can do is include a link.

THREE WISE WOMEN

 

THIS MAN WANTS TO BE YOUR PRESIDENT

From the Advocate:

In Baton Rouge, Gov. Bobby Jindal’s latest round of state budget cuts are forcing shelter director Audrey Wascome to contemplate cutting the number of beds for battered women and children by a third.

The reductions will hit shelters for domestic violence victims across the state, including the Metropolitan Center for Women and Children in the New Orleans area. The Metropolitan Center’s executive director, Dale Standifer, said Thursday the cuts will erode funding for an emergency shelter that gives women a place to sleep when they have nowhere else to go.
....

Funding for family violence prevention and intervention programs was cut by $998,413, a 16 percent reduction in total dollars through the contracts the state holds with shelters and other domestic violence prevention providers.

Other reductions impacted hospice services, health care providers, dental benefits for pregnant women and contract services for the poor, the mentally ill and the drug-addicted.

Jindal wants to put the women and children in hotel rooms, but Wascome says there is no money to pay for hotel rooms.  Right now she turns away women and children every day, because the shelters are full, and she may have to reduce the number of beds in the because of budget cuts.  Why is it so often the most vulnerable who must suffer?

For 2010, the Violence Policy Center ranked Louisiana fourth in the nation in the number of women murdered by men in single victim-single offender homicides.  Between Jan. 1, 2010, and Oct. 31, 2012, domestic violence was blamed for the deaths of nearly 200 people across Louisiana, according to the Louisiana Coalition Against Domestic Violence. 

Bobby Jindal is the very soul of "compassionate conservatism", and he wishes to share his concept of "compassion" with the entire country. He wants to be in charge of the country so much that he travels frequently to promote his own cause and phones in his orders to his staff in Louisiana.

Jindal declines requests for interviews or commentary from the local media, because he wants to be a star on the national stage, and coverage by the media in Louisiana will not further his national ambitions.  The locals know too much and might ask embarrassing questions.

DIANA SIZES HIM UP

 

Diana: I know I've lived here a long time, but do I like this person? Where is his hair? His arms are hairy, but his head....  Something seems to be missing.

IT'S STILL CHRISTMAS - 10

 

Today, I offer ten lords a-leaping on the tenth day of Christmas...literally and fundamentally.  What fun! Thanks to a Facebook friend who found the picture somewhere on the intertubes.

Ten elder lords on Christmas tenth
Leapt upward with a bound.
Though bodies jumped and stretched full length
Feet barely cleared the ground.

Did you know there are two ways of counting the days of Christmas?  Some start the count on Christmas day, and others on the day after Christmas.  I thought you'd like to know.  And that's all I have for you, my peeps.  As I've already said, I'm running out of steam with days of Christmas. 

JESUS AND MO - NORMS

 

Click on the strip for the larger view.

From Jesus and Mo.

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY FROM PEACE PILGRIM

"But, you see, I love people and I see the good in them," she continued. "And you're apt to reach what you see. The world is like a mirror: If you smile at it, it smiles at you. I love to smile, and so in general, I definitely receive smiles in return."

Listen to and/or read Peace Pilgrim's story.

H/T to Kurt Weisner at The Lead.

IT'S STILL CHRISTMAS - 9

Not nine ladies dancing, but nine stones set in a circle, the Loch Buie Stone Circle on the Isle of Mull in Scotland, which I visited a couple of years ago with my travel companions, Cathy and Jonathan.

The circle was originally nine granite stones, about 12 metres in diameter, with the tallest stone being about 2 metres high. It is mainly composed of granite slabs which have been positioned with their flatter faces towards the inside of the circle. One of the original stones has been removed and replaced in recent times with a low boulder.

There are 3 single stones in the field at differing distances from the circle. The nearest of these outlying stones is 5m away to the south-east, and is only 1m tall. The second outlier is a spectacular monolith 3m high and set about 40m away to the south-west. Also south-west of the circle, 107m away, is the third outlier, over 2 metres high. The stone is broken at the top and was probably taller when erected.

I wonder why the original stone was removed and replaced with a boulder.   Below is a photo of  the large outlier stone.

To the left is a picture of me standing beside a stone to give you an idea of the size of one of the stones in the circle, which varied in height and width.

Cathy said the photo reminded her of an illustration of Aslan and the evil White Queen from The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, and the resemblance is plain.  If I had tried to strike the pose, I couldn't have done a better job.



And what the subject of this post has to do with Christmas, I can't say, except today is the ninth day of Christmas, and there are nine stones in the circle.  Gimme a break.

HA HA HA - RIOTING BY THE RICH?

Whoo-hoo! An upper-class riot over the fiscal cliff legislation?  So asks Brian Kilmeade.  Not that the rich would be out in the streets themselves. They'd send the hirelings to demonstrate.

The commentary at Faux News is so fecking stupid, that you have to wonder how anyone with half a brain buys any of it. The English guy, Stuart Varney, who moved to the US to get away from Europe says the US is going European, yet I hear people "over there" lament that US culture is taking over the world. So. Which is it? According to certain people here in the US, the epithet "European" is the worst kind of insult, implying wimpiness, immorality, and all sorts of other undesirable qualities.

What you don't hear mentioned at Faux News is that without the awful fiscal cliff legislation, taxes would rise for everyone.  But the folks at Faux only care that taxes will rise for the rich.  Anyone who has an income of $250,000 is in the upper 2%.  How is it possible to be in the upper 2% and still be middle class?  And that's not to mention the "compromise" in the legislation that raises taxes only on those with incomes over $400,000 for individual filers and $450,000 for joint filers.

So, what are the two sides really fighting about? Surely the answer is, the future of the welfare state. Progressives want to maintain the achievements of the New Deal and the Great Society, and also implement and improve Obamacare so that we become a normal advanced country that guarantees essential health care to all its citizens. The right wants to roll the clock back to 1930, if not to the 19th century.

The war between the two parties is about what kind of country we want to live in.  A country where the rich will have an ever-larger slice of the pie?  Or a country where we give at least a slight nod to evening out the portions?

H/T to MediaMatters for the Fox video.

IT'S STILL CHRISTMAS - 8

Not eight ladies dancing maids a-milking, but six ladies all in a row.  My grandmother, Aimée, is in the center with her five daughters, from left to right, Eva, May (Aimée), Gladys, Irma, and Pearl (my mother).  Eva and Irma lived in Reno, Nevada, so they must have come to New Orleans for a visit.  My mother and my Aunt May look so young.  My grandmother always looked old to me, I'm sad to say, probably even before she  was old.  She dressed in the old-fashioned way with long dresses, lisle stockings, and sensible, lace-up shoes. 

The young lady pictured above is ready to dance.  My granddaughter was three or four years old in the picture and wears one of her costumes for her dancing school recital.  I sat through the recitals for my sister, my daughter, and my granddaughter.  As a child, I enjoyed my sister's dance recitals, but, as an adult, the recitals with performances by many youngsters seemed endless.  My sister was a talented dancer and danced through high school, but my daughter and granddaughter took dance lessons for only a few years.  Thank heaven for small mercies.

I'm running out of material for the twelve days of Christmas, with still more days to fill.  I should have stuck with the song.

UPDATE: My grandparents had seven children in all, five daughters and two sons.