Two Marketeers

After a brief and confusing debacle between Kennedy/Glazer and Kiyosaki, I wasn't sure who to trust. Thankfully, I have found an outside source who has actual experience with Dan Kennedy and his followers. I might have to check out some of his books.

HT: My Truck Buddy

Signs of Actual Hope

I totally hope that I can raise a child with this type of public speaking ability, as well as with this level of compassion and concern for the less fortunate. As always, the children will lead us.

In related news, a North Dakotan is a person, no matter how small.

A Good Attempt

My darling dearest sent me this article for me to read and post. I think Juris Mater does a good job at writing the Theology of the Body in natural terms. There are a couple of rough spots but I really enjoy the work she did. Teaching NFP in the context of the Theology of the Body can be difficult, since most students need to learn the grammar of love (NFP) before they can learn the language of love (TOTB). I don't know how I could have grasped the TOTB without having practiced NFP for years. I pray all our students may get the picture faster than I.

When in Doubt

Since I haven't written on my favorite topic in a while, I was thrilled to see that Danielle Been did it for me. I particularly love that her reason for co-sleeping and not co-sleeping are the same!

What a Couple!

I opened my Catholic Standard & Times to discover a great article about a wonderful couple who live the Church's teachings and spread the good news. I am so thankful for the many good examples of the faith which I have met in my work to share the glory of the Church's teaching.

Trash to Treasure

As part of being a good steward of my resources which is my main goal in living a natural family life, I have been searching for ways to save money on recurring expenses besides dropping the quality of my food. It seems to me that eliminating waste is part of the job of a good steward. For example, the replacing of cable with Netflix resulted in a net savings of approximately $40 per month. My next mission success in eliminating waste was in waste elimination (I'm so nerdy).

I have switched from Allied Waste Services to G&C Waste Services for a savings of approximately $10 per month. We will see if my quality of service stays the same but I have been eager to ditch AWS since the "Fuel Recovery Fee" was instituted. If AWS was a good steward they would manage their own costs instead of forcing the burden on to me.

Good Economic News

My business has made the paper as an industry likely to weather the economic crisis. I'm hoping to be able to help people with their finances, as well as with their health. It's good to know that my support network is as healthy as I feel on these products.

Freedom of Irony

Obviously, I'm strongly opinionated about a lot of things which is why this blog has gone rapidly astray from my original intent. However, this story is so ironic that I laughed out loud even as I checked to see if my civil liberties were intact. It's refreshing to see the AFA continue to push back, even though it would be easy to crawl into a hole after the countless attacks that they have endured. And I feel sympathy for the TV station, since it should be able to choose to air or not air whatever it wants.

If only people were more tolerant or something.

God, Family, Business

I have been contemplating the difference between the corporate world and entrepreneurship. Corporate guy drops into office to go through e-mail before Sunday school. Corporate guy works 50-60 hours per week and commutes another 4-8 hours for maybe 60 waking hours with the kids. If he climbs the ladder, he earns the privilege of working more hours and traveling further from home.

Home-based network marketer lists God, Family, business as priorities. He gets home after doing his paid job in 40 -45 hours per week and reduces his commute to 1 hour per week with smart house buying and works his business from home for 1-2 hours per week, for maybe 75 waking hours with the kids. If he works his business, he earns the privilege of working from home all the time.

As I frequently pray, may God bless my business and all home-based businesses.

Calling Dr. Frankenstein

Two interesting articles, one referencing the Austrian creator of the pill and other which is his response. Although Mr. Djerassi has complaints about associating the population problem with the pill, he seems to have no complaints with his final quote in the first article. This quote is, "...natural methods of regulating fertility are the ones that are effective and that respect the nature of the person..." He also makes no retraction of his statement that the pill is a horrendously damaging environmental pollutant. It seems to me that many scientists now live to see their inventions abused and to see the damage that immoral technology can wreak. I have a much better appreciation of Frankenstein's Monster, now.

Incidentally, the comments on the first article are great, and the comments on the second article verge on the incomprehensible.

Whining for Authority

In a surreal moment last month, I was asking my Mom not to give in to my daughter because she was going through the usual histrionics. I said something to the effect of, "But Mom, you can't give in to her just because she's whining." So I whined to my mother in an attempt to convince her that parents should ignore the whining of their children.

Catch-22.

Margaret Sanger's Minions

Finally, a chance to write about NFP and the news. It seems our President has decided that the Office of Faith-Based Initiatives should busy itself with family planning. I was dumbfounded to hear this news since every blurb about this office before January 20, 2009 also included the words "separation of church and state." Apparently the ACLU is okay with this office as long as its mandate is to reduce the unwanted poor children. This is exactly the tactic which Margaret Sanger, foundress of Planned Parenthood, advocated to eliminate the poor and minorities. In light of the Speaker of the House saying that contraception provides financial stimulus through reducing the number of kids on government health insurance, it seems that Margaret Sanger is required at the DNC.

I pray that one day this illusion of "caring for the poor" by preventing their births will be publicly mocked and ridiculed so that we can get back to the scriptural command of feeding the poor (personally, instead of through a giant bureaucracy).

In Case You Still Need a Reason to be Pro-life

From a good friend comes this horrendous story. A warning that the immense evil will probably make you queasy. How come a "clinic" that cares for women would charge a woman $1200 when she doesn't have the means to even support a child? $1200 would easily pay for a child's expense to the age of 6 months. I love the maturity line as well since it reflects society so well and it is completely backwards. To paraphrase G.K. Chesterton, the best thing about children is that they make adults.

At least there are organizations that help people for free. You could almost say that they actually care about women.

Almost Aesop

A book review of "The Tales of Beedle the Bard" by J.K. Rowling

I am surprised by how well the fairy tales of this book stand on their own, not just as small bits in the massive Harry Potter universe. I was expecting a lot of inside jokes and lore pertaining to the world of the boy with the lightning scar but each story made a satisfactory fable all by itself. Since no one other than Dumbledore himself writes the analysis of each fable, all the Potter trivia is still in the book, just not in the stories. This construct works amazingly well with the only hiccup being the forward, where the author has the annoying habit of writing as if she and her charity live in the world of Harry Potter and converse with the characters. Fortunately this small error, like the typo of an unmatched parenthesis on p. 85, are easy to overlook and I only found myself hoping that the book could continue beyond the far too brief hundred pages.

We Bad, We Bad!

Check out our council, all the way at the bottom of this page.

False Idols and Network Marketing

I feel that I've blogged on this before and it seems like quite the stumbling block to people who are otherwise interested in home-based business that I must comment on it.

Basically, the faith spreads like network marketing. Even though there have been some recent, excellent advertising campaigns about the Church and the faith. They are basically a rearguard effort where people who have fallen away return to the Church, which is glorious, but they don't seem to win new converts. The converts that I know either sell themselves into the Church by reading or they meet exceedingly kind and knowledgeable Catholics who listen and answer questions.

It is my sincere hope that network marketing will teach me how to listen to people and answer their questions so that I can transfer that skill to my faith life. Of course, I hope that it can do this without becoming a false idol or I will have to jettison it faster than a lifeboat on the Titanic. I have read accounts of people and even met some who acted as though their business was their God. I firmly believe that this is such a turn-off that these businesses will fail and businesses which know their proper place behind God and family will quietly grow and outlast the misguided ones. That is how good triumphs, a firm foundation and steady growth.

May the Church and my business be so blessed.