Saturday, January 31, 2015

There Is A Reason Justice Is Blind

Following is the text of a letter to the editor that I sent to our local newspaper. The exigent factor for my letter is the current session of our state legislature. There has been a bill proposed for a few years now, even before gay marriage became legal in our state, that would offer protections to the glbt community in jobs, housing, etc. This week, in an action that made national and international headlines, the LDS church authorities said that they were in favor of adding the lgbt to the protected classes. Everyone cheered until the full statement became public. The only way the church will support the bill is if protections for religious objections are added. These religious objections would be available to the church, the largest employer in this state, but also to individuals who have sincere religious objections.

"To The Editor:

Less than three years before my husband and I wed, the Supreme Court made it legal in all jurisdictions, even Texas where my Southern Baptist grandmother lived. Despite a unanimous decision finding that marriage was one of the basic civil rights, and a fundamental freedom, my grandmother still believed that the Bible prohibited interracial marriage. She disowned me and when the time came referred to our children as mongrels. She acted on her staunchly held religious principles.

The Utah legislature is poised to emulate my grandmother, passing new laws based on the Bible and on their perceived religious principles. Yet this same legislature frequently describes the Constitution as a divinely inspired document. If the Earl Warren court got it right in that unanimous decision, then the Utah legislature can only get it wrong if they choose discrimination over the Constitution.

Forty-five years later my husband and I are still married. It is less common for us to encounter outright bigotry but not unheard of. Without the support of law we would remain second class citizens, an unconscionable outcome in these United States."

I don't care how sincere your religious objections to anything are. "Judge not, that ye be not judged." is also in the Bible.



    

Sunday, January 18, 2015

Another Ring Of The BullsEye Completed

I finished the second feathered ring and started the second pieced ring. the pieced rings go very quickly because they are straight lines, simple X shapes, in the ditch. I am also picking up a small amount of the outside background so that I don't end up pushing the circles out of shape by simply moving around the circle.

Saturday, January 17, 2015

My New Throne

For decades, I have asked my husband to figure out a way to make a heated toilet seat. As a man he didn't feel any urgency, even when we lived the in the 10,000 square foot monstrosity with the inadequate heating. Technology has caught up with my request from two directions. The most obvious is that someone has built a heated toilet seat in two sizes to fit the particular toilet. The second advance is the search engine to find the toilet seat.

I won't post a picture but I can tell you that having a heated seat is wonderful. My husband didn't engineer the new addition but he and my son wired the plug to be code compliant and safe.

Friday, January 16, 2015

The Problem With German Cars II

I finally got my car back yesterday. Although the insurance covered all of the mechanical issues, the cost to them was still nearly $5000. That's added to the more than $15000 they have spent since 2010 when the insurance went in to effect. Keep in mind that the car only has 40K miles on it. Fine German engineering isn't fine but the products are still ridiculously expensive. Just one of the parts in this last go round cost $2700. I will not purchase a BMW again. When it works it is a sweet ride but every year there is something major wrong.

Saturday, January 10, 2015

Moving Quickly

This is the same picture as before but I included it for reference. I have finished the quilting to the outside edge of the first pieced ring. There is still a great deal of quilting to go, feathered wreaths in the white rings, and feathered motifs in the corners of the squares. The inner square has a stylized pineapple, a traditional symbol of hospitality, and the outside corners have feathered hearts with feathered swoops coming out of them. The pieced parts quilt up quickly since it is primarily straight lines. The feathered parts take longer. Maybe by the first day of spring?

Thursday, January 8, 2015

Profound Loss

The massacre at Charlie Hebdo may have happened in Paris but it is an assault on liberty everywhere. Political satire always takes courage. It is easy to be politically correct. It is hard to be politically aggressive because then you are a target. Speak the truth. Speak out. Don't let the monsters win.

Vive la Republique, Vive la Liberte, Vive l'Fraternite

Tuesday, January 6, 2015

The Problem With German Cars

I got all the basting done and have started the quilting, but there have been some delays caused by other issues. January is the month that my car's license plate needs renewing so I always take the car down to the dealership because I purchased an extended warranty when the regular coverage ran out. Well that turned out to be one of the smartest moves I ever made. I am not much of a trend follower, I like to hold on to old clothes, old friends, old pets, and I don't see any point in changing cars all the time. When my eight year old BMW doesn't have any issues it is a great car to drive, pretty good on gas mileage, very good in the snow and going up and down the steep hills where I live. But there have been so many issues over repairs that when people talk about fine German engineering I just laugh. To top that off all the parts are prohibitively expensive as are the repairs. Anyway, now my car has a transfer case issue, $3500 to repair that one part. It took a while to diagnose it, then it took a while to get the insurance to approve the repair. So I have been spending more time than I want to down at the dealership. The car is still not fixed since it takes time to get the part. If I were a little further along in the quilting I could just pick it up and take it with me but it's not ready for transport yet. I have been getting reading done though.

Thursday, January 1, 2015

Least Favorite Task

I started basting my quilt sandwich today. First I had to move the furniture in the living room. Then the process of push-pinning each layer to the rug and its underlayment began.
I have to take my car down to the dealer tomorrow to get it inspected for license plate renewal. Besides loathing the experience (why are those men so condescending?) I won't get to work on the basting but by Monday I should be done and quilting even with very close basting. I just checked the dates of when I started and it was only the middle of November. It seems like much longer than that, especially since each border took eight days to applique.