Good Grief! ! ! . . .

. . . Charlie Brown. . .

(from http://www.newser.com/story/158804/up-for-auction-charles-schulzs-forbidden-love-letters.html The Associated Press)
'. . . The late Peanuts creator Charles Schulz was once so infatuated with a young woman 23 years his junior he sent her dozens of romantic letters and drawings of his beloved cartoon characters. Many of the themes of that correspondence made it into his daily comic strips at the time, and now those love notes from 1970-1971 are being offered for sale at Sotheby's in New York by the family of Tracey Claudius, who the auction house says is ill at her home near Philadelphia. It's estimated the notes will fetch $250,000 to $350,000 at the Dec. 14 auction. Claudius met the cartoonist on March 16, 1970, while accompanying a friend on an interview assignment, ostensibly as a photographer but really for a chance to meet her idol. She was 25. The married Schulz was 48. There are 44 letters totaling 56 pages, including 22 original drawings of some of the characters, primarily Charlie Brown, Snoopy, and Lucy. Many are signed "Sparky," a Schulz nickname. Sotheby's says it the most significant collection of correspondence and drawings by Schulz to come to auction. . . "

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In the beginning. . .

. . . there was Adam, then Eve. . . or was there?

"The story of Adam and Eve is not a story about the first man and woman. It is the story of every man and every woman who has ever lived. Everyone who reads the Adam and Eve story needs to be reminded that they are not reading history. Rather they are reading an ancient story that seeks to explain why things in life are the way they are. . .

. . . People who try to read the creation and Garden of Eden stories as history will always be chasing rabbits that do not exist. Myths can never be read as history. Myths do not conflict with history. History attempts to report the facts of what has happened. Myths attempt to explain why things happen the way that they do. . .

. . .The Israelite tradition says that the experience described in the Garden of Eden story is repeated by every human being. We human beings keep making the same wrong decisions over and over again. One would think that we would learn and change our ways. But we do not. The Israelite tradition says that life is unrelentingly consequential. But we constantly avoid and deny this truth. Profoundly, I believe the Adam and Eve/Garden of Eden story. People who deny it, do so at their own peril. The writing of this column was triggered by the current argument about whether or not Adam and Eve were historically the first man and woman on earth. The brief summary that I have shared is taught in every non-Fundamentalist seminary in America. I cannot fathom why ministers do not share with their congregations what they have learned in seminary. Meantime we avoid the hard truths of the stories and engage in silly discussions."

(excerpts from ADAM AND EVE ARE YOU AND I by Howard Bess
The Rev. Howard Bess is a retired American Baptist minister, who lives in Palmer, Alaska. His email address is hdbss@mtaonline.net)





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Yesterdays news. . .

. . . of the Obama administration's change in stance on the Defense of Marriage Act was most certainly Good News.

Why jettison DOMA to the proverbial sharks? Because. . . "DOMA has been used by federal officials to justify excluding gay couples from a wide range of benefits that are available to heterosexual couples. These include federal health, Social Security, pension and tax benefits, even to gay couples who were legally married in the handful of states that recognize same-sex unions. The Government Accountability Office has estimated that there are more than 1,000 provisions of federal law "in which benefits, rights, and privileges are contingent on marital status or in which marital status is a factor." Widows have been forced to pay estate taxes, where a survivor in a heterosexual marriage would have no tax bill from an inheritance. Federal employees may not enroll their same-sex spouse in federal health plans or take family and medical leave to care for their partner. Same-sex couples cannot file joint income tax returns or benefit from state retiree health insurance plans that are controlled by federal tax law. DOMA even has been used to prevent a gay couple from filing a joint petition for bankruptcy."

Eric Holder said, the section of the law defining marriage as between a man and a woman is unconstitutional, in the administration's view. Importantly for judicial review, Holder says courts also should apply a heightened level of scrutiny that makes it more difficult for laws to be upheld.

Maybe we really ARE evolving.

(Hear my music at http://www.rayjozwiak.com)

Life is truly stranger than fiction. . .

By Theresa Masterson
NBC Philadelphia.com
updated 2/8/2011 3:36:54 PM ET
"A British tourist recently died after she allegedl flew to Philadelphia to get
silicone injections into her buttocks at a Hampton Inn, sources say.
Police are executing a search warrant at the Hampton Inn on Bartram Avenue
Tuesday afternoon with suspicions that someone is renting rooms in which he or
she performs butt implant procedures, sources say.
Suspicions of these hotel-room medical procedures came about after a woman
visiting from England allegedly died after a butt enhancement procedures and was
taken to a local hospital, according to court documents.
Several women from England recently traveled to Philadelphia to receive butt-
implant procedures in hotel rooms, court documents say.
The Delaware County medical examiner's autopsy is not yet complete."

(hear my music at http://www.rayjozwiak.com/)