There are 316,125 people in the U.S. with the first name Peggy.
Statistically the 196th most popular first name.
More than 99.9 percent of people with the first name Peggy are female.
There are 88,150 people in the U.S. with the last name Erickson.
Statistically the 379th most popular last name.
Interesting to note that:
They found it necessary to note that 99.9% of people named Peggy are female? What’s with that?
They had to put Margaret into the equation … I don’t know her, I never knew her and she and her name are in no way related to me …
Although this site claims their statistics come from US Census figures, I question their database, because the info on my name says there are more people named Erickson than what was reported for Steve. Census data should not change although their data might if it was based on site visits rather than census, although census sounds so much better. They have enough disclaimers about accuracy to choke a horse, so it is impossible to guess why the discrepancy.
“Starting in May, the Treasury will begin sending economic stimulus payments to more than 130 million households.” (Source: IRS) As I listened to people talking about this and how they are looking forward to their check and what they will do with it, I was more than a little dismayed. Do we have such short memories? Do we not remember how many people got all excited about Bush’s plan to “give us back our money” and how dismayed they were to discover that the “rebate” they got would be deducted from their tax refund the following year?
The economy is cyclical … highs and lows, booms and busts are part of it. The more the government tinkers the worse it gets. The highs and lows get closer together and the swings are wilder. This “stimulus” is more tinkering and probably will not have the desired result, just as the previous “rebate” did nothing to stave off the pending downturn. Most people I talked to plan to use it to catch up on past due bills, mostly energy bills and credit card debt. That doesn’t stimulate the economy in any tangible way that I can see, nor does it do anything to create jobs.
It seems government has a very short institutional memory.
It’s really Steve’s fault. I was doing fine. I told myself I didn’t need to look at the new ESV Study Bible site. After all, they aren’t publishing it until October and I have a nice ESV Study Bible … and … and … and …
I was doing fine. But then Steve started telling me about the features and I ended up looking. And then I realized that it would be published just in time for my birthday. And then I thought, someone could get it for me for my birthday. And then I thought, what if they don’t? Ah, but I could get myself a birthday present! And then I saw that I could save 35% if I pre-ordered ….
And then you know the rest of the story. It’s really Steve’s fault.
Installing the plug in for Verse of the Day creates a widget which makes setting up the display as easy as selecting it! Gotta love WordPress 2.5 and a widget ready theme!
And you see I am back to my old theme … I really haven’t found anything I like as well … the Remembrance theme is OK, but a little too neon for me.
Sometimes I find ridiculous stuff and sometimes great stuff by following links on blogs I normally read. That was the case yesterday and I am frustrated with myself that I didn’t bookmark the blog cause I wanted to come back and write something about what I read and now, I can’t find it … grrrrrrrrrr. I did check history, but have no idea which site it was and got tired of looking. Sometimes I really irritate myself!
So I borrowed Rachel’s old theme since she isn’t using it. I think I still like my old one best of all, but this will be a small change while I make up my mind. Maybe it will help me decide just what it is I want to do.
Dei is now at home on its new server and with an updated theme (widget aware, WOO HOO!). All I have left to do is to install the Verse of the Day plug-in and get the code into the sidebar. YAY!
I have to say the import process went very smoothly … so much so that I was suspicious … can’t be that easy, can it?
I may still change my theme … or I may just tweak. The challenging part is done and it wasn’t all that difficult. So I may have to find something hard to do, like writing my own theme? (That’s one way to put off the book.)
I have often been frustrated by the two party system. I’ve wondered more than once if it wouldn’t make sense to start supporting third (or fourth or fifth) parties that represent my views better than the big 2. I would not hesitate to say that most people probably do not support either the Republican or Democratic party as they now stand. They seem to have become despots, telling us what we will believe and what we will support rather that serving what we believe and support. And winning is all they care about. Being top dog as it were.
I’ve stated before that most people support the candidate, not the party. And perhaps that is why the whole system seems so dysfunctional. It probably goes a long way toward explaining voter apathy. Why vote when you don’t feel you can support either candidate? Perhaps to vote for the lesser of what you see as two evils? “Of two evils, choose neither.”* is good advice, but seldom practiced in contemporary politics. Often our vote is a vote against, rather than for, something.
I’m very disappointed that the best qualified candidates in both parties have withdrawn. I’m disappointed overall with the way we select candidates, because the ones who win are not usually the best qualified or even the most likely to win. So how do we address and correct this? How do we make the parties more responsive to what we want? We are, after all, the People, the ones it is supposed to be all about.
I’ve recently come to see that the only way to change the death grip the party system has on the election process is to change the parties from the bottom up. Rather than going away disappointed when the best candidates don’t become the nominees, we have to start changing the whole system. It won’t come the way candidates promise. The only way to “change Washington” is to start at the bottom of the political system and build it anew. It is to look for candidates at the local and state level who represent your views and really support them. It is to support candidates for Congress that represent your views. It is to stop letting incumbent Representatives and Senators run unopposed because we think they cannot be defeated. It is to demand that they stop thinking they were elected kings and start thinking they were elected servants of the people.
Good men and women with servant hearts could make all the difference.
I haven’t pulled an all nighter in years, but almost did last night. I have been determined to get the rest of my sites transferred to the new web host and have been fighting the clock … or rather the calendar. I want to get them all done before I hit another billing date and end up paying for two extra web hosts. The sites I manage have been spread among three hosting companies … a good idea at the time, but not now.
Forget the tax deadline (mine are all filed), I am working to avoid a billing deadline on Thursday. Then I will have another week to get the last site moved. Of course, the site I was working on last night is Common Ground. It’s complex because of its size, the number of audio and video files associated with it and various pHp includes like FormMail. I thought I had all my bases covered. But the uploads were going so slowly that I was beginning to suspect Comcast of throttling down the bandwidth again. My bad … it was not them … it was me. I forgot one setting on the FTP options for the new site. I got past that one. But I lost time and even though uploads were going well it was getting late and I was getting tired. With one eye on the clock, I kept working. Finally! Uploads complete, I begin to check the site.
Oh, NO, Mr. Bill! The menu is there but the format is hosed. And the page just wasn’t displaying correctly. I tried in vain to find the error. Finally common sense prevailed and I closed everything down and went to bed. When the alarm went off this morning, I decided to sleep in, but found myself wide awake and wondering what was wrong with the site. D’UH! In my haste, I uploaded the wrong CSS file … the old one. Putting up the right one made everything work as it should. *Whew*
I’m working on my 2 Corinthians study and wanted to share a few observations.
Paul Barnett is an excellent writer as well as an exceptional scholar. His commentary is as readable as his many books, something I greatly appreciate.
Murray Harris gets my vote for the best commentary so far on the NIGNT. Even thought working from the Greek text and therefore including lots of NT Greek in his commentary, he is a clear and cogent writer who doesn’t seem to feel the need to impress with verbosity. So far he has only seen fit to do one Excursus on the commentary, something I really am happy with since the commentary from the same series for 1 Corinthians seemed to have an excursus for every section.
These guys, as well as Martin and Kruse seem comfortable admitting that there are things we just cannot know. While 1 Corinthians was written in response to a letter and oral requests, we can only speculate when it comes to the second letter, and while these guys report some of the conjecture, they are careful to label it as such. Thanks!
On another note, I went Saturday and had a short training session to begin physical therapy again. Boy, was I stiff this morning! Tomorrow I go at 10 for the PT followed by some pool time. I plan to take full advantage of the great hot tub at the Community Center!
We are under a winter storm warning until Saturday am. It has been snowing off and on all evening and it is thundering like crazy. Weird! Southern and western MN are under a blizzard warning. Go figure!
I talked with Dad at length yesterday. Once again, The Book came up. I made the mistake of telling him Karen agrees with him. He said, “See, even your friend knows I have a good idea here.” Thanks a bunch, Karen.
Of course, this morning an anecdote popped into my head that might make a good article for The Book. I’m just sayin!
They have enough disclaimers about accuracy to choke a horse, so it is impossible to guess why the discrepancy.
I tried in vain to find the error. Finally common sense prevailed and I closed everything down and went to bed. When the alarm went off this morning, I decided to sleep in, but found myself wide awake and wondering what was wrong with the site. D’UH! In my haste, I uploaded the wrong CSS file … the old one. Putting up the right one made everything work as it should. *Whew*