December

I haven't posted in a while.

Business has been horrifically off this year. I've made less money than I did when I was 29, which at 49 years and 263 days old is extraordinarily depressing. I'm very good at what I do. My peers generally recognize that fact. My firm has had more business than many others in our field.

It still hasn't been enough. Add to that, despite all of the free time that lack of work has afforded me, I've accomplished nothing. I really could not tell you what I did last Monday.

One thought keeps going round and round in my head. Should I see a doctor about getting medicated? There are some excellent non-addictive anti-depressants out there. But I have seen too many doctors this year, I don't think I could bear seeing another one. Add to that, if business turns around, I will not continue being depressed. Anti-depressants are great if there's an organic reason for being depressed. They are not such a good idea if the depression has other causes.

The other part to that is that despite inflation and an overall rise in real estate prices since I started doing this, our fees have actually gone down. When I first started doing this most title examiners in Georgia were either law students (like me) or lawyers. These days only a small minority have a legal background. The prospects for my field are not great.

At age (almost) 50, I need to make a move. I need to generate more business or I need to switch fields. My problem is that I hate practising law. If I have to, I will, but the whole wearing a suit and tie and giving advice that will be ignored and not getting paid for said ignored advice palled two decades ago. I have excellent computer skills and I am a great researcher. But my l33t compy skillz are non-academic and graduate students are the preferred researchers. We all know how well paid grad students are as well.

I'm a decent writer in a job market flooded with writers who have proven work records.

So I'm stuck. One consolation is that there have been others who have been mired in much the same place. I have been reading St Augustine recently. He battled with depression as well. Boethius, who wrote the first self-help bestseller, had similar problems. Actually his were worse what with the whole imprisoned and executed thing. John Bunyan wrote about the 'Slough of Despond'. He knew its geography well.

The trick is finding the path through the mire. The problem is the silence when I ask for help.

/rambling

Rage Against the Machine

At this point the only reason I would ever vote Democrat is if the Republicans do something catastrophically stupid. Which is well within the bounds of likelihood.

I have two hot button issues: The Bill of Rights together with the 13th and 14th Amendments and space exploration. The jackasses have pressed both buttons. They have been jabbing at the first since January and now they've gone for the second.

I'll give them this much, this is the worst federal government we've had since Carter. Sky-rocketing debt, a desire to expand the ever so well managed Medicare and Medicaid programs to cover all Americans (and just how exactly will that control costs?), endless bailouts for the politically well connected, active suppression of free speech, an amoral commitment to the retention of power, a desire to destroy our national economy in the name of pseudo science and a total lack of an optimistic vision for the future.

We have a hollow man for President, a gang of thieves and thugs in Congress, and a love of failed ideologies on the part of our intellectual classes.

And don't try any 'moral equivalency' on this. The Republicans were stupid. The current crop of Democrats are flat out evil.

We're going to be paying for this fat headed exercise in 'Hope and Change' for a very long time. And unfortunately the burden of this folly will fall mostly on those who are silly enough to try to be adults. The overaged children, spawns of the 60's 'me generation' will likely skate as usual.

To put my money where my mouth is, I'll bet anyone who wishes that, if the Democrats retain control of Congress through the next election, that the inflation rate plus the unemployment rate (expressed as percentages) will be as high or higher than they are today in 2012. The stakes are, fittingly enough, two pounds of Nueske's applewood bacon.

My good friend who blogs over at S S Pequod has accepted the challenge. Inflation (2%) plus unemployment (9.4%) = 11.4 as of today.

I like bacon....

Cure for the Drearies

Kittens.

Every time I've started to slide into my usual winter melancholia our two new kittens do something unbelievably cute, amazingly stupid or both.

The only thing wrong with kittens is that they grow up from small, vibrant, affectionate bundles of energy into cats.

Wishes

Right now I wish I lived in Fort Worth, at least religiously. Instead, I live in Atlanta, where the diocese just passed the following resolutions:

R08-4

Development of Liturgical Rites for Same-Gender Unions

Resolved: This 102nd Annual Council of the Diocese of Atlanta approves the
following resolution to the 76th General Convention of The Episcopal Church,
meeting in Anaheim, California, in 2009; and be it further


Resolved: This council directs the Secretary of Council to transmit the
following resolution to the Secretary of the General Convention:


Resolved: The House of __________ concurring, the 76th General Convention of
The Episcopal Church authorizes the Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music
to develop appropriate rites for the celebration and blessing of the sacred
unions of gay and lesbian persons, taking into account the variety of civil
arrangements for such unions available in the regions served by the church;
and be it further


Resolved: that such rite or rites shall be presented at the 77th General
Convention of the Episcopal Church.



EXPLANATION
In light of events following the Lambeth Conference of 2008, it is clear
that our charitable restraint and response to the Windsor Report in the
matter of our declining to develop a rite or rites to allow the celebration
and blessing of sacred unions for people of the same gender has not had the
effect of preserving unity and civility between those who believe such
unions may be good and moral and those who cannot conceive as such a
possibility being within the bounds of Christian faith and the Anglican
Tradition. It is also clear that while a great many Episcopalians remain
undecided about their own beliefs in these matters, they recognize both the
desirability of allowing those who seek to make such commitments in the
midst of their community of faith to do so; and that the reality that the
cost of our charity has been at the expense of one clear minority within our
church; and further that there is no compelling reason that these brothers
and sisters should have to continue to bear the burden of that charity.

The development of such a rite or rites by and for the whole church will
allow a restoration of decency and order from diocese to diocese under the
guidance of each bishop, the ensuring of theological integrity to such rites
and the capacity of the church to "sanction" and declare such committed
relationships among people of the same gender to be both moral and fully
within the bounds of our common life.

Submitted by: The Rev. Geoffrey M. St.J. Hoare, The Rev. Charles M.
Girardeau,
The Rev. Noelle York-Simmons, The Rev. Elizabeth Shows Caffey
All Saints', Atlanta



R08-5

Repeal of General Convention Resolution B033

Resolved, this 102nd Annual Council approves the following resolution to the
76th General Convention meeting in Anaheim, California, in 2009; and be it
further

Resolved, this Council directs the Secretary of Council to transmit the
following resolution to the Secretary of the General Convention:


General Convention Resolution

Resolved, the House of ___________, concurring, the 76th General Convention
of The Episcopal Church recognizes that the usefulness of Resolution B033 as
passed by the 75th General Convention of The Episcopal Church has run its
course; and be it further

Resolved, that the 76th General Convention of The Episcopal Church herewith
repeals Resolution B033 as passed by the 75th General Convention of The
Episcopal Church; and, be it further

Resolved that The Episcopal Church acknowledges with regret the further
oppression visited on the lesbian and gay members of this church by
Resolution B033 and its application; and apologizes for the potentially
negative impact of said resolution on the ability to respond to the
vocational call by the Holy Spirit to the episcopate of any members of this
church; and be it further

Resolved that The Episcopal Church expresses its appreciation to the lesbian
and gay members of this church for their patience during this time of
discernment for the church; and be it further

Resolved that in the call to see the face of our Lord and Savior Jesus
Christ in each other, this church pledges its utmost effort to keep all
parties "at the table" as The Episcopal Church continues to insure the full
participation of all of God's children in the life of this church.





EXPLANATION
Resolution B033 was an attempt by The Episcopal Church to help continue the
discussions prompted by resolutions passed at Lambeth Conferences in 1978,
1988, and 1998 and in response to portions of the Windsor Report and the
requests of the Primates of the Anglican Communion. The resolution did
little to achieve those goals. Yet it did extreme damage to the spiritual
well being of the lesbian and gay members of The Episcopal Church and had
the potential for limiting the response of those members to any call to the
episcopate they might have felt from the Holy Spirit. Resolution B033 needs
to be repealed in order to reassure the lesbian and gay members of this
church of their full membership in this church and help bring about
reconciliation among us all.

Submitted by the Diocese of Atlanta



Submitted by:

Bruce Garner, All Saints', Atlanta; Member, Executive Council of The
Episcopal Church
John Andrews, Grace-Calvary, Clarkesville
RPM Bowden Sr., St. Paul's, Atlanta; Member, Executive Council of The
Episcopal Church
Tim Raasch, St. James' Marietta; Convener, Integrity Atlanta

Because we are, apparently, not out of communion with nearly enough of the Anglican Communion. Upon reflection the absence of a resolution labeling Archbishop Akinola a 'big fat meanie' is startling.

For When I Feel Blue

Two terrific websites. First, this is truly cute overload. And this one is only for dire emergencies. We started with two, we added one, one died and then we added two more. So I try not to visit it unless I'm really down in the dumps.