Chamblee54

Eighteen words appeared on facebook. “Nothing is more conductive to peace of mind than not having any opinions at all.” ~ Georg Christoph Lichtenberg. The FBF is known to have opinions.
In the google age, or le goog, you are only a right click away from too much information. In cases of facebook education, the first impulse is to ask the question, did the person really say that? In the case of Georg Christoph Lichtenberg, the probable answer is yes.
“Nothing…” is from The Waste Books (New York Review Books Classics) “German scientist and man of letters Georg Christoph Lichtenberg was an 18th-century polymath: an experimental physicist, an astronomer, a mathematician, a practicing critic both of art and literature. He is most celebrated, however, for the casual notes and aphorisms that he collected in what he called his Waste Books.”
The Sudelbücher, or scrapbooks, were written in German. They are essentially a collection of random thoughts. If twitter had existed then, these thoughts would have gone to 140 character purgatory, never to be seen again. History would not have been affected.
The first thing you learn when you investigate this quote is a translation controversy. Conducive is possibly more appropriate than conductive. German speakers might have thoughts about which word best describes the thoughts of GCL. This would constitute having an opinion.
The cited aphorism does have the aroma of truth. You are not required to have an opinion about everything that goes on. Those rhetoric warriors often do not have your best interests at heart. Sometimes the best thing to do is to realize that the hot trending hashtag is #noneofmybusiness.
While stumbling through google city, searching, like a digital Diogenes, for one honest man, a lovely essay appeared. How to Waste a Notebook: The Waste Books of Lichtenberg. The author might have actually read the Sudelbücher, instead of the Brainy Quotes highlights.
“Last month, however, I chanced upon The Waste Books by 18th century German polymath Georg Christoph Lichtenberg. (Polly Math would be a good stage name.) Containing thousands of aphoristic notes, Lichtenberg’s books read like clippings from newspaper horoscopes, fortune cookie fortunes and one-liners commingling with trenchant observations about the human condition and the existential peccadilloes with which it’s fraught. So, why call these gems The Waste Books?”

There is a meme going on, 50 Happy Things: Bloggers Unite in Flood of Gratitude. PG heard about it from Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, the perpetrator of Friday Fictioneers. The idea is to set a timer for ten minutes, and write a list of fifty things you are grateful for, or that made you happy.
It has been a slow year for writing contests at chamblee54. In August of 2014, a poem, Whitehall Street, was published. Almost immediately, an email came from the yeah write writing contest. Apparently, a line had been crossed, and chamblee54 was no longer permitted to participate in the contest. PG has been slow to find another writing contest to catch his fancy. It should be noted that on the list that follows, you will not find political correctness, sjw, or judgmental bullies.
PG read the description of the contest, and realized that he needed to participate. The resulting list might make good text for a graphic poem. At the very least, the list is good text to go between pictures, from “The Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library”. The remarkable photo collections that PG has acess to (the other one is The Library of Congress ) are a source of enjoyment. They did not make the list by name.
This is the way the list is. It is not supposed to be comprehensive. As soon as PG set the kitchen timer for ten minutes, he realized a touch of gratitude for this clanging device. It is the first item. Only three people names made the list, which is definitely not a reflection on the many wonderful people who were not named. (One of these names mentioned is a single letter, enclosed by quote marks. Not everyone has a friend like that.) There are a few catch alls, like healthy body, rather than naming all the parts. These parts work better than a man of PG’s age, and experience, has a right to expect.
So anyway, maybe we should just quit blabbering and print the list. There are a total of sixty one, one for each year of this life. These are not numbered… numbering them takes time away from writing down more. They are in groups of ten, in the order that they were written. UPDATE: Thinking was mentioned three times, and reading twice. Maybe editing should have been listed, or at least performed. The new total is 58 items.
kitchen timer, Mac, “J”, Robert, running honda, knees, back, teeth, feet, dick
rest of body, skepticism, sobriety, sense of wonder, computers, photography, gimp, WordPress blog, other peoples dogs, black people
mexicans, reading, thinking, faeries, short mountain, bicycle, house with roof, rain, america, georgia
georgia natives, clothes, foam rubber pad mattress, sleeping platform, sticker pictures, any friends not mentioned, not being broke, good health, listening, batteries
phones, internet, pain medicine, memory of mom and dad, food, anything i don’t think of in ten minutes, freedom from religion, g-d, back yard, rocks
poetry, soap, golden rectangle, being queer, not numbering, not wondering if i have enough, not getting caught dui, freedom from the press

At some point, three holidays started to be observed on a certain Monday. The big three are MLK Birthday, Memorial Day, and Labor Day. This post proposes making long weekends out of two more holidays. Whether this will happen is a good question. In any event, it will be a good excuse for text to go between some pictures. These pictures are from The Library of Congress. The pictures are Union Soldiers, from the War Between the States. This is a repost.
The first holiday to be converted is fourth of July. Under the new plan, Independence Day would be observed on the first Monday in July.
It has long been a good question why July 4 is the big day. The Continental Congress voted to declare Independence on July 2, 1776. July 6 saw the Declaration of Independence announced in the PA Evening Gazette. July 8 saw Col. John Nixon give the first public reading of the Declaration.
The other holiday due for an overhaul is Christmas. Since Christmas Eve is considered a holiday by many, Christmas should be celebrated on the fourth Friday of December.
Like Independence Day, there is considerable debate about when Jesus was born. Many scholars think the birth was in spring. Apparently, Rome decided to hold this celebration on a pagan holiday.
Traditionalists are not going to like this proposed change. It is not likely to be enacted anytime soon. It would be a more efficient use of our working time to not have Independence Day, and Christmas, occur in the middle of the week. It also problematic when the holidays fall on a weekend. Pay for holidays is part of the compensation for many, and having the holiday off on another day leads to confusion. If the holidays were adjusted per this proposal, then this would not be a problem.

PG got an email today from Allen Hunt a radio announcer. The letter had a Christmas message. PG read the story, and heard the ding ding ding of his BS detector. Here is the story.
Merry Christmas! As the wars about the public celebration of Christmas become filled with pettiness and hostility on all sides, be not dismayed. Your celebration of Christmas depends solely on you and nobody else. I heard the story of Oswald Goulter years ago and it reminds me of that simple fact. I am responsible for how I embrace the gift of Christmas.
Oswald Goulter served as an agri-missionary to China. On his way back to the USA for furlough during World War II. His sponsor mission agency gave him a ticket to get home by boat. When Oswald arrived in the port of India, New Delhi, he found boats filled with Jews, housed there to protect their lives from Nazi Germany. The Jewish boats couldn’t land anywhere. They were not accepted or welcome anywhere at the time
Oswald went to see them and said, “Merry Christmas!”
“We’re Jewish,” they responded.
“I know, I know. But what would you like for Christmas. Merry Christmas!”
“Don’t you understand? We are JEWISH.”
“Merry Christmas. What do you want?”
To get rid of this nuisance, they said, “How about some German pastry? That sure would be grand.”
Oswald scoured the city until he found a bakery that made German pastry. Oswald sold his ticket for home to get money to purchase some pastry. He went back to the boat and shared it with them.
As he spoke about this experience later in one of his supporting churches, a very prim member of the congregation stood and asked, “Why did you do that? They were Jewish. They don’t even believe in Jesus.””I know,” Oswald replied, “but I do.”
PG sent a reply to the original email. This post is being written an hour later, so it is not unreasonable that Mr. Hunt has not replied.
Allen do you have any proof that Oswald Goulter existed? This story seems a bit far fetched. I googled Oswald Goulter, and all I see is the same story told over and over.
Why did he go to India? This is over the Himalayan mountains, or around Vietnam. Couldn’t he do just as well in North Asia, or even Russia?
When did this incident happen? There are mixed indications in the versions I read, and no exact dates. If this was after WW2, then restrictions about admitting Jews would start to loosen up.
Why German pastries? After all that the German people had done to them, this seems a bit strange.
There are hundreds of real, verifiable Christmas stories out there. This one seems a bit fishy.
After sending the email, PG hunkered down in the google.(Snopes never heard of Oswald Goulter) It seems that Oswald John Goulter was born June 22, 1890 in Oklahoma. He died in March 1985, in Santa Clara California. He was interviewed in 1971 as part of a project involving missionaries to China. “This interview supplements the account of Goulter’s life in Wilfred Powell’s Scattered Seed. Mr. Goulter portrays the disruption in Chinese life in the area of Lu-chou (Hofei) in Anhwei province during the years 1922 to 1951. He tells how the Communists were able to take advantage of the disorder caused by warlords and bandits and the Japanese invasion to drive the nationalists from power. He also discusses his conception of practical Christianity and its applicability in China.”
There is another story about Mr. Goulter. After the communist takeover, Mr. Goulter and his wife, Irene, were taken into custody. Mr. Goulter was beaten repeatedly, but refused to renounce his faith. Finally he was released (or, in some versions, escaped). This imprisonment is generally agreed to for three years. If he left in 1951, that would be consistent with the time line of the communist takeover.
In the Hunt version of the story, Oswald Goulter left during World War 2.
This does not answer the question of why Mr. Goulter would go to India, before America. It also does not account for the appearance of the Jews in India, six years after the end of World War 2. It should also be noted that India was in chaos, with the advent of Independence and the partition. Would they have Jews hiding in the city?
There is a book, Scattered Seed: The Story of the Oswald Goulters, Missionaries in China 1922-51. PG does not know if it discusses German pastries.

This is a repost, with pictures from “The Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library”. The original had several comments about Mr. Goulter, which we will share below. Allen Hunt sent a reply, which was lost in a hard drive crash. It was rather snide. Dr. Hunt has quit sending emails to PG. His radio show is no longer being broadcast.
Lindsay goulter said, on February 26, 2010 at 3:26 am Hi oswald goulter was my great uncle.Born in Auss. If you would like to know more about him please reply to my e/mail. lindsay g
Teena Anderson said, on October 30, 2010 at 10:02 pm
Oswald Goulter is my grandfather. He was a missionary to China for 30 years. His story is told in the book Scattered Seed by Wilfred Powell. Oswald and Irene had 3 daughters, Lovena, Doris ( who is still living!) and Jean. Doris and Jean were born in China. Jean was my mother-she spoke excellent chinese with a Hefei accent. I am the eldest grandchild. They lost a baby boy born in China and buried him in the mountains of Kuling, where the missionaries would go for the summer.
My husband, Hugh Anderson (Presbyterian minister) and I have taught in China with the Amity Foundation. Our first summer of teaching we traveled to Hefei and met Rev. Zhu who helped Oswald after he had been confined in the internment camps. They were great friends. Rev. Zhu’s son is now a Disciple of Christ minister here in the United States. Teena Anderson, Medford, Oregon.
chamblee54 said, on October 30, 2010 at 10:09 pm
Thanks for stopping by. Do you know if the story about the German Pastries was true? It is an inspiring story, but as I noted in my post, there are a few issues with it.
Miaohua Jiang said, on January 19, 2011 at 11:06 pm
The book by Wilfred E. Powell titled Scattered Seed came in mail yesterday. I searched in the book for any evidence that this story might actually happened. Unfortunately, the story as it is stated never happened. At least it did not happen in India.
The sabbatical year was between 1936 and 1937. The family did take the western route going through Europe to return to US. They arrived in US in September 1936. Christmas of 1936 was their first Christmas in US in many many years. They were not able to return to China because of Japenese invasion until late 1937. Mr. Goulter did help refugees in Shanghai around Christmas time 1937. The book did mention that Shanghai also had ships with Jewish refugees. So, the story could have happened in Shanghai, China, instead of India. It did not involve boat tickets. Mr. Goulter had clothings shipped from Los Angeles to Shanghai. Also Mr. Goulter was interned by Japenese for many years, not communists.
chamblee54 said, on January 20, 2011 at 12:02 am
Thank you for following through. That is an inspiring story, too bad it can’t be proven to be true.
Miaohua Jiang said, on January 1, 2011 at 10:13 pm
Doris is visting us this new year’s day of 2011!
Miaohua Jiang said, on January 4, 2011 at 2:23 pm
This is what I got from my conversation with Doris, O.J.’s second daughter. According to Doris, Mr. Goulter did not like his first name. Chinese people would simply call him Gou Shee-Sang (Mr. Gou). Doris was born in Hefei in 1924. Her mother homeschooled the girls. By the time she was 10, they felt it was time for girls to have a more formal education in Shanghai. Before they left for Shanghai, they travelled for a year to Europe, going through possibly the Hongkong – India route. So, it was around 1934 – a time Jews were forced to escape Germany. So, the story is credible. The girls stayed in Shanghai until 3 month before Pearl Harbor was attacked when American government ordered evacuation of women and children. Mr. Goulter stayed behind and was imprisoned by invading Japenese because of his British citizenship. I am ordering this book and hopefully when Doris visits again next time I will have a chance to verify a few more details with her. Amazingly, after leaving Hefei for more than 75 years, she can still speak the local dialect and sing local children songs forgotten even by the local people.
Teena Anderson said, on October 30, 2010 at 10:09 pm
Oswald Goulter was my grandfather. He was born in Australia. He heard about the Boxer rebellion and felt called to go to China. He came to the U. S. to get more education. He married Irene Goucher (my grandmother) in Oklahoma and they spent 30 years together in China. They had 3 daughters, 2 of whom were born in China. My mother was born in Tsingtao but spent 10 years in Hefei (Lu Chow Fu). She had a great Hefei accent. They also had a baby boy that died and was buried in the Kuling mountains. (Lu Shan) Oswald Goulters life was written by Wildfred Powell in the book Scattered Seed. Our family still have ties to Chinese that were ministered by my grandfather. There are many more accounts of what my grandfather accomplished in China. He loved the Chinese and they loved him. Teena Anderson of Medford, Or.
Lauri Penry said, on March 25, 2012 at 8:27 am
My grandparents (Dr. and Mrs. Paul R. Slater) served as medical missionaries in China with the Goulters. I have heard the story many times of how my grandfather met up with Mr. Goulter, and he wasn’t wearing shoes. So my grandfather gave him his. The next time they crossed each other’s paths, Mr. Goulter was again without shoes. He told my grandfather that he found someone who needed them more than he did.
I was just going through some pictures at my parents’ house this weekend, and found one with Mr. Goulter in it. I am in the process of reading Scattered Seed now. My parents were attending Phillips University when Mr. Goulter was a member of the faculty. From what I have always heard about this man, he was exceptional, and a true servant!
John McBride said, on May 10, 2012 at 10:10 am
Oswald Goulter is my grand uncle and he was born in Australia. I had the pleasure of meeting him and Irene in in either 1973/4 when they visited Australia and later in San Jose in 1981. He was quite some bloke who’s achievements were quite incrediable. My grand father was a potato farmer at a place called Irrewillipe, about 100 miles west of Melbourne. One year my brother and I spent our Easter weekend (4 days in Australia) helping dig up the crop. At night, my grandfather read Oswald’s letters to us by kerosene lamp beside the wood stove in the kitchen. As a ten year old, those letters were more exciting to listen to than reading my Superman comics.

Until 2009, PG had never heard of Mithras.
Mithras is a Persian deity, from the Zoroaster tradition.(That is pronounced Zor uh THRUS ta.) Not much is known about Mithras … did he really exist, or was he a legend? There was a cult of Mithras in the first century Roman empire.
There are supposed to be similarities between Mithras and Jesus. These include the virgin birth, the birth on December 25, and rising from the dead after three days. Some spoilsports say the early christians grafted Jesus onto the legend of Mithras.
One indication that this might be true is The Catholic Encyclopedia. “Some apparent similarities exist; but … it is quite probable that Mithraism was the borrower from Christianity.” This repost has pictures from “The Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library”.

PG was stumbling through facebook when he saw someone enthusiastically praising something. Against his better judgement, PG clicked on the video. Within seconds, it was familiar.
Paige Yore (she wants you to know her name) made a video about an incident at walmart. The video was shot in that annoying cell phone style, with a skinny image in the middle of a blank screen. In the story, Ms. Yore was at walmart, when a lady before her had a problem with a cashier. Ms. Yore intervenes, a unicorn army parades through the store, and all is well with the world.
It was just another inspirational video, until the lies got thick. “The young cashier stopped in his tracks and began crying. He came from the bagging area and began hugging Paige. He told her that his mother committed suicide that morning. He said he had to work because he has to pay rent and bills. “This woman is yelling at me and I don’t even have a mom anymore,” said the young man.” At this point, PG realized it was a fraud.
Apparently, other people were not fooled. A local tv reporter did some checking. Walmart found a surveillance video of the incident. The lady did not hug the cashier, whose mother is still alive.
The perpetrator of this video is unrepentant. “I just want everyone to know that I am here to inspire people. I’m not here to cause any problems. I’m just a normal girl from Idaho, just another cow girl, and just happened to go viral. Did I plan on it? Absolutely not. Did I want that? Probably not.” In another comment thread she adds “I’m not bipolar and never been diagnosed.”
People, don’t believe everything you hear. If you want inspiration, look at the sky outside, and marvel that a creature that can see this exists. Don’t let people pull your chain all the time. Cynicism is ugly. But when you are lied to repeatedly, it is what is left. Pictures by The Library of Congress.

PG does not want to bore you with talk about gratitude. This is a repost. Pictures are from The Library of Congress. There will be one story.
“I used to work for a company that produced annual reports. One year, I was sent on this huge cross country trip to art direct a series of shots for a food processing mega-company, and one of the stops involved a turkey farm. Okay, so you have to understand that turkeys are extremely skittish birds. The slightest thing will set them off, so the farmer kept them in a large, basically dark barn just to keep them under some semblance of control. So we go in, and the photographer sets up the lights, which he gradually turned on so the birds (and me, for that matter) could get used to it. Everything’s going fine. We have the farmer in front of his (literally) hundreds of free-range turkeys. The photographer clicks off the shot… and in doing so sets off a flash he forgot he had triggered. Immediate chaos: birds running everywhere.At least a dozen fainted and died right on the spot. Farmer was none too happy. Neither was the agency.”

The text below is a conversation between Mr. Nixon, John D. Ehrlichman, and H. R. Haldeman. The tape was made May 13, 1971. This is a repost. Pictures are from The Library of Congress.
NIXON: … CBS … glorifying homosexuality.
EHRLICHMAN: A panel show?
H. R. HALDEMAN: No, it’s a regular show. It’s on every week. It’s usually just done in the guy’s home. It’s usually just that guy, who’s a hard hat.
NIXON: That’s right; he’s a hard hat.
EHRLICHMAN: He always looks like a slob.
NIXON: Looks like Jackie Gleason.
HALDEMAN: He has this hippie son-in-law, and usually the general trend is to downgrade him and upgrade the son-in-law–make the square hard hat out to be bad. But a few weeks ago, they had one in which the guy, the son-in-law, wrote a letter to you, President Nixon, to raise hell about something. And the guy said, “You will not write that letter from my home!” Then said, “I’m going to write President Nixon,” took off all those sloppy clothes, shaved, and went to his desk and got ready to write his letter to President Nixon. And apparently it was a good episode.
EHRLICHMAN: What’s it called?
NIXON: “Archie’s Guys.” Archie is sitting here with his hippie son-in-law, married to the screwball daughter. The son-in-law apparently goes both ways. This guy. He’s obviously queer–wears an ascot–but not offensively so. Very clever. Uses nice language. Shows pictures of his parents. And so Arch goes down to the bar. Sees his best friend, who used to play professional football. Virile, strong, this and that. Then the fairy comes into the bar. I don’t mind the homosexuality. I understand it. Nevertheless, goddamn, I don’t think you glorify it on public television, homosexuality, even more than you glorify whores. We all know we have weaknesses. But, goddammit, what do you think that does to kids? You know what happened to the Greeks! Homosexuality destroyed them. Sure, Aristotle was a homo. We all know that. So was Socrates.
EHRLICHMAN: But he never had the influence television had.
NIXON: You know what happened to the Romans? The last six Roman emperors were fags. Neither in a public way. You know what happened to the popes? They were layin’ the nuns; that’s been goin’ on for years, centuries. But the Catholic Church went to hell three or four centuries ago. It was homosexual, and it had to be cleaned out. That’s what’s happened to Britain. It happened earlier to France. Let’s look at the strong societies. The Russians. Goddamn, they root ’em out. They don’t let ’em around at all. I don’t know what they do with them. Look at this country. You think the Russians allow dope? Homosexuality, dope, immorality, are the enemies of strong societies. That’s why the Communists and left-wingers are clinging to one another. They’re trying to destroy us. I know Moynihan will disagree with this, and Mitchell will. But, goddamn, we have to stand up to this.
EHRLICHMAN: It’s fatal liberality.
NIXON: Huh?
EHRLICHMAN: It’s fatal liberality. And with its use on television, it has such leverage.
NIXON: You know what’s happened [in northern California]?
EHRLICHMAN: San Francisco has just gone clear over.
NIXON: But it’s not just the ratty part of town. The upper class in San Francisco is that way. The Bohemian Grove, which I attend from time to time–it is the most faggy goddamned thing you could ever imagine, with that San Francisco crowd. I can’t shake hands with anybody from San Francisco. … Decorators. They got to do something. But we don’t have to glorify it. You know one of the reasons fashions have made women look so terrible is because the designers hate women. Designers taking it out on the women. Now they’re trying to get some more sexy things coming on again.
EHRLICHMAN: Hot pants.
NIXON: Jesus Christ.