First of all, the conditionals. Am a Christian. Not is the sense of born again but in the sense that I grew up in a Christian home and live in a Christian society. Do not attend church. Church is a business, an organization, not a religion. Do not believe that my religion is any better or any more right than the others. Except headhunters, cannibals, zealots, or extremists.

God exists. That is not a belief or a thought. It is a fact. Like the Hawking proof. Fifteen billion years ago, stuff was created. There are two possibilities. Everything is a series of random events or there is a Creator. But when you go through the odds, they become astronomical in favor of The Creator. But then, the odds were astronomical that OJ was guilty. Let's face it folks, The Creator is a fact.

And the Bible is the word of God. As interpreted by man. My Principles of College Physics is the word of God, also. As interpreted by Shortley and Williams. There is a lot of really good stuff about our world and universe in both of them. Both are hard to understand and subject to a lot of errors. But they are the word of God. They help us comprehend a very complex world and ourselves.

Prayer works. Do not believe that if you pray for a million smackers, it will get dumped in your lap this afternoon. But if you really want it to happen, you can pull up from within yourself the ablilities that Mother Nature gave you. And you can align the forces of the universe to help things happen.

First Cause is a concept that The Creator created stuff and then went off for a cup of coffee and a nap while everything coasts. Now, we do get into beliefs. I for one, am not about to say that The Creator was so incompetent that He/She cold not get things right the first time. But I do enjoy having God-Allah-The Creator-Jehovah-Flying Spaghetti Monster-etc. sticking His/Her finger into my everyday life. And I do enjoy my conversations. And my associations with The Creator's CEO, Mother Nature.

The universe and the world would not work if things did not die. Stars and worlds die. Critters die. If they did not, we would not be here. When The Creator made stuff, that is the way it works. And life is not easy. It is the challenges and hardships that make things move along. And make life interesting. The discoveries that came from World War II are still being developed. Necessity is the mother. When the going gets tough. Good things happen to good people. Good things happen to bad people. Bad things happen to good people. Bad things happen to bad people. But we do have the strength and ability to handle it. Mother Nature may give us a lot of grief. But She also gives us all the tools we need.

Mother Nature gave us a spectacular brain. Do you want to know what blasphemy is? It is not using that brain.

And there is so much good, fun,and really neatsy-cool stuff in our world and our lives. Thank God for all of that.

The Westminster Kennel dog show was on a couple of channels. And the delightful little beagle, Uno, has been in the news a lot. Got me to thinking about pets and their meaning in life and the universe.

There are a bunch of things that give us pleasure. Our families, of course. Over the millenia, evolution has bred that into us. National Geographic had an article on gorillas. Family was everything. Ditto the meerkats. And almost all critters. And our homes and cars give us pleasure. They represent security and comfort, freedom and mobility. And of course, status. And there are some other things that give us pleasure but that is another blog at another time.

But why do dogs and other pets warm our hearts so? It could go back thousands, even hundreds of thousands of years to where animals were our helpers and saviors. Is it in our genes, nature or nurture? How about the animal cruelty situations, does Michael Vick disprove or is he just a pervert? Some societies practice dog fighting regularly. Dogs and cats and horses could just be co-passengers on our earthly vessel. But the turkey buzzards on the water tower behind the house are too and they are certainly not lovable.

Not my dogs. Just went to "lovable dogs" on YouTube.

And music gives us such pleasure. Why is that, do you suppose? Is there something in our genes that recognizes certain resonant frequencies? If you listen to music from different civilizations, there are dramatic differences. But there are remarkable similarities, too. It does not seem reasonable to me to relate music to speech communication which has been such an important tool for human predominance. Some mothers exposed their fetuses to music but a lot did not. A puzzlement.

Tuvan throat singers. Richard P. Feynman never got that chance to go to Kyzyl

But, of course, the bottom line is that dogs and music certainly are fun.

An epiphany visited me while contemplating the meaning of life and the universe while seated on my cogitation throne (you produce epiphanies on your cogitation throne, don't you?). My wonderful Dad, God rest his soul, was born in 1903 and died in 1976. So many discoveries and advances during his lifetime. From horses to trips to the moon. TV. Medical. So many things.

What brought this on was that it looks like one of my computers has a fatal illness. The four year old Dell had given me a warning a while ago when it had trouble getting up to full power. A computer geek friend told me it was an intermittant mother board problem. That prompted me to take advantage of getting a second one, a Shuttle, from a friend moving overseas and networking it. And then yesterday, the keyboard and mouse on the Dell started to intermittantly not do anything. Again very possibly the motherboard. Oh, dear, oh dear. Woe is me. Glad I got the Shuttle. So I could continue blogging regularly.

What a part of life a computer and the internet are here in the 20th Century (But wait, it really is the 21st Century, isn't it? What happened to the 20th ?) . In my retirement, it has become very much a part of my everyday life.

I tutor online somewhere around four hours a day. Seven days a week when not otherwise engaged. Really enjoy it and get a few bucks also. Some neat kids out there. Would miss it, and not just for the money, if it went away.

Really enjoy my cyber-associations. When I finish my morning chores, the first thing I do is my computer stuff. Do a couple of sweepstakes. Read the news. Check emails and respond. Emails are definitely not a replacement for handwritten letters and phone calls. But they have become a real part of 21st Century communication. Our daughter who programs for a banking organization does a major part of her job through emails. Where would we be in 2008 without emails? Well, we did it before and we could do it again, but it does add a real dimension to our lives.

And then it is time to cruise blogs. Who would have thought that writing your cogitations onto pages on the internet would become such a significant thing to do? Whether anyone reads those cogitations or not, it is enjoyable. And who would have thought that having fellowship with folks you can not see and know few facts about would become so rewarding? Blogging gives a level of intercourse that did not exist before blogs, before the internet, and before computers. Giving it up would cause some serious dt's.

And I did not even mention researching neat stuff. And buying neat stuff.

My kids can reflect on a father who grew up before TV. Did not see a TV until I was in college. And before computers. I started messing with computers back in the days of a PDP11 and Apple II's. But I was still well into middle age when that happened. And I can remember when they said that the still developing world wide web would be like “letting the tiger out of its cage.” That was shortly before my retirement.

Suffer future shock about a lot of stuff these days. But certainly am glad it was not from computers. And am certainly glad for all that my computer and the internet bring me.

When I was a tyke, my folks had some records of Lily Pons which they particularly liked, including the epitome of coloratura pieces, the Queen of the Night from the Magic Flute. Could not find it, or much else from Lily so that must wait for some more research.

And then, I cruised through Mr. Ornery's blog (http://orneryisback.blogstream.com/) and he has a positng about New Zealand.

That brought to mind one of my favorite singers, Dame Kiri te Kanawa (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kiri_te_Kanawa):

She is a half Maori, half European New Zealander. Modern civilization has some remarkable things. One is being able to share blogs with folks half way around the world, like New Zealand. Another is that stellar opera singers comes from such a variety of backgrounds. Along with Dame Joan, we have Dame Kiri.