Under Glowering Skies

No foreign sky protected me,

no stranger's wing shielded my face.

I stand as witness to the common lot,

survivor of that time, that place. 

(Anna Akhmatova)

What remained after the flood? For us, we few survivors? A glowering sky for sure, that much is constant.

And shacks, somehow these too remain.

As does the Dojo. Kick 'em out, kids, before you too are washed away in the flood.

But trees still stand. What happens here is that roots destroy the sidewalk which no one walks on, so the Town in its wisdom cuts down the trees. Idiots.

So back again to the Compound, unscathed, frosty, our enemy the Weather threatening. But questions remain.

Have we paid too much Climate Tax, too little, or is this an issue caused by prayer? Pray for rain, God agrees, cause and effect. Problem, solution. But note how abundantly our Creator provides this. 

Do you detect judgment?

LSP

Climate Change Eschaton

 

This small farming community in North central Texas faced down ferocious storms on Monday, but it was nothing compared to Dallas. Our Old Adversary, the Weather, changed with a vengeance and flooded the Metrosprawl.

Like no kidding. Torrential rain turned suburban streets into raging torrents and shut down the Mix Master, an insane highway complex in the center of town which is a nightmare at the best of times. A woman died in Mesquite, caught in her car as it was carried under by the current. May she rest in peace.

Even the world famous Margaret Hunt bridge was threatened with disaster as the waters rose with primal, apocalyptic fury. Yes, the levees hold, for now. And it's a here and now issue because, apparently, that's not some kind of God-given thing. Work it out, Dallas.

In the meanwhile, Ma LSP's house rests on high ground and I'll be sure to swing by and make sure all's well, safe from marauding hordes of waterborne looters. On that note, smart people are investing in BOATS.

Row Jimmy row,

LSP

Monday Admonishment

 

Who do you love? Your truck, your money, the British Army, what's left of it, the ritual of the Mass itself?, the idea of Rhodesia and the Selous Scouts? How very awesome, until it isn't.

I tell you, readers, there's no luggage rack on the back of a hearse; so store up treasure in heaven, strive for eternal value. Which reminds me of all these young brokers in London, back in the day, "Value!" they'd shout, while hoisting yet another champagne bottle before they got busted for *dealing.

Gross, eh, picture the scene, all kinds of hi-spirits. That in mind, crazy rain here and we thank God for this. Providence, kids, is both loving and implacable.

Your Old Pal,

LSP

Yet Another Sunday Sermon -- WARNING GRAPHIC

I'm not a contractor, never have been, never will be, just a humble LSP, but I do know this. 

Roddy walked into our South Ken office in '97, in tears, positively weeping, all 6.4 of him. Why? Because Lady Di had died and he'd just visited her multi-candlelit shrine. "Why are you crying, Roddy?" asked the Guv'nor. "Because she... she... died!"

Our boss paused, "But Roddy, you're a fkn arms dealer." And he was; tragedy meet mourner and, to be fair, what a neat guy. He sold missiles and drove a Porsche through West London while threatening to invite me to the Special Forces Club. 

Drive Safe.

Your Old Pal,

LSP

A Mercifully Short Sunday Sermon

“Lord, will those who are saved be few?” And he said to them, “Strive to enter by the narrow door; for many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not be able." (Lk 13:22)

Strive to enter by the narrow gate. It grates against post-modernist Marcusian ears, against the culturally ascendant air we breathe  because "narrow gate" sounds dangerously like narrow-minded, and so bigoted, intolerant and hateful.

"After all," says our Ivy League uneducated friend, "I've got my truth, you've got yours. Coexist!"

What a broad path and it sounds alluring; so free and tolerant, so very narrative. But let's apply this logic to mathematics. Imagine a classroom full of young children, pronouns mixed. Their teacher asks, "You have two rainbows in the sky and you add another two rainbows, how many rainbows are there?"

An impetuous youngster raises zhir hand, "One!" A pensive girl, she/hers, utters "three," another adventurer exclaims four, another eight and an enthusiastic child offers up "eighty eight!" The teacher beams, "Children, all of you are right!" And each receives a delicious unicorn cupcake, don't say Lambeth Conference.

But look what's happened. In the name of freedom, these poor children have been denied the liberty of doing mathematics because they haven't been allowed to go through the narrow gate of correct addition. The logic of salvation's similar.

As with 2+2=4, there's one solution to paradise and that's Christ; He is the gate. Only He unites humanity to God, He alone is true God and true Man. He alone offers the perfect, sinless, atoning sacrifice to the Father for the forgivness of sins and He, and only He, rises victorious from the grave only to give His resurrected life to the faithful.

So to get to heaven, the end or τέλος of desire, we have to go through Christ, the door, the gate of the sheep, the way, the truth and the life. And we must strive to do so, to make the conscious, deliberate effort to conform our lives to His.

The Savior's grace, frightened and gentle readers, will supply the deficiency.

Here endeth the Lesson,

LSP

A Civil Disturbance

 

Remember the Cherokee Nation uprising? I do, just, and part of our people goes that way, so. Speaking of which, did you know that some 80% of US combat arms are from Texas.

Food for thought,

LSP

Italy

 

Go figure, everyone's in Italy, living large and escaping the beautiful strip malls and flyovers of our cultural ascendancy for something else, and who can blame them? 

I texted an old music buddy, who's set up in an Italian castle, "Maybe they need to turn that town square into a parking lot. Ffs, get onnit." He clicked between contracts and replied, "Look. Castle ceiling. Standard." Have a look:

Huh. But that's not all. Ma LSP and several sisters are in Italy, living it up on the Adriatic. I guess Texas wasn't good enough, they just had to go one better:

Feeling badly left out, I drove through Italy but didn't stop. Let the reader understand.

Italy Texas, a fine place to be. Then there's this town, where the kids are staying:

So unattractively awful, why hasn't this been torn down and turned into a strip mall? I mean to say, what's wrong with these people? As we reflect on that, here's a castle garden.

Soothing, don't you think?

LSP

What A Good Couple Of Days

 

It started as it often does, with a drive down I35 to the Metrosprawl, but this time in a V8 Beast, result. Objective? Set up at Dallas HQ then visit with the Bishop the next day and, the day after that go for a post-op checkup at a medico in Plano.

Two orders of business, several possible orders of outcome. So perhaps I was a little... pensive, how would it go? It went well. Had a great meeting with our outstanding new(ish) Bishop, which found financial security for Mission #1. No small thing, I live there.

And the Doc was helpful too, "You know, that was a pretty serious operation and you're healing way better than expected, I'm surprised." Result, and I drove back to base through the Tollway wasteland of North Dallas in good spirits.

Seriously, surgery's a deal. I know, we're all Warriors, but still, it's helpful to have the thing checked off by a doctor. He's Christian, to boot, and asked for permission to pray before the op, "Of course you can, I'm a priest." And there you have it, back to the sylvan boulevards of Old Hill County tomorrow.

Drive Safe,

LSP

EPIC LOSER

 

Liz Cheney, net worth in 2018 >15MN$ on a 174K$ congressional salary got wiped out in Wyoming in this week's election.Her campaign? Trump is evil and everything the Democrats do is awesome, which is why she's Republican. 

Who thought this genius pol strategy up? Imagine, there you are on K Street in what would've been a smoke filled room, now filled with the fizz of Topo Chico:

Look, Liz, the wave of the future, how do I put this, of history itself, is open borders, trans bathrooms and 'eat the bugs.' You know, Green. So occupy the middle ground and bring it home, get the old hippies and their kids and bag those aging Cold Warriors, blame Russia at every point. That'll get 'em and you'll win big.

 

Leaving aside millionaire progleft traitor Liz's enormous heft, she certainly campaigned on an aggressively pro-Democrat/Progressive ticket, and lost hard, really hard. No wonder, who wants a hypocritical multimillionaire, faux leftist shill to rule them? Wyoming certainly didn't, and while we're at it, don't mention Haliburton.

                                                                          How Very Gross

Rest of the country and Uniparty RINOS? Take note, we're taking names.

E Pluribus,

LSP

Just Hanging Out

 

Just hanging out in Dallas, Lao Tze style, enjoying the porch

Good thing there's a handy leaf blade knife, right?

Blue agrees, he's up for a treat scrap

In other news, the appalling Salman Rushdie's been stabbed by some outta control Jihadist. Rushdie wrote the aggressively annoying Satanic Verses and incurred a Fatwah. Well, looks like it caught up with him. Bad luck, Rushdie.

I met the bizarrely annoying Rushdie back in the '90s at some place in London. He was with the even more annoying Malcolm McLaren, who distinguished itself by wearing fancy shirts without cuff-links. Whoa, what a radical.

The intenselt irritating McLaren died in 2010, Rushdie still lives.

All best,

LSP

Assumption

 

Today's the great Feast of the Assumption and the Compound's celebrating with garlic, spring onion, and ginger stir fried pork, sweet and sour to boot. It's not hard, just shake it up in an iron skillet or wok and off you go. But some people don't like this.

"The Assumption, that aptly named feast," said one famous Anglican cleric. And for sure, it's not in Scripture but is it "repugnant to the Word of God"? Of course not. If Elijah can get assumed into heaven why shouldn't the same be true of the incomparably more holy ever virgin Mother of God? No, they snarl, that's idolatry. But is it. 

At this point in time excessive reverence of the saints is the least of our worries. Where, really, do our idols lay? Not in plaster, polychrome images of holy men and women, but in wealth and power, in Mammon. In worldly, carnal, atheistic disbelief.

To put it another way, if you conducted a thorough interrogation of an average congregation, asking the hapless Christian captive what thing or series of things was most important in their lives, their god, what would you get?

I'll wager the fighting monkey that it wouldn't be Mary or her divine Son. And therein lies the decline of the Western Church, call it apostasy if you like. In the meanwhile, the unpleasantly lib/smug Atlantic magazine's run an article saying the Rosary's an extremist war symbol. Well yes, especially if you're a Turk at Lepanto.

House of Gold,

LSP

Meet The New Rig Almost The Same As The Old Rig

 

Finally bit the bullet and got a new rig, which meant reaching over to the monkey, yes, a floor safe, extracting necessary bullion from the snarling simian and driving to Dallas and a cash only dealership. Run by Iraqis, no less.

There it was, a fleet 2018 F150 4x4, low miles, realistically way under dealership price, and it drove well, the truck I was after. So I bought the V8 beast, cash on the nail, and drove it back to the Compound, where it sat looking powerful next to the old rig. But not for long.

After Mass at Mission #1, a young soldier came downstairs; no, not to go to Mass at Mission #2, "Dad, there's a Battalion recall, I've got to get back in an hour." I pondered this for about a second, "Good thing there's an extra truck. Take it, don't crash, insurance docs in the glove compartment." And off he went back to the Hood where, apparently, someone had scored a DUI causing the Battalion to parade. Huh. 

In the meanwhile, the new rig's a definite upgrade, with a spacious cab, icy AC, a computer which tells you things, 4x4, and these massive great off road tires. Awesome. But... and I can't grumble given the price/miles, it has an IWE vacuum issue, maybe a faulty check valve, certainly a cracked hose. Easy fixes for cheap, rubbish, built to fail plastic/rubber parts. So, I'll get the rig checked out tomorrow.

Ride On,

LSP