Verse for Today 11/15/23 - Romans 8:15

(I'm a slow writer hoping to write a short daily blog. I wrote this on a Monday and didn't find the time to post it until Friday. I'm going to attempt to write shorter less edited posts to try to get a daily turn around of the messages out.)

A verse popped out at me during today's daily readings for Catholics. It comes from Romans, chapter 8.

 "For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you received a spirit of adoption, through which we cry,  "Abba, Father. "

- Romans 8:15

Chapter 8 is a great chapter. Paul is writing with great clarity here. It's very uplifting to know we've received a spirit of adoption. But the first half of this verse is what struck me today. 

"...you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear..."

I take great joy in the courage God gives me; in the courage He wants to give to all His people. All the fear mongering that masquerades as religion nowadays disturbs me deeply. 

Using God's name to manipulate people through fear seems to me to be one of the ways to commit the unpardonable sin of blaspheming against the Holy Spirit. This verse seems to be a shield against people attempting to manipulate us with fear. We've received a spirit of adoption. Our heavenly Father sends us love and courage. His "perfect love casts out fear".* Cast out these messages of fear and embrace the love of God that unites us as children of God, Abba, our Father. 

* “There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love.”  - 1 John 4:18 

Happy Thanksgiving

 I just want to wish everyone a happy Thanksgiving. I hope you have a day full of gratitude and are able to see the many things you have to be thankful for.

New, New Plans

 

"The best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry." - Robert Burns

Funny, I always thought that was a quote from Steinbach. Good thing I researched that before I gave out incorrect information.

I was trying to set up a Wordpress blog/website. Many authors use Wordpress. After about 20 hours of work, I cut my losses. The site kept breaking down on me. So I'm going to revamp my blogger blog to also serve as my website. 

Changes have already started. And it's about time I gave this old blog some love anyway. It still gets traffic despite my mostly ignoring it for years. Hopefully, I can figure out a way to build a fan base and email list from this site. Blogger doesn't automatically collect the email addresses of subscribers the way Word Press does, but maybe I can make it work.

Books - Soon To Come

 

Stolen - By K.C. Trae Becker

A children's picture book about a duckling and a gosling that don't see eye to eye on how to behave.

OARS -TEC, AGDA, File #1 - 

The Case of the Lost Cow - By K.C.Trae Becker

Middle-Grade Fantasy Mystery

What happens when twins bet against each other and involve their whole case as they try to solve a mystery in a reform school for orphans. A school with its own secrets. 

Book Review : The Stolen Kingdom by Jillian Boehme

 

Title: The Stolen Kingdom

Author: Jillian Boehme

Page Count: 327 pages

Publication Date: 2021 by Tor Teen, A Tom Doherty Associates Book

Jillian Boehme creates a world with powerful magic in The Stolen Kingdom, but people with the ability to use this powerful magic are rare. A young cook at her father’s winery has a secret that could get her killed. A young prince wants nothing to do with his father’s destructive, oppressive magic, the only legal magic in the kingdom. Let the plotting begin. With memorable characters and a strong turning point, The Stolen Kingdom is a laudable addition to the Fantasy genre.

I studiously tried to make notes after each chapter. The first chapter was easy, due to the slow start. But each chapter got progressively harder and harder to stop reading to make notes. The chapters are short and things pick up quickly. Halfway through The Stolen Kingdom, self-control exhausted, I rushed ahead, finishing in the wee hours of the night.

Boheme is a fresh voice in fantasy. In her second published fantasy novel, she accomplishes what few modern authors pull off, a good fantasy story that treats religion with respect. And despite frequent power grabs and betrayals, the heroine manages a rare feat also. She shatters her glass ceiling while staying true to herself. She doesn't even sacrifice her feminine side.

This is a book where even the villains, though terrifying, are written with a sympathetic quality. Several characters showed refreshing altruism. Though the trappings of religion are somewhat sparse in the story itself, this book sits well with a religious viewpoint. A nice achievement for a fantasy story. All in all, The Stolen Kingdom is an uplifting and enjoyable read that is hard to put down, especially in the second half. Bravo to Jillian Boehme.

5 stars

Norse Myths : Idunn and Loki Research Spillover

I need to know about Idunn and Loki for the back story of some minor characters. And of course. Just because. Norse Mythology! Am I right?

Before I go further into what my research turned up, let me get people unfamiliar with their story up to speed. Basically, Loki tricked Idunn into being captured by a Frost giant. The gods were growing old without Idunn’s apples of youth and so made Loki go and rescue her again.

Here’s a link for the full story of the misadventure between these two Norse deities. http://www.hurstwic.org/history/articles/mythology/myths/text/idun.htm

While I’m dishing out links, here’s a link to a cute picture of the Norse pantheon.   https://www.reddit.com/r/heathenry/comments/d4mzqq/drew_my_buddies_left_to_right_tyr_thor_odin_hela/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x

Book Review: Wayward Magic

Hello Friends,

     I've been remiss in posting, but I've worked out a new schedule with writing time and blogging time on it. Hopefully, that will make the needed difference. I'm kicking off my new schedule today with sharing a book review I volunteered to do as part of a blog tour. I hope you all enjoy it.

Hello Again, from the Excuse Corner, Back with New Plans

New horizons.
KC Trae Becker

After a long hiatus (2 years is far too long) from writing this blog to work on my story writings, I'm finally back. No groaning, please. I've been working on both a picture book and a Young Adult Fantasy series.

The picture book is done, except for the last third of the pictures. I've also made good progress on the YA Fantasy series but have rediscovered that learning how to write with a series is a hard way to figure it all out. I keep restarting because I've learned something new about how to make my story better and need to work it in. Now, I feel like I finally have a solid beginning and decent transition into the middle of my first book. But that still leaves a lot of story left.

Thor Ragnarok Movie Review

Awesome! Perhaps my new favorite MCU movie, yet. A humorous-serious epic movie that plays to the strengths of both MCU characters, Thor, played by Chris Hemsworth of course, and Banner/Hulk, played by Mark Ruffalo, with help from Lou Ferrigno. [Pun recognized after the fact and made me smile, so I left it in.] I laughed many good belly laughs at this ultimately sad movie about loss. The writers, Craig Kyle and Christopher Yost, deserve a pat on the back for a funny, yet moving script for the actors to work from. The comedic timing was spot on. But the real credit for this revamping of the Thor character from the more serious Thor: The Dark World back to a lovable buffoon, who is sometimes clever and wise, goes to Chris

Mythology – Horse / Ass

General – Horse : royalty, divinity, otherworldly transport, water and storms, especially thunder,
peace and good harvest, indestructibility, purity and loyalty (one of Buddist's seven treasures)

Ass : matter, body, misfortune, rampant sexual desire, ridicule, lazy, stupid, poverty

Culturally Specific – royalty: Celtic kings and priests's chariots drawn by white horses, Irish kingship rite's symbolic copulation with a white mare, then bathing in her broth, divinity: Welsh Rhiannon, Celtic Epona, Old Grey Mare (aspect of the Celtic goddess in winter at Yule and New Year)

Movie review - Wonder Woman (better late than never)

(PG – 13) (2hrs 21 mins) I went into this movie not expecting much because after all, it's DC. If you read my last post, you'd know that I find almost all DC comics to take themselves too seriously. Many of the parodies of DC heroes, Lego Batman, How It Should Have Ended You Tube parodies, etc, are hilarious because it's so easy to poke fun at DC heroes' overly dramatic and pompous lines. This movie, though, knocked it out of the park. The director, Patty Jenkins, did a fabulous job. The star, Gal Gadot, playing Diana / Wonder Woman, was amazing! I had never seen her before. How she managed to look so young, fresh and innocent, I'll never know. She had me buying that she was a young immigrant from an Amazonian Island and had never seen modern civilization before she went with Steve Trevor, played by Chris Pine, to England to stop the war. Chris Pine who played Captain James Kirk in the Star Trek reboot makes a far better Steve Trevor than he did Captain Kirk, but I'm bias having loved William Shatner's Captatin Kirk way more than Lyle Wagggoner's Steve Trevor. While I'm on the TV series The New Adventures of Wonder Woman (1975-9), having loved Lynda Carter's Diana, I was dubious whether her

Spider-Man: Homecoming Movie Review - Unexpectedly Funny

It's been a while since I've posted anything other than my About Me page. I had forgotten I do movie reviews, too. In my next post I'll review

Wonder Woman, [I know, old news, but better late than never.] but for now...

I have a hot relevant topic: Spider-Man: Homecoming! (Pg-13)

About Me

I guess after 3 1/2 years it's about time I post an official About Me page in an effort to make this blog more professional. I haven't posted in a few months due to the extreme stress of teaching a high school level science class amide my numerous other obligations, but that's completed and I can get back down to the business of writing. Yeah! I've previously had my list of interests and skills at the top of the blog. I'm going to change the heading. It was hard to read anyway. So on to About Me...

The Occult Takes New York - Movie Reviews of Dr. Strange and Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them

Two movies have recently debuted about the occult taking over / protecting New York City: a Marvel film about a sorcerer supreme starring the much revered Benedict Cumberbatch (a need to posting about the Climate Change agreement preempted a post about it, though I enjoyed the movie immensely. So little time in these days of homeschooling and teaching three classes at homeschooling co-ops that I have to choose my battles for time to blog.) and last night I watched the new movie about the wizarding world with only a few big names scattered among the villeins, Colin Farrell and Johny Depp. But the main actor Eddie Redmayne, playing Newt Scamander, was wonderful.

(For some unknown reason beyond my control this site has decided to print this portion in white instead of black like the rest of it. Hmm.)

Climate Change

At the Global Warming Alert Conference in Harrisburg, there were messages of hope, accompanied by speakers typically talking about climate change dangers predicted to take place in the future. That future is not only getting closer, but according to Donald Brown of Widener University, we only have about 5 years to drastically change our behavior to stop a ecological switch from flipping that would trigger runaway global warming.

He also spoke about a campaign of disinformation and named perpetrators. Disinformation gets my dander up, especially about such an important topic and for so self serving an end. This inspired me to poll readers about their understanding and feelings about climate change. Please take the poll on the side bar to the left.

Animal #1 - Horse - Science

The first talking animal I'm going to be writing is a horse. Since I am currently working on a horse scene.

Animal – Horse

Classifaction Scientific name – Equus caballus

Genus – Equus (One toed hoofed animals - Horses, zebras, asses)

Family – Equidae (Odd toed hoofed animals - Horses, tapirs, Rhinos)

Order – Perissodactyla (hoofed animals)

Starting a New Series from research for Talking Animals

 I'm writing my first post about animals. I'm planning to have some talking faery animals in my series. I know talking animals sounds childish, to some people, but they are a frequent part of faery tales and folklore about faery. Also, I really like animals. Since I'm a biology teacher I want my talking animals to feel like they are real animals given the ability to talk. That requires a deep understanding of the animals and a bit of research, which is where my blog comes into the picture since this is supposes to be research overflow.

Guest Essayist - A Nine Year Old on Dragons

This is my last blog in my dragon/ serpent people series. This is an essay written a few years ago by my nine year old. He did research and drew diagrams, but since the source was mostly Wikipedia and the diagrams weren't terribly clear I won't include them. I am including this essay here to demonstrate how deeply rooted dragons are embedded into the imagination of humans. He was so excited to try to "prove" that dragons could be real, it was the easiest writing assignment to get him to complete up to that point. [Hint to teachers : kids have am easier time writing if they are excited about their subject matter.]

New Disney's Jungle Book Movie Review

I finally found time to go see the new live action Disney Jungle Book movie.

 It was brilliant. I loved how they brought the whole jungle to life. It had a slightly Bambi-esque feel to it at times. Even the bugs were there. The CGI animals had a wonderful look to them. Even though they were clearly CGI and not real animals to someone familiar with animals, it was possible to suspend your disbelief for long periods of time and see them as real.

The actor, Neel Sethi, was amazing. So much talent for such a young person (age 12). The voice acting was well done too. I'm glad they went with big name top quality voice actors (Bill Murray and Ben Kingsley, etc). It made the suspension of disbelief all the easier.

Earth Day and Arbor Day

Earth Day is April 22^nd. That's this Friday. I've always liked Earth Day. People get all concerned about the condition of the planet and want to clean up trash and stuff. I would be nice to have more of that, but I'll settle for what we can get.