Not an abandoned blog

The New York Times reports that a 2008 survey indicated only 7.4 million out of 133 million blogs had been updated in the past 120 days, in other words 95 percent of blogs are basically abandoned. Well this blog is not abandoned, this update is the first one since March 2nd. Let's see, that's only about 90 days.

This was my first blog, but now I have several more, including blogs on journalism and Biblical Archaeology. Plus I have a life. So keeping QV up-to-date is not my highest priority.

But every now and then I have something I'd like to say, an observation or a comment that I don't want to go unexpressed. So I'll say it here. Or on Facebook.

The Land Remembers

I noticed a long time ago that deaths seem to happen in clusters. When someone close dies, it often seems that several more with personal connections depart their mortal existence within a few days.

And so it was that not only did my mother pass away last week but I also note the passing of the well know radio newscaster Paul Harvey (to whom she and dad often listened), as well as Walter Schlaugat, the owner of the radio station where I got my first job, and also Philip Keillor, the brother of radio humorist Garrison Keillor.

A decade or two ago I was at a meeting and met Philip Keillor on a rainy fall afternoon. I gave him a ride back to work after the meeting, we had a nice chat, and I felt like I could call him a friend even though I don't think we ever met again. I had just started writing a newspaper column for The Capital Times and he had been reading it. He complimented me on what I had written. The newspaper obituary noted that he also was quite proud of his brother Garrison's weekly newspaper column, as well he should have been.

I was born in 1951, which is when Paul Harvey started his radio news career and about when Walter Schlaugat got an FCC permit to start a radio station in Prairie du Chien. WPRE was a regular fixture in our home, since it was the only local radio station and was an important source for local news, such as obituaries. I took it for granted, like running water and electricity, until my college years when I started to pay attention to how radio stations differed based on the news they carried and the music they played. When I applied for a job at WPRE as a summer fill-in announcer in 1971 I was surprised to get hired. Walt was more occupied with management and engineering than programming, so I didn't deal with him a lot but I do remember getting a phone call from him one evening when I inappropriately played Led Zeppelin's Stairway to Heaven during a slot that was usually reserved for sedate MOR standards.

We didn't listen to WPRE all of the time, otherwise we never would have heard Paul Harvey, since he was carried by the ABC network and WPRE was not an ABC affiliate. Paul Harvey's genius for succinctly reporting news, with bedrock Midwestern values, made him an icon. I met him once at the EAA Fly-In in Oshkosh (his love for flying and pilots was well known). I also heard him speak at a journalists convention once or twice. My image of Paul Harvey is slightly tarnished, no fault of his, due to run-ins with dim witted radio consultants who didn't understand why everyone couldn't do news like Paul Harvey. But I don't want to tell you how many times I sat in front of a soon-to-be-live microphone, waiting for my newscast to begin, warming up my voice with my best Paul Harvey imitation.

And finally, mom, who would've celebrated her 92nd birthday next June. Her years on earth were about ten fewer than those of her own mother. She spent almost two decades in the nursing home in Lancaster, which is a very long time. But I never heard her complain about living so many days in a little room. She had never gotten a driver's license, and didn't get out a lot even when we were growing up. Maybe that's part of it.

She did emerge from the nursing home from time to time when she could get a ride from one of us. Probably her last time out was her 90th birthday, which we celebrated at a local park. Her birthday always came around Father's Day, so a family picnic in mid-June was a long-held important family tradition.

The funeral at the Lancaster United Methodist Church featured live music by guitar and fiddle, as well as organ. And there were kind words by the pastor about a life lived close to God, which is a comforting thing to hear at a funeral.

A couple of weeks ago I finally began a book that I had wanted to read for many years, The Land Remembers, by Ben Logan. This memoir of a southwestern Wisconsin farm childhood not only has place names with which I'm familiar, but also describes early 20th century farm life that I heard about frequently from my dad as we were growing up. Since we lived on the family farm up until I was almost eight years old there are redolent memories hidden all through the book.

I'm sure my mom was not cut out to be a farm wife. She was raised in the city, the daughter of an accountant and a milliner. But nonetheless she lived on a farm, raising her family, for a dozen years before we finally moved to town. She raised seven boys well, although we tried her patience many times. We will miss her but she is part of us and will always be with us.

3/4/9 Addendum - Thinking further about the events of the last few days, I should correct the last sentence. It implies a permanence belied by the granite markers in the snowy grass behind the Mt. Zion Church. We have been making more and more visits to this country church near the original Govier farmstead north of Lancaster. I tell my children, some day you will visit me here.

Reflecting on the deceptive impermanence of our lives it occurs to me that just as this virtual online world is a fabrication of our day to day existence, our day to day existence is a fabrication of a more permanent creation. C.T. Studd, the great missionary of a century ago, is credited with saying, "Only one life, twill soon be past. Only what's done for Christ will last."

It seems to me those who built this little country church, and could hardly imagine the trappings of the world that now surrounds it, well knew the difference between permanence and impermanence. The apostle Paul wrote, "And now these three remain, faith, hope and love. And the greatest of these is love."

February 12 Birthdays

Today's recognition of Abraham Lincoln's 200th birthday reminds me of a visit to New Salem, Illinois, where Lincoln spent important years of his early manhood. It was noted there that New Salem was a short lived frontier town. It began just a few years before Lincoln arrived, and was abandoned not long after Lincoln left. It was as if it was created providentially to help forge the values of America's 16th president.

Much has been and will be written about Lincoln, that's my memory. This year I hope to visit the Lincoln library in Springfield.

How Sleep Works

As a teenager with an early morning newspaper delivery route I invested in an alarm clock with two snooze bars, one for five minutes and one for ten minutes. I thought the snooze bar would make it easier to get up in the morning. Later I bought a radio with a snooze bar. After the alarm went off I could hit the bar and then, theoretically, be soothed into wakefulness by music. Neither made it any easier to wake up in the morning.

As an adult I ended up in a job for which I awoke at 3:45am. I realized, in waking up daily for that job, that the best way to wake up was to get to bed at a reasonable time, and to get up and get moving as soon as the alarm sounded in the morning. It's a whole lot easier to get out of the clutches of the bed as quickly as possible, kind of like ripping a bandage off of a sore.

I've become more and more protective of my sleep, and less and less enamored with late night attractions that might keep me from getting the sleep I need and enjoy. Even on weekends I'm prone to hit the sack around the usual time, so I can get up at my usual time. Being consistent in my sleep patterns seemed like a good idea. Now, I read that there's evidence to back me up on that.

An Associated Press article the other day said that the best way to prevent the common cold was to get plenty of sleep. "Small sleep disturbances increase the risk of getting sick," the story said.
It brought to mind a bout of bronchitis I had a decade or so ago, the sickest I've probably ever been. I had been out working late three nights straight and very low on sleep, and I paid for that with a hacking cough that lasted for weeks.

The story goes on to warn against getting too much sleep, which is also not healthy, and give a number of other excellent suggestions on sleeping properly and healthily.

My resolution for the past year or so has been to better prepare for sleep by turning off the computer an hour earlier and spend the last hour of the day reading. As much as I enjoy sleep it's been a struggle but I'm gradually getting better at it. I hope to do even better this year.

Election Day 2008

Ever since 1974, 34 years ago, election day has meant late night news coverage. Radio news was all about live coverage from the polls and from the clerks office as the returns came in. Then after radio I worked as an AP stringer for a number of elections. But this year I voted and I'll be able to watch the returns tonight as the results of what appears to be an epoch-creating election are counted.

Whether it's McCain or Obama winning, U.S. Politics will be moving in a new direction. Particularly if Obama wins. A democratic party landslide would be particularly momentous, as some polls are predicting. But lest we get too alarmed, we should remember what Dave Harris was trying to tell voters as they drove to work on the beltline this morning (photo).

Archaeology tidal wave

What a week for archaeology. It used to be that major announcements were sometimes saved for the annual meetings of archaeologists and Bible scholars that happen every year in mid-November. Now it looks as if archaeologists are releasing their discoveries in advance of the meetings to insure more news coverage.

News coverage is important for archaeologists because it helps with fund-raising, a very important element of modern excavating. Each of these discoveries and developments is a major announcement. It's incredible to have them happen in the same week. We'll be discussing these developments for weeks to come on my Book & the Spade radio program (this item is cross posted with the blog that goes with the radio show). Read the stories now, and tune in at www.radioscribe.com/bknspade.

• James Ossuary trial teetering - October 30, 2008


• Ancient Hebrew text from the Valley of Elah - October 30, 2008


• Possible seal of army commander found in Jerusalem - October 30, 2008


• Water tunnel found in Jerusalem - October 29, 2008


• Copper smelting ruins in Jordan link to Solomon - October 27, 2008

In a nutshell, here's what's so important about each of these discoveries.

#1 - The James Ossuary is a first century stone burial box for bones with the inscription "James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus." The ossuary is unquestionably authentic but the inscription is controversial. The Israel Antiquities Authority has pronounced it a fake and accused its owner of forging antiquities. It may still be a fake inscription, but it doesn't appear as though the IAA can prove it in a court of law in Israel. The IAA was hoping to put a big dent in the antiquities trade with this case. It doesn't look like it's going to happen. For a fascinating, behind-the-scenes tale about this artifact and others like it, check out the new book Unholy Business, by Nina Burleigh. The book will raise more questions in your mind, but doesn't officially take sides in the controversy. Maybe it really was the repository for the final remains of Jesus' brother, James.

#2 - The Khirbet Qeiyafa excavation is going to be a major excavation in Israel because it's a single period site that's dated right smack dab in the middle of the time of greatest controversy in Biblical Archaeology right now, the time of David and Solomon. This could be a benchmark site for that era and clear up a lot of controversy. The discovery of an ossuary (pottery sherd with writing on it-shown above) may provide further evidence for the state of the Israelite kingdom at that time.

On our Book & the Spade tour last winter we crossed the Valley of Elah twice, stopping the first time to discuss the famous battle between David and Goliath that occurred there. Little did we know it would be the scene of probably the most important archaeological discovery of the year, if not the decade.

#3 - Another seal found in Jerusalem with the name of a Biblical figure. These seals and seal impressions have been popping up with increasing frequency in the various digs going on around Jerusalem lately, giving us an incredible hands-on connection to the Biblical world. This one not only has a name on it, it has a beautiful engraved archer depicted, a true work of art.

#4 - The water tunnel found in Jerusalem also seems to date from the time of the Davidic kingdom. It's location suggests in may be the water conduit used by David's army to conquer the seemingly impregnable Jebusite city. It was once thought that Warren's shaft was that water conduit but recent archaeology has disproven that idea. This water feature bears further study.

#5 - Another discovery that may bolster the case for David and Solomon, particularly Solomon, being the kind of powerful kings depicted in the Bible. This discovery is in Jordan and further investigation may yield additional evidence.

For some good commentary on some of these discoveries I also recommend the weblog of my friend Todd Bolen.

The Heat

Now that the summer is over (Labor Day being the unofficial end of summer), the temperature in Madison finally rose above 90 today. What a beautiful weekend to end on, and what a beautiful summer it's been.

A month or so a friend from Texas was visiting and I couldn't help thinking there's a big chunk of the country that never gets to enjoy beautiful weather like we've had here in Wisconsin.

The fact of the matter is that summer is really the season that Wisconsin shines. The other eight months of the year we're anticipating the coming summer season. Football, skiing, basketball, etc., are all just diversions to keep us occupied until the summer returns.

Sure we had some nasty flooding a year ago, and earlier this summer, that caused a few headaches. But summer in Madison has been, for the past dozen years or so, nearly perfect, weather-wise. At least that's the way I see it.

Postscript: OK, so maybe I was wrong. I saw a survey this week that indicated a majority of people find autumn as their favorite season. I still like summer best.