Some good advice about BDSM

This was posted on an S&M dating website. Don't ask me how I got it. ;)

"As a submissive, i do not get much email from other submissives or many submissives viewing my page. However, if you are a submissive and you come across this, read on, because there are some things to beware of in the S&M scene that have recently come to my attention.

"BDSM is supposed to be Safe, Sane, and Consensual. That means first and foremost, no matter HOW BADLY you want your punishment, whatever it may be, it must NOT do things to you that CANNOT BE REPEATED because they CANNOT BE HEALED. ANY situation that requires medical expertise to carry out, for instance, MUST only be carried out by licensed medical personnel. That includes any kind of amputation, castration, surgery, or other forms of extreme injurious procedure with PERMANENT results. Other examples of extremely dangerous play you should not entrust to ANYONE without knowing them, knowing they have expertise, and having an ongoing and established Safe Sane Consensual relationship with them first include: Asphyxiation, Hanging, Branding, Burning, Knife play, Crucifixion, Ice Bath, Starvation, Cattle Prods, or any other play that obviously draws blood, stops breathing for over 30 seconds, or subjects the body to extreme temperature, extreme trauma or a current of electricity. These things are DANGEROUS and can END YOUR LIFE if done improperly or by persons with MALICE towards you!!!

Remember it is up to you first to save your own life. If you entrust your life to some person you met in a bar because you were horny and itching to play, you can wind up DEAD or WORSE. Remember your rights as a person -- you ALWAYS have the RIGHT to say no, and at the first sign that someone you don't know won't respect your rights, GET AWAY FROM THAT PERSON. You do not want to wind up in a situation where you will have to be rescued by your friends or the police from some black hole where they can't even find you. IT DOES HAPPEN. Play it safe!!!

Remember, Safe means Play with concern for and preservation of your Well-Being, Sane means Play that is Reasonable and within tolerances and Limits of the Submissive as well as the Dominant, and Consensual means both Submissive and Dominant are in a CONTINUAL state of mutual agreement AND understanding about the play scene and the relationship. Remember also that the less you know the other person, the less likely you will have a Safe, Sane, Consensual or even Pleasurable Scene."

Evidence Validating the Gospels: An Overview of Sources

I was asked the following question by "Noor," who commented on my Mark 9:1 post:

"I really want to know why you believe that God had become a man and died for our sins ...every time I've asked this question ..people explain how it's supposed to work..saying 'God is pure and we are sinners so someone has to die for our sins.' They fail to understand that this is an explanation and not a proof. I understand how it's supposed to work but what I want to know is why do you believe that God has to die for our sins ..the question is Why and not How..if you know what I mean."

The best I can do if I understand the question correctly is refer to those authors who have established the case for the resurrection of Christ, which is the culmination of His saving mission on Earth and the verification of his own stated claims that he is the son of God, son of man and Messiah. (If I blog about the Resurrection myself, I would only be duplicating their work.)

The book I'm most familiar with that proves this was written by Dr. Gene Scott, "Jesus Christ, Super Nut or Super Natural!" There is a condensed version of his case for the Resurrection and Godhood of Jesus, preached as a sermon on an Easter Sunday, at http://www.gospeloutreach.net/resurrection.html. Other classics in this vein include "Who Moved the Stone" by Frank Morrison, Fairbain's "Christ in Modern Theology," D.W. Forrest's studies on Christ, Sherlock's "Trial of the Witnesses," Paley's "Evidences for the Christian Faith," Nathaniel Lardner's studies of ancient history linking verifying evidence to the Gospels, and C.S. Lewis's "Mere Christianity." And no, I haven't read all of them, Dr. Scott's persuasion was adequate for me, even though I did read "Mere Christianity."

I'm told there is an author named Lee Strobel who wrote a book called "The Case for Christ." I've never read it, but it's one of the latest in a panoply of books that have been written that prove that Jesus Christ said things about himself impossible to believe or credit unless he backed it up with miracles only God could work, and then further prove that he did those works (including being raised from a death by Roman crucifixion after 3 days dead in a guarded sepulcher and ascending into a cloud 40 days later) and thereby proved he is God in the flesh.

There is also an article in the New Advent Encyclopedia that outlines the pagan and Jewish sources that confirm the validity of the Gospel sources for the life of Christ, found at http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08375a.htm. And not to be forgotten, as background evidence to support the antiquity and authenticity of the New Testament, there is F.F. Bruce's classic study "The New Testament Documents: Are They Genuine?" And I'm sure there are many others that one can find out there.

My only point here is that I believe in Jesus Christ because he was proven to me to be the Lord God, not because of a feeling or a rhetoric laden, emotionally evocative Sunday morning harangue, but because there really is findable historical evidence that logically validates the Gospels' story about him. You don't have to cut the top of your head off or suspend belief in science or good scholarship to be a Christian, and at least some of these authors, including Gene Scott, started out as skeptics and were convinced along the way by the evidence.

British school puts tracking chips in school uniforms

This is copied and reposted here from http://tech.yahoo.com/blogs/devlin/17027 just in case someone gets a notion to delete this story in the future:

RFID Chips in School Uniforms Track Students
Fri Oct 26, 2007 8:16AM EDT
See Comments (1043)
How would feel about this: Tracking chips in kids' school clothing so that school officials can know their whereabouts during the school day?
Oh, it's happening. Ten students in a secondary school in the United Kingdom are being tracked through RFID implants in their school uniforms in a pilot program. Information Week reports that the kids attend Hungerhill School for ages 11-16 in Edenthorpe, England.
Add the RFID chips to increased video surveillance and fingerprinting of kids, and this is a heavily tracked generation—for safety's sake.
That extra peace of mind for adults comes with a heavy loss of privacy for kids. Do you agree with David Clouter, a parent and founder of the children's advocacy group Leave Them Kids Alone, who says taking all these precautions has the effect of treating kids like criminals? Or do you agree with the parents who have OKed the pilot program who do not find it egregiously intrusive?
One possible side effect: Uniform sales may pick up as kids try to procure extra non-RFID-tagged clothing. As security expert Bruce Schneier writes on his blog: "So now it's easy to cut class; just ask someone to carry your shirt around the building while you're elsewhere."
LINK: U.K. Kids Get RFID Chips in School Uniforms [Information Week]

See the story and comment on it on its original page at http://tech.yahoo.com/blogs/devlin/17027.

Ice age weather? See how much ice buried the high altitude tropical city of Bogota, Colombia today on November 4, 2007. Paste this into your browser to view: javascript:void(window.open('http://cosmos.bcst.yahoo.com/up/ynews;_ylt=Ahl_gFTDChF4ETCJ5Z5_HdD9xg8F?ch=4226714&cl=4854979&lang=en','playerWindow','width=793,height=608,scrollbars=no'));

A Simpler Solution to the Energy Crunch

First, Double Nickels.

We need to institute what was done by Congress under President Nixon: impose a national speed limit that maximizes highway mileage, which is 55 miles per hour. This measure, when it was adopted the first time, not only cut consumption of gasoline and diesel fuel by several percentage points, adding 2 to 3 miles per gallon to the nation's average highway fuel economy, but also saved thousands of lives per year by reducing highway traffic accidents, and the best part of it was that no one hadto retool car manufacturing, revamp gasoline formulations, spend money on alternative energy schemes, some of which remain dubious in cost recovery, or impose punitive taxation to limit consumption at the pump to achieve the same benefits. Even a 1 or 2 percent reduction of gasoline consumption would add many thousands of barrels of fuel a day, in effect, to the nation's fuel supply.

Second, Sixty-Eight/Seventy-Five.

We need to pass a law requiring business establishments and government offices nationwide to set their heating thermostats no higher than 68 degrees Fahrenheit during colder weather, and air conditioning no lower than 75 degrees for summer weather. This should include EVERY business, no exceptions. In addition to this, advertising should be funded strongly encouraging private homeowners and renters to conserve energy by setting their thermostats to the same limits, 68 degrees maximum for heat, 75 degrees minimum for air conditioning. Besides conserving energy this would also encourage healthier living, because heat that is set too high fosters the multiplication of viruses and bacteria indoors, and A/C set too low tends to encourage the spread of mold and mildew, as well as impacting the immune system through excessive exposure to chill in the warm season. These factors are probably responsible for literally millions of respiratory illnesses every year that take enormous amounts of man-hours out of the economy and seriously impact our already beleaguered health care system.Let's do this now, since they would be easy to implement (compared to other measures) and with oil prices nearing $100 a barrel, both measures would be very timely and would put downward pressure on the price spiral that has been taking place.

Debt Collection Agency Rudeness to PAYING CUSTOMER

The following was posted on http://www.pissedconsumer.com/ recently.

First, background. I loaned my name to a friend of mine so that she could have a phone with Verizon. Shortly after she got the phone account she got into some trouble and was unable to pay the bill, and at the time neither was I. Time went by, Verizon sent notices to her address which was eventually vacated, and the account went into delinquency... after it did she tried to make a payment or two on it but gave up as she was also supporting a family and trying to keep a cell phone going with a different company. Two years go by... and I get a notice from this debt collection service called Allied Interstate. I'm wondering who these people are, and I call Verizon, and they verify that this is an agency that collects money for them and that indeed this old debt was valid.

So, I call Allied Interstate, a rather pleasant woman answers the phone and in the discussion she proposes these payment options which didn't at all fit with what my friend might be capable of paying all at once. I settled on $10 a month which would have incurred an extra charge of $6.95. The bill was over $250 total, and I thought about it, and though I'm unemployed I did actually have just enough to pay it by check. So, I repent of the $10 a month idea that my friend wanted to do and decided, "I just want this thing off my back." Mailed in a check for the whole amount.

The next day Allied Interstate leaves a message saying to call them. I'm like "what are they wanting now?" and it's 8 pm and my dad's in the shower and this isn't something I want to be his business. I talk to this male person, and he is abrupt and rude, the more so after I tell him I've changed my plans and am paying the whole amount up front. He starts treating me like I'm lying, and asks me these stupid questions like am I voluntarily doing this, and saying basically that AI won't accept the check unless I have a phone number to be reached at. His tone just gets more aggravating by the minute, he cuts me off when I try to tell him I don't really want to be called here, and he just acts like I screwed up by paying it all up front instead of letting them own me for two years on this stupid phone bill.

I was so angry after this, because of the verbal treatment of me doing the best thing I could do which is pay it all and have done with it, that I had to pray to God and you don't even want to know what it was I was praying for. All I can say is they better take the payment and leave me the hell alone or the next time I get a call and that asshole is on the phone taking the answer call, I'll file with the state attorney and have him up on stalking charges. Of course if there is also a class action pending or proposed that I hear about, I'll be signing up for that.

Nostradamus and the Last Days overview

I watched the Nostradamus "lost book" program on the History Channel last night. One of the predictions, interpreted by the scholars looking at the book of illustrations, and at the original quatrains, comes out roughly depicting this present Middle Eastern war lasting through two "nobles" or presidents, both with long terms. So, if that is correct, we're only midway through the "War on Terror" and if Iraq is winding down quickly as seems to be the case, then another front on this war is about to open that will last probably well into the second term of the next president, with an interruption due to the pre-Antichrist calm if the man of sin is to be revealed in 2012. Again, I say, if.

Also, the Nostradamus program pointed up the astronomical significance -- in Earth-Sun-Galaxy alignments -- of the year 2012. Apparently an alignment of the Sun in between the constellations Ophiuchus, Scorpio, and Sagittarius will center it exactly over the Galactic Center for the first time in 13,000 years in that year, as the ecliptic (Earth's orbital plane, path of the Sun in the sky) exactly intersects the center of the Milky Way as seen from Earth. What that actually means, who knows, but it's interesting. Anyway, coincident with that astronomical alignment is a repeat fulfillment (based on illustrations from the "lost book of Nostradamus") of Noah's Ark, or a sign of something similar happening. The interesting thing for me was that the Ark was depicted in the air, not on water. A sign of an aerial catching away, perhaps?

Another program on Nostradamus that I watched prior to the "lost book" program gives us a name for the evil ruler in the last days, MABUS. The experts were saying this is probably an anagram, but they combine the names Osama-Bush -- i.e., O.S.A.MABUS.H. However, my own opinion of this is neither Osama nor Bush are the Antichrist, even if their actions are bringing about the coming of this ruler. Being an anagram I think it is more likely a clue to the actual name of the ruler as "Hister" was to Hitler. If we rearrange the letters we probably get a lot closer to the name... such as Musab which is a name of one of the earliest and most famous disciples of Muhammed (as well as a moniker of Al Zarkawi, the recently killed Al Qaida figure in Iraq), and is pretty much the only Arab name with widespread references I can get out of it. If you think of others let me know.

This is a link -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mus%60ab_ibn_%60Umair to the original Mu'sab of history, as seen through the eyes of an obvious Muslim admirer... note the similarities between his character and career as a proselytizer and those of the apostles of Christ in Acts. We should probably expect a "man of peace" to look very much like this, until the time of war comes and he shows his true colors.

By the way, none of this should be taken to mean that any Biblical fulfillments taught on by Gene Scott or some others that I've elaborated on are negated by these scenarios.... I may not know how it all fits together yet, and Dr. Scott was probably the only one who did. So I am not by any means negating the future Ten Toes; one should include portions of Europe in it, into the Balkan nations, Turkey, the central Arab states, Egypt, and it will also include Iran, which technically is not an Arab nation and is also an ally of Russia as Turkey may soon become. In any case the union of ten is the last step of pre-Rapture fulfillment OR the very first thing that happens after the general church Rapture. When you see that, "look up, for your redemption is nigh."

I believe the Arab or rather Middle Eastern-Southeast European ten toes union comes after a US-Iran war if there is going to be a US-Iran war. Neither the present Iraq war nor a near-future Iran war is the Antichrist war, that's not yet. It's my firm but considered belief that a period of peace must intervene for Antichrist to come on the scene, probably a short period of calm following exhaustion due to war in the region. Let's not also forget that Egypt is to be a troubler in the last day, so there must be a regime in place there which is hostile to the US and hostile to peace with Israel, which means Mubarak and his supporters are out of the scene by then. (He is well into his 70s now.) And, Turkey is to wind up in the Russian sphere of influence to fulfill Ezekiel 37 in the last days, and the Kurdish troubles may spark that separation from the US toward Russia in the coming year or two. I'm already rather amazed at how fast the Iranian-Russian alliance beginning the fulfillment of Ezekiel 37 has progressed so far, after America blew opportunity after opportunity to win Iran over in recent years. Turkey appears to be next to gravitate into the Russian orbit, so watch that country, and also watch Egypt and its radical movements.