Another Aunt Nita

What power, what mysterious connection does Nita have to the cosmos at large? I'm just wondering, because I seem to recall some truly odd stories. She can correct me if she sees this, and I'll send her a link so she does.

Nita bought her "fancy sewing machine" sometime after her husband died. "He would never have brooked so much money on equipment for a hobby," she told her sisters. Nita never did anything by halves and she learned to use all the fancy geegaws on that machine. Next thing we knew she was sewing a fancy gown for a baby, sort of like a baptismal gown, but not so fancy. It was a burial dress for a still born or for a baby that didn't survive the stay in the neo natal intensive care. It was through some volunteer program, and she made her first gown. The tragedy in that story was that she only made one gown for the program and it was her grandchild that was buried in it. How did she know to get moving ahead to be ready?

Another program Nita voluteered for was playing her autoharp and leading singing at the local rehabilitation home. When they needed a contestant at the last minute at an autoharp contest, Nita was ready. She competed, fully expecting to come in dead last, but they had enough entries to hold the contest.

At some point she got involved in hospice, and helping families dealing with family members who were terminally ill. The training served her well when her husband was diagnosed with prostrate cancer.

All of this would just be coincidence, but she also tells of driving home as her mother died, trying to get home in time to say goodbye, and feeling her mother pass her as a shade or a shadow as she drove down the road. She knew at that point that she'd no need to hurry, and that her mother had already said goodbye. I don't think she has particularly worked for this "gift" or tried to develop it. But the woman has an sense, some power most of us do not.

Bits and Pieces

A quip from the comments in BuzzMachine

Someone needs to take away the Government’s right to employ the terminology of economics when they clearly have never understood it.

And finally an explanation for the Palin explosion. The Spectator:

For months, conservatives have mocked the celebrity appeal of Barack Obama, but now they are flocking to Palin in a similar manner. Just as liberals swooned for Obama because his biography appealed to their cultural sensibilities, conservatives instinctively identify with Palin, because, as Cindy McCain put it, she is a "reform-minded, hockey-mommin', basketball shootin', moose huntin', fly-fishin', pistol-packing, mother of five."

Lileks cuts through an article by a Canuck on the Palin Phenom. Not recomended for those with Democratic leanings.

The photo of the day is.... problematic! My own rules, and I can break them but I don't On picture in 10 goes in the blog. The choices today were birds out of focus and about 4 shots of the early morning light on my street. I like low light photography, I pulled out the tripod and then because there was intermittent lighting behind the houses I took a LOT of attemps to get some of the fireworks. No go. But the tripod is needed for these low light shots. My attempts to skip it are pathetic.