"Fooding" is not usually a verb, but it is in the Himalayas, so I'm absconding with it for local use. Today the Junior Friends had a fundraiser, though perhaps not sufficiently announced.
The theme was "Middle Eastern" and extended to include a lamb stew (even if many Friends are individually vegetarian). I brought the ingredients for Teresina Lentils and cooked the dish en situ, in our "Food Not Bombs" kitchen (as I tend to think of it, private namespace).
Speaking of which, Walker has re-purposed a portion of her wardrobe to practice as "FNB CEO" (one of many in an anarchy). Not that different from me being in the Education Ministry, sometimes as the actual Minister (rotating position). Steve Holden and I are watching In the Thick of It (BBC), which is fun.
Keith McHenry is another FNB CEO who has come through. He's been in Mexico and Chiapas and places. I've read some communiques. Walker is meeting with Unitarians today, after their service. She's droped her urban survivalist look for something more churchy today.
Today is Business Meeting at Multnomah Meeting. I should ascend the stairs and continue journaling from there.
Was what happened in Connecticut all that different from what happened in Fallujah? Crazed mad-cow-like humans hell bent on taking lives, and equipped with the tools for so doing.
I'm curious about whom nominating has added to the slate for Oversight Committee (OC). We lost four Overseers in a short time recently, including the previous clerk (Debbie has been acting clerk).
Walker thinks a Major Payne type character, perhaps more than one, vets, friendly big guy types whom the kids adore, would be a stereotypical, OK way to add security. They have responsibilities as faculty as well. We had our armed guards in Manila but they didn't get to teach anything.
I'm used to the idea of armed security around me, on base, in the hood. Should kids be practicing with swipe cards then? It depends on the school I think. School is a lot about preparing for the work place, and a lot of work places are locked down to some degree. Learning the habits of working in secure environments is worth starting early.
Mari, Barbara and I talked about language learning, Arabic in particular. Mari has been in Egypt recently. She's finding Arabic hard. She and Barbara both speak Spanish pretty well. Mari has noticed Arabic roots in Bantu. I bought some coffee roasted by Josh, one of our former armed services guys. I don't speak any Arabic, to speak of, though I've studied it and admire it.
Leslie Hickcox gave the annual report of the FCNL liaison: she'd traveled to DC for the November meeting. The Friends Committee on National Legislation is a Quaker lobby based in the Imperial City (QUNO represents Quakers to the United Nations).
There's a somewhat slow version of the Countdown to Zero campaign going on around Congress, run mostly by eventualists (not immediatists, i.e. not radical abolitionists).
"Immediatist" is a term from Civil War days, when some people wanted to end the institution of slavery in North America right away. Others, including many Friends, were for ending slavery all in good time, maybe in a few hundred years. Big wheels turn slowly and so on.
