Happy New Year American Patriots. It’s a new year, with a new battle looming. Sorry, but we still have to fight for our Republic, So lets start with this bloggers’ research on Islam in our country.
I hope everyone had a great New Year’s Eve, but now it is time for us to get back to work! The Sharia movement continues without rest. Today, we are going to take a look at the Islamic Social Services of Oregon (ISOS). Their motto is “Serving the Community through Islam”.
Hat tip to New Crusader.
Usually I provide direct links to all of the stories on the blog, but today, because it’s the magical time of Christmas and I am starting up the blog again; you can find the links. Merry Christ-mas!!!!
In Britain, the Christmas tree was introduced in the time of the personal union with Hanover, by George III’s Queen Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz in early 19th century, but the custom hadn’t yet spread much beyond the royal family. Queen Victoria as a child was familiar with the custom. In her journal for Christmas Eve 1832, the delighted 13-year-old princess wrote, “After dinner…we then went into the drawing-room near the dining-room…There were two large round tables on which were placed two trees hung with lights and sugar ornaments. All the presents being placed round the trees..”. After her marriage to her German cousin Prince Albert, by 1841 the custom became even more widespread throughout Britain. In 1847, Prince Albert wrote: “I must now seek in the children an echo of what Ernest [his brother] and I were in the old time, of what we felt and thought; and their delight in the Christmas-trees is not less than ours used to be”.
A woodcut of the British Royal family with their Christmas tree at Windsor Castle, initially published in the Illustrated London News December 1848, was copied in the United States at Christmas 1850, in Godey’s Lady’s Book (illustration, left). Godey’s copied it exactly, except for the removal of the Queen’s tiara and Prince Albert’s mustache, to remake the engraving into an American scene. The republished Godey’s image became the first widely circulated picture of a decorated evergreen Christmas tree in America. Art historian Karal Ann Marling called Prince Albert and Queen Victoria, shorn of their royal trappings, “the first influential American Christmas tree”. Folk-culture historian Alfred Lewis Shoemaker states, “In all of America there was no more important medium in spreading the Christmas tree in the decade 1850-60 than Godey’s Lady’s Book”. The image was reprinted in 1860, and by the 1870s, putting up a Christmas tree had become common in America.
The yule log happens to be one of the oldest Christmas traditions. In fact, it was created long before the act of Christmas came into existence. It originated in Scandinavia to celebrate the winter solstice and the beginning of longer days. This celebration meant that the darkest days were over and the rebirth of the sun has begun.
The burning of the yule log not only took place in the Scandinavian countries but also as far west as Ireland to the south in Greece to as far north as Siberia. The flames represented the light of the sun, but in later years, when it was incorporated into the Christmas holiday it represented the light of the Savior.
Many of us have heard about the burning of the yule log during Christmas, but few of us are aware of the reason for this ritual. Originally the burning of the yule log began during the winter solstice and lasted for a period of three days. As long as the log burned, people did not have to work. If that were the case today, I would be burning one continuously and long after the winter solstice ended. But today it is more symbolic than it is an actual ritual.
People chose their yule log based on many ideas and beliefs. Different types of tree wood represented different things to the people that burned them. Some chose the wood of the aspen for spiritual understanding. Others chose the wood of the mighty oak as it represented strength, wisdom and healing. The wood of the pine urged a coming year of prosperity and growth. And for those wishing for a family, opted for the wood of the birch representing fertility along with new beginnings. The ash, the most common, invoked protection.
Each year a new log is brought into the home and lit for the yule festival. It is a time of celebration, feast and family. In those days, fireplaces were quite large and could host the trunk that was brought in for burning. Usually they would soak this log in water for days or choose a very green log to ensure a long and consistent burn. The yule log is never allowed to completely burn as a piece is saved to start the new one the following year. Not only did this bring good luck, is also represented continuity and the eternal light of heaven.
The remaining piece of unburnt yule log was left in the house through the year to protect it from fire, lightning or hail. The ashes were sprinkled in wells to keep the water safe. Some ashes were also placed at the roots of fruit trees and vines to help them bear a good harvest the following year.
In some cultures, these logs were also used to predict bad luck. If the fire was ever allowed to go out before the night was over, it meant tragedy would strike the home in the coming year. If the flames cast someone’s shadow without a head, it supposedly meant that person would die within a year.
It was a ritual of the past that many held true to tradition and belief. In today’s world, fireplaces are no longer large enough to host a tree trunk to be used during the festival period. Many places do not even have a fireplace anymore, thus comes the creation of the symbolic yule log many of us have today.
The word itself does not have much appeal, the guttural sound and the thought of drinking egg doesn’t sound very appetizing to most. There are differing opinions as to the origin of the name for this famous drink. One version says that nog derives from an Old English word for strong beer, hence “noggin”. Another version attributes the name to Colonial America where colonists referred to thick drinks as “grog” and eggnog as “egg-and-grog”. Either way, we know it today as Eggnog.
It is believed that the eggnog tradition began in Europe as an adaptation of the various milk and wine punches often served at social gatherings. In the 17th century, eggnog was used as a toast to one’s health and was consumed by the well-to-do of society as milk and eggs were scarce commodities in Europe.
When the brew was brought to the “New World,” colonists added a new twist, rum. The rum Americans could get from the Caribbean was considerably less expensive than the other liquors shipped from England. And so, along with the readily available supply of milk and eggs in the colonies, the rum version quickly became a popular drink for people of all classes. As a rich, spicy and (oh yes) alcoholic drink, eggnog soon became a familiar item during the holiday season across the growing nation. Each region would adapt the drink to their personal tastes. Even George Washington devised his own version of the brew which only the most courageous would partake using rye whiskey, rum and sherry.
In the south, Southern taste replaced rum with bourbon. And when the brew reached Latin America even more adaptations were made; in Puerto Rico coconut juice or milk was added, in Mexico eggnog became a harder liqueur to be sipped with the addition of Mexican cinnamon and rum or grain alcohol, and in Peru it was made with the Peruvian pomace brandy called pisco.
Candles for the tree were glued with melted wax to a tree branch or attached by pins. Around 1890, candleholders were first used for Christmas candles. Between 1902 and 1914, small lanterns and glass balls to hold the candles started to be used.Albert Sadacca was fifteen in 1917, when he first got the idea to make safety Christmas lights for Christmas trees. A tragic fire in New York City involving Christmas tree candles inspired Albert to invent electric Christmas lights. The Sadacca family sold ornamental novelty items including novelty lights. Albert adapted some of the products into safe electric lights for Christmas trees. The first year only one hundred strings of white lights sold. The second year Sadacca used brightly colored bulbs and a multi-million dollar business took-off. Later, a company started by Albert Sadacca (and his two brothers Henri and Leon) called NOMA Electric Company became the largest Christmas lighting company in the world.
Historians largely agree that apple trees existed along the Nile River Delta as early as 1300 BC, but it is unclear whether cider was ever produced from the fruit.
When the Romans arrived in England in 55 BC, they were reported to have found the local Kentish villagers drinking a delicious cider-like beverage made from apples. According to ancient records, the Romans and their leader, Julius Caesar, embraced the pleasant pursuit with enthusiasm. How long the locals had been making this apple drink prior to the arrival of the Romans is anybody’s guess.
By the beginning of the ninth century, cider drinking was well established in Europe and a reference made by Charlemagne clearly confirms its popularity.
After the Norman Conquest of 1066, cider consumption became widespread in England and orchards were established specifically to produce cider apples. During medieval times, cider making was an important industry. Monasteries sold vast quantities of their strong, spiced cider to the public. Farm laborers received a cider allowance as part of their wages, and the quantity increased during haymaking. English cider making probably peaked around the mid seventeenth century, when almost every farm had its own cider orchard and press. The industry later went into decline, due to major agricultural changes. Cider regained its popularity during the twentieth century, but demand was largely for the mass-produced variety. Only in recent years has traditional cider making finally triumphed.
American history tells a different tale. Early English settlers introduced cider to America by bringing with them seeds for cultivating cider apples. During the colonial period, grains did not thrive well and were costly to import. On the other hand, apple orchards were plentiful, making apples cheap and easily obtainable. As a result, hard cider quickly became one of America’s most popular beverages. Consumption of cider increased steadily during the eighteenth century, due in part to the efforts of the legendary Johnny Appleseed, who planted many apple trees in the Midwest.
However, a series of events led to cider’s fall in popularity. The introduction of German beer with its faster fermentation process quickly made beer popular because German immigrants were able to set up large breweries for producing great quantities of beer. The production of apple cider was still limited to small farms. The religiously based Temperance movement then caused many church-going farmers to give up cider. Some even went as far as to chop down their apple trees. Then Prohibition became the law and pretty much destroyed the market for apple cider.
This is extremely disturbing and needs to be spread all over the net.
Washington – US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told the press on Wednesday that the US would be sending an additional $150 million in direct aid to the Palestinian Authority.
Yea, I know where I found this story, but sometimes it is better to get it from the “horses mouth”!
CNN Considers Political Correctness as a Factor in Ft. Hood Shootings?
The Major was and is a Major “Nut Job Muslim Terrorist” period. Case, closed, everything else done. All you Left Wing Socialist, Commie Bastards get over this one.
On Wednesday’s Situation Room, CNN’s Brian Todd actually considered that political correctness prevented earlier action against Ft. Hood shooter Nidal Hasan. Despite referencing “a senior investigative official who…said he has never heard any indication…that Hasan got any favorable treatment…before this shooting,” Todd also cited three others who were certain of the political correctness factor.
Good for him. I wish our elected cockroaches would follow his lead. But they won’t.
Holding aloft evidence of Hitler’s Final Solution, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday railed against Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for his denial of the Holocaust and scolded the United Nations for allowing Ahmadinejad to speak during its opening session of the 64th U.N. General Assembly.
With detailed reminders in hand of the war that sent 6 million Jews to their deaths in concentration camps, including construction blueprints for Auschwitz, Netanyahu took his turn at the dais to recall the agreement within the world body to create the Jewish state and express astonishment at what he witnessed a day earlier in that organization’s great hall.
He commended those who boycotted Ahmadinejad’s speech, but condemned those who allowed it.
Now, while the Lame Stream Media and the rest of the world “speculates”, I will let my learned readers “decide”. After, I have asked the following questions: How do we know they do not already have such a weapon? Just because the media and the powers that be around the world say so? And, what great plan does the “world” have for stopping them if they do?
Iran has perfected the technology to create and detonate a nuclear warhead and is merely awaiting the word from its Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, to produce its first bomb, Western intelligence sources have told The Times of London.
A U.S. National Intelligence Estimate two years ago concluded that Iran had ended its nuclear arms research programme in 2003 because of the threat from the American invasion of Iraq. But intelligence sources have told The Times that Tehran had halted the research because it had achieved its aim — to find a way of detonating a warhead that could be launched on its long-range Shehab-3 missiles.