Promoted by slksfca.

I'm sorry this is late.  I did not realize I would be writing it.

This is the last double parsha, and the last consecutive reading until the very end of the holidays, since the holidays have special readings.  The children of Israel are poised to enter the land of Israel, and Moses finishes his second lecture and when next we hear from him he will be breaking into poetry.  The holidays end with Simchat Torah, where we will finish the book of Deuteronomy and immediately begin again with Genesis 1:1.

In a recent Coffee Hour Rain shared with us one aspect of Portlanders' passion for food. Here's my weirdo variation on that theme, as relates to my own city.

San Francisco in cookware (by Zhan Wang)

There's a rather quirky race shaping up in Salt Lake County for the Utah state legislature, one with significant implications for queer folk.

The challenger, Mel Nimer, is gay. He is also the president of Utah's Log Cabin Republicans, and a member of the Board of Directors of the Utah Pride Center. The incumbent, Ben McAdams, is a straight Mormon Democrat — and one of Utah's most prominent supporters of LGBT equality.

In the world of Native American art today, there are four extremely well-known traditions: the wood-carving traditions of the Northwest Coast tribes, Navajo blankets, Tohono O’odham baskets, and Pueblo pottery. Of these, Pueblo pottery is probably the best known.

I'm kicking off a new weekly series (hopefully).  I'm a big information junkie and I'm sure many of you are as well, and am always spotting interesting little stories here and there.  Well, in honor of school starting, and our own never-ending quest to broaden and expand our horizons, I'm sharing some of my finds and hope you share some of yours.

Promoted by Rain

During his first post-Restoring Honor rally show on Monday, Glenn Beck demonstrated the "contempt" of HuffPost by showing his audience some of the photos included in a HuffPost slide show titled Glenn Beck's Restoring Honor Rally: The Most Ridiculous Messages, which showed some of the messages on the clothing and buttons worn by rally attendees.

Beck, of course, in showing how "contemptible" HuffPost is, didn't show the slide show photos of the people in their "Got Tea?" and other Tea Party t-shirts, or the "Give me Liber-TEA," "I Love My Gun," and "Obama's Worst Nightmare" buttons. After all, Beck had insisted that this was not going to be a Tea Party rally, and had asked the attendees to leave their Tea Party and anti-Obama signs at home. And, following the instructions of their leader, they did. They just displayed their Tea Party messages on their persons instead. So, Beck carefully selected a few photos of people merely looking suitably patriotic in their red, white, and blue and rally-themed "Restoring Honor" attire, and then questioned how anyone could possibly think these people were ridiculous.

In a world measured in nano-seconds and instant on, you have to be fast when you are late.

I'm late.

Not late like the third base runner who takes off a zillionth of a second after the ball leaves the short stops hand. That's too late. " You're outta there."

There is no way to slide in at S/P. Your just flat late.  Words must hit the page, spelled in a recognizable manner even if not on time. It takes time.

Even when you are late. Hurry. Hurry up DD.

Zooming past the fold.

In the human energy system there is a rainbow bridge made up of the seven main energy vortices called chakras. There is, of course, controversy surrounding whether or not chakras even exist, and it is easy to understand. First they are not physical, in different cultures they are understood to radiate different colors and in some cases there is even disagreement regarding the actual location and functions of certain chakras. No human body, mind, nervous system is exactly the same as any other; on a gross level we all have the same equipment, but that equipment is tuned differently in each of us. So in my opinion, it is only natural for people and different cultures to perceive subtle energies differently.

A note to chakra skeptics, please feel free to disregard what you find here. I share this as a matter of general interest and as a primer for pieces that will come later. What follows is a very basic description of the seven main energy centers.

The United States acquired what would become Colorado and Utah from Mexico following a brief war in 1848. In the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, the United States agreed to recognize Indian land holdings and to allow Indian people to continue their customs and languages. At this time, the primary Indian tribes in Colorado were the Ute, Comanche, Arapaho, and Cheyenne. It was not long, however, before the American settlers in Colorado began to advocate that all Indians be removed from the territory so that the land could be developed for cattle, farming, and mining by non-Indians.

In 1880, the American government forced the Whiteriver Ute to agree to move to the Uintah Reservation in Utah where they were to live with other Ute bands. Under the agreement with the federal government, the bands were to have a perpetual trust fund created from the sale of their Colorado homelands. The United States, however, makes no attempt to sell the Ute lands and they remain in government possession.

Promoted by Ojibwa

According to Religious Right leader Lou Engle, evangelical Christians who don't get political are helping elect Satan's candidates.

In an interview with Charisma magazine, Engle said he believes that the midterm elections could turn on a rally he is leading this weekend in Sacramento.

"There is a hill above Capitol Hill," Engle said. "It's God's praying church who actually begins to influence the governments of the earth through their prayers."

Engle makes no apologies for his political advocacy. He believes if Christians don't influence politics, Satan will.

Prayer and preaching the gospel are the church's primary calling, he said. "But to say don't get involved in those high places [of government] is actually allowing our archenemy Satan to put his own people in those high places, where spiritual powers can actually control societies and release laws that actually legalize systemic evil," Engle added.

Welcome to Coffee Hour! Pull up a chair, pour your favorite beverage, and tell us about your day!

McDoc likes to tease me by saying that I have agoraphobia, because I have a bad habit of not leaving the house often enough. I'll start the day with the best of intentions about running errands or going to park or what have you, but then I'll get so caught up in some creative, usually computer-based task, that by the time I finally get my shoes on, it's nearly sunset.

Okay, I confess, a lot of that time gets eaten up by simply farting around online. If you're reading this, I'm sure you know what I mean!

I don't like Ken Mehlman; his responsibility as a Bush Administration flackey® and anti-gay culture warrior cannot easily be dismissed (or forgotten). But I am distressed, and frankly, irritated, by the harshness displayed by so many progressives — of all sexual orientations — in reaction to Mr. Mehlman's belated coming out (confirmed last week in a piece by The Atlantic's Marc Ambinder). The reaction I'm talking about is perhaps most succintly expressed by blogger Joe. My. God.:

Repulsive Anti-Gay Quisling Homophobic Scumbag Asshat Closeted Former RNC Chair Ken Mehlman Has Come Out

How is this kind of rhetoric in any way useful?