If the first chapter of Unweaving the Rainbow was all about the wonder of the world, the second chapter is about how people think that science lessens that wonder. Dawkins gives us snippets of poetry villifying science, and the history of science and poetry’s relationships. He also bemoans the current state of public thought about science in terms highly reminiscent of those used by the church.

Dawkins complains that scientists are expected to make their work unrecognizable in an effort to appeal to the masses, treating science as fun and nothing but fun, as though the idea were to lure kids into the field and then hit them with the reality of scientific study like a mackerel in the face. His complaints precisely echo those of churches where there is pressure to remove everything from Christianity but “God loves you.” He complains about the relativistic notions of truth that cause people to behave as though identifying something as a fact is in some way oppressive — and sounds just like people of faith who complain that moral relativism causes people to behave as though believing in absolute truth were somehow oppressive. I like the irony of this, since Dawkins is an evangelical atheist.

We are inviting our glamorous aunt to Thanksgiving, and #2 daughter will be able to come after all, so the guest list is expanding. I think that, with the turkey a foregone conclusion, adding an extra pie and a vegetable or two is the best way to approach this. So here is a recipe for a really wonderful apple pie:

Special Apple Pie

4-5 apples, peeled, cored,and thinly sliced
1/2 c. apricot jam
3 T lemon juice
2 T grated lemon peel
1/2 c. raisins
1/2 c. sugar
1 t cinnamon

Toss all these things together and arrange them in a deep-dish pie crust.

1/2 c. flour
1/2 c. sugar
1/4 c. butter (1/2 stick)
1 c. ground walnuts or pecans

Cream the butter and sugar and stir in the nuts. Sprinkle it over the fruit and bake the pie for about an hour, till the top is nicely browned.

I had a call last night from a dear friend with whom I had lost touch when I switched churches. I am seeing some of my former choir-mates at the Master Chorale, and this old friend is gathering some others for lunch on Sunday. We are having glorious fall days, and Thanksgiving is such a perfect season for reconnecting with old friends and family.

It is absolutely not the season for knitting pirate hats, but I just have to link you to the pattern, because it is so cute. Maybe you have a little friend who would like to have this hat for Christmas. If so, then this would be the perfect time for knitting pirate hats.

We now have TV at our house, after a hiatus of two or three months.

I arranged it online. I got a message from some place in east Texas (I know, because the email had “easttexas” in its address line) telling me that I had an appointment for Nov 2, between 8:00 and 10:00 a.m. I was to have someone over 18 at home and my animals secured so that the cable guy could have access to the outside and inside of my home. I was to have money ready in small unmarked bills — no, actually, it just said they wouldn’t take cash. I just got carried away there.

So I stayed home, skipping the gym, and knitted a completely incorrect repeat of the bawk’s cable pattern. Along about 9:30, I heard a truck pull up and thought they had arrived. But no one came to the door. I did housework, fended off Jehovah’s Witnesses, and got cross with the cable guy. At 9:45, I called the store to say I was going to wait until 10:00 precisely before I left, so I would be late.

At 10:00, I left for work, leaving a note on the door for the tardy cable guy, seriously cross because I would be late to work and would also have to go through the whole thing again later. And I didn’t even want TV.

After school, my sons both called me — one from work and one from home — to say that the cable was working. The Poster Queen said that she didn’t think the cable guy needed the householder. “They need you to sign a paper,” I said, “and give them money.” She said they just bill you.

I think she was right. I don’t know what those folks in East Texas were thinking about. I do however have a mental image of the cable guys. I see them gathered after their workday, with a few beers, sniggering.

“I like to arrive just exactly at 10:00, so they have had to wait the whole time but I’m not exactly late,” says one.
“Yeah, but it’s better to get there and do it, but not tell them, so they still have to keep waiting,” says the second.
“Yeah!” sniggers the third. “That way they might even call the office and complain, and the people in the office will tell them that their cable has been on all day. Hng, hng.”

That’s the sniggering.

Where I live, there is no TV reception without cable. My menfolks had agreed that we could do without cable, but when football season began, they changed their minds.They had the TV on all yesterday evening. I was at work and at choir practice for some of the time, but I still was present for quite a bit of TV. The thing I found interesting was that the programs being broadcast appear to be exactly the same as they were three months ago. Not just the same schedule. They seem to me to be the same movies, the same episodes of the situation comedies, the same stand-up comics, and the same basketball games. This last can’t be true; I am sure that the game was a new one, but it did look exactly the same to me as all previous ones.

#1 son judged a dance contest on public access TV, though, so he claims that we can watch him doing this. I know that #2 daughter used to be on public access, singing, every few days after they had filmed her once, so I guess we will have myriad opportunities to see #1 son judging this dance contest.

As for me, I have a meeting this morning with the trainer at the gym. This should be a novel experience. I have no idea what trainers at the gym do. The first chapter of Unweaving the Rainbow is a lovely sort of hymn (famed atheist Dawkins actually uses the word “blessed”) to the marvels of the world and our great fortune to be alive. If you are feeling at all depressed, you might just pop down to the library and grab a copy and read it, because it is quite a joyful thing. It is so beautifully written, too — Dawkins is wonderful with words. He is in large measure saying what Stevenson did: “The world is so full of a number of things/ I’m sure we should all be as happy as kings.” With an added measure of pleasure because of the sheer statistical improbability of our being alive at all, when we had so many opportunities to be dead. While Dawkins is offering squid as an example of the kind of new and amazing experience that should thrill us, I think meeting with a trainer could be just as good.

If it is, I will resist the temptation to tell the young man that I found him as thrilling as a squid.

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Here is an update. I did meet with Evan,. and I cannot tell whether he is more or less thrilling than a squid, but I will tell you that my meeting with him was very useful. He was competent, knowledgeable, and bright, and I intend to introduce him to my daughter.

If you have the opportunity to meet with a trainer yourself, do it. I already knew the Frequency Intensity Time bit, but he explained how to tell whether you are working hard enough, how to tell when to increase the intensity of the workout and how to do so, how to keep track, how to use the machines correctly, and how to organize a workout. He gave me a paper to list things and check them off (and you know how I like that) and showed me where they are filed in the gym. I feel as though I had a really good workout, as opposed to merely doing the 30 minutes the doctor said to do.

Now, I may not get as much magazine reading done as I have hitherto. If it weren’t for the gym, I wouldn’t even know who Mary Kate and Ashley were. But I do think I will enjoy my gym time more, and be more fit.

I also am watching TV — The Daily Show, in particular. So I will quit whining about the boys’ forcing me to have cable.

Yesterday, the bawk was fine. I was joking that it might have looked alarmed. However, it probably should have looked alarmed, because look what happened to it between then and now. The second repeat, at the top, bears little resemblance to the first repeat. It will all have to be frogged.

Sigh. I came home last night after class and knitted while reading Pompeii, without looking at the pattern — and I suppose without looking at the first repeat, either. This morning I sat and knitted while waiting for the cable guy, and did not notice how wrong it was. Then I had rehearsal after work and knitted some more, continuing with the error. What was wrong with me? I do not know. But I definitely lost a day on this bawk. I may still be able to finish it this week, as I had planned. But right now I have to pull out several inches. Sigh.

Having finished Pompeii in time for today’s Book Club meeting, I have returned to the Richard Dawkins readalong. And I find that the creation /evolution debate continues to be in the news. More than half of all Americans, according to AOL news reports, do not believe in evolution. A woman in discussion group last night claimed that all the fossil evidence was deposited in the flood (of Noah and the ark fame). I kept my eyes down; I like and respect the women in that group, even if it does seem to me that a literal reading of the book of Genesis requires more imagination than I have.

If you are still finding the subject interesting, I have some good online references for you:

Here is a really mean-spirited, dark humor kind of bit on the question of intelligent design. It does make some excellent points, but please consider yourself warned and do not click on that link if you are easily offended. I found it over at Swatch It, where you will also find some Fuzzy Feet action.

Here is one without the violence. And here is one which is not funny at all, but has a lot of points to ponder.

I am being a Fuzzy Feet spectator right now, though I have picked out the yarn for my second pair. I hope to make them over the weekend. By now, #2 daughter has probably received the first pair — she should have been surprised, because I lied outright and said that they were not for her. In reality, she had already told me that she had no slippers and was freezing (sob!) so she had to get the first pair in her coat-and-cookie care package. I am hoping to finish the fifth bawk before casting on for the second Fuzzy Feet. If you want to make yourself a bawk, here is a link to a free online pattern.

There is some sort of strange SUV convention going on next door. I’m sitting here, minding my own business, finishing Pompeii for book club and getting in my hour on the bawks, and twelve SUVS drive up next door. Vroom, park, slam. Vroom, park, slam. Twelve times. A few minutes pass, and then it is slam, park, vroom. Twelve times. I have no explanation for this.

Here is the bawk, though. Does it look frightened? Alarmed and greenish because it knows that the odd goings-on next door are signs of — Hmm… Recent reading offers me signs of impending doom of various kinds. Volcanoes about to erupt and destroy all the decadent Romans… a global flood preparing to wipe out all living things… the Four Horseman of the Apocalypse getting out their motorcycles to prepare the end of the world… war and devastation striking down the bridegroom and the farmers…

Well, no, actually, A strange gathering of SUVs in a quiet street doesn’t actually fit in with any of those scenarios, does it? I guess we’re okay.

For today.