Christmas 2004 
Dear friends, neighbors, and foes,
May the Christmas Season find you happy and the New Year
add good health and prosperity.
My sister Marlene enters the sixth year of her successful
kidney/pancreas transplant, which “technically” has removed her from being a
juvenile onset “diabetic”. Her leg
doctors continue adjusting her prosthetic leg and her prosthetic eye makers has
promised to continue making her plastic eye, even though he is leaving the
field. When she can, Marlene continues
going to the YMCA, but her newest pursuit reflects her deepening interest and
study of current affairs, world health, and politics. No, she is not a candidate for office, but
she has been appointed to the
For me the past year saw a culmination of events that
often happen to the 100,000 + mile automobile.
In jumping that odometer hurdle many cars suffer: a rock in the
windshield – I got a basketball game poke in the eye that still hasn’t healed
properly; a couple flat tires – I popped a hernia as a five year old and the
same spot blew out traveling the bumpy roadways of life this year; worn down
shock absorber -- x-rays revealed that my continued one-sided, painful and
lumpy ride resulted from wearing down my cartilage suspension system cushioning
my left hip. Replacing shock absorbers
gets greasy while replacing a hip is bloody, so Chicken Little me is pursuing
everything from pills, yoga, and workouts to prolong or fix the hip’s
drivability.
Hoping that hope is on the way, early stem cell cartilage
re-growth is encouraging.
Due to needed repairs, I will miss a fourth 
consecutive
Habitat Build, right when the world so much needs Americans building homes and
lives, and thereby help stem the unprecedented evil will an historically epic
portion of the world is casting upon America due to our myopic policies. So, in this Christmas spirit of giving, I
hope you consider filling in for me and volunteer your time and or money to
Habitat. Volunteering for Habitat is as
close as you 
will
get, in a 2-3 week stint, to being a productive Peace Corps volunteer. And if you are a fundamental Christian, you
must have read those Biblical lines in which Christ asks us to walk in the
sandals of the meek, humble, and suffering, which is the dusty path some Peace
Corps volunteers and Habitat builders travel.
Had we had decades of a million yearly PCVs in the field, as Kennedy
wanted, we would not have anything near today proliferation of terror cells,
terrorists, and America hating erupting throughout today’s world. Habitat
offers a chance to walk the walk and not just talk the talk, which seems to be
what too many American believe is all the world’s declining super power needs
to do to fulfill its responsibility to lead the world to a more adult, healthy,
smart, and responsible future. Habitat
is a chance to win hearts and minds, so that tomorrow’s American soldiers are
less exposed to maiming, killing, and its costly aftermath. You can contact Habitat at: http://www.habitat.org/getinv/
You can review more of my policy thoughts on Peace Corps
and Habitat and
There
are not many more Christmas gifts one can give that tops helping build a house
for those in need of basic shelter.
Stemming hatred by performing works of good will and learning about the
world’s true needs is what Christ and all other religious leaders I know
of were all about, right?
Much of my work this year revolved around educating for the
future development of the 85-acre Canalways parcel. If you are interested in the politics and
headaches of land development in places like affluent
With political people involvement bubbling to historic
levels, I had increased opportunities to become re-involved on discussions on
the initiative, national initiative, and national policy issues. Some of that work is listed at: www.peopleslobby.hypermart.net and my web site:
To all my Excel customers, thanks. With increasing concentration in telecommunications,
as in all our industries, Excel faces difficulties accessing today’s broad band
telecommunications lines and, consequently, struggles to remain one of the
leading telecommunication companies that forced down phone rates years ago.
May you have happiness and good health through the coming
year.
“From everyone to whom much has been given, much will
be required; and from one to whom much has been entrusted, even more will be
expected.” (Luke 12:48)
LaGrange.
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