Craters of the Moon National Park

This park is in Idaho and it is basically a huge area full of dried lava rock. We even got to look down the centers of two very old volcanoes. One of them had snow in the bottom. It was pretty cool. It is interesting to see the rocks covered with lichens and then once the lichens turn the lava to small rocks other small plants come in and grow and then eventually the lava is broken down enough for sagebrush, trees and other vegetation to start growing. What a planet!! We also saw a lot of chipmunks there!!

The Teaching Company

We love the teaching company!! We have almost all of their lectures and they have all been fabulous. They are a major part of the high school education we want for our children. My favorite is The History of Freedom by Rufus Fears. He starts with the battle of Marathon in Greece so we learn that the marathon is named for that battle when a soldier ran from Marathon to Athens to tell the Athenians not to let the invaders in because they beat them at Marathon and then he dropped dead after delivering the message and it was 26 miles that he ran. Dr. Fears tells it much better of course!! Then Dr. Fears go through some Roman history and Alexander the Great to Constatine, to England and finally the United States and the constitution. That's just what I remember from first listening to it about 2 years ago so my facts may not be exactly right on. It was so enlightening to hear all these historical events in perspective with each other and how we got to the United States and the constitution. I highly recommend that lecture. The others have been very interesting and enlightening too. I just love learning new things!! I think libraries have them too because they do get expensive, always buy them on sale!!

Their website is www.teach12.com

I hope you enjoy. They have free lectures you can download and those are always interesting too!

The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James

This was a very long book!! My audio files came out to about 17 hrs. Volume I is especially lengthy in describing and protraying the main characters of the story. The real interesting attention-getting part doesn't come until volume II. If I had to recommend the book to anybody, I would explain the point of vol. I which is that Isabel Archer is a perfect American lady who attracts the very best of men and turns them down. She is also admired by her invalid cousin, Ralph, who convinces his dying father to bestow half his inheritance on her, thus making her a free and rich woman- able to do whatever she imagines in life. There are some good comparisons between the old and new worlds and the difference in social behaviors between the 2 that are quite interesting and just seeing the way things were back them might be worthwhile, but it does take a long time.

Then we get to vol. II. Isabel actually gets married!!! She was deceived into it though on account of her large inheritance. She also comes to find out that her husband had been an adulterer and her good friend his partner and the true mother of his fine daughter. The descriptions of the way Gilber, her husband, treats Isabel and Pansy, his daughter are very educational. He was so underhanded and good at manipulating appearances so that he would always be obeyed. Even so, Isabel has a hard time breaking away from him to comfort her cousin before his death, because she is so commited to the contract of marriage and admits she did it of her own free will. This is admirable and yet Gilbert was so mean, that I hoped she would leave since there were no children involved. Her longtime suitor whom she turned down many times again tried to canvince her to marry him, but in the end she returns to Rome although we don't know what she does once she gets there.

This book is all about relationships. There are several throughout. It is interesting to read about the different ones described. It is also nice to see the consequences of the heroine's decisions. Overall, I think it was worth listening to, but there are probably many other better books to study before this one.

Thanks for reading!!

Money As Debt

There is an excellent video you can watch for free online that explains our money system pretty well. It is a cartoon and it will help you understand a little better why we are in the situation we are as far as the economy goes. Basically our money is not backed up by anything substantive like gold, and the way we get more money is not through working first and then getting paid, it is by taking out loans. The loan money we get from the banks is not actual money they have, it is money that we promise to pay in the future and therefore DEBT!!! Our Money today is DEBT!!! So when people forclose on their homes and stop making payments, the loan money they received and used is essentially gone - disappeared- no longer there. So that causes the bank to scramble because they've been using that promise to pay to lend out more Debt money. It is a huge mess!!! This video does a great job of explaining banking and how this system of money as debt works. Their idea for how to fix it is interesting, but I think we would be better off to just move to a gold standard and have our money have intrinsic value. I think that would fix this mess. In a lot of ways, I hope the whole system does come down because it is so messed up. The fear is that we could end up with something worse though since most people just don't understand basic economics and money. But if that is you, then this video will help!!

Here's the link : http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-9050474362583451279

The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith Book 1 and the introduction

Adam Smith is considered the father of economics and now I know why. I read chapter one and the introduction of Adam Smith's, The Wealth of Nations. If we as Americans read and understood what Adam Smith was telling us in 1776, maybe we wouldn't be in the economic situation we are in now. The aspects I will discuss in this essay are the devaluation of currency, price of commodities and price of labour and wages.

Smith gives an excellent history and lesson on money and how metals were first chosen as a means of exchange because of their portablility and stability. Then he talks about how rulers would issue coins that actually contained less gold or silver than they did previous and how this devalued the money which would lead to inflation. I wish we understood this concept today. The dollar isn't even backed by anything, all it is is a piece of paper and in many cases today it's not even a piece of paper; it's just a number in a computer somewhere. No wonder we are experiencing massive inflation now. We don't have a stable means of exchange. It's unfortunate we left the gold standard, we are paying the price now.

Another very interesting and applicable point Smith makes in this first book is that prices are almost always measured by the amount of corn or wheat that can be bought. In times of plenty the price of food is lowered and price of luxuries are increased, but in times of scarcity, the price of food will rise and luxuries may no longer even be exchanged. People will not care for extras, just the necessities in times of scarcity. Food is always necessary and is a good measure of the economy. He also discussed the interesting idea that laborers earn more money in times of plenty and are more independent than in times of scarcity. He says the opposite is also true:

"Masters of all sorts, therefore frequently make better bargains with their servants in dear that in cheap years, and find them more humble and dependent in the former than in the latter. They naturally therefore, commend the former as more favourable to industy." (towards the end of Chapter VIII Of the Wages of Labour)

He also points out that the masters, landlords and farmers, often make a better profit in dear years because the price of labour is less. Another interesting point he brought up earlier in this chapter is that wages for laborers are the highest when the economy is growing rapidly. He says:

"It is not the actual greatness of national wealth, but its continual increase, which occasions a rise in the wages of labour. It is not, accordinigly, in the richest countries, but in the most thriving, or in those which are growing rich the fastest, that the wages of labour are highest."

This was an excellent read and very thought provoking. I highly recommend this book especially if you want to learn more about Economics. So many things begin to make sense under this new light. Adam Smith is very exact and uses many case studies from history to illustrate his points. If you are willing to take the time to really delve in and understand his points, then you can certainly draw parallels to the present. Good luck, thanks for reading!!

Red Badge of Courage

This is a male novel. The youth/ soldier/ main character, Henry Fleming is excited to fight in the Civil War and to be a war hero. He runs off in his first battle when he thinks they are losing only to find that they won that battle and he should have stayed. He was extremely disappointed in himself but tried to justify his action and eventually found his way back to his regiment and in the following battles fought bravely and eventually died in battle to gain his Red Badge of Courage and was at last a man.

My moms' book club was unimpressed and spent only about 15 min. on the whole thing( I unfortuantely had to miss it this month). Moms don't like war. Henry Fleming should have listened to his mother and stayed home where it was safe. War is stupid. I suppose there are times when we have to defend ourselves, but the Civil War was just a great slaughterhouse. No other country fought a war to defeat slavery, they just slowly outlawed it as Great Britain did. What a shame we could not do the same. There are better ways of dealing with things, but I guess that if you can't work it out, then you have to kill each other and hopefully the good guys win.

We were going to read War and Peace next, but decided we have had enough of war stuff so we will be reading Portrait of a Lady and Wuthering Heights next and then we'll start War and Peace.

Is Harry Potter good or bad?

There is a great article on this subject on the Memoria Press website.

The idea basically is that all literature can be dangerous if it is the only literature a person has read, the only ideas they have come across. Literature becomes less dangerous the more one reads. By being exposed to many ideas one learns to discern when they are reading something bad, good or great. Great literature is literature that teaches truth and inspires a person to do good.

Harry Potter is only dangerous if it is the only thing read. Otherwise, it is a good book with a good story, but not a great book.

Read the article here http://www.memoriapress.com/articles/08/potter.html and check out some of their other articles here: http://www.memoriapress.com/articles/index.html