Good Friday

 One of the saddest days of the Church Year, Good Friday is again one of the Church days that are part of my family memory. The Litany and three hours of prayer for a young child is my memory. I can remember crying on Good Friday and still do; it is sad that Jesus died but in two days it will be Easter and Jesus lives once again; the sadness of the two days is wiped away and joy fills the heart in which Jesus dwells. 

Up early, my sleep pattern is somewhat awry but happily the Cataract Surgery is managed. I am very content with that and looking forward to getting started the first surgery and then the wait and the second surgery and I am finished. It will be my first real surgery actually at 78.5 years of age. How nice that it is an out-patient activity. Hospitals are wonderful places but I never want to be a patient if I can avoid it. 

Worked away on Blake but mostly getting back into it again; the last week has been somewhat chaotic but perhaps next week will be calmer and more routine. That lets me get back into the stream of work once again. Today I think I will do Blake again and then Pencombe on Saturday with Easter Sunday being a day of rest much needed for the eyes for sure. 

Looking around the world and the news is less full of Putin's war and Hamas's war. What a sad state for Russia to have Putin as their leader. He is a very greedy man and one is beginning to see the effect of Russia enslaving Eastern Europe after the second world war. Those who were adults are still conflicted by the KGB I think. They brainwashed all of Eastern Europe into thinking that Russia was unbeatable and Putin is pushing that theme as hard as he can. The problem I suspect is that Putin is quite willing to see Ukraine be a barren wasteland; he just wants the Ukrainians gone because he knows they are a much more ancient population than Russia is. Russia (certainly the population is descendant of the Ukraina Ice Refuge) by comparison is a young country composed of many many ethnic groups and he is slowly but surely eroding that unity that was created first by the Czar and later by Lenin and Stalin. He is destroying Russia and will complete the task likely over the next couple of years. Interesting spending time with that child from Russia. She simply did not understand the word no; if she wanted something she just never stopped talking about it and rotating between demanding to go to the United States and playing the sad neglected type who just really wanted to go to the United States. Neither of them won out with me although my husband was certainly becoming susceptible and actually said to me that we could just slip across at one of the small crossings. I said absolutely not she doesn't have a visa! But the type of person she was reminds me so much of Putin. Greedy and doesn't care who gets hurt along the path of what he desires. Anyone is just collateral damage. 

Then there is Hamas; a greedy terrorist group which has its sights on genocide of the Jewish people. One might ask why? Why is that? Ignorance and greed as Iran (and the people of the world through the United Nations) pays out the monies to support them in the lifestyle in which they have become accustomed. Then they found the right group to just have whatever they wanted because the United Nations was willing to do anything to appease the Palestinians. For some reason the United Nations, some of them, moved to the idea that the Palestinians had suffered. Their memories are short; I can remember Jewish children murdered in their school yards by Palestinians when I was a child. They simply moved from being the actual aggressors to playing the victim. They hoped that Hamas would get them the land which Israel had nurtured and brought forth to its glory whilst they sat in Gaza fed by the world doing nothing except whining. 

The two world situations both of which Jesus would have found unsupportable - Putin and Hamas. Jesus loved the downtrodden and that is Eastern Europe and the Jewish people. Eastern Europe finally escaped from the Soviet Union and there is Putin trying to pull them back in and using every KGB trick in the book. Give him an inch and he will take a mile and not care how many Russians died in the process and especially not how many Ukrainians. Sad really that the world has come to this once again where a brutish Nazi dictator tries to dominate and create a "new world order." That term should be very familiar to anyone studying the history of Hitler and the nazi movement. 

Well must have some breakfast and perhaps a nap since I am up so early. Done with thinking about the world situation for a bit. Good Friday Service will be on YouTube I am sure on the Church of England channel. I should go to Church; it is one of my failings but I am old and it is just easier to go to Church on YouTube. 

I actually think AI is a boon as I am going to utilize its power to do searching on the Internet for items. It will be very self-directed and I can accumulate information that is interesting to me in a rigorous fashion. We must always be in charge of AI though. It is powerful to be able to access and organize knowledge. It may be one of the most important abilities in the future as people put less time into memorization of facts and more into gaming and that sort of thing trusting they can always find any item they want to know. Knowledge is priceless and will keep our countries free; it is the lack of education that causes dictators to rise. All they want is as much money and things as dictators can accumulate; They have no interest in proper governance and they will do anything to stay at the top. 

Breakfast and then a nap.