QUARANTINE BLOG # 470

July 13, 2021

The top American general in Afghanistan, Gen. Austin S. Miller, stepped down yesterday, a symbolic moment as the United States nears the end of its 20-year-old war and Taliban fighters sweep across the country.  “Our job is now not to forget,” General Miller said.  

The ceremony came on the heels of a Taliban military offensive that has taken swaths of the country, sometimes without firing a shot.  The Taliban’s advance is a constant indicator of the United States-led mission’s inability to groom an effective Afghan military despite spending billions of dollars on the effort since the U.S. invasion in 2001.  2,442 U.S. troops have been killed and 20,666 wounded since the war began.

President Joe Biden promised an end to the United States’ longest foreign war in April while trying to assure the Afghan government that it was not being abandoned as Taliban forces surged across the country.  Despite thousands of airstrikes, increased civilian casualties and short-term tactical gains, the final agreement between the insurgent group and the United States in February 2020 clearly favored the Taliban, and the Afghan government was completely cut out of the deal.

👉  Brian sent me this one from Victoria, BC.  

The man used to go to public functions, and he always carried a sugar bag to collect empty bottles and cans.  His name was Albert (Tapper) Torney.  Everyone thought he was a bit eccentric and kids would tease him.  After he died in 1998 (aged 86) his large collection of model cars made from aluminum cans was discovered.  This goes to prove “you shouldn't judge a book by its cover” or a sculptor by his sugar bag.  Some of his amazing collection:

👉  Nationwide, the cases of reported COVID-19 infections is up 60% in the last 14 days (66% here in Georgia).  The uptick in cases is primarily due to localized outbreaks in places with low vaccination rates.  Parts of Arkansas, Missouri, Texas and Nevada are struggling as the Delta variant spreads.  48% of us are vaccinated nationwide (only 37% in Georgia).  79% Americas 65 years old and up have had both shots as compared to 59% of the rest of the population.  Deaths also appear ready to start climbing.  More than 99% of deaths are now among people who have not been vaccinated, the Center for Disease Control and Prevention reports. 

  Something to think about:

👉  Let’s go back to the lanes and roll a few.  Nine pins was the most popular form of bowling in much of the United States from colonial times until the 1830s, when several cities in the United States banned nine-pin bowling out of moral panic over the supposed destruction of the work ethic, gambling, and organized crime.  Ten pin bowling is said to have been invented in order to meet the letter of these laws.  

Today, nine pins are bowled mostly in Europe.  In modern systems the pins are reset by a pinsetter which lifts up the pins, each connected by a string on top, and lowers them back into the square shape for the next throw.  The strings can be a positive factor for the bowler, as they can knock down other pins.

Candlepin bowling is played with a handheld-sized ball and tall, narrow pins that resemble candles, hence the name.  In candlepins each player uses three candlepin balls per frame, rather than two.  Candlepin balls lack finger holes, are much smaller, 4½ in diameter and weigh as much as only one candlepin.   

Fallen pins are not cleared away between rolls during a frame.  Fallen pins in the gutter are “dead wood” and cannot be used in scoring.  Other fallen pins are “live wood” and can be propelled into standing pins to increase the bowler’s score.  In addition to the foul line for the bowler themselves, there is a line 10 feet down the lane from the foul line; this is the “lob line,” and the ball must first contact the lane at any point on the bowler’s side of it.  Any pins knocked down by such a lob ball does not.

Personal note: When we lived in the area of Pittsburgh television, we watched “Bowling for Dollars.”  When we lived in Connecticut, the show was called “Candlepins and Dollars” (our first exposure to the game with the tall, skinny pins).

Duckpin bowling is a third variation of the sport of bowling.  Duckpin balls are 5 inches in diameter, and weigh 3 lb 12 oz, and lack finger holes.  Duckpins, though arranged in a triangle identical to that used in ten-pin bowling, are shorter, slightly thinner, and lighter than their ten-pin equivalents, which makes it more difficult for the smaller ball to achieve a strike.  The bowler is allowed three rolls per frame.

In 1953, Ken Sherman developed the first automatic duckpin pinsetter.  No parts for the Sherman pinsetter have been manufactured since 1973, so that anyone wanting to open a new bowling center must cannibalize parts.  Only one company makes duckpins, and it only leases them.  Both of these facts have severely limited the expansion of duckpin bowling.

Because of the size of the pins and their placement on the alley, there has never been a sanctioned 300 game rolled in duckpins.  The high score a 279 game rolled by Pete Signore Jr. in 1992.

👉  Some smiles for your busy day:

👉  Today’s close continues in Psalm 119 from Praying with the Psalms, by Eugene H. Peterson.

“I find my delight in your commandments, because I love them” (Psalm 119:47).

Jesus summarized all the commandments of God by telling us to love God and to love our neighbor.  This psalmist goes a step further, and loves the commandments that tell him to love!

Prayer: O God, your love creates me, redeems me, and commands me.  May all my responses to you be shaped in love, for the sake of Jesus Christ who first loved me.  Amen.

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