"The problem with movies and books is they make evil look glamorous, exciting, when it's no such thing. It's boring and it's depressing and it's stupid. Criminals are all after cheap thrills and easy money, and when they get them, all they want is more of the same, over and over. They're shallow, empty, boring people who couldn't give you five minutes of interesting conversation. Maybe some can be monkey-clever, some of the time, but they aren't hardly ever smart."
Dean Koontz
“You are fettered,” said Scrooge, trembling. “Tell me why?”
“I wear the chain I forged in life,” replied the Ghost. “I made it link by
link, and yard by yard; I girded it on of my own free will, and of my
own free will I wore it. Is its pattern strange to you?”
Scrooge trembled more and more.
“Or would you know,” pursued the Ghost, “the weight and length of the
strong coil you bear yourself? It was full as heavy and as long as this,
seven Christmas Eves ago. You have laboured on it, since. It is a
ponderous chain!..."
“But you were always a good man of business, Jacob,' faltered Scrooge, who now began to apply this to himself.
"Business!' cried the Ghost, wringing its hands again. "Mankind was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence, were, all, my business. The deals of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!”
Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol
The US Dollar rallied today, purportedly on statements that Fed Chair to be Yellen would like to see a stronger dollar.
LOL
Actions speak louder than words.
This is a holiday shortened week, and shenanigans will be abounding until the end of the year.
Gold and silver retreated a bit.
Silver always shows more energy than gold when they are moving.
"Why is God landing in this enemy-occupied world in disguise and starting a sort of secret society to undermine the devil? Why is He not landing in force, invading it? Is it that He is not strong enough? Well, Christians think He is going to land in force; we do not know when. But we can guess why He is delaying. He wants to give us the chance of joining His side freely. I do not suppose you and I would have thought much of a Frenchman who waited till the Allies were marching into Germany and then announced he was on our side.
God will invade. But I wonder whether people who ask God to interfere openly and directly in our world quite realise what it will be like when He does. When that happens, it is the end of the world.
When the author walks on to the stage the play is over. God is going to invade, all right: but what is the good of saying you are on His side then, when you see the whole natural universe melting away like a dream and something else — something it never entered your head to conceive — comes crashing in; something so beautiful to some of us and so terrible to others that none of us will have any choice left? For this time it will be God without disguise; something so overwhelming that it will strike either irresistible love or irresistible horror into every creature.
It will be too late then to choose your side. There is no use saying you choose to lie down when it has become impossible to stand up. That will not be the time for choosing: it will be the time when we discover which side we really have chosen, whether we realised it before or not. Now, today, this moment, is our chance to choose the right side. God is holding back to give us that chance. It will not last for ever. We must take it or leave it."
C. S. Lewis, 1944
"Let us profit by what every day and hour teaches us, as it flies. What is dark while it is meeting us, reflects the Sun of Righteousness when it is past. Let us profit by this in future, so far as this, to have faith in what we cannot see. The world seems to go on as usual. There is nothing of heaven in the face of society; in the news of the day there is nothing of heaven; in the faces of the many, or of the great, or of the rich, or of the busy, there is nothing of heaven; in the words of the eloquent, or the deeds of the powerful, or the counsels of the wise, or the resolves of the lordly, or the pomps of the wealthy, there is nothing of heaven.
And yet the Ever-blessed Spirit of God is here; the Presence of the Eternal Son, ten times more glorious, more powerful than when He trod the earth in our flesh, is with us. Let us ever bear in mind this divine truth,—the more secret God's hand is, the more powerful—the more silent, the more awful.
Wonderful providence indeed which is so silent, yet so efficacious, so constant, so unerring. This is what baffles the power of Satan. He cannot discern the Hand of God in what goes on; and though he would fain meet it and encounter it, in his mad and blasphemous rebellion against heaven, he cannot find it."
John Henry Newman
Pride blinds Satan from seeing the works of the Lord.
It is the first and greatest sin.
Those who harden their hearts with pride, and aloof disdain, have invited the parasite of evil to latch onto their souls, and drain themselves of the vitality of true life, which is love.
The range in the equity futures markets was a bit surprising really.
The same with the precious metals.
Unless you have actively speculated in the futures markets, ranges of this magnitude are not so impressive perhaps.
I suspect that there were more 'technical' shenanigans involved in this, despite the attribution of the talking heads to the sudden realization that there is a new strain of the virus in the UK.
The rally in the miners while the metals were slumping was also of interest.
I like to think of this sort of thing as cleaning and sanding the tape, before the year end paint is applied.
It did tend to clear out the small specs I would imagine.
Please remember our friend and fellow blogger Tony Sanders in your prayers. He is still in hospital, struggling with pneumonia and the coronavirus.
And of course, we pray for all those who are affected by illness and hardships, often made worse by the pride and willful ignorance of others.
“What we would like to do is change the world--make it a little simpler for people to feed, clothe, and shelter themselves as God intended them to do. And, by fighting for better conditions, by crying out unceasingly for the rights of the workers, the poor, of the destitute--the rights of the worthy and the unworthy poor, in other words--we can, to a certain extent, change the world; we can work for the oasis, the little cell of joy and peace in a harried world.
We can throw our pebble in the pond and be confident that its ever widening circle will reach around the world. There is nothing we can do but love, and, dear God, please enlarge our hearts to love each other, to love our neighbor, to love our enemy as our friend.”
Dorothy Day
“Above all, do not lie to yourself. A man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to a point where he does not discern any truth either in himself or anywhere around him, and thus falls into disrespect towards himself and others. Not respecting anyone, he ceases to love, and having no love, he gives himself up to passions and coarse pleasures in order to occupy and amuse himself, and in his vices reaches complete beastiality, and it all comes form lying continually to others and himself.
A man who lies to himself is often the first to take offense. it sometimes feels very good to take offense, doesn't it? And surely he knows that no one has offended him, and that he himself has invented the offense and told lies just for the beauty of it, that he has exaggerated for the sake of effect, that he has picked up on a word and made a mountain out of a pea--he knows all of that, and still he is the first to take offense, he likes feeling offended, it gives him great pleasure.”
Fyodor Dostoevsky
"For what does it profit a man, to gain the whole world, but lose his very soul?"
Mark 8:36
Today was the quadruple witching options expiration, and the final index option expiration for the year.
There will be a minor Comex metals option expiration on the 28th.
I sat the day out in cash, and spent most of my time on other things.
Let us pray for those whose hearts are hardened against His grace and loving kindness by greed, fear, and pride, and the seductive illusion and crushing isolation of evil.
We pray that we all may experience the three great gifts of our Lord's suffering and triumph: repentance, forgiveness, and thankfulness. And in so doing, may we obtain abundant life, and with it the peace that surpasses all understanding.
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