Does a shepherd go home for dinner?

April 2007, Sheep-shearing Festival
Gore Place, Waltham, MA

Wikipedia ("shepherd"): A shepherd (pronounced /ˈʃɛpərd/) is a person who tends, feeds or guards flocks of sheep.

Recently I have been thinking about the shepherd and his other duties.  Do the shepherds have specific roles or duties?  Do they work as a team?  Do they go home to sleep in a house, or do they sleep in the field with their flocks?  And what about their families?  Would the family be out and about with the shepherd?  Would the shepherd  have someone to back him up if he needed to run home for family prayers or something?  

More from Wikipedia:

Shepherding is one of the oldest occupations, beginning some 6,000 years ago in Asia Minor. Sheep were kept for their milk, meat and especially their wool. Over the next millennia, sheep and shepherding spread throughout Eurasia.
Some sheep were integrated in the family farm along with other animals such as chickens and pigs. To maintain a large flock, however, the sheep must be able to move from pasture to pasture; this required the development of an occupation separate from that of the farmer. The duty of shepherds was to keep their flock intact and protect it from wolves and other predators. The shepherd was also to supervise the migration of the flock and ensured they made it to market areas in time for shearing. 

via Wikipedia.

Okay, so that makes sense.  Tough to be a shepherd and a farmer, as they require completely different lifestyles.  Some of the questions in my head have been circulating because of my duties at church-- we are a lay ministry, so in some sense we've got to find time to be the shepherd and the farmer.  I completely understand how some churches employ a pastor to make it a full time job. Here's more:

Shepherds were often wage earners, being paid to watch the sheep of others. Shepherds also lived apart from society, being largely nomadic. It was mainly a job of solitary males without children, and new shepherds thus needed to be recruited externally. Shepherds were most often the younger sons of farming peasants who did not inherit any land. Still in other societies, each family would have a family member to shepherd its flock, often a child, youth or an elder who couldn't help much with harder work; these shepherds were fully integrated in society.  

Shepherds would normally work in groups either looking after one large flock, or each bringing their own and merging their responsibilities. They would live in small cabins, often shared with their sheep and would buy food from local communities. Less often shepherds lived in covered wagons that traveled with their flocks.

Noteworthy Biblical sheperds: Abraham, Jacob, 12 Tribes, Moses, King David, Jesus.  Bishops have pastoral responsibilities, as pastor is rooted in Latin for shepherd.

“I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep.  But he that is an hireling, and not the shepherd, whose own the sheep are not, seeth the wolf coming, and leaveth the sheep, and fleeth: and the wolf catcheth them, and scattereth the sheep.” (John 10:11-12.)” 

There were two kinds of sheepfolds in Jesus’time. One, a large building with beams covered with tree branches andstraw, was used in the winter for the sheep. In the summer and spring thesheep for an entire town were kept in a large enclosure open to the skybut with walls high enough to keep predators out. At night all theindividual family shepherds brought their flocks to the large fold and one man stood guard through the night instead of all the shepherds.  (H. S. Ellsworth Thoughts on the Good Shepherd, Dec 1985) 

The Lord is My Shepherd, by Simon Dewey.

Article on Jesus our Shepherd
"The tendency of humans to put themselves into danger's way and their inability to guide and take care of themselves apart from the direct power and leading of God is also reinforced with the metaphor of sheep in need of a shepherd."


So I haven't had time to fully pontificate on the subject of shepherd and sheep.   But the direction I'm hoping to understand more fully here is this:  Where is the balance between caring for my family and tending the "flock" allocated to me elsewhere?  Perhaps climbing a high mountain will help.

MOS Night

 I believe I've mentioned it before, but if not... we love to go to the Boston Museum of Science on Friday Nights!  (Open until 9pm!  Low Crowds!  Free parking for members after 5pm!)

This our second year with a membership, and it really only takes a couple of visits to "be worth it" and it makes for a great venue to have a place to go when-- you need a place to go.

It has a Life Sciences Wing, Technology Wing, Dinosaurs, Butterfly Garden, Children's Discovery Center, IMAX, 3D, Planetarium, Rotating Exhibits, this cool Acoustic Sculpture, and a automated hand-stamper at the exit turnstyles!  (And much, much more, as any good advertisement should say.)

This week we had one of those times.  I packed the boys a picnic dinner and off we went, while Jen took advantage of a couple of quiet hours at home alone.  We can make it there in 20 minutes with no traffic, or 45 if there is some mysterious backup on Storrow Drive that makes it so we sit at a standstill for an additional 25 minutes.  Makes sense, eh?

This is Blake's first time to come with Ian and Dad on MOS Night.  Over the last year and a half, Ian and I have gone regularly on Fridays.  (Was it to give Mom bonding time with Blake?  Ian bonding time with Dad?  Mom some chance to have a quiet house?  Dad a chance to play with toys and not get funny looks?)  
I don't think Ian minded, and I certainly could  tell that Blake enjoyed himself!

                           

My boys like to eat.  And I like to eat.  We're a good team.
We did a good job polishing off the PB&J and grapes.

At the Kids Discovery Zone, we got lots of learning accomplished.
We did a little paleontology, electrical circuitology, magnetology.

We did a little bubble science, where I'm not sure Blake felt comfortable in the safety goggles.  So I lent him my sweet shades.  Ian was the bubble master, with some seriously big ones.  He said by sucking on the straw, he could make the bubble go inside the cup.  I didn't try that experiment, for fear of tasting soapy air.

We sauntered over to the water table, which is always a hit.  I felt like Blake and Ian played so nicely together.  Ian took all-things-round, and Ian dealt with all-things-swimmy.  

Needless to say, we'll be going back again.  Soon.  Especially when the snow flies and Jen says the boys are suffering from cabin fever.  Or Blake wants to watch chicks hatch.  Or Ian wants to "build a fish" at the virtual fish tank.  Or I need my hands-on experiment fix.  Any excuse will do.

So much to learn, so little time.

Umbagog

Last year (2010) I was one of the primary chaperones for the Young Men High Adventure.  It was awesome.  This year, my duties were somewhat different.  Here's the pictoral overview of my experience with High Adventure, 2011, in and around Lake Umbagog.

Arrive on day 5 of 6 in time to portage the canoes and week's worth of gear.

Hoot and holler on the white water on the Androscoggin River right around Errol, NH.  On day 6, help load up canoes on the trucks and shoot the rapids a few more times.

Demonstrate to the Young Men how a rope swing is properly ridden.

Provide support so the chaperones feel at ease.  I don't think they needed any help, to be honest.

"Recharge"

Provide slabs of meat, fresh greens, juicy fruit options, and a manly breakfast at the conclusion of the week.

Take in some solitude.

Wake up early and cook breakfast for the troops after a decently warm swim.

Navigate home without getting lost.

Typical or Atypical?

Today I'd like to poll the audience to see if I'm as unique as Jen thinks I am.

When I was a kid, we watched alot of movies.  Not so much after school, but certainly we covered a fair amount of territory on Saturdays and during the summertime.  Don't get me wrong, we spent hours upon hours riding bikes, playing in the tree-house, playing in the yard, and strewing toys around in the playroom too.  Now that I have a couple of kids, I can definitely see the merits of having a library of media available to entertain children.  Keep those kids busy so mom/dad can have a nap!  (Thank you Netflix!)

So here's Jen's observation:  She thinks that I was raised on watching a handfull of obscure, made-for-TV Disney films.  Is that derogatory/defamatory?  Should I care?  I'm confident enough to quote lines from some of these movies from time to time, but Jen thinks I shouldn't expect anyone else to know what I'm talking about.  So just off the top of my head, here are 20 movies that me and my siblings watched a multitude of times, in the order of release date.  (Excluding the typical Disney musicals or animated features like Peter Pan, Mary Poppins, Bedknobs and Broomsticks and Jungle Book that should not earn me a weird label!)

Title	Year Released	Studio	$$
The Shaggy Dog	1959	Disney	$27M
The Misadventures of Merlin Jones	1964	Disney	$4M (rentals)
That Darn Cat!	1965	Disney	$12.7M (w/re-release)
The Gnome Mobile	1967	Disney	??
The Reluctant Astronaut	1967	Universal	??
The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes	1969	Disney	??
The World's Greatest Athlete	1973	Disney	$22.5M
Benji	1974	Mulberry Square	$39.5M
The Apple Dumpling Gang	1975	Disney	$31.9M
Escape to Witch Mountain	1975	Disney	$20M
No Deposit No Return	1976	Disney	??
The Cat from Outer Space	1978	Disney	??
The Black Stallion	1979	Omni Zoetrope	$37.8M
Astronaut in King Arthur's Court (Unidentified Flying Oddball)	1979	Disney	??
Herbie Goes Bananas	1980	Disney	$18M
Condorman	1981	Disney	??
Summer to Remember	1985	InterPlanetary Pictures	(TV)
Lots of Luck	1985	Disney	??
Biggles: Adventures in Time	1986	Compact Yellobill	$112K
Flight of the Navigator	1986	Disney	$18.5M

I notice here that Ken Berry, Tommy Kirk, Kurt Russell, Tim Conway, Don Knotts, Mickey Rooney, Annette Funicello are on the cast lists multiple times, and that they are predominantly Disney.  That would have something to do with my parents getting a whole collection of movies recorded to video-cassette (recorded off the Disney Channel) from the Ables around 1987.

I took the liberty to average the release dates here, and came up with 1975.

Now I recognize that some of the movies might not have financial data because either they were big losers or they didn't make much, BUT, I added that column just to give an indication of how well they did at the box-office.

This $22.5M winner Jen makes fun of me for referencing!


So now I leave it to you.  How many of these 20 have you seen (or recognize), and was my movie selection really that unique as a child?

Bonus question: What other movies do you think I would like to see based upon this list?

On Confidence

Anecdote #1:
A couple of months ago, I was in a relatively small church planning meeting (maybe 10-12 people), where we start with a hymn and a prayer.  I have some talent in the musical department, so I am often looked at to pick the starting note, set the tempo, and whatnot.   
From where I stand, I see singing is one of those things that either a) you are good at, b) you aren't good at it, but you do it anyway, c) you aren't good at it, and try to avoid it.

So during this meeting, I was suffering from a bit of a morning sneeze or something, and when it came time to proceed from the first to the second verse, I paused to sneeze or whatever.  I'm sure I had that goofy sneezy face where my eyebrows were up, my chin was dropped, nostrils elongated, just waiting to explode into a tissue.

But what happens when one voice drops out?  If that voice is the confident voice, then you might find that everyone takes a deep breath, gets ready to sing, and just holds the air in the depths of their lungs and waits.  After a ridiculous couple of seconds, they look over to the confident voice and burst into laughter, realizing that the only reason they stopped was because they felt they needed to follow someone.  

So why do I tell this anecdote?  First, I thought it was kind of funny that my dropping out wielded so much power.  Second, I thought it provides an interesting look at confidence.  I am a confident singer, so people look to me and follow my lead (even when I'm wrong...).

Anecdote #2

I was sitting at an intersection one day waiting for a green light and watching some of our local teenage boys walking down the sidewalk.  I think there were four of them.  Three in front, one trailing behind.  Fourteen and fifteen year olds sometimes have a bit of swagger that says, "Hey look at me, my voice has changed and I now could shave twice a week if I really wanted to."  (I occasionally say that to myself, too.)  The boy front and center had the swagger on, and the boys to his left and right flank seemed to be engaged with banter with him seeking the center boy's approval.  When the sidewalk narrowed to go around a utility pole, the left or right flank would drop back, and the lead would push through with the other wing-man.  Interesting to watch the dynamic.  

I remember as a teen occasionally being in a posse of boys being a flank man.  I don't remember being the one leading a pack, but I DO remember occasionally having that same swagger-- but with nobody following me.  Hear that sound?  Must be the beat of my own drum.  (Though I recall that my drum-beat hit some pretty cool riffs in harmony with some others at Stake Youth Activities and EFY... then BYU was a pretty sweet drumline altogether.)


Now lets draw some observations.

What makes a confident person?  I don't think it's apathy.  I don't think it's sheer talent.  I don't think it's necessarily synonymous with being popular or famous or rich.  It's not having a fit body.  Or winning praises.

Honestly, I think it's about knowing who you are and not having to fit someone else's label.  It's a step above "I don't care what other people think" and more humble than "Look how good I am."

Instead it says, "I like the way I do things and I can back up why I do things this way."

via.

via.

that's me.

Confidence can be saying to your boss, "You are doing something wrong."
Confidence can be singing a solo.
Confidence can be having abnormal fashion sense.  (Different than no fashion sense)

What else can confidence be?

Here are a few tips that I agree with:

1.  Smile.
2.  Assume that people like you.
3. Have good hygiene.
4. Get good amounts of rest.
5. Dress well.
6. Avoid unnecessary over-analyzing or apologizing.
7. Become knowledgeable about something.
8. Put a positive spin on everything.
9.  Exercise on occasion.
10. Do nice things for others.  DC 121:45

The A.T. is where it's AT.

For my first post of the month, I thought I'd stream some consciousness your way.

I had never heard the term "Bucket List" until last year.  I'd never considered enumerating all the things I want to do during my lifetime (most people would probably find my list relatively mundane, anyway).  I still have never sat down to do that exercise.  BUT...  I have had times of my life where I thought to myself, "I really want to ________ at some point."  I remember having one of those bucket-list type moments when I was a teenager and was the coordinator for our troop High Adventure.

In 1996, I wanted to do some hiking, so I led out on the planning of a High Adventure for Troop 336.  I surveyed websites (because hotbot and altavista could get results!) for decent week-long hikes, decided on a stretch in the Nantahala National Forest in North Carolina, and ordered some maps.  Planning a hike doesn't really take that much more planning than picking a stretch of trail and arranging for transportation if you're 15.  (I think we did Sassafras Gap to Wesser, NC.)  Comforts of life are meaningless if you have a deck of cards and a tent.

Here's the posse of 5 adults and 9 boys.  In the end 3 adults and  7 boys made it the full 65 miles.

Dad took the week off to spend with Ben and me, and we made it the whole way together.  The last day or two started to wear on Dad's knee, and I remember him strapping some duct tape around under his knee-cap to help on the descents.  There was a gratifyingly frigid river at the end of the week (Nantahala River).

1996 was a great year for the teal shorts.

Somewhere around this picture, we ran into some thru-hikers, who were in it for the long-haul.  Can you imagine 6 months on the trail?  April to October, perhaps.  I hadn't really considered that people would do the whole trail, but I guess if it could be done, people would want to do it.

Expansive views of 4K and 5K mountains.

There's no doubt the views were good, and the air was refreshing.

Smoky Mountains.

But can you imagine seeing the back side of your hiking buddy for a whole summer?

Dad and his vintage backpack, with Ben a few steps ahead.

So then, earlier this summer (back to 2011), my cousin Joy and her husband Jason came to visit us in MA, and Jason raved about A Walk in the Woods, by Bill Bryson, describing a writer's take on through-hiking the A.T..  Jen ordered it for the Kindle, and we read it together.  The book is a clever blend of history, humor, and a perspective looking at the quirky folks who actually make the A.T. their home (for several months, at least).  It's an interesting read, and got me thinking again about that tugging idea in the back of my head that when I retire, I'd like to take a summer to traverse from Springer Mountain, Georgia to Mount Katahdin, Maine.  I could join that elite group of weirdos who set out to take millions of steps somewhat mechanically to make their bodies conquer 2000 miles of undulation.

Later this summer, as I was on my way to meet up with the troop for the last couple of days of their High Adventure canoeing in northern New Hampshire, I had some extra time to stop and take some pictures on a scenic road, and what did I behold but a map of the region revealing that the A.T. cut right through there!  It was at Grafton Notch scenic byway that I took my chance.  

A roadside tourist placard that I saw indicated that if I backtracked just a few miles, I'd meet up at a trailhead to go up Old Speck.  At the trailhead, I saw that the Eyebrow Loop was only a couple of miles long, and I had enough time to do a bit of hiking before meeting the boys at Errol, NH.  (Had I read the  review in the above link before-hand, I might have tried something different!  ...advanced ascent with ladders and steel rungs...)  

It was these 2.2 miles that I started to think that maybe doing a thousand of these one-hour trips with gear on my back is a bit more than I could handle.  

What I expected.

What I got.

Rungs!  Oh, for heaven's sake.  Step, step, step.  Take a break.  Step, step step.  Take a break.

One of the rewards after the ascent.  Do you see the parking lot down there?  I'm the hiker who drove a minivan to the parking lot.

Our troop hasn't done any serious hiking in the 5 years we've lived here.  I can't think of any considerable hiking that I've done in over a decade.  Long walks, yes.  Several miles here and there for Geocaching, yes. Hiking, not much.

So I'll have to re-appraise the merits of thru-hiking the A.T.  However, I think this adds to my opinion that a bucket list is so intangible and variable (subject to whims, perhaps?) that perhaps the best way to meet your dreams is to do neat things all along your way.  Otherwise, can a bucket list be realized in anything but an idealized world?  Life happens.  With a wife and kids, there are other factors on the table now that weren't considered half my life ago.  I reckon that LIFE can be an adventure every day if you take Old Speck by the horns and do something.  Forget the list.  Here's to taking something you want to do and just doing it.  Or at least 3% of it.

Do you agree?  Or do I need a bucket list as a guiding document for my adventures?

Happy NaBloPoMo Eve, also known as Halloween.

We had a decent Halloween this evening, and I took my two little monkeys trick-or-treating down the street and back tonight.  Ian had a great time of it, and always wanted to be the first one to the door.  Blake politely said thank you in baby sign each time someone put candy in his bag.  Fortuitously for me, his monkey mits made it a challenge for Blake to pick a candy from each of the bowls, so I took the liberty to choose for him (me).  Blake's bag might be biased toward M&Ms, Twix, and Butterfinger.  Unfortunately for me, I carried him on my hip, so my arms were twitchy and achy by the time we had finished traveling door to door begging for candy.  When we got home, we sorted through the loot and put the sticky goey candies back in our bowl for redistribution to the other families in the neighborhood, and kept the chocolaty treats and the hard candy on a stick.

The boys at my office for some trick-or-treat.  I was the tourist, taking pictures of the fauna.

So starting tomorrow, we'll be in November, which I am planning to participate in Blog Posting Month, and Jen said I could "Occupy Funghi Fritti Street" during the staged event.  Should be good.  I've been brainstorming things worthy of a blog post.  Now just to find the time to create my daily record.

As a preview, I make my first offering:  A look at sugars.  After all, it IS Halloween.

This summer, I made a bunch of Strawberry Jam, since Jen went and picked 30 pounds of the sweetest, ripest berries at a PYO (Pick Your Own) farm in Southern Maine with her mother.  Generally, I'm not much of a fan of using PYO as a means to get bulk items, since you have to pay a premium to have the chance to make your own selection.  Most of the time, I'm happy to have the leftovers for the sake of making apple chips, peach jam (free last year!), or tomato sauce.  But.  Pristine strawberries and leftover strawberries have a very wide chasm of quality between them.  The flats of strawberries Jen came home with smelled like sweet nectar and were mouth-wateringly delightful.  Jen said the impetus behind the 30 pounds was to make enough jam to make it through to next summer.  And we go through alot of Jam around here folks.  So I went and bought a few bags of sugar and a whole case of pectin.

Jen said she wanted freezer jam, because it tastes sooooo good.  You get the raw berry flavor, plus the tang from the pectin when you do freezer jam.

I made 12 batches.  Freezer jam takes 2 cups berries and 4 cups sugar per box of pectin.  Catch that?  Twice as much Sugar!  No wonder Jen likes it so much!  I got pretty good at making a double batch, even, but much beyond that and I couldn't get the timing right on boiling the pectin and dissolving all the sugar with the fruit and cooked pectin.  (Raw fruit, remember, so the only heat comes from the boiled pectin.)

Total Strawberries: $60, 48 cups  ~$1.25 per cup

Pectin: $2.00/box

Sugar: 2.78/5 lb bag, 11.25 cups/5 lb, ~$.25 per cup

Freezer Jam breakdown: 12 batches, 2 c. berries, 4 c. sugar=> ~30 pints  (in 12 pints, 10 half pints, and as many plastic containers as we had).  So each batch ran about $5.50 for 2.5 pints = $2.20 per pint.

Those twelve batches were starting to get a bit tedious, because using up the berries only 2 cups at a time was pretty slow going.  I was starting to get worn out, I was looking at a rapidly diminishing supply of freezer-eligible containers, and thought it was time for a change.  Now, last year, when I stocked up on the end-of-season mason jars, there were a few boxes of sugar-free pectin that I picked up, too, just because.  You know, you want to have something for all your diabetic friends.  (Or does the strawberry sugar negate the sugar-free part of the equation?)  It's a cooked recipe, so the jam DEFINITELY tastes different.  Cooked berries and no heaps of sugar, but replaced with honey is quite likely to be... different.  But it was a fun experiment still.

Sugar-free breakdown: 2 batches, 4 c. berries, 1 c. honey=> 5 pints (in 5 pint sealed jars), which puts my estimate around $8 for 2.5 pints, or $3.20 per pint.

Now that I was out of the sugar-free pectin and out of freezer containers, I came down the home stretch with traditional jam for the food storage shelves.  I figured this was the most prudent thing to do, as it used the berries up and prevented our careful investment in the Maine Berry industry from rotting before our eyes.

Regular breakdown: 3 batches, 5 c. berries, 7 c. sugar=> 12 pints (in 12 pint sealed jars), costing about $10 for 4 pints, equaling $2.50 per pint.

So now you ask, "Joe, what do you make of these facts and figures from your Summer Jam Session?"

Here's what I have to say:  The freezer jam, though heavy on the sugar, DOES taste the best of the three recipes, costs the least, and requires the least amount of berries per pint of jam.  I resisted early on because of the sugar to berry ratio, and I just thought it was silly to not take advantage of my mad canning skills.  Turns out that we've barely made a dent in the jam supply so far, and I think if we backed off from 30 pounds to 10 pounds next year, that'd still cover us for a year's supply of freezer jam.  And for my last observation-- I probably didn't need to process ALL of the berries, since we have a freezer and could have kept some whole for milk-shakes.  But I didn't think of that until afterward, did I?


Anything else I should consider for the jam-fest?

Breakheart Reservation

Jen made me a deal that if I let her sleep in on Saturday morning, she'd clean the kitchen.  So at 7:15am when the boys woke up, we had our oatmeal, got dressed, and went out hiking/geocaching at Breakheart just North of Boston.  I had only been there once, but never exploring.   This serves as a photo journal of our morning adventure on Saturday.

Ian took my picture with Blake.  I kind of have to put myself wherever he's pointing. :)

We found a geocache.  Good reason to stop and have a break, eh?

Ian was surprised to see this car on top of Breakheart Hill.  I was too... but with a straight six like that, how could it not make it?

This is how Blake got forward looks strapped to my back.  And that's the vein the Red Cross sometimes uses to take my blood.

This is how you grow crows feet.  Contort your face in as many ways as possible, and the wrinkles will just stick.

I am surprised that Ian looks like he's 22 in this picture.  While I am plenty eager to go on adventures with a man-son, I am happy to have my little boy for now!

Note:  As soon as we sat down at the top of the hill, Blake insisted that for his break to be official, he needed to take off his socks and shoes.  So be it.  I'm sure the granola bar tasted better with the breeze between his toes.

Hydration is especially important when you are strapped to someone's back.

Here's an action shot while hiking down the paved trail.  Okay, so it's in the suburbs, not in the mountains.  It's close to home, though, and has plenty of miles of trail!

The boys at the Upper Lake.

Blake thinking, "Dad, I want to go splash in that..." and it wasn't too long after the click of the shutter that I had to quickly prevent such fun.  I don't mind splashing, but it would help if he had a bit better balance first.

Here's Blake receiving wisdom from heaven.  Or at least a very interesting camera shot with glare.

Ian thought this flume was awesome.  Built by the Civilian Conservation Corps in the 1930s, it connects the upper lake to the lower lake.  He gave me the grand tour of where the water goes.  Smart kid!

This is several miles into the hike.  Turns out when a 5 1/2 year old hits his limit of walking, he starts crawling.  I guess I had forgotten that, since we haven't done much hiking this year.  Last year, we had vanilla wafers to keep the feet motivated.

And here are the happy hikers just before the home stretch back to the car.  Some of us are more alert than others.

Few words... but it's intonation!!

{a joe post.  still worth reading, though!}
We once had our friend from collage, Jennaye, who had served a mission to Taiwan, describe speaking Mandarin as all in the intonation.  I remember sitting around the living room trying out the ways to say "ma", which depending on how it was said, could mean "mother", "horse", or the word indicating a question was posed.  Honestly, I can't type intonation, so I'm not going to try to impersonate how that discussion sounded.  But rest assured, the same consonant and vowel can be put together with a different sing-song to mean something completely different.

We have an 18 month old linguist in the house that understands this principle.  His name is Blake, and he knows how to use similar consonant/vowel combinations to indicate a host of words.  Until you spend a little time with him, it's tough to know what "Dah" means.  Here's a primer in the language of our dearest Blake.

Unknown meaning:
assah.  (not sure really, but could be what's that? or maybe awesome!)


Word,  Blake Version
Dad, dad
Uh-oh, uh-oh
(not interested yet?)

No, nun  (German, perhaps?)

Yes, dah  (is that Scandinavian?)

Ball, bah

Up, bup

Down, dah  (now, do you mean yes? or down?)

Noodle, doo-dt

Cat, dat ("I want dat": a potentially confusing sentence)

Dog, dah or oof-oof

Bite, bup

Bath, bahf

Car, dahr

Cheese, chiz

Done, dut or ahhhh-dah

Brother, buh-buh
Papa, pa-pa

and finally, the much anticipated term

Mama, mom-mom.

Addendum 10/12/2011
I've asked Blake to tell me some of his other words, and this is what he came up with.  Also, keep in mind that all of blakes words slide upward  _-^ in pitch toward the end, they way you might say "really?" or "want to go?"

Teeth, theeth
Tickle, thithle
Shoes, boo  (boots?)
Cup, bup
Spoon, poo

Interesting experiment tonight.  A couple of years ago I was having some allergy issues, and for my birthday Jen got me a HEPA air purifier (accept no imitations!  at least that's what they say, if you want to get 99.7% of allergens removed from the air at some micron size).

I hear there are some things where getting the knock-off just can't cut it.  I can think of a few examples.  Car tires.  Bread loaves. Electronics.  Quilting fabric (!?).  Vanilla extract.  Power tools.  I guess what I'm trying to say is that there are some things that between the top of the line and bottom of the line there is so much variation that it really does make a difference.  Some things really don't make much difference what the brand is, and you have to judge them one-by-one.  Hole punches.  Furniture.  Clothes.  Cars.

So anyway, here's the experiment.  Last year when I installed a new filter, I wondered if there was a measurable amount of dust caught in the filter.  I generally try to reuse the filter for about a year vacuuming it out once per month (since--you know--the real deal doesn't always come cheap, and I am generally a cheapskate) and by the time it reaches the end of it's reusable life, it's been through alot of dust in our home.  So imagine my surprise when there wasn't really a measurable difference between the two filters.  In fact, I think the new filter measured a smidge heavier last years.

Have a look here.  In all their comparative glory.

The dirty nasty one measures in at 13.7 oz.

 The brand-spankin new clean filter weighed in at 13.8 oz.

The brand new one is HEAVIER than the dust-laden for that one.  Is there any logical reason for this?  The only thing I can imagine is that they impregnate the fibers with baking soda or febreze or something that wears off over repeated collecting dust then vacuuming it out.  Any other thoughts?