How to replace a bodyboard cover

Today, I'll show you how to go from this:





















To this:

So, you decided to get one of those cheap bodyboards, a piece of styrofoam with a cloth sleeve around it, not very sturdy. Maybe you didn't have much money to spend, or maybe you were pretty sure you wouldn't use the thing enough to warrant spending big money. Perhaps now you used it more than you expected, or perhaps you got into some pretty serious waves, but now the cloth cover is torn and coming off, and you aren't in a position to buy another one. Have no fear! Making your own new cover is totally doable and, depending on the cloth you buy, can be WAYY cheaper than buying a new board, particularly if you don't live in a place that sells boards at every grocery store.

Materials: 

1. Cloth: Enough to cover your board. Depending on the size of your board and the width of the cloth you buy, as little as a yard may be enough. Measure before you buy.
2. Needles, pins, and thread
3. Chalk, pencil, or something else to draw on the cloth

Directions:

1. If your board has a leash attached, you will probably need to remove it before you put the new cloth on. You may need to remove your leash to get the old cloth off. Turn your board over onto the back. The back of the leash apparatus may have a notch on it like a large screw. If so, you can probably unscrew the leash from the board. 

   

   This is the back of my board's leash attachment. You can see the notch in it. The attachment is in two pieces which screw together and come apart when unscrewed. 

2. Figure out how much cloth you need to cover your bodyboard. Measure the widest part of its width, making sure to account for its thickness (it may help to measure around the board and divide the number in half) and measure its length. You will need to cut out two pieces of cloth slightly larger than this board. It is easiest to round the amount of cloth you need to the nearest yard or meter, depending on which system your country uses for cloth sales. (If you're used to one system and are shopping in the other, remember that a meter is significantly larger than a yard). It also helps to consider the usual width of  cloth, which is typically about 60 inches (152.4 cm), although some bolts are narrower. Always check the width of a bolt of cloth before buying. This means that a yard of cloth purchased from a 60 inch wide bolt would be a piece one yard (36 inches) wide by more than a yard and a half long. Say, for example, that your board is 26 1/2 inches (67.3 cm)long and 18 inches (45.7 cm) wide. Assuming these measurements, you need a piece a little more than a yard long (or about a meter long) and a little less than a yard wide (less than a meter). A yard of cloth 60 inches wide is enough to cover this board. However, if your cloth is one yard wide, buying a yard gives you one square yard, which would probably be a bit too narrow for the width while being plenty for the length. A piece a meter wide and long would be just enough. 
3. Buy your cloth. I used a type of nylon, a tough cloth, which is just right for this project. You want something strong. 
4. Make your pieces: If you have a reasonably intact piece of cloth from your board (I had the whole top piece) you can use that as a pattern. Otherwise, you will need to make some more measurements of your board. Trace around your board, adding about an inch to accommodate its thickness and use your measurements as reference points to help you. Cut the cloth, leaving a GENEROUS seam allowance (I left more than an inch in some places) so you can correct any pattern errors. 

   

   The colorful cloth is my old cover which I used as a pattern for the new one. Note the green cloth around the bright cloth cover and notice the white line around the colorful piece. The white line is what I used to guide my sewing. 

5. Pin the pieces together. You will not sew all the way around the cover. You must leave the wide end un-sewn so you can fit the board into it.  You will sew the rest up by hand. 

   

   If you look closely, you can see the pins around the piece of cloth. Note that none of the pins are on the top of the piece. That is the widest part, and that is where I won't be sewing with the machine. 

6. Try your cover on for size and see if you need to make any adjustments. You may want to try it on inside out so you can baste (make large stitches to hold together cloth that will later be sewn by machine) wherever you see something that needs to be taken in. 
7. Once you have your board cover the way you like it, it is time to sew the board into its cover. Start where your seam ends, fold the raw edges inside, and sew using a whip-stitch (over and over stitch). 
   
8. Now it's time to put that leash back on. Feel for where the hole is where the leash was attached. You will make your hole with a knitting needle or something similar. A pencil might work. If you have more than one kind of knitting needle around, start with a small knitting needle. Push the needle through the fabric, into the hole, and out the fabric on the other side. Be patient. Be prepared to put the thing in and take it out several times. You are tearing the fabric a bit, but you are also pushing the threads apart.
   
   Once your hole is big enough, push the larger end of the leash attachment into place. The fabric will probably tear a bit, but that is all right. Seal the hole from fraying with clear nail polish or fray check. Screw in the other end. 
   
9. Now go catch some waves!

Cherry Oatmeal

This weekend, my parents and I were in the country. As the sour cherries are just coming out, I decided to make oatmeal with cherries in it. As I have already made oatmeal with apples and dried fruit in it, I thought I would try the process with seasonal fruit, knowing that sour cherries taste very good cooked. The result was quite scrumptious, if a bit sour.
Here's the recipe. Apologies in advance that it isn't very specific on amounts. You won't get such a result as we had with just one or two cherries. Half a cup or more per serving should be good.

Cherry Oatmeal
Serves: 1 (multiply the recipe for more people)
Ingredients:
1 cup water
1/3 cup old-fashioned oats
a generous handful of sour cherries, pitted
black currants (optional)
salt to taste
sugar to taste
cracked walnuts (optional)

Directions: 

1.  Measure out the water and put it on to boil. Add salt. While the water is boiling, pit the cherries and measure out the oats. 
2. As soon as the water is at a rolling boil, add the oats, cherries, and currants, if you are using them. Boil for about five minutes, or until the oats are as cooked as you want them to be. 
3. Serve the oatmeal with sugar and, if you want, butter and cracked walnuts. 

When the peaches come out, I just may make this recipe again and report how it turns out!

The Dangers of Relativism

           So what is our problem today? The rejection of absolute truth is the main danger in our day. When we reject the outside reality of truth, we reject the outside reality of falsehood. How long before the alt-Left wises up to the terrible weapon they have taken up? How long before, instead of using relativism as a sort of short-cut weapon to defend against oppression bolstered by lies that cannot be easily refuted or against truths cruel people misuse, greedy people start using it merely for power? How long before the phrase “Women and People of Color” becomes nothing but a stock phrase to twist people’s consciences into acquiescing to whatever the person who said it demands, whether or not the thing demanded benefits anybody? How long before historians start churning out blatant lies and calling them history? How long before scientific studies come out that were never conducted at all, merely concocted as expressions of The Narrative? How long before juries turn a blind eye to the facts and condemn the white innocent with a cleaner conscience (and greater awareness of the role of race in their choice) than when they condemn the Black innocent? If there is no objective truth, there is no objective falsehood! There is only the Narrative. 

           One problem is that those who wield this weapon, be they on the right or left, have man’s better nature on their side. Nobody wants to be racist. Nobody wants to be sexist. Most people honestly wish everybody well and prospering. The scholarship bashing the West has taken so many steps that few white people of goodwill can resist the call to self-abasement. Who want  be considered selfish? So what if we don’t like the world the Left wants to bring about? We are privileged. Surely we can afford to give a little. The world we thought was so good and lovely was actually very bad, and it must be abandoned for the good of The Oppressed. So what if we don't like it. The very fact that we don't like it is what is wrong with us. We must trust those who aren't poisoned by Toxic Whiteness to build a new world for us, instead of combining perspectives and designing things with all races together. Don't you see that this kind of talk dismisses white people's perspective, making us out to be blind and deaf? Must we go, without any gradation, from having all the say to having no say? Is there really no other alternative? Now, I have heard that to counteract one extreme, the other extreme may be needed, but I fear the balance may be tipping. 

              The perspective I am talking about is perhaps best summarized in the little saying, “When you are accustomed to privilege, equality feels like oppression.” I have trouble even beginning to go through the problems with this saying. For one, it is a kind of dogmatic assertion. While this saying can be used to attempt to palliate people who make fake oppression claims to delay or deter the cause of justice, it could also be used to mask the truth. Try saying that to the victims of the Chinese Cultural Revolution. Many of them were privileged. Instead of an inditement of the excesses of that movement, might not their suffering have been, rather, a proof that equality had been achieved? Can we be sure that this saying won’t be misused? Yet perhaps the most important thing about this statement is the fact that, by and large, it isn’t true. Most white people won’t feel oppressed if fewer unarmed Black men are shot. Most won’t feel oppressed if fewer Black people go to jail. Most white people won’t feel oppressed if more Black people do well in school. 

Covenant to purchase ghost for Andreas Hall

Due to the newness of Andreas, and to the building’s boring reputation among non-athletic  students, Covenant College has decided to purchase a ghost for its youngest residence hall. Unfortunately, President Halverson declined to comment on the purchase, and seemed genuinely surprised at the news. However, a young employee of the college who wishes to remain anonymous agreed to speak to our reporter. This employee is involved in the details of the recent transaction. “We just put an add in the paper,” she explained. “We actually got more offers than we could follow up on, but the prices were dirt cheap. One guy out near Stone Mountain actually offered to pay us! We’ve been scoping out our options, and I think we’ve narrowed it down to four options.” When asked if the ghost from Stone Mountain were under consideration, our informant answered, “Oh, no! We looked into that one pretty early on. The ghost had a habit of tracking in blood. Some of us thought that would be a plus, greater dramatic value, but the Facilities department wouldn’t have it, too messy, and Health Services said it’d be a health hazard. There was another ghost that caused flooding. We had to reject that one, too. We have enough trouble with that in our other buildings. The ghosts we’re looking at now specialize in the noise department. There’s even one that plays the bagpipes. I personally thing we’re going to go with that one.” So, a Scottish ghost for a Scottish school!

Why I Don't Like the Emphasis on White Privilege

Any system of social change that focuses on demonizing what the haves have instead of lamenting what the have-nots lack risks contenting itself with the equitable distribution of oppression and misery, rather than with actually amending the social ills it deplores. For this reason, I am disturbed at the focus on white privilege. Such a focus makes the benefits whites enjoy the problem, rather than the oppression from which nonwhites suffer. If white privilege is ended, and whites are also subjected to being gunned down by the police, being overlooked for hiring and promotions, having to attend substandard schools, and being unjustly and inaccurately stereotyped, the job will be far from over. Such a state of affairs will be no better than the current one, and I doubt it is anyone’s goal. Yet I fear that popular philosophies will lead to such a conclusion. Demonizing other people’s benefits provokes envy and resentment, sentiments that are more apt to cause destruction of others’ benefits than construction of one’s own freedom and happiness. 

Take the story of Solomon and the two prostitutes arguing over a baby. While we usually focus on the affection which prompts the mother of the live baby to be willing to give up her child rather than see him killed, there is another streak in this story. Note the other woman’s reaction to the suggestion that the baby be cut in half. She consents readily, greedily. Her baby is dead, and it is enough for her that they both have dead babies, although the killing of the live baby does not make hers any less dead. 

Consider also this Ukrainian joke. An angel came to this one man and said to him, “I will grant you one wish, but, whatever I give you, I will give twice over to your neighbor.” The man thought a bit, then said, “Take out my eye.” The joke ends here, but you can guess the rest, and the moral. The man saw gain to himself in having more than his neighbor, even if that meant losing something. This is not to say that we should not desire equality in society, but an equality achieved by taking away the benefits of one group without changing the circumstances of the oppressed helps nobody. It is not enough to make everybody equally miserable. The problem in our society is not that whites enjoy certain freedoms. It is that these freedoms are not given to all.

Follow-up

This is a follow-up on my last blog. Last time, I said I believed that religious neutrality is impossible, even in politics, and that I do not think Christians have a duty to surrender cultural power. The next question is whether Christians ought to try to set up a theocracy. I am hesitant to say so. Again, when Christianity has had, or sought, that degree or kind of cultural power, things can get ugly. I no longer believe that this ugliness is inevitable, or that Christians ought to relinquish power unless that is the only way for abuses to end. However, I am wary of any efforts to seek power, as these efforts can suffer from the pitfalls common to Transformationalism. 

Transformationalism is the idea that Christians have a duty to transform this present world. What differentiates it from ordinary political involvement? Transformationalism puts high hopes on what can be accomplished before Jesus comes back, even to the point of denying, or minimizing, any notion of the final destruction of the world and expecting that something almost akin to the New Heavens and the New Earth can be created without any such catastrophe. It usually takes one of two forms: liberal or conservative. Liberal Transformationalism focuses on alleviating poverty, and inequality, encouraging education and other social programs, and generally trying to make society and government more just and fair. Conservative Transformationalism is, I would suspect, growing rarer, but I may be wrong. At any rate, Conservative transformationalists focus on such efforts as abolishing abortion, encouraging sexual morality, and keeping Christianity in the public sphere. 

My main problem with Transformationalism is its minimizing of the notion of a final destruction of the world. While there may be legitimate interpretations of the Bible that allow for no end-of-the-world destruction, I fear people may get into Transformationalism without understanding that such a philosophy entails a particular eschatology.

My other problem is Transformationalism’s tendency to overemphasize temporal, secondary matters. Although justice and morality are both important, they are signs of bigger changes. Faith in Christ, not abstaining from abortion or refusing to participate in injustice, saves a person. However great a society human efforts can manage to produce, perfection can never be achieved as long as there are those in that society whose hearts are unchanged. Injustice and immorality both stem from a broken relationship with God, a problem which even the best laws and the most sophisticated social programs cannot fix. Conversion to Christianity is the only solution. 

I do not mean to say that Christians should not be involved in politics. I only am saying that our hope is not in any earthly government or society. We do well to improve the country where we live, but we do not put our hope in the fortunes of that country. Jesus is already King, whoever may sit in the White House. If we follow in the footsteps of Kim Davis, let us do so not to place Jesus on His throne, but to point out to our governors that Jesus is on His throne, and that doing as He says is usually a good idea.

The Ultimate Heresy

I have come to a terrible realization. It started when I was in college, particularly when I considered the intense conflict that ensues over gay rights vs. religious freedom. At first, the only thing I would admit to anyone other than myself was that religious diversity is not an ideal, that its benefit was in its preventing the problems of other ages, things such as the inquisition. I was always taught that church-state entanglements were the bane of Europe, and that the separation of church and state was, at worst, a necessary evil. But now, I'm not sure it even works. You got that right. We've been bamboozled, tricked, sold a false bill of goods. 

See, freedom of religion doesn't work. Here's why. In order to determine what to allow and what to forbid, to decide what programs to enact and which not to, and to make a myriad of other decisions, a government must have certain values. For instance, in America, we don't allow people to take what belongs to somebody else. Such a law seems elementary, obvious, but even this law relies on the notion of material ownership. We believe that people's property rights trump the needs and desires of even the most resourceful thief. Note, however, that not all religions have the same values. It only stands to reason that certain religions will be more in line with the national ideology than others. In such a situation, religious conflicts are inevitable.

As I tried to trace back the problem, to see what went wrong, allowing the present conflicts between cake bakers and certain couples, I came to see that the flaw goes to the very roots of our national foundation. We thought we could do something we couldn't. And now we are reaping the fruits. Here's why we did it: Europe had just undergone numerous conflicts over religion, specifically, over which expression of Christianity would be allowed and would have cultural power. Many people came to America to get away from laws that forbade them to worship as they saw fit. To these settlers and their descendants, religious freedom meant they could set up their own churches without restrictions.

Perhaps the first sign of trouble for the new nation came when polygamy was made illegal. Note that polygamy violates nobody's rights, provided the parties involved are all willing. It does not harm anyone. It is simply contrary to our sensibilities, to politicians at the time, downright repugnant. In a landmark case, the judge ruled that the government, if it were to govern at all, cannot accommodate everybody's conscience. Using the example of human sacrifice, he said that there are certain religious acts that the government simply cannot allow, things that cannot be allowed in a free society. Now, let us ask ourselves, why can't we allow human sacrifice in America? Because it violates an individual's right to life (unless the victim were to submit voluntarily). Even then, the idea of somebody being killed to appease a god strikes the average American as barbaric and backwards. Can a nation that calls any religious practice or belief "backward" or "quaint" or "sick" really embrace all religions?

Another blow at the notion of religious diversity was the government's venturing out into the business of children's education. While it may be possible, in theory, to govern a country with no other guide than a skeletal understanding of human rights as laid out in our foundational documents, (life, liberty, property, pursuit of happiness, etc.)it is not possible to run a school that way. Perhaps the most obvious manifestations of the impossibility of running a school without any governing ideology are the various conflicts over religion in public schools. While prayer in public schools is something of a side issue, controversies such as abstinence only sex education versus "safe sex" and Creation vs. Evolution, as well as the question of Intelligent Design show that the problem runs deeper. As an acolyte of the grand tradition of Reformed, Christian education, I understand that everyone has a worldview. That worldview comes out in all subjects, math, science, language arts, even foreign language studies. Education in any subject must be conducted from a broader understanding of where that subject fits into the broader scheme of the world, the universe, and everything. A historian who believes God had a hand in what happened in the world teaches history differently from one who teaches it from the premise that it is the story of human progress towards the perfect society as the most evolved beings on the planet, similar as these perspectives may seem.

Present controversies over the observance of cultural holidays with religious roots shows the impossibility of a truly cultureless society. It is much more fun to celebrate Christmas when at least eighty percent of your town is doing so, too. Holidays are perhaps the most obvious sign that religion is not, and was never meant to be, a private matter. Holidays have just that public, communal character that demands the participation of many. For example, here, in Ukraine, our family celebrates Easter when the rest of the country does, according to the Orthodox calendar. That is the day our church celebrates it, the day the rest of the city celebrates it.

While the Civil Rights Movement brought necessary changes to America, it also underscored the impossibility of ideological neutrality in a country that wants to be just, and to do right by all its citizens. The idea that certain people were not eligible for equal rights would simply not be tolerated. Justice demands it.

Now, we come to the present case. In recent times, cake bakers have refused to bake wedding cakes for gay couples. While it is important to note that the bakers are refusing to offer a service to a couple because they are doing something only gay people do, not because they are gay, the situation is a bit complicated. The very existence of bakers who refuse same-sex couples wedding cakes testifies to the fact that some people in this country still believe same-sex marriage is wrong. Now, if religious objection to same-sex marriage were just as bad as racism (something I don't believe), then tolerating such an objection would be quite a concession to make, if such a concession can even be condoned. It seems many gay-rights activists would have religious objection to homosexual practice relegated to the same rubbish bin to which we have, for the past fifty years, trying to relegate racism. In the case of racism, such efforts are commendable, (provided they are characterized by a charitable mien towards those one is trying to correct). In the case of objection to homosexual practice, I cannot say the same. On the one hand, we have people who see as an injustice moral objection to same-sex marriage, while, on the other, we have people who feel they must maintain the position that such marriage is wrong if they are to be faithful to their creeds.

The issue has again come up in the furor over Kim Davis's refusal to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples and her preventing others in her office from issuing such licenses. While objection to the extent of her civil disobedience is understandable, while disagreement with her interpretation of the Bible is understandable, many of the things people on the internet are saying about her go beyond simple disagreement. The vibe I sense is contempt, contempt for this woman's principles automatically translating into contempt for her decision about how to live by them.

What we must ask ourselves is this: Is there room for both parties in the same country? I don't know. I'm beginning to wonder if there isn't, but I don't know what to do about it. Seizing political power at the expense of other religions does not seem a very Christian thing to do, yet surrendering power in favor of lies merely because of a political dogma that has proved faulty looks just about as bad.