I have placed life and death before you, blessing and curse; and you shall choose life, so that you will live, you and your offspring - to love Yahweh, your God, to listen to His voice and to cleave to Him, for He is your life and the length of your days, to dwell upon the land that Yahweh swore to your forefathers, to Avraham, to Yitzchak, and to Yaakov, to give them. ~HaTorah

So what have I been up to lately...
Yahweh gave me a job. A good job. Todah rabah, Abba! I've been working at a straw bale house half an hour outside Saskatoon. The house is built but there's some finishing work to do. Neil Driedger made this awesome spruce floor on the second storey, and I got to help with nailing, sanding, and varnishing it. I also used a draw knife for a few days on some pine logs that are going to support the roof of a porch beside the house. The man I'm working for, Paul Belanger, is really special. I'm learning a lot from him.

Has anyone ever wondered about the origin of the abbreviation "O.K."?

OK is a quintessentially American term that has spread from English to many other languages. Its origin was the subject of scholarly debate for many years until Allen Walker Read showed that OK is based on a joke of sorts. OK is first recorded in 1839 but was probably in circulation before that date. During the 1830s there was a humoristic fashion in Boston newspapers to reduce a phrase to initials and supply an explanation in parentheses. Sometimes the abbreviations were misspelled to add to the humor. OK was used in March 1839 as an abbreviation for all correct, the joke being that neither the O nor the K was correct. Originally spelled with periods, this term outlived most similar abbreviations owing to its use in President Martin Van Buren's 1840 campaign for reelection. Because he was born in Kinderhook, New York, Van Buren was nicknamed Old Kinderhook, and the abbreviation proved eminently suitable for political slogans. That same year, an editorial referring to the receipt of a pin with the slogan O.K. had this comment: “frightful letters... significant of the birth-place of Martin Van Buren, old Kinderhook, as also the rallying word of the Democracy of the late election, ‘all correct’.... Those who wear them should bear in mind that it will require their most strenuous exertions... to make all things O.K.”
Source: The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth EditionCopyright © 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company.Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

SHABBAT SHALOM, OK?