Rabid Fun

Opening Words:

Mar 17

Yesterday, I finished the first draft of a book manuscript I’ve worked on for years. Began it in about 1990. My working title is: If God Leads Me, Why Do I Run In Circles. It’s a 400-page book about knowing and doing the will of God.

First draft done, now the real work of re-write begins.

Thought I’d place my book’s opening words here:

I’ve Missed God’s Will

First off, let me tell about one of the times I’m sure I’ve missed God’s will.

Back then I worked on the religion deck at the Library of Congress, one of the most extensive libraries in the world with more than 400 miles of shelving stuffed with books on every conceivable subject.

That spring I felt in love with God. Every morning I hurried to work early so I could go to my desk before anyone else arrived. In the silence of that vast religious collection I would read my Bible and pray and sometimes even sing. I was so enamored of the love of Jesus Christ that my eyes would tear up at the thought of His exquisite perfections.

I felt that, if necessary, I could gladly die for Him.

As my workday began I rushed to meet it with a bounce in my step and love in my heart as I felt the presence of God with me in the midst of everyday duties.

One day as I walked up Capital Hill on my way for my early morning tryst with Jesus, a white-haired old lady hobbled across the street in front of me struggling with two heavy suitcases. Obviously she was laboring under the strain of her burden as she made her way toward nearby Union Station to catch a train.

Immediately I knew that I should carry those bags for her.

Don’t ask me how I knew that God wanted me to help that old woman. I heard no voice. I saw no vision. She did not ask my help or even speak to me. But I felt a strong internal conviction that I should carry her bags to the train for her.

I had plenty of time before needing to be at work; it would take just a few minutes to walk to the station only a couple of blocks back the way I had just come.

But I knew that if I did it, I would miss my precious devotional time.

I knew I should do the will of God by carrying those bags.

“Lord, I’ll pray for her when I get to work,” I told Him.

You carry her bags, the conviction said.

“But I’ll miss my devotions,” I prayed.

Carry her bags.

This is not the voice of God, I reasoned. It’s just a resurgence of my Boy Scout training; A Scout Is Helpful. That’s a Boy Scout law not a law of God. I’m mentally conditioned to help old ladies (yes, I really said that to myself). Obviously God would not want me to skip reading the Holy Bible and praying and worshiping Him just to be a do-gooder. This old lady is a temptation not an opportunity to do God’s will.

I did not carry her bags.

I walked on to the Library. I slipped behind my desk. I opened my Bible…. and my fervent devotion turned to ashes.

The words of Scripture became dull ink on gray paper.

My prayers raddled around in my mouth.

No hymn graced my lips.

No joy touched my heart.

I had clearly known what God wanted me to do…

and I chose not to do it.

This incident happened over 50 years ago, yet to this day, when I think about the will of God, a mental picture of that old woman lugging those bags pops into my mind.

Sometimes I speculate about what would have happened if I had helped her. Maybe, those suitcases were stuffed with hundred dollar bills and she would have given me a stake which I’d have invested and become richer than Bill Gates. Maybe she was a retired missionary or pastor’s wife and she would have revealed some spiritual secret to me that would have guided me through my own spiritual journey. Maybe she had a great granddaughter waiting to meet her at the train and I would have met the truelove of my life… Maybe my kindness and witness would have resulted in this old woman’s conversion just hours before she launched into eternity. Maybe…

I have no idea what would have happened if I had done the will of God.

No one ever does.

I only know that here, years later, I regard this incident as one of the greatest spiritual turning points of my life… and I blew it.

Now, eventually the spiritual fervor I once had returned. The words and paragraphs of Scripture made sense again. Prayers sweetened. Songs came to mind again. Worship awed me. People responded to my witness and accepted Christ as Savior.

Nevertheless, I know that I had missed something, something eternally important that I will never regain.

I had missed doing the will of God.

Now it may seem odd to begin a book about the will of God with a personal example of not doing His will, but my purpose in telling you this is to let you know that the will of God is not necessarily what you’d expect. I also want you to know that if you have said No to God in the past that does not necessarily mean He has written you off for ever and ever. I want you to know that God is easier to please than you might think.

But I also want you to realize that it is indeed possible for you and me, frail, fragile, temporal creatures to actually say NO to Almighty God.

… With consequences.

As I Lay Sleeping

Mar 16

The time change threw me off.

Monday, I woke at my usual 3 a.m., which is now 4 a.m., but since I’d stayed up late reading Sunday night, weariness overwhelmed me.

After getting Ginny off to work, I sat down to read and fell asleep in my chair. Slept till almost 4 in the afternoon!

Ever hear the fairy tale about the shoemaker and the elves? How elves crept into the shop while he and his wife slept and sewed together these wonderful leather boots? Well, while I slept, my son Donald and his wife Helen crept into my blog site and did wonderful things.

Notice the librarian hit by lightening in my sidebar—he introduces old books in e-book pdf format. Free.

Each month I plan to offer as a free e-book, a book which I have either written or edited for readers to download without charge. A different book will appear in that link about the middle of each month for a limited time.

And the kids fixed this feature while I lay asleep…

Reminds me of something Jesus once said:

“And he said, So is the kingdom of God, as if a man should cast seed into the ground; And should sleep, and rise night and day, and the seed should spring and grow up, he knoweth not how.

“For the earth bringeth forth fruit of herself; first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear. But when the fruit is brought forth, immediately he putteth in the sickle, because the harvest is come.

“And he said, Whereunto shall we liken the kingdom of God? or with what comparison shall we compare it?”

And what was it St. Paul said about salvation? Oh, yes, here it is, ““For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast”.

Anyhow, check out this month’s free e-book, the diary of Richard Rogers, a man who hungered after God.

It’s Time

Mar 13

Two Prayers

Mar 12

Long ago at our church, the prayer group used to put out wooden boxes where folks could place written prayer requests either anonymously or signed with just a first name. On Fridays we’d meet, open the boxes and pray for the specific things people submitted.

One evening I drew a slip from a lady named Mary who wanted to have another baby. I prayed long and loud for Mary to get pregnant.

When it came the next guy’s turn to pray, he started, “Lord, if it was my wife Mary who put that slip in the box, please disregard everything Cowart just prayed for!”

For The Birds—An Odd Occurrence

Mar 11

Wednesday’s issue of the London Daily Mail reported an odd incident involving a hundred birds. The newspaper report can be found at : http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1256840/Mystery-scores-starlings-fall-sky-lay-dying–single-garden.html#ixzz0hnaTCUhi

If this report can be believed—and it must be true. It was in the newspaper—last  Sunday night over 100 birds dropped out of the sky and fell dead into the front yard of Julie Knight, a nurse in Somerset.

“Covering an area 12 feet across, more than 100 birds carpeted the garden, each with blood oozing from its beak and curled up claws”. The paper said.

Lloyd Scott, from the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, said: ‘This is one of the oddest things I’ve ever heard about. We’ve certainly never come across anything similar”.

An animal control officer collected some of the bird bodies and took this photo:

Authorities could only guess why this happened at all or why all these birds fell only in one lady’s front yard. One speculated that a hawk or other predator panicked a flight of starlings in the air and the birds collided with each other trying to escape. Another questioned if the birds may have eaten weed poison and all died at the same time; or could they have hit a power line and been electrocuted?

Helen Cohen, an RSPCA officer said ‘This is still a mystery. … This is obviously an extremely unusual occurrence…Tests were carried out on some of the birds and they were found to have physical injuries but we could find no evidence of any health issues which could explain what had happened”.

Ms knight, the homeowner, said, “’It was like something out of an horror film – like Hitchcock’s The Birds – it was absolutely terrifying….The sky was raining starlings. One of my neighbors saw them. They seemed to just fall out of the sky. About 70 were dead straight away”.

What could have cause this strange occurrence?

Did it really happen?

Must have. It wouldn’t be on the Internet if it wasn’t true. Would it?

I know what happened. Get this:

Ms Knight said, “I’m worried about what could have killed them because I have a young grandson and two cats that are often in my garden”.

Ah Ha! The truth comes out.

Cats!

Need I say more?

Of course there may be another explanation. Doesn’t the Scripture say that our Father in Heaven knows every sparrow that falls?

But these birds in Somerset were not sparrows.

Maybe God has it in for starlings.

The reason I write about this incident is that I’m bogged down in my work and not getting anywhere. So I walked away from my desk and did a bit of yard work outside.

A robin came to drink from our garden fountain just a few feet from me and I snapped his picture with my little key chain camera (I love to play with that gadget).

Last Sunday, while birds rained down over Somerset, Ginny and I worked outside in our own yard . We identified eight or ten species of birds in the yard and we saw three hawks soaring overhead. Sorry, I’m not ornithologist enough to identify hawk species in flight.

Our birds are ok.

If a cat came into our yard, the hawks would get him.

You’d Have Had To Have Been There

Mar 10

My friend Wes laughed so hard he rocked back and forth in his chair.

He laughed so hard he gasped for air.

He laughed so hard his face turned red like a round party balloon with a smiley face drawn in black marker.

I don’t know what my face looked like because I was laughing so hard I could not catch my breath. My nose ran. Tears streamed down my face.

What brought on this burst of hilarity?

We were discussing the presuppositional apologetics of theologian Kornelis Van Til… and…

Well, I can’t describe it.

I suppose you’d have had to have been there to see what was so funny.

Wes came over Tuesday to take me to breakfast; we get together every couple of  weeks to shoot the bull and talk about life and theology.

Wes drives this big double-cab pickup truck and as I got in I noticed that he had not unloaded some fire wood that had been in the truck bed three weeks ago. When we got to the default breakfast place, Wes explained that he is not too lazy to unload the firewood, but he subscribes to a three-point philosophy about moving things; he wrote it our for me on a paper napkin:

We ordered breakfast. The waitress said she didn’t have what we ordered. We ordered something else. She checked with the cook and found he did have what we’d originally ordered—so she brought us each two full breakfasts!

Good thing that truck is double-sized because we ate everything she brought to the table.

Back at my house, we sat in the living room puffing our pipes, talking about past anguish, present concerns, and future hopes.

That’s when we got into discussing presuppositional apologetics. I’d never heard of it before Wes explained, but apparently through life experiences I have arrived at conclusions similar to Van Til’s.

Overall, Wes and I talked for seven hours.

You know something? I pity unbelievers because they miss out on so much fun.

Mid-afternoon I got a bug to eat some shrimp gumbo. Wes and I jumped in his truck and drove 15 miles west out to the town of Baldwin to Toot’s Restaurant in where they make the best gumbo I’ve ever tasted.

Alas, Toot’s had sold out of gumbo!

Local customers had eaten every drop the cook had brewed! He will not stew another batch till Thursday. Life is cruel. And, since Wes and I’d also talked about my divine  guidance book in the morning, I questioned why, if God leads us, would He let us drive 15 miles out into the boondocks only to find they’d sold out of shrimp gumbo?

Wes said the Lord is teaching me to call ahead.

As we drove back to Jacksonville by a different way, Wes pointed out a building on U.S. Highway 90, one of north Florida’s oldest routes. Wes has talked with a former owner and toured the building in the past; he stopped so I could snap a photo through the fence with my key-chain camera:

I’ve seen this building before but knew nothing about it.

Wes said the building was the first stage-coach stop out of Jacksonville on the old plank road between Jacksonville and the town of Alligator. It was build in 1834. It may have swerved as a refuge for settlers during the Second Seminole War of 1842.

Through the years various owners have expanded the place and added brick facing, or stucco, or other material over the original siding. The tavern served Confederate soldiers from near-by Camp Milton during the Civil War, and the place was a speakeasy/roadhouse during Prohibition. The building has also housed a general store, a roadhouse, a restaurant, and  a whore house. Some big brass beds from those days may still be stored in the attic.

Construction of Interstate 10, drew traffic away from the old road years ago. The glory days now past, for a long time the old stage-coach stop has been up for sale.

Anyhow, that’s the way I spent my Tuesday.

Didn’t get a lick of work done.

Good.

A Long Standing Interest

Mar 09

Monday saw great progress made in my writing in that will of God manuscript. By great progress I mean I actually got a few more first-draft pages written.

My current chapter involves Kooks And The Will Of God. It questions how I am to differentiate between God’s voice and my own mental whims. I need to address this issue because… well, there are folks who say God told them to do some bizarre things.

For instance the lady here in Florida who said God told her to direct traffic in the middle of a busy intersection—having removed her blouse and brassier first.

Or the guy in Chicago who lost his job and his wife while he spent five years obeying what he said was the voice of God telling him to construct a giant statue of Jesus out of Superglue and toothpicks—65,000 toothpicks.

Or John Wilkes Booth who wrote in his diary that God told him to assassinate President Lincoln.

Or Adolph Hitler who said, “The Jews have made no contribution to human culture and in crushing them I am doing the will of the Lord”.

How do I know that I’m not as crazy as those fine folk when I try to obey God?

Well, first off, I don’t own 65,000 toothpicks…

Anyhow, that’s the chapter I’m working on at the moment.

The rest of the day I read for pleasure.

Saturday when Ginny and I attended that gigantic book sale, I bought a book on the great plagues of history, a copy of Dave Barry’s In Cyberspace, a copy of Aubrey Burl’s The Stone Circles Of The British Isles, and volume of sermons by the Puritan preacher William Temple (1555-1627).

Being a serious Christian with a long standing interest in spiritual matters and a deep commitment to knowing Christ, I naturally put that sermon book on the bottom of the pile and read Dave Barry first, cover to cover, in one sitting.

Laughed till I turned blue as America’s Funniest Man describes his frustrations with computers—which are often the same as my own.

Then I turned to Burl’s Stone Circles. Haven’t finished it yet, but it enthralls me. Oddly enough, I found the introduction hilarious and laughed as the author describes his frustrations over research when the names of some sites have been updated, the British map office changed their grid system so things previously described in one location no longer match the older grid citations, construction damaged some sites, and some stone circles were moved to new locations for housing developments.

The way Dr. Burl describes these frustrations is a hoot!

I read some paragraphs aloud to Ginny, who did not laugh at all.

I’m married to a humor impaired woman.

I mean if you don’t find moving megalithic monuments funny, what joy is there in your life?

I have a long standing interest in megalithic monuments. Take a look at this photo:

I constructed this dolmen in a high school art class back in 1955.

Do you mean to say that I’ve kept my high school art project for all these (2010-1955=?} many many years?

Well, yes.

And I’m one to worry about the toothpick guy?

Somehow Ginny finds that funny.

Be that as it may, I find Dr. Burl’s book, published by Yale University Press, fascinating—except that I often don’t know what he’s talking about.

I have to read this thing with a dictionary at my elbow and look up word after word.

Even then…

Dr. Burl writes for readers more educated than I am; he assumes I’ll know the meaning of skeuomorph (a derivative object retaining design clues to a structure), and penannular (forming an almost complete ring but with a break). He talks about the difference between a henge, a stone circle, a ring cairn, a howe, a tor, and a kerbstone.

The difference between those structures eludes me.

I’ve heard of Stonehenge and Avebury Circle, but I did not know there are over a thousand such Neolithic structures in the British Isles. And they have such cool names: Long Meg And Her Daughters, Blackwaterfoot Round Cairn, Brats Hill, Devil’s Quoit, Merry Maidens, Giant’s Ring Henge, Goat Stones, King Arthur’s Round Table Henge, and Robin Hood’s Ball.

Then there are a whole bunch of names I can’t even begin to spell.

Yet, all those erect stones both fascinate and mystify me.

But all those professional archaeological terms lose me in jargon. After all, Dr. Burl earned the reputation of being the foremost authority on British Neolithic antiquities. Who else could use the term skeuomorph in everyday conversation?

That reminds me, back in the late ‘50s I took a coup-le of anthropology courses at Florida State and a story made the rounds:

An anthropologist just returned from field work in Borneo gave a lecture at the university, and displayed some artifacts he’d collected among the tribesmen.

When he asked for questions, a co-ed on the front row timidly raise her hand, pointed to an object on the table and asked, “What’s that thing?”.

“That’s a tribal phallic emblem,” the professor said.

“Oh,” said the co-ed breathing a sigh of relief, “I’d hate to say what I thought it was”.

From Women, Blacksmiths, and Druids

Mar 07

Ten More Days.

Today is March 7^th; St. Patrick’s Day falls on March 17^th. So, about this time each year I try to steer teachers and other interested people away from green beer and green bikini contests popular here in Jacksonville and toward accurate information about a Christocentric man I greatly admire.

One such source is an biographical profile I wrote about St. Patrick many years ago. Here is the author’s note at the end of that piece:

While I wrote this sketch of St. Patrick, my father was in the hospital dying of cancer. My mother wanted one of us to stay with him at all times and I drew the all night shift for—what wasn’t, but seemed like—months. Because I was writing this on a strict deadline and there was no writing surface in Daddy’s room, I wrote 90% of this piece in longhand on a yellow pad while laying on my belly on the floor under his bed. My youngest daughter was born just weeks after Daddy died; naturally we named her Patricia, the feminine form of Patrick. The name means NOBLE.

You can find my biography of Patrick at http://www.cowart.info/John%27s%20Books/St.%20Patrick/St.%20Patrick.html

Another source (which has nothing to do with me) can be found at http://www.joyfulheart.com/stpatrick/ This site contains a wealth of information including a translation of St. Patrick’s book, Confession, which begins saying, “I, Patrick, a sinner, a most simple countryman, the least of all the faithful and most contemptible to many…”

His short book is a joy to read.

The Joyful Heart site also contains a translation of a prayer hymn ascribed to Patrick, The Breastplate. It is a comprehensive prayer for God’s presence and protection in his life. I like these last five verses:

I invoke today all these virtues
Against every hostile merciless power
Which may assail my body and my soul,
Against the incantations of false prophets,
Against the black laws of heathenism,
Against the false laws of heresy,
Against the deceits of idolatry,
Against the spells of women, and smiths, and druids,
Against every knowledge that binds the soul of man.

Christ, protect me today
Against every poison, against burning,
Against drowning, against death-wound,
That I may receive abundant reward.

Christ be with me, Christ before me,
Christ behind me, Christ within me,
Christ beneath me, Christ above me,
Christ at my right, Christ at my left,
Christ in the fort, [i.e., at home]
Christ in the chariot seat, [i.e., traveling by land]
Christ in the poop deck. [i.e., traveling by water]

Christ in the heart of everyone who thinks of me,
Christ in the mouth of everyone who speaks to me,
Christ in every eye that sees me,
Christ in every ear that hears me.

I bind to myself today
The strong virtue of an invocation of the Trinity,
I believe the Trinity in the Unity
The Creator of the Universe.

I See Every Head Bowed

Mar 06

Ginny ought to know better than to take me to places like that!

She know my weakness.

She know I can’t afford the expense.

But Saturday morning she drove me to the annual Friends Of The Library Book Sale in the exhibition halls at the Jacksonville Fair Grounds where over 200,000 books were offered at discount prices.

I stood in the middle or one aisle and snapped these photos with my key chain cameral:

That photo looks down a single table with readers hunched over scanning titles. A twin to that table stretched behind me. My beautiful wife was lost somewhere amid books and bibliophiles. Anybody see her?

I centered my attention on the history and biography sections vying with other book people for Florida history books.

Why would I look for more Florida history materials? Just last week Helen helped me post an 86-page catalogue of my Florida history collection to sale (Take at look at http://www.cowart.info/WritersFloridaCollection/index.htm ).

If I’m trying to sell my amassed Florida History collection, why in the world would I want to buy more of the same sort of materials?

Because I’m a nut!

When I see a book or artifact that fits my collection, I feel compelled to add that item.

Ginny says that in my heart of hearts, I do not want to sell my books.

I guess I am a little bit of a materialist.

Thus, while Ginny bought two books at the sale, I bought two bagsful!

It pains me to see so many books by so many writers being held in such low esteem.

Every book on those tables represents as much work and as many dreams as my own books do. Sobering thought.

I envision every book’s author, dead or alive, looking on in spirit. These writers worked just as hard as I do, and I know the months or even years that go into producing each book. And here thousands of books languish on tables picked over by indifferent crowds who think a dollar is too much to spend on a writer’s life work.

“Of the making of many books there is no end, and much study is a weariness of the flesh,” said wise King Solomon.

That didn’t stop him from writing his own books though, did it?

Hey, he even wrote poetry and we all know what a booming market there is for that stuff.

Of course, King Solomon lucked out and got his books included in the pages of the Bible—which didn’t become a best seller till long after he was dead.

Even kings are frustrated writers at heart.

Well, I guess the only thing for me to do is pull down my old bookshelves and erect bigger new bookshelves, then I can relax and “I will say to my soul, Soul, thou hast much books laid up for many years; take thine ease, eat,  drink, and be merry” .

Now, where have I heard something like that before?

Practice With Graphics

Mar 04

For hours yesterday, Helen, my daughter-in-law, demonstrated much patience in walking me through a tutorial on using this new software. Thus, while learning this new blog software, I’m practicing inserting pictures; so this older post comes from page 373 of my book A Dirty Old Man Gets Worse:

Thoughts On A Ladder About The Evolution Of The Mouse

Tuesday I intended to work on the fire history book, but instead I spent much of the day on top of a ladder nailing metal plates up on the roofline of our house to seal holes the mice have gnawed in the siding.

They can’t come inside anymore.

And as a special treat for the ones who may already be inside, I put rat poison in each hole — Welcome to My Magic Kingdom, rat!

Regular blog readers know of my battle with the beasts ravaging our house.

Of course as I worked, I pondered the evolution of the mouse.

I’ve mentioned my love for biology before. Never have I felt any deeper sense of worship than in a biology lab dissecting an earthworm, frog, pig or cat; and once I was privilege to witness the dissection of a human cadaver. To see how living things are put together inspires me to worship the Creator of such wonders.

Therefore when my kids were little and came home with biology assignments from school, I wanted to help them with their homework.

They hated that.

They never believed my explanations of how things work, such as evolution.

The process of evolution is perfectly logical.

For instance, take a mouse.

A mouse scampers around in the fields all summer eating seeds. Come Autumn, the mouse burrows into a deep burrow and goes to sleep. This deep sleep is called hibernation. It takes a long time. As the creature sleeps, it evolves; its hair grows thicker and its tail longer, until come Spring the creature emerges as a rat:

It is the same animal, but over the course of time it has evolved. The rat spends the summer avoiding cats and eating trash. At the approach of another Winter, the rat snuggles in its nest and hibernates. During the long sleep, evolution continues as the fur changes from black to gray and the tail grows longer.

The following Spring it emerges from its den as a Possum:

Anyone can see the resemblance the possum bares to its evolutionary ancestors.

The possum spends Spring and Summer foraging in fruit trees, But come Winter, the happy creature again hibernates and again evolves. Evolution takes a long time but after months of sleep, the possum greets Springtime with even thicker fur which by now has evolved to cover its tail. Yes, every spring a new crop of raccoons emerge from hibernation and evolution:

The raccoon is known in some places as a wash bear from its habit of rinsing anything it eats in water. No wonder. Raccoons will eat anything.

But in the cycle of life, Winter again comes. Mr. Raccoon goes to sleep in a cave and evolves as it sleeps for a long, long time. The animal becomes more complex, it increases in size, and its tail just about disappears. The animal emerges from its den in Spring as a bear:

Do you see the progress here?

A simple animal becomes more complex and larger as it evolves.

Now bears do certain things in the woods, including eating berries and hunting bee hives. But bears also hibernate deep in the caves of the earth. And as they sleep for a long long time, certain changes take place. Evolution is a complicated process and for reasons no scientist really understands, sometimes a bear will emerge from the cave as a rhinoceros and sometimes as a hippopotamus. In either case, notice how the tail has reverted back to it’s original rat-like appearance.

Of course, even with all the time in the world, not all creatures evolve.

Some degenerate.

Consider the lizard:

Were this creature to hibernate properly it would evolve into a noble Gator and go to the University of Florida where it would eat bulldogs every season.:

But for some reason sometimes evolution goes horribly wrong and perfectly nice lizards degenerate into insurance salesmen:

Such tragic mutations have been known among birds also.

God intended every titmouse to evolve into an eagle:

But this upward progress does not always happen in evolution; sometimes creatures fall. Sometimes they degenerate lower and lower. Sinking below insurance salesman, the once happy titmouse falls:

Yes the avian unwed mother falls into a gutter to pick purses on the street while its victims are distracted by the fatherless offspring.

But there is hope for fallen birds… and for fallen people.

“Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing?” Jesus said. “And one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows.

“Whosoever therefore shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in Heaven”.

Anyhow, that’s what I thought about up on the ladder sealing possible mouse holes to keep potential hippos or insurance salesmen out of our attic.